Base Wages: The Problem with Selling Labor

A min­is­ter is not to la­bor of his own ex­pense (1 Cor. 91 Corinthians 9¹Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord?²If to others I am not an apostle, yet at least I am to you, for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.³My defense to those who examine me is this.⁴Have we no right to eat and to drink?⁵Have we no right to lead about a wife that is a believer, even as the rest of the apostles, and the brothers of the Lord, and Cephas?⁶Or only I and Barnabas, have we not a right to refrain from working?⁷What soldier ever serves at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard, and does not eat its fruit? Or who feeds a flock, and does not eat of the milk of the flock?⁸Do I speak these things after the manner of men? Or does the law not also say the same?⁹For it is written in the law of Moses, “You shall not muzzle the ox when he treads out the corn.” Is it for the oxen that God cares,¹⁰or does he say it assuredly for our sake? Yes, for our sake it was written: because he who plows should plow in hope, and he who threshes, [to thresh] in hope of partaking.¹¹If we sowed to you spiritual things, is it a great matter if we will reap your carnal things?¹²If others partake of [this] right over you, do not we yet more? Nevertheless, we did not use this right; but we bear all things, that we may cause no hindrance to the gospel of Christ.¹³Do you not know that those who minister about sacred things eat [of] the things of the temple, [and] those who wait on the altar have their portion with the altar?¹⁴Even so did the Lord ordain that those who proclaim the gospel should live of the gospel.¹⁵But I have used none of these things; and I do not write these things that it may be so done in my case, for [it were] good for me rather to die, than that any man should make my boasting void.¹⁶For if I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of, for necessity is laid on me, for woe is to me, if I do not preach the gospel.¹⁷For if I do this of my own will, I have a reward; but if not of my own will, I have a stewardship entrusted to me.¹⁸What then is my reward? That, when I preach the gospel, I may make the gospel without charge, so as not to use to the full my right in the gospel.¹⁹For though I am free from all, I brought myself under bondage to all that I might gain all the more.²⁰And to the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain Jews; to those who are under the law, as under the law, not being myself under the law, that I might gain those who are under the law;²¹to those who are without law, as without law, not being without law to God, but under the law of Christ, that I might gain those who are without law.²²To the weak I became weak, that I might gain the weak: I have become all things to all men, that I may by all means save some.²³And I do all things for the gospel’s sake, that I may be a joint partaker of it.²⁴Do you not know that those who run in a race run all, but one receives the prize? Even so run, that you may attain.²⁵And every man who strives in the games exercises self-control in all things. Now they [do so] to receive a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible.²⁶Therefore I thus run, not as uncertainly; so fight I, as not beating the air,²⁷but I discipline my body, and bring it into bondage, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself should not be rejected.:TODO). Christ him­self de­clared that “the la­borer is wor­thy of his wages” (Luke 10:7Luke 10:7And in that same house remain, eating and drinking such things as they give; for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not go from house to house.), a prin­ci­ple that the apos­tle Paul re­peated in 1 Tim­o­thy 5:181 Timothy 5:18For the scripture says, “You shall not muzzle the ox when he treads out the corn.” And, “The laborer is worthy of his wages.”. The fund­ing of min­is­try is not merely per­mit­ted; it is com­manded. Yet, it’s a sin to sell any spir­i­tual thing. How do those go hand in hand?

If you’ve been a part of this com­mu­nity for any pe­riod of time you know the an­swer. Min­is­try is to be sup­ported, not sold. God pro­vides for his min­is­ters through the faith­ful giv­ing of the saints. Yet, it would be ben­e­fi­cial to rederive that an­swer by walking through al­ter­na­tives, es­pe­cially in light of the his­tory of thought on the mat­ter.

So let me step back and ask the ques­tion afresh in the lan­guage of si­mony: If every ex­change of tem­po­ral things for spir­i­tual things is si­mo­ni­a­cal, how can the church fund its min­is­ters with­out sin­ning? When a con­gre­ga­tion pays its min­is­ter’s sal­ary, it gives tem­po­ral things to one who ad­min­is­ters spir­i­tual things and does so on ac­count of his spir­i­tual la­bor. This ap­pears, on its face, to be an ex­change, hav­ing the struc­ture of si­mony.

Many who wrote about si­mony la­bored to re­solve this ten­sion. Specif­i­cally, they sought to de­ter­mine the proper mode of giv­ing. We will con­sider four pos­si­ble op­tions. One may give

• as char­ity (elee­mo­syna),

• as the price of the prod­uct (pre­tium ope­ris)—the spir­i­tual thing that re­sults from spir­i­tual la­bor,

• as the price of la­bor (pre­tium la­boris), or

• as the sus­te­nance of the la­borer (sus­ten­ta­tio lab­o­ran­tis).¹For how the schools’ dis­tinc­tion be­tween the price of the work and the sus­te­nance of the worker reached later Eng­lish au­di­ences, see The Anat­omy of Si­mon Ma­gus, 92; Ames, Con­science, 5.230.

