Earrings

Earrings appear throughout the Old Testament as common personal ornaments worn by both men and women in Israel and throughout the ancient Near East. The Hebrew term nezem refers to a ring worn in the ear or nose; context often determines which is meant. Jacob gathered the earrings of his household at Shechem and buried them beneath the oak at Bethel as part of a religious purification, suggesting that some earrings had idolatrous associations (Genesis 35:4). The golden earrings contributed by the Israelites in the wilderness became the material for the golden calf — a cautionary instance of ornamentation misused for idolatry (Exodus 32:2–3).

In Numbers 31:50, the Israelite soldiers offered captured earrings as a gift to the LORD. Ezekiel's allegory of Jerusalem as a bride describes earrings among God's gifts to her (Ezekiel 16:12), reflecting the cultural normalcy of the adornment. Isaiah 3:20 lists earrings among the ornaments of proud Jerusalem that will be stripped away in judgment. The New Testament cautions against elaborate jewelry as a primary basis of personal appearance (1 Timothy 2:9; 1 Peter 3:3), though without prohibiting it outright.