MINA

(miʹna).

A unit both of weight and of monetary value. (1Ki 10:17; Ezr 2:69; Ne 7:71) According to the Hebrew text of Ezekiel 45:12, one mina (maneh) equals 60 shekels. The Greek Septuagint rendering of the scripture, though, assigns a value of 50 shekels to the mina. (See RS, Mo.) Since, when large numbers of shekels are referred to in the Bible, the numbers are divisible by 50, this may indicate that in earlier times a mina consisted of 50 shekels.​—Ge 23:15; Ex 30:24; 38:29; Nu 31:52; 1Sa 17:5.

There is archaeological testimony for a mina of 50 shekels. An uninscribed weight of about 4,565 g (12.2 lb t) found at Tell Beit Mirsim, if divided into eight minas of 50 shekels, would yield a shekel of 11.4 grams. This value basically corresponds to that of the average of some 45 inscribed shekel weights found in Palestine. Therefore, in this publication the mina of the Hebrew Scriptures is calculated at 50 shekels or 1⁄60 talent, that is, 570 g (18.35 oz t). Accordingly, in modern values, the silver mina would equal $110.10 and the gold mina $6,422.50.

There is also a possibility that, as in the case of the cubit, two values were assigned to the mina, one perhaps for a royal mina (compare 2Sa 14:26) and the other for a common mina.​—Compare Eze 40:5.

The mina (mna) of the Christian Greek Scriptures (Lu 19:13-25) is reckoned at 100 drachmas, this being the value derived from ancient Greek writers. The drachma was worth nearly as much as a denarius. So the mina was a considerable sum. The present-day value would be $65.40; in the first century C.E., it amounted to about a fourth of the wages earned annually by an agricultural worker.