Phoenicia, Tyre Silver Shekel, Judas’s 30 Pieces of Silver – Struck One Year after the Crucifixion (34/35 AD)

Description Near East/Holy Land. Roman Period (time of Tiberius). Phoenicia, Tyre AR (Silver) shekel. Dated Civic Year 160 = 34/35 AD. VF; popular Biblical type struck just one year after the conventional date of the crucifixion of Christ.    Design: Laureate head of Heracles-Melqart (fusion of Greek & local Phoenician deities) right, wearing Nemean Lion skin around neck / Eagle perched left; date above club in left field, legend in Greek "of Tyre, the holy and inviolable" Reference: HGC 10, 357. DCA2 947. Dimensions: 23 mm / 9.71 gm Historical Background: This coin represents the shekel that served as the famed "thirty pieces of silver" that Judas Iscariot was paid by the Roman authorities to betray Jesus Christ. The original passage in Matthew 26:15 uses the word argyria (silver coins), which were almost certainly silver shekels of Tyre. Tyrian half-shekels and shekels were the only acceptable coin with which to pay the tax to the Second Temple in Jerusalem, and as the authorities paying Judas were closely associated with the Temple, it is almost certain that their payment was in shekels. Condition: VF; porosity, roughness.