Is It Proper to Give to a Min­is­ter as Char­ity?§

First, one might give to a min­is­ter of God as an act of alms­giv­ing. In­deed, a min­is­ter re­ceives of that which has been char­i­ta­bly given, but the no­tion that oth­ers pro­vide for him as a mere act of mercy has been re­jected since the early days of the church. For ex­am­ple, John Chrys­os­tom con­cluded from Mat­thew 10Matthew 10¹And he called to him his twelve disciples, and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of disease and all manner of sickness.²Now the names of the twelve apostles are these: the first, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the [son] of Zebedee, and John his brother;³Philip, and Bartholomew; Thomas, and Matthew the tax collector; James the [son] of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus;⁴Simon the Cananaean, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him.⁵These twelve Jesus sent out, and charged them, saying,⁶but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.⁷And as you go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand.⁸Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons: freely you received, freely give.⁹Get you no gold, nor silver, nor bronze in your purses;¹⁰no wallet for [your] journey, neither two tunics, nor sandals, nor staff; for the laborer is worthy of his food.¹¹And into whatever city or village you will enter, search out who in it is worthy; and there abide until you go out.¹²And as you enter into the house, greet it.¹³And if the house is worthy, let your peace come on it; but if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you.¹⁴And whoever will not receive you, nor hear your words, as you go forth out of that house or that city, shake off the dust of your feet.¹⁵Indeed I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment, than for that city.¹⁶“Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves: be therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.¹⁷But beware of men; for they will deliver you up to councils, and in theirs synagogues they will scourge you;¹⁸yes and before governors and kings will you be brought for my sake, for a testimony to them and to the Gentiles.¹⁹But when they deliver you up, do not be anxious how or what you will speak; for it will be given to you in that hour what you will speak.²⁰For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaks in you.²¹And brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child; and children will rise up against parents, and cause them to be put to death.²²And you will be hated by all men for my name’s sake, but he who endures to the end will be saved.²³But when they persecute you in this city, flee into the next; for indeed I say to you, you will not have gone through the cities of Israel, until the Son of man be come.²⁴“A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his lord.²⁵It is enough for the disciple that he be like his teacher, and the servant as his lord. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more them of his household!²⁶Do not fear them therefore. For there is nothing covered, that will not be revealed; and hidden, that will not be known.²⁷What I tell you in the darkness, speak in the light; and what you hear in the ear, proclaim on the housetops.²⁸And do not be afraid of those who kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.²⁹Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall on the ground without your Father,³⁰but the very hairs of your head are all numbered.³¹Do not be afraid therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.³²Everyone therefore who will confess me before men, him I will also confess before my Father who is in heaven.³³But whoever will deny me before men, him I will also deny before my Father who is in heaven.³⁴“Do not think that I came to send peace on the earth: I did not come to send peace, but a sword.³⁵For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.³⁶And a man’s foes [will be] those of his own household.³⁷He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.³⁸And he who does not take his cross and follow after me, is not worthy of me.³⁹He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it.⁴⁰“He who receives you receives me, and he who receives me receives him who sent me.⁴¹He who receives a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and he who receives a righteous man in the name of a righteous man will receive a righteous man’s reward.⁴²And whoever will give one of these little ones even a cup of cold water to drink, in the name of a disciple, indeed I say to you he will by no means lose his reward.” that Christ for­bade his dis­ci­ples to go about as “beg­gars”²Chrys­os­tom, Ho­mil­iae in Mat­thaeum, hom. 33 (PG 57:587). and re­garded oth­ers as their “debt­ors.”³Ibid., hom. 35 (PG 57:608). Au­gus­tine re­marked that a min­is­ter’s pro­vi­sions are “not a mat­ter of men­dic­ity, but of au­thor­ity.”⁴Au­gus­tine, De opere mo­na­cho­rum, 15.16 (p. 558).

Me­dieval theo­lo­gians for­mal­ized this dis­tinc­tion. The min­is­ter’s sti­pend flows from due jus­tice rather than char­ity, though he re­ceives of alms given to the church.⁵Aqui­nas, ST II‑II, q. 187, a. 4. The con­text of this ci­ta­tion is a de­fense of the re­li­gious (here the fri­ars), but for our pur­poses it is suf­fi­cient to note Aqui­nas’s ap­pli­ca­tion of this prin­ci­ple to sec­u­lar clergy. Ga­briel Biel of­fered a re­duc­tio: A gift given not in view of a per­son’s need but on ac­count of an oblig­a­tion to some of­fice or la­bor is not alms, but a sti­pend or a wage. Oth­er­wise every trib­ute given to kings and princes would be alms. So too would every wage a man earns for the sup­port of his own life and sta­tion, and con­se­quently all such la­bor­ers would be beg­gars.⁶Biel, Col­lec­to­rium, IV, d. 16, q. 4 (sig. ff3rb).

Later au­thors con­curred.⁷E.g., Bul­lin­ger, Dec­ades, 5.10 (foll. 380r–v); Tur­re­tin, In­sti­tu­tio, 18.28.8–12. Thomas Hall, who ad­dressed the mat­ter at length, spoke starkly: “Our sti­pends, there­fore, are wages, not alms. Woe to those min­is­ters who ex­pect their sup­port from the peo­ple’s good­will alone! Such good­will will be­come ill-will; such nour­ish­ment will be­come stin­gi­ness; this some­thing will soon be­come noth­ing.”⁸Hall, Sal Ter­rae, 101.

This con­vic­tion ex­tended even to those who could com­fort­ably sup­port them­selves and their fam­i­lies from their own pat­ri­mony. They should not be de­nied their sti­pends.⁹E.g., Keach, The Gospel Min­is­ter’s Main­te­nance Vin­di­cated, 89–91. Ralph Cud­worth wrote to the same ef­fect: “Again, hence I gather, that those that la­bour in the word and doc­trine, may law­fully take wages, al­beit they have suf­fi­cient of their own to main­tain them­selves.” Cud­worth, The Sup­ple­ment, 543. Though they may choose to char­i­ta­bly give them away in their own ca­pac­ity, they ought not, with­out spe­cial rea­son, re­fuse them ei­ther, “lest they ap­pear to seek the glory of some ex­cep­tional sanc­tity or bur­den their poorer col­leagues with re­sent­ment, and lest the peo­ple, en­ticed by this ex­emp­tion, nour­ish their av­a­rice to the great dis­ad­van­tage of suc­ces­sors and the peril of the whole church.”¹⁰Tur­re­tin, In­sti­tu­tio, 18.28.13.

