Protestant work ethic
The Protestant work ethic is a biblically based teaching on the necessity of hard work, perfection and the goodness of manual labor. It is part of old American culture of the 1800's and is seen as one of the cornerstones of American prosperity. Protestant preachers preached on the goodness and the necessity of manual labor and its efficacious effect for humans personally and on Christian society as a whole. Protestant preachers saw this as a salve or a correction for original sin.
The term was first coined by Max Weber who was the ?youngest? of the German Historical School.
Biblical Foundation
The Protestant work ethic is based on teachings and concepts in the Old Testament especially, Genesis and Proverbs.
Man was created in the Garden of Eden and God commanded him to "cultivate and keep". (Septuagint Genesis 2.15) This was man's first job — to work in a garden as a farmer would. After this God gave another command to Adam and Eve that they could eat of every tree in the garden but not of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Adam and Eve broke this law of God and in Christian teaching this is called original sin and caused Adam and Eve to break communion with God and they were thrown out. Furthermore, God punished all three, the serpent, Eve and then Adam. In the first two, God laid the punishment upon their persons but with Adam, God cursed the ground that Adam had to work for food. He laid on this punishment: (Septuagint Genesis ch. 3)
- "(18)Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and eaten of the tree concerning which I charged thee of it only not to eat — of that thou hast eaten, cursed is the ground in thy labours, in pain shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. (19) Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herb of the field. (20) In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat thy bread until thou return to the earth out of which you were taken, for earth thou art and to earth thou shalt return."
Protestant ministers saw that this was not only a punishment meted out to man for his disobedience but also as a means for correcting and benefiting man as a sort of medicine. To work the ground was divinely ordained and a necessity because of man's act of disobedience and state of sin.
This teaching is further buttressed in the Protestant idea that "Idle hands are the devil's workshop". They taught that man is to keep busy in order to keep from doing evil.
They also sought to better their community by teaching and exhorting that work is good. It brought about economic prosperity. In this, they found support in Proverbs 10.4 (Septuagint) which says "Poverty brings a man low: but the hands of the vigorous makes rich". Again, Proverbs 6.6 attacks those who are lazy:
- "(6) Go to the ant, O sluggard; and see and emulate his ways, and become wiser than he. (7) For whereas he has no husbandry, nor any one to compel him, and is under no master (8) he prepares food for himself in the summer, and lays by abundant store in harvest. Or go the bee, and learn how diligent she is, and how earnestly she is engaged in her work; whose labours kings and private men use for health, and she is desired and respected by all: though weak in body, she is advanced by honouring wisdom. (9) how long wilt thou lie, O sluggard? and when wilt thou awake out of sleep?
They endeavored to impart a work ethic that encapsulated work as both materially and spiritually beneficial. Laziness is a sin and not proper to Christian character. Work was seen as both occupying a person's time to prevent him from sinning, a boon to the economic well-being of the family and society, and as a necessary consequence due to original sin.
The spirit of the Protestant work ethic is captured in the Swiss-Germans' saying Arbeit macht frei.
Related Verses
- "Hate not laborious work, neither husbandry, which the most High hath ordained". Book of Sirach, Ecclesiasticus, 7.15.
- "(1)...A slothful man is compared to a filthy stone, and every one will hiss him out to his disgrace (2) A slothful man is compared to the filth of a dunghill: every man that takes it up will shake his hand." Book of Sirach, Ecclesiasticus 22.
- "Behold, I have seen good, that it is a fine thing for a man to eat and to drink, and to see good in all his labour in which he may labour under the sun, all the number of the days of his life which God has given to him; for it is his portion". Ecclesiastes 5.17
- "Whatsoever thine hand shall find to do, do with all thy might; ...". Ecclesiates 9.10
Max Weber
For an expanded commentary of Weber's thought, see The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.
