1 Corinthians 9:4

King James Version

Have we not power to eat and to drink?

Parallel Translations

Easy-to-Read Version
We have the right to eat and drink, don't we?

Revised Standard Version
Do we not have the right to our food and drink?

Tyndale New Testament (1525)
Have we not power to eate and to drynke?

Hebrew Names Version
Have we no right to eat and to drink?

International Standard Version
We have the right to eat and drink, don't we?1 Corinthians 9:14; 1 Thessalonians 2:6; 2 Thessalonians 3:9;">[xr]

New American Standard Bible
Do we not have a right to eat and drink?

New Century Version
Do we not have the right to eat and drink?

Update Bible Version
Do we have no right to eat and to drink?

Webster's Bible Translation
Have we not power to eat and to drink?

English Standard Version
Do we not have the right to eat and drink?

World English Bible
Have we no right to eat and to drink?

Wesley's New Testament (1755)
Have we not power to eat and to drink?

Weymouth's New Testament
Have we not a right to claim food and drink?

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Whether we han not power to ete and drynke?

English Revised Version
Have we no right to eat and to drink?

Berean Standard Bible
Have we no right to food and to drink?

Contemporary English Version
that Barnabas and I have the right to our food and drink.

Amplified Bible
Have we not the right to our food and drink [at the expense of the churches]?

American Standard Version
Have we no right to eat and to drink?

Bible in Basic English
Have we no right to take food and drink?

Complete Jewish Bible
Don't we have the right to be given food and drink?

Darby Translation
Have we not a right to eat and to drink?

Etheridge Translation
Have we not authority to eat and to drink ?

Murdock Translation
Have we not authority, to eat and to drink?

King James Version (1611)
Haue wee not power to eate and to drinke?

New Living Translation
Don't we have the right to live in your homes and share your meals?

New Life Bible
Do we not have the right to have food and drink when we are working for the Lord?

New Revised Standard
Do we not have the right to our food and drink?

Geneva Bible (1587)
Haue we not power to eat & to drinke?

George Lamsa Translation
Have we not the right to eat and to drink?

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Have we not a right to eat and drink?

Douay-Rheims Bible
Have not we power to eat and to drink?

Bishop's Bible (1568)
Haue we not power to eate and to drinke?

Good News Translation
Don't I have the right to be given food and drink for my work?

Christian Standard Bible®
Don’t we have the right to eat and drink?

Lexham English Bible
Do we not have the right to eat and drink?

Literal Translation
Have we not authority to eat and to drink?

Young's Literal Translation
have we not authority to eat and to drink?

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Haue we not power to eate and drynke?

Mace New Testament (1729)
have we not a right to meat and drink?

New English Translation
Do we not have the right to financial support?

New King James Version
Do we have no right to eat and drink?

Simplified Cowboy Version
A ramrod has the right to eat and drink, doesn't he?

New American Standard Bible (1995)
Do we not have a right to eat and drink?

Legacy Standard Bible
Do we not have authority to eat and drink?

Contextual Overview

³ Mine answer to them that do examine me is this, ⁴ Have we not power to eat and to drink? ⁵ Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas? ⁶ Or I only and Barnabas, have not we power to forbear working? ⁷ Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges? who planteth a vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? or who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the milk of the flock? ⁸ Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? ⁹ For it is written in the law of Moses, thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? ¹⁰ Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope. ¹¹ If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things? ¹² If others be partakers of this power over you, are not we rather? Nevertheless we have not used this power; but suffer all things, lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

we: 1 Corinthians 9:7-14, Matthew 10:10, Luke 10:7, Galatians 6:6, 1 Thessalonians 2:6, 2 Thessalonians 3:8, 2 Thessalonians 3:9, 1 Timothy 5:17, 1 Timothy 5:18

Reciprocal: Leviticus 22:7 - General Nehemiah 5:14 - I and my Mark 6:3 - James 1 Corinthians 4:11 - unto 1 Corinthians 9:14 - ordained

Cross-References

Genesis 9:10
And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.

Genesis 9:14
And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud:

Leviticus 3:17
It shall be a perpetual statute for your generations throughout all your dwellings, that ye eat neither fat nor blood.

Leviticus 7:26
Moreover ye shall eat no manner of blood, whether it be of fowl or of beast, in any of your dwellings.

Leviticus 19:26
Ye shall not eat any thing with the blood: neither shall ye use enchantment, nor observe times.

Deuteronomy 12:16
Only ye shall not eat the blood; ye shall pour it upon the earth as water.

Deuteronomy 12:23
Only be sure that thou eat not the blood: for the blood is the life; and thou mayest not eat the life with the flesh.

Deuteronomy 14:21
Ye shall not eat of anything that dieth of itself: thou shalt give it unto the stranger that is in thy gates, that he may eat it; or thou mayest sell it unto an alien: for thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.

Deuteronomy 15:23
Only thou shalt not eat the blood thereof; thou shalt pour it upon the ground as water.

Acts 15:20
But that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Have we not power to eat and to drink?] Having proved his apostleship, he proceeds to establish his right to a maintenance as a Gospel minister; which he expresses by various phrases, and confirms by divers arguments: by a "power to eat and drink", he does not mean the common power and right of mankind to perform such actions, which everyone has, provided he acts temperately, and to the glory of God; nor a liberty of eating and drinking things indifferent, or which were prohibited under the ceremonial law; but a comfortable livelihood at the public charge, or at the expense of the persons to whom he ministered; and he seems to have in view the words of Christ, Luke 10:7.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Have we not power - (ἐξουσίαν exousian) Have we not the “right.” The word “power” here is evidently used in the sense of “right” (compare John 1:12, “margin”); and the apostle means to say that though they had not exercised this “right by demanding” a maintenance, yet it was not because they were conscious that they had no such right, but because they chose to forego it for wise and important purposes.

To eat and to drink - To be maintained at the expense of those among whom we labor. Have we not a right to demand that they shall yield us a proper support? By the interrogative form of the statement, Paul intends more strongly to affirm that they had such a right. The interrogative mode is often adopted to express the strongest affirmation. The objection here urged seems to have been this, “You, Paul and Barnabas, labor with your own hands. Acts 18:3. Other religious teachers lay claim to maintenance, and are supported without personal labor. This is the case with pagan and Jewish priests, and with Christian teachers among us. You must be conscious, therefore, that you are not apostles, and that you have no claim or right to support.” To this the answer of Paul is, “We admit that we labor with our own hands. But your inference does not follow. It is not because we have not a right to such support, and it is not because we are conscious that we have no such claim, but it is for a higher purpose. It is because it will do good if we should not urge this right, and enforce this claim.” That they had such a right, Paul proves at length in the subsequent part of the chapter.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 1 Corinthians 9:4. Have we not power to eat and to drink? — Have we not authority, or right, εξουσιαν, to expect sustenance, while we are labouring for your salvation? Meat and drink, the necessaries, not the superfluities, of life, were what those primitive messengers of Christ required; it was just that they who laboured in the Gospel should live by the Gospel; they did not wish to make a fortune, or accumulate wealth; a living was all they desired. It was probably in reference to the same moderate and reasonable desire that the provision made for the clergy in this country was called a living; and their work for which they got this living was called the cure of souls. Whether we derive the word cure from cura, care, as signifying that the care of all the souls in a particular parish or place devolves on the minister, who is to instruct them in the things of salvation, and lead them to heaven; or whether we consider the term as implying that the souls in that district are in a state of spiritual disease, and the minister is a spiritual physician, to whom the cure of these souls is intrusted; still we must consider that such a labourer is worthy of his hire; and he that preaches the Gospel should live by the Gospel.