Is It Proper to Give to a Min­is­ter as the Price of Prod­uct?§

Sec­ond, things might be given as the price of the prod­uct (ut pre­tium ope­ris), that is, as the price of the spir­i­tual thing it­self.¹¹The range of tech­ni­cal vo­cab­u­lary used here is fairly nar­row, but oc­ca­sion­ally, “spir­i­tu­al­ium” (“spir­i­tual things”) is used in­stead of “ope­ris,” and some­times in­stead of “pre­tium,” “mer­ces,” the Vul­gate’s word for “wages” in Luke 10:7Luke 10:7And in that same house remain, eating and drinking such things as they give; for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not go from house to house.. We have al­ready seen the il­le­git­i­macy of such pay­ments ar­gued ex­ten­sively, but their le­git­i­macy is fre­quently in­ferred from cer­tain scrip­tural pas­sages that would ap­pear to sug­gest them.

For ex­am­ple, their de­fend­ers reg­u­larly in­voke 1 Co­rin­thi­ans 9:141 Corinthians 9:14Even so did the Lord ordain that those who proclaim the gospel should live of the gospel. (“those who pro­claim the gospel should live of the gospel”). Thomas Aqui­nas han­dled the ob­jec­tion that the apos­tle’s lan­guage jus­ti­fies ac­cept­ing tem­po­ral things in ex­change for spir­i­tual things: “It must be said that sti­pends are due to preach­ers for the sus­te­nance of their live­li­hood, lest they be forced to aban­don the word of God and be­come oc­cu­pied with pro­cur­ing ne­ces­si­ties for them­selves; how­ever, they are not due to them as if they were a price for the preach­ing.”¹²Aqui­nas, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. 3, a. 2, qc. 2, arg. 5 & ad 5. In his Summa theo­lo­giae, he an­swered the ob­jec­tion at greater length, and there added suc­cinctly that “to preach­ers, like­wise, tem­po­ral things are due for the sus­te­nance of those who preach, not for pur­chas­ing the preached word.”¹³Aqui­nas, ST II‑II, q. 100, a. 3, ad 2.

The com­mand to freely give is not ab­ro­gated by the la­borer be­ing wor­thy of his food (Matt. 10:8–10Matthew 10:8–10⁸Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons: freely you received, freely give.⁹Get you no gold, nor silver, nor bronze in your purses;¹⁰no wallet for [your] journey, neither two tunics, nor sandals, nor staff; for the laborer is worthy of his food.); the two are rec­on­ciled by this very dis­tinc­tion. The wages of the worker are not the price of the prod­uct.

Is It Proper to Give to a Min­is­ter as the Price His La­bor?§

Third, things might be given as the price of the la­bor (ut pre­tium la­boris), to pay the la­borer in ex­change for his work. At least at first glance, this ap­pears to be what is re­quired by phrases like “the la­borer is wor­thy of his wages” (Luke 10:7Luke 10:7And in that same house remain, eating and drinking such things as they give; for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not go from house to house.; 1 Tim. 5:181 Timothy 5:18For the scripture says, “You shall not muzzle the ox when he treads out the corn.” And, “The laborer is worthy of his wages.”), and in­deed, some re­garded pay­ment for the la­bor as the proper mode of giv­ing.¹⁴E.g., Bo­na­ven­ture, In Sent. IV, d. 25, a. 1, q. 4, ad 4 (p. 648); Lu­ther, Vor­le­sun­gen über 1. Mose, 23:3–4 (WA 43, 282:38–42); Thomas of Stras­bourg, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. 1, a. 4, qc. 2, ad 2 (fol. 150v); cf. Alex­an­der of Hales, Summa Halen­sis, III, P. 2, Inq. 3, Tract. 2, S. 2, Q. 1, T. 1, D. 5, C. 2 (pp. 644–45). But rarely did any of these weigh an­other mode against it, and the few who did raised dif­fi­cul­ties with reck­on­ing the min­is­ter’s pro­vi­sion as a sale of la­bor.

La­bor as a Spir­i­tual Thing§

These theo­lo­gians pointed out that the mat­ter at is­sue in Acts 8Acts 8¹And Saul was consenting to his death. And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church that was in Jerusalem; and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles.²And devout men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him.³But Saul laid waste the church, entering into every house, and dragging men and women committed them to prison.⁴They therefore that were scattered, went about preaching the word.⁵And Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ.⁶And the multitudes gave heed with one accord to the things that were spoken by Philip, when they heard and saw the signs which he did.⁷For [from] many of those who had unclean spirits, they came out, crying with a loud voice; and many who were paralyzed, and that were lame, were healed.⁸And there was much joy in that city.⁹But there was a certain man, Simon by name, who previously in the city used sorcery, and amazed the people of Samaria, giving out that himself was some great one:¹⁰to whom they all gave heed, from the least to the greatest, saying, “This man is that power of God that is called Great.”¹¹And they gave heed to him, because for a long time he had amazed them with his sorceries.¹²But when they believed Philip preaching good news concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women.¹³And also Simon himself believed, and being baptized, he continued with Philip. And beholding signs and great miracles being performed, he was amazed.¹⁴Now when the apostles that were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John:¹⁵who, when they had come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Spirit,¹⁶for as yet it had fallen on none of them: only they had been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus.¹⁷Then laid they their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.¹⁸Now when Simon saw that through the laying on of the apostles’ hands the Holy Spirit was given, he offered them money,¹⁹saying, “Give me also this power, that on whomever I lay my hands, he may receive the Holy Spirit.”²⁰But Peter said to him, “Your silver perish with you, because you have thought to obtain the gift of God with money.²¹You have neither part nor lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God.²²Repent therefore of this your wickedness, and pray the Lord, if perhaps the thought of your heart will be forgiven you.²³For I see that you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity.”²⁴And Simon answered and said, “Pray you for me to the Lord, that none of the things which you have spoken come on me.”²⁵Therefore, when they had testified and spoken the word of the Lord, they returned to Jerusalem, and preached the gospel to many villages of the Samaritans.²⁶But an angel of the Lord spoke to Philip, saying, “Arise, and go toward the south to the way that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” (This is a desert [road].)²⁷And he arose and went. And behold, a man of Ethiopia, a eunuch of great authority under Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was over all her treasure, who had come to Jerusalem to worship;²⁸and he was returning and sitting in his chariot, and was reading the prophet Isaiah.²⁹And the Spirit said to Philip, “Go near and join yourself to this chariot.”³⁰And Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and said, “Do you understand what you read?”³¹And he said, “How can I, except someone will guide me?” And he begged Philip to come up and sit with him.³²Now the passage of the Scripture which he was reading was this, “He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and as a lamb before his shearer is silent, so he does not open his mouth:³³In his humiliation his judgment was taken away: his generation who will declare? For his life is taken from the earth.”³⁴And the eunuch answered Philip and said, “Please, of whom speaks the prophet this? Of himself, or of some other?”³⁵And Philip opened his mouth, and beginning from this Scripture, preached to him Jesus.³⁶And as they went on the way, they came to a certain water. And the eunuch says, “Behold, [here is] water. What hinders me to be baptized?”³⁷[And Philip said, “If you believe with all your heart, you may.” And he answered and said, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”]³⁸And he commanded the chariot to stand still; and they both went down into the water, both Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him.³⁹And when they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord caught away Philip; and the eunuch saw him no more, for he went on his way rejoicing.⁴⁰But Philip was found at Azotus; and passing through he preached the gospel to all the cities, until he came to Caesarea. and else­where is not one of mod­er­a­tion. Nor is it one that per­mits a mean­ing­ful dis­tinc­tion be­tween the la­bor and the prod­uct of that la­bor. Si­mon Ma­gus could not ab­solve him­self by claim­ing he was not look­ing to pur­chase the Spirit, but only Pe­ter’s la­bor of lay­ing on hands. The causes of spir­i­tual things are pre­cisely what a si­mo­niac sets out to buy.¹⁵See Aqui­nas, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. 3, a. 1, qc. 3, ad 3. Wil­liam Swin­derby for­bade a priest to “sell by bar­gain­ing and cov­e­nant his ghostly tra­vail” (spir­i­tual la­bor), claim­ing that any who does “errs and doth si­mony.”¹⁶Foxe, Actes and Mon­u­ments, 5.468.

