Cubit

A cubit was the length of a forearm, the everyday ruler of the Bible. Noah is told to finish the ark’s window “in a cubit,” and Ezekiel is shown a temple measured with a reed of six long cubits. Even Og’s iron bedstead is described in them: “nine cubits was the length thereof.” Jesus turns the unit into a question about worry, asking which of his hearers, by taking thought, can add one cubit to his height. The answer is no one, which is his point. Matthew 6:25 to 34 gives the full teaching.

6 verses

Genesis

Genesis 6:16

A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it.

Deuteronomy

Deuteronomy 3:11

For only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of giants; behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron; is it not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? nine cubits was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, after the cubit of a man.

Ezekiel

Ezekiel 40:5

And behold a wall on the outside of the house round about, and in the man's hand a measuring reed of six cubits long by the cubit and an hand breadth: so he measured the breadth of the building, one reed; and the height, one reed.

Ezekiel 43:13

And these are the measures of the altar after the cubits: The cubit is a cubit and an hand breadth; even the bottom shall be a cubit, and the breadth a cubit, and the border thereof by the edge thereof round about shall be a span: and this shall be the higher place of the altar.

Matthew

Matthew 6:27

Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?

Luke

Luke 12:25

And which of you with taking thought can add to his stature one cubit?

From Easton's Bible Dictionary

Matthew George Easton, 1897

Heb. ‘ammah; i.e., “mother of the arm,” the fore-arm, is a word derived from the Latin cubitus, the lower arm. It is difficult to determine the exact length of this measure, from the uncertainty whether it included the entire length from the elbow to the tip of the longest finger, or only from the elbow to the root of the hand at the wrist. The probability is that the longer was the original cubit. The common computation as to the length of the cubit makes it 20.24 inches for the ordinary cubit, and 21.888 inches for the sacred one. This is the same as the Egyptian measurements.

A rod or staff the measure of a cubit is called in Judg. 3:16 gomed, which literally means a “cut,” something “cut off.” The LXX. and Vulgate render it “span.”

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From Smith's Bible Dictionary

William Smith, 1884

[WEIGHTS AND MEASURES AND MEASURES]