Leviticus 19:36
Hebrew Bible
34 The resident foreigner who lives with you must be to you as a native citizen among you; so you must love the foreigner as yourself, because you were foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. 35 You must not do injustice in the regulation of measures, whether of length, weight, or volume. 36 You must have honest balances, honest weights, an honest ephah, and an honest hin. I am the Lord your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt. 37 You must be sure to obey all my statutes and regulations. I am the Lord.’”
Date: 5th Century B.C.E. (Final composition) (based on scholarly estimates)
Source
Amos 8:5
Hebrew Bible
4 Listen to this, you who trample the needy and do away with the destitute in the land. 5 You say, “When will the new moon festival be over, so we can sell grain? When will the Sabbath end, so we can open up the grain bins? We’re eager to sell less for a higher price, and to cheat the buyer with rigged scales! 6 We’re eager to trade silver for the poor, a pair of sandals for the needy. We want to mix in some chaff with the grain!” 7 The Lord confirms this oath by the arrogance of Jacob: “I swear I will never forget all you have done!
Date: 6th Century B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
Source
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Notes and References
"... Just as Amos criticizes dishonest merchants who make the ephah “small” and the shekel “great” (Amos 8:5), Micah 6:10-11 also cautions them against cheating their customers with a false measure of grain ... A just society was one in which the government standardized and guaranteed honest weights and measures. The prologue to the law code of the Ur III king Ur-Nammu includes a list of the measures he had taken to insure justice and truth throughout his realm. This included the standardization of all the copper and stone weights used in commerce. The Egyptian Instruction of Amenemope warns against tampering with scales or the weights used for buying and selling. In a Babylonian Hymn to Shamash, Shamash as the god of justice will punish the merchant who uses deceptive practices with regard to the scales or the weights. The fact that Micah complains of false weights indicates a lawless period without strong government or a concern for covenant obligation (see Proverbs 11:1; 20:23) ..."
Walton, John H.
The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
(p. 786) InterVarsity Press, 2000
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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