Spir­i­tual la­bor is it­self a spir­i­tual thing and there­fore can­not be sold.¹⁷E.g., “not only can the afore­said spir­i­tual things not be sold, but nei­ther can the la­bor.” Au­riol, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. un., a. 2 (p. 166b). As Aqui­nas wrote of acts that are spir­i­tual in their prin­ci­ple, “no one can in any way hire out his acts with­out si­mony.”¹⁸Aqui­nas, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. 3, a. 2, qc. 2, sol.; cf. Aqui­nas, ST II‑II, q. 100, a. 3.

The Ex­cuse of Sell­ing La­bor§

John Wyc­liffe’s lan­guage on the point ad­mits of more than one read­ing,¹⁹In his trea­tise on si­mony, Wyc­liffe ar­gued for “in­or­di­nate will­ing” rather than “ear­nest de­sire,” in part be­cause he held that a preacher ought to ex­change his spir­i­tual ser­vice for mod­est tem­po­ral sup­port. Wyc­liffe, De si­mo­nia, cap. 1 (2:13–28). How­ever, this no­tion of “ex­change” is not spelled out in terms that clearly in­di­cate a sale, and else­where he de­nied that preach­ers may charge for their work. “And here Christ tea­cheth openly that men should not buy this of­fice, ne [nor] take no meed [re­ward] of the peo­ple to tra­vail thus in Christ’s name, for then they put upon Christ that he sold preach­ing of his word, and gave leave to do si­mony; and both these be blas­phe­mies.” Wyc­liffe, Ser­mons, serm. 58 (1, p. 177). but Jan Hus, work­ing from Wyc­liffe’s trea­tise, gave what is pos­si­bly the most com­plete treat­ment. Against those who would make such a jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for charg­ing for their ser­vices, he wrote,

But here they have Si­mon’s lit­tle cap with which they cover them­selves, say­ing com­monly that they sell the bod­ily la­bor, but not the bless­ing or the con­se­cra­tion; and also that they take money for food, but not for con­se­cra­tion. But that ex­cuse is like the greedy ale­wife who serves the food and then charges only for the beer, in that one pay­ment more than cov­er­ing both the meal and the drink. That ex­cuse is also like the tale one writer tells, of a greedy lord who came to the an­nual fair. Then a ser­vant told him that in that town the inn­keep­ers at ta­ble give very fat geese for free, but beef and veal and other dishes they charge more dearly. So the lord com­manded his ser­vants to eat the freely given food, and he him­self would eat the coarser fare to which he was ac­cus­tomed. And when din­ner was over and the ac­count was made, the veal was reck­oned so dear that the free geese proved costly af­ter all! Like­wise the si­mo­ni­acs wish to de­ceive the peo­ple of God with this an­swer, say­ing that they sell the la­bor, but give the bless­ing, con­se­cra­tion, or con­fir­ma­tion for free! There­fore against this cun­ning the holy or­di­nance says: “Those who buy bod­ily things and do not buy spir­i­tual things should by no means be called si­mo­ni­acs.” And im­me­di­ately it con­tin­ues: “But the an­swer is that not only those who take spir­i­tual things for money, but also those who take for money bod­ily things that are an­nexed to spir­i­tual things, are called si­mo­ni­acs.”

So says the or­di­nance, so that you may un­der­stand that the la­bor of preach­ing, cel­e­brat­ing Mass, con­se­crat­ing, anoint­ing, bap­tiz­ing, hear­ing con­fes­sion, and dis­trib­ut­ing the body of the Lord—that la­bor is so joined with the spir­i­tual, that is, with God’s power and of­fice, that it may not, and can­not rightly, be sold for money. Al­though peo­ple ought to sus­tain the priests in that la­bor, the priests ought not to sell that la­bor or set a price on it; for oth­er­wise every case of si­mony could be ex­cused by say­ing: “I am sell­ing the la­bor!” There­fore the Lord God says through the prophet Mal­a­chi: “Who is there among you who would shut the doors and kin­dle my al­tar for noth­ing? I have no plea­sure in you, says the Lord of hosts, and I will not ac­cept an of­fer­ing from your hand.” Here Gra­tian, who com­piled the De­cree [i.e., the De­cre­tum], says that to shut the doors is not the of­fice of the holy sac­ri­fice, but it per­tains to the spir­i­tual of­fice.²⁰The idea here is that shut­ting the doors of the tem­ple is a bod­ily act, but is an­nexed to spir­i­tual things, since it is only by the door­keeper that one would have ac­cess. See C. 1, q. 3, d.a.c. 1. There­fore the ex­cuse by which they de­fend them­selves, say­ing that they sell the la­bor, is not valid.²¹Hus, O sva­to­ku­pectví, 5.D; cf. ibid., 9.A.

