Masters and Servants

In Luther’s SMALL CATECHISM, the next “holy orders” in “The Table of Duties” are those of employees and employers.

EMPLOYEES
Servants, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in sincerity of your heart, as to Christ; not with eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, with good will doing service, as to the Lord, and not to men, knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive the same from the Lord, whether he is a slave or free. Ephesians 6:5-8.
 
EMPLOYERS
Masters, do the same things to them, giving up threatening, knowing that your own Master also is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him. Ephesians 6:9.

One of my complaints about most modern translations of the Bible is that they render what the KJV gives as “servants” as “slaves.” These are generally the very translations that insist on translating ancient concepts into contemporary equivalents. In this case, that would make sense. A “slave” in the Greco-Roman world was not the same thing as race-based slavery, which is what the word connotes in modern English. Yes, Greco-Roman douloi–who did much of the physical labor in that pre-cash economy–were not the kind of paid servants on the order of Jeeves. They were owned by their masters, but they sometimes served for only a time. At any rate, if all Scripture is profitable for our use, as it is, it must speak to our own day and our own economy. If you work for someone, your boss is a kind of “master” and you are a kind of “slave,” or, better, “bondservant,” or just “servant.”