Moses requires that the hireling should be paid as soon as his
work is over: “The wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee
all night unto the morning,” Lev. xix, 19. A hireling’s days or year is
a kind of proverb, signifying a full year, without abating any thing of
it: “His days are like the days of a hireling,” Job vii, 1; the days of
man are like those of a hireling; as nothing is deducted from them, so
nothing, likewise is added to them. And again: “Till he shall accomplish
as a hireling his day,” Job xiv, 6; to the time of death, which he waits
for as the hireling for the end of the day. The following passage from
Morier’s Travels in Persia, illustrates one of our Lord’s parables: “The
most conspicuous building in Hamadan is the Mesjid Jumah, a large mosque
now falling into decay, and before it a maidan or square, which serves
as a market place. Here we observed, every morning before the sun rose,
that a numerous band of peasants were collected with spades in their
hands, waiting, as they informed us, to be hired for the day to work in
the surrounding fields. This custom, which I have never seen in any
other part of Asia, forcibly struck me as a most happy illustration of
our Saviour’s parable of the labourers in the vineyard in Matt. xx;
particularly when, passing by the same place late in the day, we still
found others standing idle, and remembered his words, ‘Why stand ye here
all the day idle?’ as most applicable to their situation; for in putting
the very same question to them, they answered us, ‘Because no man hath
hired us.’”
work is over: “The wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee
all night unto the morning,” Lev. xix, 19. A hireling’s days or year is
a kind of proverb, signifying a full year, without abating any thing of
it: “His days are like the days of a hireling,” Job vii, 1; the days of
man are like those of a hireling; as nothing is deducted from them, so
nothing, likewise is added to them. And again: “Till he shall accomplish
as a hireling his day,” Job xiv, 6; to the time of death, which he waits
for as the hireling for the end of the day. The following passage from
Morier’s Travels in Persia, illustrates one of our Lord’s parables: “The
most conspicuous building in Hamadan is the Mesjid Jumah, a large mosque
now falling into decay, and before it a maidan or square, which serves
as a market place. Here we observed, every morning before the sun rose,
that a numerous band of peasants were collected with spades in their
hands, waiting, as they informed us, to be hired for the day to work in
the surrounding fields. This custom, which I have never seen in any
other part of Asia, forcibly struck me as a most happy illustration of
our Saviour’s parable of the labourers in the vineyard in Matt. xx;
particularly when, passing by the same place late in the day, we still
found others standing idle, and remembered his words, ‘Why stand ye here
all the day idle?’ as most applicable to their situation; for in putting
the very same question to them, they answered us, ‘Because no man hath
hired us.’”