My defense to those who examine me is this: [a](A)Do we not have a right to eat and drink? [b](B)Do we not have a right to take along a [c]believing wife, even as the rest of the apostles and the (C)brothers of the Lord, and [d](D)Cephas? Or do only [e](E)Barnabas and I have no right to refrain from [f]working? Who at any time serves (F)as a soldier at his own expense? Who (G)plants a vineyard and does not eat its fruit? Or who tends a flock and does not [g]consume some of the milk of the flock?

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. 1 Corinthians 9:4 Lit It is not that we have no right to eat and drink, is it?
  2. 1 Corinthians 9:5 Lit It is not that we have no right to take along...Cephas, is it?
  3. 1 Corinthians 9:5 Lit sister, as a wife
  4. 1 Corinthians 9:5 Peter’s Aramaic name
  5. 1 Corinthians 9:6 Lit I and Barnabas
  6. 1 Corinthians 9:6 I.e., to support themselves
  7. 1 Corinthians 9:7 Lit eat from

This is my defense to those who would examine me: We have the right to earn our food,[a] don’t we? We have the right to take a believing wife with us like the other apostles, the Lord’s brothers, and Cephas,[b] don’t we? Or is it only Barnabas and I who have to keep on working for a living? Who ever goes to war at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat any of its grapes? Or who takes care of a flock and does not drink any of its milk?

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. 1 Corinthians 9:4 Lit. to eat and drink
  2. 1 Corinthians 9:5 I.e. Peter