Bhagavad Gita 18.44
कृषिगौरक्ष्यवाणिज्यं वैश्यकर्म स्वभावजम् । परिचर्यात्मकं कर्म शूद्रस्यापि स्वभावजम् ॥
kṛṣi-gaurakṣya-vāṇijyaṃ vaiśya-karma svabhāva-jam / paricaryātmakaṃ karma śūdrasyāpi svabhāva-jam
Translation
Agriculture, cattle-keeping, and trade are the work of the vaishya, born of his nature. Service-natured work is the work of the shudra also, born of his nature.
Reflection
Which kind of work, by your nature, would you do well, and what makes you ashamed of it?
Read this verse in its chapter: Chapter Eighteen
Vaishya and shudra karma. Vaishya, three lines of work, krishi, cultivating the earth, gaurakshya, tending herds, vanijyam, commerce. The cluster names the producer-merchant function in any society. Shudra, paricharya-atmaka karma, work whose essence is service to others. Notice that none of these are demeaned in the verse. The Gita does not rank the four works by spiritual prestige; it ranks them by their internal grain. Whatever your work, the next verse says, do it as worship, and it becomes the path. The fourfold scheme is descriptive, not punitive. The danger arrives only when later interpreters convert these descriptions into fixed castes.