Giv­ing four ex­am­ples, Hus con­tin­ued to dem­on­strate that those who claim to sell la­bor in spir­i­tual things are sell­ing some­thing more. First, the bishop charges more for the same la­bor than one who does the same work. Sec­ond, the bishop who blesses an al­tar re­quires more than the car­pen­ter or ma­son who crafted it, though they did greater la­bor. Third, the bishop’s en­dow­ment al­ready pro­vides for his la­bor, yet he re­quires a sec­ond pay upon ser­vice. Fourth, the same con­se­cra­tion costs less from a poor bishop than from a rich one.²²Ibid., 5.D.

Al­most all of this dis­course—from the ex­cuse it­self, to the par­a­ble of the geese, to the ci­ta­tion of Gra­tian, to the four ad­di­tional ar­gu­ments—is trans­lated di­rectly from Wyc­liffe,²³Wyc­liffe, De si­mo­nia, cap. 6 (74:3–76:13). with three no­table al­ter­ations. First, Hus did not in­clude Wyc­liffe’s pref­ace to the par­a­ble, which frames the abuse as a mat­ter of de­gree: money “in­or­di­nately” col­lected, “ex­ces­sive” fees, sac­ra­ments sold “so dearly.”²⁴Ibid., cap. 6 (73:12–74:2). Sec­ond, Hus did not trans­late Wyc­liffe’s sar­cas­tic com­pro­mise on the bishop’s bless­ing, “Ei­ther, then, let him give it for noth­ing, or let him sell it justly for a fair price,” which com­puted by pro­por­tion to a lay­man’s la­bor would be “a half­penny.”²⁵Ibid., cap. 6 (75:24–29). Third, Hus pulled Wyc­liffe’s in­fer­ence—that oth­er­wise any si­mony what­ever could be ex­cused—for­ward to just be­fore the Mal­a­chi pas­sage, mak­ing it the ground of a di­rect pro­hi­bi­tion of sell­ing spir­i­tual la­bor for any price.²⁶Ibid., cap. 6 (74:26–27). In other words, Wyc­liffe’s ar­gu­ments showed that con­tem­po­rary bish­ops sold spir­i­tual things and not, as they claimed, mere la­bor, but stopped short of say­ing that the la­bor it­self may not be sold. By the same line of rea­son­ing, Hus set as a rule what Wyc­liffe had left as an in­fer­ence: charg­ing any­thing for spir­i­tual la­bor nec­es­sar­ily sells spir­i­tual things.

La­bor In­sep­a­ra­ble from Its Prod­uct§

Some school­men also ob­served that ec­o­nomic re­al­ity does not per­mit us to di­vorce prod­uct and la­bor so cleanly in trans­ac­tions. Pe­ter Pa­lu­danus, re­hears­ing the ar­gu­ment of Du­ran­dus of Saint-Pour­çain, put the is­sue thus:

For who would ever buy the la­bor of a worker, ex­cept for the fruit of the work? No one. And there­fore it is ri­dic­u­lous to say that min­is­ters can sell their la­bor [la­bor], where they can­not law­fully sell their work [opus]: if there­fore an ec­cle­si­as­ti­cal min­is­ter dis­pens­ing sa­cred things re­ceives any­thing, he does not re­ceive it as the price of the work or of the la­bor, but as the sus­te­nance of the min­is­ter.²⁷Pa­lu­danus, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. 5 (p. 319a); cf. Du­ran­dus of Saint-Pour­çain, In Sent. (red. C), IV, d. 25, q. 3 (fol. 315r). See also Pa­lu­danus, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. 5 (p. 320a–b); con­tra, Ma­jor, In Sent. (red. B), d. 25, q. 1 (fol. 183rb).

One prob­lem with a model of giv­ing that pos­its a pur­chase of la­bor is that it ne­ces­si­tates an oblig­a­tion be­tween the giver and the re­ceiver. The re­ceiver be­comes ser­vant to the giver, un­der­min­ing the spir­i­tual worker’s duty to the Lord with a con­flict of in­ter­est (Gal. 1:10Galatians 1:10For am I now seeking the favor of men, or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still pleasing men, I would not be a servant of Christ.). Thus, noth­ing should be given to any min­is­ter “by way of oblig­a­tion and con­tract, but only by way of nec­es­sary as­sis­tance.”²⁸Au­riol, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. un., a. 2 (p. 166b). The one who re­ceives is not bound to the giver as though his la­bor had been bought, and the one who gives does not owe the min­is­ter pay­ment for what he has re­ceived. Ei­ther would bear the mark of a con­tract. In­stead, the giver is bound to ren­der tem­po­ral things by a nat­ural oblig­a­tion of jus­tice to sup­port the min­is­ter in his work.²⁹See ibid., IV, d. 25, q. un., a. 2 (p. 166b).

