employers

¹You masters, supply your servants with what is just and equitable, knowing that you, too, have a Master in heaven.

⁴Consider the pay of the workers who reaped your fields: it has been misappropriated by you; it cries out. And their cry has entered into the ears of the Lord of hosts.

²³Whatever you do, do it from the heart, as for the Lord, and not for men.

⁹And you, lords, act similarly toward them, setting aside threats, knowing that the Lord of both you and them is in heaven. For with him there is no favoritism toward anyone.

⁴But for he who works, wages are not accounted according to grace, but according to debt.

¹⁸Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and meek, but also to the unruly. ¹⁹For this is grace: when, because of God, a man willingly endures sorrows, suffering injustice. ²⁰For what glory is there, if you sin and then suffer a beating? But if you do well and suffer patiently, this is grace with God.

¹⁶Whoever slanders the poor, so as to augment his own riches, will give it away to one who is richer, and will be in need.

¹³You shall not slander your neighbor, nor shall you oppress him by violence. The wages of a hired hand, you shall not delay with you until tomorrow.

⁵And I will approach you in judgment, and I will be a swift witness against evil-doers, and adulterers, and perjurers, and those who cheat the hired hand in his wages, the widows and the orphans, and who oppress the traveler, and who have not feared me, says the Lord of hosts.

¹³Woe to one who builds his house with injustice and his upper rooms without judgment, who oppresses his friend without cause and does not pay him his wages.

¹⁴You shall not refuse the pay of the indigent and the poor, whether he is your brother, or he is a new arrival who dwells with you in the land and is within your gates.

¹⁸For Scripture says: “You shall not muzzle an ox as it is treading out the grain,” and, “The worker is worthy of his pay.”

²²Servants, obey, in all things, your lords according to the flesh, not serving only when seen, as if to please men, but serving in simplicity of heart, fearing God.

¹⁰Then when the first ones also came forward, they considered that they would receive more. But they, too, received one denarius. ¹¹And upon receiving it, they murmured against the father of the family, ¹²saying, ‘These last have worked for one hour, and you have made them equal to us, who worked bearing the weight and heat of the day.’ ¹³But responding to one of them, he said: ‘Friend, I caused you no injury. Did you not agree with me to one denarius? ¹⁴Take what is yours and go. But it is my will to give to this last, just as to you. ¹⁵And is it not lawful for me to do what I will? Or is your eye wicked because I am good?’