The Mishnah on Collecting the Temple Tax

1:1. On the first of Adar, they announce the [upcoming collection of] shekels and [removal of] unlawful mixtures [of produce]. [ . . . ]

3. On the fifteenth of [Adar, moneylenders would set up] their tables, at which they sat in the provinces. On the twenty-fifth [of Adar, the moneylenders] sat in the Temple. From the time that they convened in the Temple, they began to take pledges [from people who still needed to pay]. From whom would they take pledges? Levites, Israelites, converts, and freed slaves, but not from women, slaves, and minors. Any minor whose father began to pay [the half-shekel] on his behalf could not cease [paying].¹ They did not take pledges from priests because of the ways of peace. [ . . . ]

3:3. [Those of] the household of Rabban Gamaliel entered [the Temple], each with their shekel between their fingers. [Each] would throw it before the collector, and the collector would purposefully press it into [the appropriate] basket. The collector would not collect until he said to them, “I will collect,” and they would say to him, “Collect, collect, collect,” three times.

4. He collected the first [collection] and covered [the rest] with a leather cover. [He collected] the second [collection] and covered [the rest] with a leather cover. [He collected] the third and did not cover [the rest] lest he forget and collect from that which was already collected. He took the first collection for the land of Israel, the second for surrounding cities, and the third for Babylonia and Persia and the far provinces.