In Chap­ter 8, we sur­veyed sev­eral ways one might re­gard what a min­is­ter re­ceives. To con­strue it as pure char­ity does not ac­cord with Scrip­ture’s in­sis­tence on the la­borer’s wor­thi­ness; to con­strue it as the pur­chase of his spir­i­tual prod­ucts would be man­i­fest si­mony. Many then con­cluded that the giver pays a min­is­ter for his la­bor; yet we noted a strain of the tra­di­tion that found even this for­mu­la­tion in need of cor­rec­tion.³⁰See Chap­ter 8, pp. 142–47. Spir­i­tual la­bor is a spir­i­tual thing, so its sale does not es­cape the charge of si­mony. As was ob­served, no one who pays a la­borer truly de­sires the la­bor it­self, but the thing that la­bor pro­duces. In terms of mod­ern ec­o­nomic the­ory, we might frame these me­dieval ob­ser­va­tions as a sub­jec­tive the­ory of value con­tend­ing with a la­bor the­ory of value.³¹A la­bor the­ory of value holds that a good is worth the la­bor re­quired to pro­duce it, so that price tracks the quan­tity of work that went into a thing. A sub­jec­tive the­ory holds that worth lies in the es­ti­ma­tion of the one who val­ues, so that the same good is worth dif­fer­ent amounts to dif­fer­ent peo­ple and noth­ing at all to one who has no use for it. Those who de­nied that one should give to a min­is­ter as a pur­chase of his la­bor ar­gued in­stead that one ought to give for his sus­te­nance.

Al­ter­na­tively, we might ask whether a min­is­te­rial sti­pend is for the worker or the work. The ques­tion so posed turns on an am­bi­gu­ity in one word. The prep­o­si­tion “for” car­ries two dis­tinct senses: it may mean “in ex­change for,” as in the price one pays for a pur­chase, or it may mean “in sup­port of,” as in a fi­nan­cial con­tri­bu­tion to a cam­paign. The no­tion of me­di­ated oblig­a­tion sup­plies clar­ity here. To give in sup­port of the worker is co-la­bor; to give in ex­change for the work is rec­i­proc­ity. Both may be called wages as both are in some sense pay­ment for la­bor; but in the one model, these wages is­sue from the Lord while in the other they come di­rectly from a hu­man client.

This was the con­cern of Hus, Pa­lu­danus, Du­ran­dus, and oth­ers who ob­jected to any sim­ple for­mula of sell­ing la­bor.³²See Chap­ter 8, pp. 142–47. An­thony Tuck­ney and Ben­ja­min Keach, for their part, granted that a min­is­ter’s main­te­nance might be called wages, yet de­nied that it could be called base wages.³³See Chap­ter 8, pp. 148–49. What is this dis­tinc­tion but a rec­og­ni­tion of the me­di­ated shape those wages must take? In each case the aim was the same: to deny that a peo­ple stand in di­rect rec­i­proc­ity with their min­is­ter.

Re­gard­ing the word “wages” in Luke 10:7Luke 10:7And in that same house remain, eating and drinking such things as they give; for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not go from house to house., re­peated in 1 Tim­o­thy 5:181 Timothy 5:18For the scripture says, “You shall not muzzle the ox when he treads out the corn.” And, “The laborer is worthy of his wages.”, the West­min­ster di­vine An­thony Tuck­ney³⁴Tuck­ney chaired the West­min­ster As­sem­bly com­mit­tee that framed the Larger Cat­e­chism’s ex­po­si­tion of the Ten Com­mand­ments, where ques­tion 108 names “the min­is­try and main­te­nance thereof” among the du­ties re­quired by the sec­ond com­mand­ment, and ques­tion 109 “si­mony, sac­ri­lege” among the sins it for­bids. WLC Q. 108; WLC Q. 109. re­marked on the dan­ger of in­ter­pret­ing the term to en­tail a si­mo­ni­a­cal ex­change of money for la­bor and pointed to the cor­rec­tive of­fered in the pre­vi­ous verse of Paul’s epis­tle. Ad­dress­ing min­is­ters, he ac­knowl­edged the scrip­tural lan­guage of “hire” or “wages,” but re­jected the idea that this fund­ing func­tions as a rec­om­pense of la­bor be­tween the peo­ple and the min­is­ter, for that would bind the lat­ter to the will of the for­mer who makes the pay­ment. All such sen­ti­ments are “base si­mo­ni­a­cal chaf­fer­ings.”³⁵Tuck­ney, “Ser­mon 38,” 645.

Is It Proper to Give to a Min­is­ter as His Sus­te­nance?§

Fourth, things might be given for the sus­te­nance of the la­borer (ut sus­ten­ta­tionem lab­o­ran­tis).³⁶Once again, the lit­er­a­ture var­ies in its vo­cab­u­lary. Some­times “sti­pend” (sti­pen­dium) is used in­stead of “sus­te­nance” (sus­ten­ta­tionem), and some­times “min­is­ter” (min­is­tri) in­stead of “la­borer” (lab­o­ran­tis). What is given to the spir­i­tual worker, fi­nan­cial or oth­er­wise, should be given in or­der to sus­tain him.³⁷E.g., “to re­ceive or to give some­thing for the sus­te­nance of those who min­is­ter spir­i­tual things, ac­cord­ing to the or­di­nance of the Church and ap­proved cus­tom, is law­ful.” Aqui­nas, ST II‑II, q. 100, a. 3, corp.; cf. ibid., II‑II, q. 100, a. 2, ad 2; Wil­liam of Aux­erre, Summa au­rea, III, tr. 21 (fol. 227rb). The peo­ple do not give as cus­tomers pur­chas­ing a prod­uct or as em­ploy­ers pur­chas­ing la­bor, but out of an oblig­a­tion to sus­tain the la­borer in his work.

