Shekels (biblical) to Grams (shekel to g)

1 shekel (biblical) equals 11.5 grams exactly.

1 shekel (biblical) = 11.5 grams

How to convert shekels (biblical) to grams

To convert shekels (biblical) to grams, multiply the number of shekels (biblical) by 11.5. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply grams by 0.08695652174 (rounded).

grams = shekels (biblical) × 11.5

Example: 10 shekels (biblical) = 115 grams.

Approximate value. Standards for the shekel (biblical) varied by place and period, so this converter uses the most commonly cited value. Treat results as estimates, not exact figures.

About these units

Shekel (biblical) (shekel)

Biblical (Hebrew)Historical unit (no longer in standard use)Approximate value

About 11.5 g. The usual biblical weight for silver and gold; the name later became a currency.

Long before it meant a modern currency, the shekel was a weight. The word comes from a Proto-Semitic root and matches Akkadian siqlu, and it is attested as early as about 2150 BC under Naram-Sin of Akkad. English acquired it through the Hebrew Bible, where it first turns up in Genesis 23. Israelites, Moabites, Edomites and Phoenicians all weighed metal in shekels long before coinage took hold in the region.

Ancient shekels ranged from about 7 to 17 grams across the region. A two-shekel weight from the First Temple period weighs 23 grams, or about 11.5 grams each, which is the figure used here, though it is one estimate and not a certainty. A separate Shekel of the Sanctuary served the Temple. Later, Jews paid an annual half-shekel to the Temple, and the Tyrian shekel was the coin preferred for that tax. The modern Israeli shekel is a fiat currency and carries no fixed weight of metal. The biblical weight is roughly that of two nickels, or about 0.4 ounce.

1 shekel (biblical) = 0.0115 kilograms (approximately).

Sources: Wikipedia: Shekel; Wikipedia: Mina (unit); Wikipedia: Talent (measurement)

Gram (g)

Metric (SI)Current unit

One thousandth of a kilogram. The standard unit for food quantities and small objects.

A gram was once defined as a small drop of the natural world. The French National Convention of 1795 set it as the absolute weight of a volume of pure water equal to a cube one hundredth of a metre on each side, a cubic centimetre. The reference temperature was first the melting point of ice and was later changed to the temperature of maximum density of water, about 4 degrees Celsius. The word came into French as gramme, from Late Latin gramma, itself from the Greek for a letter or small mark; in Late Antiquity it meant about one twenty-fourth of an ounce.

The gram was the base unit of mass in the centimetre-gram-second system, but in 1960 the SI took the kilogram as its base unit, which made the gram one thousandth of it. That is why it appears in so many everyday places: it is the standard for non-liquid ingredients in cooking and shopping, and nutrition labels commonly list contents per 100 g. For a sense of scale, a small paper clip or a pen cap weighs about a gram, and a Japanese 1-yen coin is close to exactly that, while a US penny is around 2.5 g.

1 gram = 0.001 kilograms (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Gram; Wikipedia: Kilogram

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