1Am I not an emissary? Am I not free? Have I not seen יהושע Messiah our Master? Are you not my work in the Master?

2If to others I am not an emissary, I certainly am to you. For you are the seal of my office of the emissary in the Master.

3My defence to those who examine me is this:

4Do we not have a right to eat and drink?

5Do we not have a right to take along a sister – a wife – as do also the other emissaries, and the brothers of the Master, and Kĕpha?

6Or do only Barnaḇah and I have no right to refrain from working?

7Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat of its fruit? Or who shepherds a flock and does not feed on the milk of the flock?

8Do I say this as a man? Or does not the Torah say the same too?

9For it has been written in the Torah of Mosheh, “You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain.” Is it about oxen Elohim is concerned?

10Or does He say it because of us all? For this was written because of us, that he who ploughs should plough in expectation, and the thresher in expectation of sharing.

11If we have sown spiritual seed among you, is it too much if we reap material goods from you?

12If others share authority over you, should not rather we? But we have not used this authority, but we put up with all, lest we hinder the Good News of Messiah.

13Do you not know that those serving the Set-apart Place eat from the Set-apart Place, and those attending at the altar have their share of the offerings of the altar?

14So also the Master instituted that those announcing the Good News should live from the Good News.

15But I have used none of these, nor have I written this that it should be done so to me. For it would be better for me to die than that anyone should make my boasting empty.

16For if I bring the Good News, it is no boasting for me, for necessity is laid on me, and it is woe to me if I do not bring the Good News!

17For if I do this voluntarily I have a reward, but if not voluntarily, I am entrusted with a management.

18What then is my reward? That in bringing the Good News, I should offer the Good News of Messiah without cost, so as not to abuse my authority in the Good News.

19For though I am free from all, I made myself a servant to all, in order to win more,

20and to the Yehuḏim I became as a Yehuḏite, that I might win Yehuḏim; to those who are under Torah, as under Torah, so as to win those who are under Torah;

21to those without Torah, as without Torah – not being without Torah toward Elohim, but under Torah of Messiah – so as to win those who are without Torah.

22To the weak I became as weak, so as to win the weak. To all men I have become all, so as to save some, by all means.

23And I do this because of the Good News, so as to become a fellow-partaker with it.

24Do you not know that those who run in a race indeed all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way as to obtain it.

25And everyone who competes controls himself in every way. Now they do it to receive a corruptible crown, but we for an incorruptible crown.

26Therefore I run accordingly, not with uncertainty. Thus I fight, not as one who beats the air.

27But I treat my body severely and make it my slave, so that when I have proclaimed to others, I myself might be rejected.