Au­gus­tine ex­plained this dy­namic in a ser­mon on Eze­kiel 34Ezekiel 34¹And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying,²“Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and say to them, to the shepherds, ‘Thus says the Lord Jehovah: “Woe to the shepherds of Israel that feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the sheep?³You* eat the fat, and you clothe yourselves with the wool, you kill the fatlings; but you do not feed the sheep.⁴The diseased you have not strengthened, nor have you healed what was sick, nor have you bound up what was broken, nor have you brought back what was driven away, nor have you sought what was lost; but with force and with rigor have you ruled over them.⁵And they were scattered, because there was no shepherd; and they became food to all the beasts of the field, and were scattered.⁶My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and on every high hill: yes, my sheep were scattered on all the face of the earth; and there was none that searched or seek [after them].”’”⁷Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of Jehovah:⁸“As I live,” says the Lord Jehovah, “surely since my sheep became a prey, and my sheep became food to all the beasts of the field, because there was no shepherd, nor did my shepherds search for my sheep, but the shepherds fed themselves, and did not feed my sheep;⁹therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of Jehovah:¹⁰‘Thus says the Lord Jehovah: “Behold, I am against the shepherds. And I will require my sheep at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the sheep; neither will the shepherds feed themselves any more. And I will deliver my sheep from their mouth, that they may not be food for them.”’”¹¹For thus says the Lord Jehovah: “Behold, I myself will search for my sheep, and will seek them out.¹²As a shepherd seeks out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered, so will I seek out my sheep; and I will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.¹³And I will bring them out from the peoples, and gather them from the countries, and bring them into their own land; and I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the ravines, and in all the inhabited places of the country.¹⁴I will feed them with good pasture; and on the mountains of the height of Israel will their fold be: there will they lie down in a good fold. And on fat pasture will they feed on the mountains of Israel.¹⁵I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I will cause them to lie down,” says the Lord Jehovah.¹⁶“I will seek what was lost, and will bring back what was driven away, and will bind up what was broken, and will strengthen what was sick; but the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them in justice.¹⁷And as for you, O my flock, thus says the Lord Jehovah: ‘Behold, I judge between sheep and sheep, the rams and the male goats.¹⁸Does it seem a small thing to you to have fed on the good pasture, but you must tread down with your feet the rest of your pasture? And to have drunk of the clear waters, but you must foul the rest with your feet?¹⁹And as for my sheep, they eat what you have trodden with your feet, and they drink what you have fouled with your feet.’”²⁰Therefore thus says the Lord Jehovah to them: “Behold, I myself will judge between the fat sheep and the lean sheep.²¹Because you thrust with side and with shoulder, and push all the diseased with your horns, until you have scattered them abroad;²²therefore I will save my flock, and they will no longer be a prey; and I will judge between sheep and sheep.²³And I will set up one shepherd over them, and he will feed them, my servant David; he will feed them, and he will be their shepherd.²⁴And I, Jehovah, will be their God, and my servant David prince among them; I, Jehovah, have spoken it.²⁵And I will make with them a covenant of peace, and will cause wild beasts to cease out of the land; and they will dwell securely in the wilderness, and sleep in the woods.²⁶And I will make them and the places all around my hill a blessing. And I will cause the shower to come down in its season; there will be showers of blessing.²⁷And the tree of the field will yield its fruit, and the earth will yield its produce, and they will be secure in their land; and they will know that I am Jehovah, when I have broken the bars of their yoke, and have delivered them out of the hand of those who made bondmen of them.²⁸And they will no longer be a prey to the nations, nor will the beasts of the earth devour them; but they will dwell securely, and none will make them afraid.²⁹And I will raise up to them a plantation for renown, and they will no longer be consumed with famine in the land, neither bear the shame of the nations any more.³⁰And they will know that I, Jehovah, their God am with them, and that they, the house of Israel, are my people,” says the Lord Jehovah.³¹“And you my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, are men, and I am your God,” says the Lord Jehovah., first spec­u­lat­ing that Paul may be in­di­cated by the inn­keeper of Luke 10:35Luke 10:35And the next day he took out two shillings and gave them to the host and said, ‘Take care of him; and whatever you spend more, I, when I come back again, will repay you.’. The Samar­i­tan prom­ises to re­pay the inn­keeper on his re­turn for what­ever he spends be­yond what he was given, and Paul, who chose to sup­port him­self by his own hands, would be paid at the Lord’s re­turn.³⁸Au­gus­tine, Ser­mones, 46, cap. 2 (PL 38:272). Au­gus­tine con­tin­ued to ex­plain that what min­is­ters re­ceive is not a price “as though the gospel were for sale,” be­cause then they would “sell a great thing for a tri­fle.”³⁹Ibid., 46, cap. 2 (PL 38:273). In­stead of min­is­ters sell­ing, “let them re­ceive from the peo­ple the sus­te­nance [sus­ten­ta­tionem] their need re­quires, and from the Lord the re­ward of their stew­ard­ship.”⁴⁰Ibid., 46, cap. 2 (PL 38:273); cf. The Anat­omy of Si­mon Ma­gus, 92ff. The re­ward for their la­bor does not come from the peo­ple; they must “look for their re­ward no­where but where the peo­ple look for their sal­va­tion.”⁴¹Au­gus­tine, Ser­mones, 46, cap. 2 (PL 38:273).

Sus­te­nance was not un­der­stood as bare sub­sis­tence. Proper main­te­nance in­cluded a sig­nif­i­cant mea­sure of honor per­tain­ing to the dig­nity of the per­son in his of­fice.⁴²E.g., the min­is­ter “can quite prop­erly re­ceive sus­te­nance suit­able to his state.” Au­riol, In Sent. IV, d. 25, q. un., a. 2 (p. 166b). The word “hon­o­rar­ium” has come down to us from the Latin do­num hon­o­rar­ium, des­ig­nat­ing a gift meant to honor rather than to func­tion as a wage.

