Not in the modern sense, and the gap is worth understanding rather than arguing about.
Scripture assumes work across a lifetime, in a world with no pensions, where the old were
supported by land and family.
The one explicit retirement in the Bible is the Levites: full service until fifty, then they
stop the heavy work and assist their brothers. That is a change of role, not an exit from
usefulness, which is roughly the biblical picture everywhere. The righteous are described
as still bearing fruit in old age. Grey hair is called a crown (Proverbs 16:31). Older
believers are told to teach the younger, which is a job description. And Isaiah has God
carrying his people to their grey hairs (Isaiah 46:4): the only retirement plan with a
guarantee attached.
Providing for later life is plainly wise. The ant stores. Proverbs praises leaving something
to your children's children. A believer who does not provide for his household is judged
harshly, and many readers count your future self as part of that household.
So funding a retirement is wisdom, not disobedience. What is not in Scripture is retirement
as decades of self-focus. The barn-builder's problem was not that he stopped working; it
was what he stopped for. Fund the years, then spend them on something worth doing.
The passages
Printed in full from the public-domain World English Bible, resolved from a local copy of
that text before this page was built. Read them before you take our summary on trust, and
see how we read Scripture on money for the ten rules
every page here follows.
23Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, 24“This is that which belongs to the Levites: from twenty-five years old and upward they shall go in to wait on the service in the work of the Tent of Meeting; 25and from the age of fifty years they shall cease waiting on the work, and shall serve no more, 26but shall minister with their brothers in the Tent of Meeting, to perform the duty, and shall perform no service. You shall do thus to the Levites concerning their duties.”
12The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree. He will grow like a cedar in Lebanon. 13They are planted in Yahweh’s house. They will flourish in our God’s courts. 14They will still produce fruit in old age. They will be full of sap and green,
2that older men should be temperate, sensible, sober minded, sound in faith, in love, and in perseverance: 3and that older women likewise be reverent in behavior, not slanderers nor enslaved to much wine, teachers of that which is good; 4that they may train the young wives to love their husbands, to love their children, 5to be sober minded, chaste, workers at home, kind, being in subjection to their own husbands, that God’s word may not be blasphemed.
6Go to the ant, you sluggard. Consider her ways, and be wise; 7which having no chief, overseer, or ruler, 8provides her bread in the summer, and gathers her food in the harvest. 9How long will you sleep, sluggard? When will you arise out of your sleep? 10A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: 11so your poverty will come as a robber, and your scarcity as an armed man.
16He spoke a parable to them, saying, “The ground of a certain rich man produced abundantly. 17He reasoned within himself, saying, ‘What will I do, because I don’t have room to store my crops?’ 18He said, ‘This is what I will do. I will pull down my barns, and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. 19I will tell my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years. Take your ease, eat, drink, be merry.”’ 20“But God said to him, ‘You foolish one, tonight your soul is required of you. The things which you have prepared—whose will they be?’ 21So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”