And so you were made beautiful with gold and silver, and your clothes were silk and linen and beautifully embroidered. You ate the finest foods and became more beautiful than ever. You looked like a queen, and so you were!

You took the very jewels and gold and silver ornaments I gave to you and made statues of men and worshiped them, which is adultery against me.

“Son of dust, the people of Israel are the worthless slag left when silver is smelted. They are the dross, compounded from the brass, the tin, the iron, and the lead. Therefore the Lord God says: ‘Because you are worthless dross, I will bring you to my crucible in Jerusalem, to smelt you with the heat of my wrath.

and you will melt like silver in fierce heat, and you will know that I, the Lord, have poured my wrath upon you.’”

“‘From Tarshish come all kinds of riches to your markets—silver, iron, tin, and lead.

You have used your wisdom and understanding to get great wealth—gold and silver and many treasures.

“But Sheba and Dedan and the merchant princes of Tarshish with whom she trades will ask, ‘Who are you to rob them of silver and gold and drive away their cattle and seize their goods and make them poor?’”

The unit of weight shall be the silver shekel (about half an ounce); it must always be exchanged for twenty gerahs, no less; five shekels shall be valued at five shekels, no less; and ten shekels at ten shekels! Fifty shekels shall always equal one mina.