Es­pe­cially in the sev­en­teenth cen­tury, a num­ber of works made this dis­tinc­tion be­tween “wages” (mer­ces) and “honor” (hon­o­rar­ium), as­sert­ing that, prop­erly speak­ing, min­is­ters do not re­ceive the for­mer but the lat­ter.⁴³For ex­am­ple, the Eng­lish cler­gy­man Wil­liam Sclater ar­gued on the sup­po­si­tion that “my por­tion be not mer­ces, but hon­o­rar­ium.” Sclater, The Quæs­tion of Tythes Re­vised, un­num­bered, 5 pp. af­ter p. 33. John Cooke, a Pu­ri­tan le­gal scholar, wrote of min­is­ters among sev­eral pro­fes­sions to which this prin­ci­ple ap­plies, of­fer­ing in the mar­gin the Latin phrase, non mer­ce­nar­ium sed hon­o­rar­ium (“not as wages, but as honor”). Cooke, The Vin­di­ca­tion of the Law, 3. We have al­ready noted that Tuck­ney re­quired qual­i­fi­ca­tion for the term “wages” in 1 Tim­o­thy 5:181 Timothy 5:18For the scripture says, “You shall not muzzle the ox when he treads out the corn.” And, “The laborer is worthy of his wages.” in or­der to avoid si­mo­ni­a­cal im­pli­ca­tions. He con­tin­ued by ob­serv­ing that in the pre­vi­ous verse, “The Apos­tle would lift us up to higher thoughts, when he calls the Church of­fi­cers’ main­te­nance, not wages but hon­our.”⁴⁴“All thy grace, wis­dom, abil­ity to dis­pense the Word and other or­di­nances, to gov­ern the church, etc. are God’s gifts, which he never be­trusted thee with to en­joy, or make a mar­ket of for thy­self, thine own gain or ap­plause, but for the glory of thy Mas­ter, and the ser­vice of his spouse: and there­fore al­though the la­bourer be wor­thy of his hire, Luke 10:7Luke 10:7And in that same house remain, eating and drinking such things as they give; for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not go from house to house.. yet nei­ther be thou on the one side ever so mer­ce­nary, as to ac­count thy main­te­nance such an hire of thy la­bour as which thou aim­est at, and put­test off the or­di­nances of God for: no, in this sense freely thou hast re­ceived, and there­fore freely give. “Nor let the peo­ple be ever so mean as to think, when they have paid their pit­tance they have bought you for slaves, and like good chap­men have made a fair pur­chase of the Word, and the rest of God’s or­di­nances, which they here­upon claim as their due, and in case, though by their own de­fault, they come short of, you shall fall short of yours. But how un­wor­thy are such base si­mo­ni­a­cal chaf­fer­ings of thee, as thou art ei­ther a min­is­ter, or Chris­tian? some­thing akin to Ju­das sell­ing, and the Jews buy­ing of Christ for thirty pieces of sil­ver: and a goodly price, where­with I was prised at of them, saith the Lord, Zech. 11:13Zechariah 11:13And Jehovah said to me, “Cast it to the potter, the precious price that I was prized at by them.” And I took the thirty [pieces] of silver, and cast them to the potter, in the house of Jehovah.. The Apos­tle would lift us up to higher thoughts, when he calls the Church of­fi­cers’ main­te­nance, not wages but hon­our, 1 Tim. 5:171 Timothy 5:17Let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the word and in teaching.. to be freely hon­or­ably al­lowed, not as a rec­om­pense of their la­bour, but as an hon­or­able tes­ti­mony of our love and re­spect, not as the price of the Gospel, and all that ei­ther we mean to give for it, or the min­is­ters should look at in dis­pens­ing of it.” Tuck­ney, “Ser­mon 38,” 644–45.

The Par­tic­u­lar Bap­tist Ben­ja­min Keach made a sim­i­lar ob­ser­va­tion, re­ject­ing such a “base” ex­change in fa­vor of “hon­our.” Re­mark­ing that New Tes­ta­ment min­is­ters are to re­ceive af­ter the pat­tern of the Old Tes­ta­ment priests (1 Cor. 9:13–141 Corinthians 9:13–14¹³Do you not know that those who minister about sacred things eat [of] the things of the temple, [and] those who wait on the altar have their portion with the altar?¹⁴Even so did the Lord ordain that those who proclaim the gospel should live of the gospel.), he pointed out that such funds granted to min­is­ters are not di­rect pay­ments, but given “as gifts due to the Lord, and to them from him.”⁴⁵While the ap­pli­ca­tion is Keach’s own, he made it by quot­ing Henry Ains­worth: “They were not (as Mr. Ains­worth not­eth) to re­ceive it af­ter a base or ser­vile man­ner, but as gifts due to the Lord, and to them from him: the He­brew canons (saith he) show the Is­ra­el­ites were to give them their por­tion with hon­our; and it was un­law­ful for the priests or Le­vites to snatch away the heave-of­fer­ing, or the tithes; yea, saith he, if they did but ask their por­tion with their mouth it was un­law­ful. […] He saith again, the priest might not vi­o­lently take the gifts, nor ask them with his mouth, but he re­ceived them when they were given him with hon­our.” Keach, The Gospel Min­is­ter’s Main­te­nance Vin­di­cated, 107–8. In other words, while the peo­ple owe ma­te­rial sup­port to min­is­ters in one sense, be­cause the priests had no right to de­mand or take pro­vi­sions by force as one might with his own prop­erty, such things can­not be said to be owed to min­is­ters by the peo­ple in the most im­me­di­ate sense. Keach ex­panded on the same dis­tinc­tion to ex­plain that the min­is­ter’s sti­pend is not to be re­garded as “base” wages but as “hon­our” be­cause the peo­ple do not ac­tu­ally pay him as an em­ployer might. In­stead, they give to the Lord, and the Lord gives his wages to his own work­ers; the Lord is the em­ployer to whom the min­is­ter is bound.

Con­clu­sion§

The pro­hi­bi­tion of si­mony does not leave min­is­ters des­ti­tute. Tem­po­ral things may and ought to be given to those who pro­vide spir­i­tual things, but the mode of this giv­ing is de­ci­sive. What the peo­ple give is nei­ther char­ity to a beg­gar, nor the price of a prod­uct to a ven­dor, nor wages owed to a hired la­borer, but the main­te­nance of one whom the Lord has set apart to serve them. Their giv­ing is di­rected ul­ti­mately to God, and from God the min­is­ter re­ceives his sup­port. The min­is­ter’s sti­pend is there­fore not mer­ces but hon­o­rar­ium, a rec­og­ni­tion of the dig­nity that be­longs to the of­fice.

Min­is­try is to be sup­ported, not sold.

Bib­li­og­ra­phy§

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