Commentary for Menachot 153:12

אמר רבינא מתני' נמי דיקא דקתני תודה היתה באה חמש סאין ירושלמיות שהן שש מדבריות שמע מינה:

And if it be said [that the reason why no more than a sixth may be added to weights is] that the dealer may not incur any loss,<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' A dealer is allowed to make a profit of one sixth on a transaction. By limiting the increase to a sixth a dealer who sells his goods ignorant of the increase will at most lose his profit but will not suffer any loss.');">¹⁴</span> [it will be retorted]. Is [then the whole purpose of the law that] he be guarded against loss? Is he not entitled to make any profit? 'Buy and sell [at no profit] merely to be called a merchant!' - Rather, said R'Hisda, Samuel found a Scriptural text and expounded it: And the shekel shall be twenty gerahs; twenty shekels, five and twenty shekels, ten and five shekels shall be your maneh.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Ezek. XLV, 12.');">¹⁵</span> Was then the maneh two hundred and forty denars?<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' The maneh according to Ezekiel was 20 + 25 + 15 shekels = 60 shekels = 240 denars (one shekel = 4 denars) , whereas elsewhere throughout the Talmud it is established that the maneh was 25 shekels = 100 denars.');">¹⁶</span> But three things are to be inferred from this: it is to be inferred that the Temple maneh was doubled;<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' I.e., consisting of 200 denars.');">¹⁷</span> it is to be inferred that they may increase the measures<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' And also the value of coins.');">¹⁸</span> but that they may not increase them by more than a sixth; and it is to be inferred that the sixth is added 'from the outside'.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' So as to add a sixth 'from the outside' the original was divided into five parts, and another part of equal value, making a sixth one, was added to it. Thus the maneh consisted of 240 denars.');">¹⁹</span> Rabina said, This<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' That the sixth was added 'from the outside'.');">²⁰</span> may be proved from our Mishnah which states: THE THANK-OFFERING REQUIRED FIVE SE'AHS [OF FLOUR], JERUSALEM MEASURE, WHICH ARE SIX SE'AHS WILDERNESS MEASURE.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' It is evident that the Jerusalem se'ah was made to equal one se'ah and a fifth of the wilderness se'ah, thus there was an increase of one fifth, which in Rabbinic parlance is 'one sixth from the outside'.');">²¹</span> This obviously proves it.

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