Wages

Wages in Scripture are governed by two principles: prompt payment and just compensation. The Mosaic law required that a hired worker be paid before sundown on the day he worked: "Thou shalt not oppress a hired servant that is poor and needy... At his day thou shalt give him his hire, neither shall the sun go down upon it" (Leviticus 19:13; Deuteronomy 24:14–15). To withhold wages was a form of oppression denounced by the prophets (Jeremiah 22:13; Malachi 3:5) and by James, who declares that the cries of cheated laborers have reached the ears of the Lord (James 5:4). The only specific wage-rate cited in the New Testament is the denarius per day paid to vineyard workers in Jesus's parable (Matthew 20:2), which represents the standard daily wage of the period. Paul uses the concept theologically in Romans 6:23: "The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord" — contrasting earned penalty with freely given grace.