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?

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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 examine me. Do we not have the right to financial support?[a] Do we not have the right to the company of a believing wife, like the other apostles and the Lord’s brothers and Cephas?[b] Or do only Barnabas and I lack the right not to work? Who ever serves in the army at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat its fruit? Who tends a flock and does not consume its milk?

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Footnotes

  1. 1 Corinthians 9:4 tn Grk “the right to eat and drink.” In the context this is a figurative reference to financial support.
  2. 1 Corinthians 9:5 sn Cephas. This individual is generally identified with the Apostle Peter (L&N 93.211). Both the Aramaic name “Cephas” and the Greek name “Peter” are related to words in each language which mean “rock.”