17And he said to his disciples, “It is impossible for causes for stumbling not to come, but woe to him through whom they come! ²It would be better for him if a millstone^a is placed around his neck and he is thrown into the sea than that he causes one of these little ones to sin.

³“Be concerned about yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him. ⁴And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times he returns to you saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.”

⁵And the apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” ⁶So the Lord said, “If you have faith like a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.

⁷“And which of you who has a slave plowing or shepherding sheep^* who comes in from the field will say to him, ‘Come here at once and^* recline at the table’? ⁸Will he not rather say to him, ‘Prepare something that I may eat, and dress yourself to serve me while I eat and drink, and after these things you will eat and drink.’ ⁹He will not be grateful^b to the slave because he did what was ordered, will he?^* ¹⁰Thus you also, when you have done all the things you were ordered to do,^c say, ‘We are unworthy slaves; we have done what we were obligated to do.’ ”

Read in Logos

Luke 17:10: “So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, ‛We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.’”

Footnotes

aLiterally “a stone belonging to a mill”
*Here the direct object is supplied from context in the English translation
*Here “and” is supplied because the previous participle (“come here”) has been translated as a finite verb
bLiterally “have gratitude”
*The negative construction in Greek anticipates a negative answer here, indicated by “will he”
cLiterally “things that were ordered to you”