Hebrew word · H4909

מַשְׂכֹּ֫רֶת

maskurti

wage

Wage or hire: the payment owed for hired labour. It comes from the root שׂכר, 'to hire'. Ruth 2:12 uses it for the 'full reward' God gives.

Appears 4 times in 4 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

wages

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Genesis 31:7

Range of meaning

Wage or hire: the payment owed for hired labour. It comes from the root שׂכר, 'to hire'. Ruth 2:12 uses it for the 'full reward' God gives.

Against the English

'Wages' is accurate. Here, though, the wage is not money. It is a share of the flock's offspring, defined by colouring (speckled, streaked, v. 8).

Used elsewhere in the period

Gen 29:15: Laban asks Jacob, 'tell me what your wages shall be.' Gen 31:41 repeats the complaint. Ancient Near Eastern herding contracts, such as the Laws of Hammurabi §§261–267 and the Old Babylonian herding contracts, paid hired shepherds partly with a share of the animals born.

From the study of Ruth 2:12

Range of meaning

Wages: the pay agreed for hired work. It comes from sakar 'to hire'; the related noun sakar means 'hire, wage, reward'. Maskoret is rare. Outside this verse it occurs only in the Jacob–Laban story (Gen 29:15; 31:7, 41), where it is the disputed pay of a man working in a relative's household.

Against the English

English 'reward' suggests a prize, a bonus or a gift for merit, and in church language often a heavenly reward. The Hebrew is plainer and more commercial: the wages a worker has a right to.

How it drifted

'Reward' is a fair English idiom for blessing language, but over time it has taken on overtones of merit and the afterlife. A later Jewish paraphrase, the Targum of Ruth, already moved this verse toward reward 'in the world to come'.

Used elsewhere in the period

Gen 29:15: 'Tell me, what shall your wages (maskurtekha) be?' Gen 31:7, 41: Laban 'changed my wages ten times.' In both places it means the pay of a dependent laborer within an extended family, much as here.

Where it appears

Genesis · 3

  1. Genesis 29:15 מַּשְׂכֻּרְתֶּֽךָ׃ [is] wage[s] your

    Laban said to him, “Just because you are my relative, should you work for nothing? Tell me what your wages should be.”

  2. Genesis 31:7 מַשְׂכֻּרְתִּ֖י wage[s] my

    And although he has cheated me and changed my wages ten times, God has not allowed him to harm me.

    Here: The agreed pay for hired work. It is the same word Laban himself used when he first asked Jacob to name his wages (29:15).

  3. Genesis 31:41 מַשְׂכֻּרְתִּ֖י wage[s] my

    Thus for twenty years I have served in your household—fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks—and you have changed my wages ten times!

Ruth · 1

  1. Ruth 2:12 מַשְׂכֻּרְתֵּ֜ךְ wage[s] your

    May the LORD repay your work, and may you receive a rich reward from the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have taken refuge.”

    Here: 'Your wages': the pay a hired worker is owed. The word is rare and elsewhere is used only of Jacob's wages from Laban. Boaz uses payroll language for a gleaner who is not on anyone's payroll: may God pay her what no employer owes her.

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.