Beryl

תרשיש , a pellucid gem of a bluish green colour, whence it is called by the lapidaries, aqua marina. Its Hebrew name is a word also for the same reason given to the sea, Psa 48:7. It is found in the East Indies, Peru, Siberia, and Tartary. It has a brilliant appearance, and is generally transparent. It was the tenth stone belonging to the high priest’s pectoral, Exo 28:10; Exo 28:20; Rev 21:20.

Ber´yl. This is supposed by some to be the precious stone intended by the word shoham, which occurs in Gen 2:12; Exo 28:9; Exo 35:9-27; Job 28:16; Eze 28:13. Whether the beryl be the shohamor not, it is a Scriptural stone by virtue of the mention of it in Rev 21:20. There is no doubt that the stone which we call beryl is the substance to which the ancients gave the same name. It is of a pale sea-green color, inclining sometimes to water blue, and sometimes to yellow. In its crystallized form it exhibits sexagonal columns striped longitudinally. The shoham furnished the shoulder-pieces in the breastplate of the high priest, on each of which six names were engraven, and for this purpose the stalky beryl, consisting of long, stout, hexagonal pieces, was peculiarly suited. Beryls are found, but not often, in collections of ancient gems. In Gen 2:12, the shoham is named as the product of Havilah; in Job 28:16, it is mentioned as a stone of great value, being classed with the sapphire and the gold of Ophir; in Eze 28:13, it appears as a valuable article of commerce.

Luther, relying upon the authority of some ancient versions, makes the shoham to have been the onyx. This indeed is the stone usually given for the shohamin Hebrew lexicons, and is the one which the Authorized Version has also adopted.

The name of a precious stone of a sea-green color, found principally in India, Dan 10:6 Jer 21:20 .\par

Beryl. Beryl, (Hebrew, tarshish), occurs in Exo 28:20. It is generally supposed that the tarshish derives its name from the place so called, in Spain. Beryl is a mineral of great hardness, and, when transparent, of much beauty. By tarshish, the modern yellow topaz is probably intended, while in Rev 21:20 a different stone is perhaps referred to, probably the mineral now called beryl, which is identical with the emerald except in color, being a light green or bluish-green.

The first in the fourth row of precious stones in the high priest’s breast-plate (Exo 28:20; Exo 39:13), Hebrew tarshish, the tartessus stone, found in Spain. Sea green, pale blue, yellow, and almost white, are its various colors. The color of the cherubic wheels (Eze 1:16; Eze 10:9). In Eze 28:13 it is one of the Tyrian king’s treasures, margin: chrysolite. Set in rings of gold (Son 5:14); not as Smith’s Bible Dictionary, "his wrists are circlets of gold full set with topazes,’ but the hands bent in are compared to beautiful rings in which beryl is set, as the nails are in the fingers The body of the man seen in vision (Dan 10:6) resembled it. In Rev 21:19-20, the city’s eighth foundation, the chrysolite being the seventh. The aquamarine, according to Schleusner.

is the uniform rendering in the Auth. Vers. only of the Heb. תִּרְשִׁישׁ, tarshish’ (so called, according to Gesenius, as being brought from Tarshish), and the Gr. βήρυλλος, a precious stone, the first in the fourth row on the breastplate of the high-priest (Exo 28:20; Exo 39:13). The color of the wheels in Ezekiel’s vision was as the color of a beryl-stone (Eze 1:16; Eze 10:9); it is mentioned among the treasures of the King of Tyre in Eze 28:13, where the marginal reading is chrysolite; in Son 5:14, as being set in rings of gold; and in Dan 10:6, the body of the man whom Daniel saw in vision is said to be like the beryl. In Rev 21:19, the beryl is the 8th foundation of the city, the chrysolite being the 7th. In Tob 13:17, is a prophetic prayer that the streets of Jerusalem may be paved with beryl. In Exo 28:20, the Sept. renders tarshish by “chrysolite,” χρυσόλιθος, while they render the 11th stone, שֹׁה — ם, shoham, by “beryl,” βηρύλλιον. In Ezekiel f, 16, they have- θαρσείς; in 10:9, λίθος ἄνθρακος; and 28:13, ἄνθραξ, in Son 5:14, and in Dan 10:6, θαρσίς. his variety of rendering shows the uncertainty under which the old interpreters labored as to the stone actually meant. SEE GEM. Josephus takes it to have been the chrysolite, a golden-colored gem, the topaz of more recent authors, found in Spain (Pliny 37:109), whence its name tarshish (see Braun, De Vest. Sac. Heb. lib. 2, c. 18, § 193). Luther suggests turquoise, while others have thought that amber was meant. Kalisch, in the two passages of Exodus, translates tarshish by chrysolite, which he describes as usually green, but with different degrees of shade, generally transparent, but often only translucent-harder than glass, but not so hard as quartz. The passage in Rev 21:20, is adverse to this view. Schleusner (1, 446) says the βήρυλλος is aqua-marine. “The beryl is a gem of the genus emerald, but less valuable than the emerald. It differs from the precious emerald in not possessing any of the oxide of chrome. The colors of the beryl are grayish-green, blue, yellow, and sometimes nearly white” (Humble, Dict. Geol. p. 30). — Penny Cyclopaedia, s.v.; Smith’s Dict. of Class. Antiq. s.v. Beryllus. SEE ONYX.

There is no certainty as to what stone the word tarshish denotes. The LXX translate it by different words. In Eze 1:16; Eze 10:9 the ’wheels’ are compared to its colour, without stating what that was. Some suppose it was the golden topaz; others that it was the chrysolite. It was the first in the fourth row of the high priest’s breastplate, and is mentioned in the foundation of the heavenly Jerusalem. Exo 28:20; Exo 39:13; Son 5:14; Eze 28:13; Dan 10:6. In Rev 21:20 the word is βήρυλλος, beryl.

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By: Morris Jastrow, Jr., Gerson B. Levi

A stone, ranging in color from blue to pale yellow and found all over the world; three kinds are to be distinguished—beryl, aquamarine, and emerald. According to Ex. xxviii. 20 and xxxix. 13, the beryl was the first on the fourth row of the breastplate of the high priest. It is also mentioned frequently in the apocalyptic literature; e.g., Ezek. i. 16, x. 9, xxviii. 13; Dan. x. 6).

BERYL.—See Jewels and Precious Stones.

ber´il. See STONES, PRECIOUS.

Beryl (âÞñõëëïò [Rev_21:20], a word of unknown etymology) is a mineral which differs little from the emerald except in colour. It never exhibits the deep rich green of that gem, being in general pale green, and sometimes yellowish, bluish, brownish, or colourless. Its finer varieties, which are transparent, are called aquamarine. It usually takes the form of long six-sided prisms, vertically striated. It was much prized as a gem-stone by the ancients, and very fine specimens of Greek and Roman engraving in beryl are extant. Its great abundance in modern times has depreciated its value. In Revised Version margin of the OT, ‘beryl’ stands for shôham, which Flinders Petrie (Hasting's Dictionary of the Bible (5 vols) iv. 620b) identifies with green felspar.

James Strahan.