benjamin
n.a slang word for a one-hundred-dollar bill. You use this because Benjamin Franklin's face is on the money.
n.a slang term for a United States one-hundred-dollar bill, referring to the portrait of Benjamin Franklin on the obverse. Informal in register and common in hip-hop culture and financial slang.
“He pulled a Benjamin out of his wallet to pay for dinner.”
“The jacket was expensive, costing several Benjamins even after the store applied a discount.”
“In many urban lyrics, the pursuit of Benjamins serves as a central metaphor for social mobility and the harsh realities of economic survival in the modern city.”
Usually used in the plural ('Benjamins') to refer to a large amount of money.
“The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, called the UK “the Islamic republic of Britain” in a podcast interview, where he also described the country as the “first Islamic republic to get a nuclear weapon”.”
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, has bolstered illegal settlement expansions since he first came to power in 1996.”
Common in sport writing
From Late Latin Benjamin, from Ancient Greek Βενιαμίν (Beniamín), from Biblical Hebrew בִּנְיָמִין (binyamīn, literally “son of the right/south or son of days”). Authorities differ on the meaning of the original Hebrew. Philo of Alexandria, the Samaritan Pentateuch The Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs and Midrash Leḳaḥ-Ṭob understand יָמִין to mean "days" (a meaning attested in Daniel 12:13) understanding the name to mean "son of days (i.e. old age)" (compare to the direct translations into Arabic بِنْ يَومِين (bin yawmīn) "son of the days" and Arabic بِنْ يَمِين (bin yamīn) "son of the right hand"), a formula paraphrased in Genesis 40:22 where Benjamin is described as a child of Jacob's old age. Rashi in his commentary on Genesis also gives this as a possible meaning but favors an understanding of יָמִין to mean "right" in the sense of "the south", noting that Benjamin was the only son of Jacob born in the south. Jerome understood the name to mean "son of the right hand" and Gesenius speculated that this expression might have meant "son of good fortune".
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.