Bible Strands
Ezra 8:27
20 gold bowls valued at 1,000 darics, and two articles of fine polished bronze, as precious as gold.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Ezra addresses the returned exiles and their leaders immediately after weighing out the silver and gold for the journey to Jerusalem. He speaks at the moment of entrusting the consecrated materials to their care.
The words — The Hebrew כְּפֹרֵי זָהָב (khe.fo.rei za.hav) identifies twenty gold bowls, while כְלֵי נְחֹשֶׁת מֻצְהָב (khe.lei ne.cho.shet mutz.hav) names two gleaming bronze vessels. The text specifies their valuation at one thousand darics and notes their polished, precious quality.
The thread — The designation of these metals as a freewill offering to the LORD echoes the consecration of temple goods recorded in Ezra 1:7–11. The contrast between the value of the vessels and the people they serve appears in Lamentations 4:2, which notes how the sons of Zion were once esteemed as pure gold but are now compared to jars of clay.
Why it lands — The text requires the reader to recognize that material wealth is treated solely as a consecrated contribution to God. It demands that the community handle the offerings with reverence, acknowledging that the objects themselves are set apart for divine use.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Also twenty basons of gold, of a thousand drams; and two vessels of fine copper, precious as gold.
Cross-references
- Lamentations 4:2 How the precious sons of Zion, once worth their weight in pure gold, are now esteemed as jars of clay, the work of a potter’s hands!