Books/NT/latex/chapters/_glossary/epiousios.tex
2026-07-08 19:34:33 -07:00

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\ifdefiningfootnotes
\DeclareFixedFootnote{\fnEpiousios}{
epiousios: This word appears nowhere else in Greek. Not once, before Matthew and Luke used it in Matt 6:11 and Luke 11:3,
and never again in another several centuries of living Greek (apart from writers quoting the Lord's Prayer).
Origen (3rd century), considered perhaps the greatest Bible scholar of antiquity, when Greek was still a living language,
said he couldn't find it anywhere either — no author, sacred or secular.
It looks like it was coined for this prayer.
\fnPar
Two guesses exist. It could come from epi (``upon'') + ousia (``being,'' ``substance.'')
When Jerome translated the Bible into Latin (the ``Vulgate''--- the Latin
translation upon which the Catholic Church relied for over a millenium), he translated as ``supersubstantial'' in Matthew,
but ``daily'' in Luke. Same word.
\fnPar
Or it comes from epi + a participle of "to come" — "the coming day's bread." Most lexicons favor this now.
"Daily" splits the difference. It fits neither guess exactly. It just sounds safe.
I've left it untranslated. You're standing where Origen stood. No easy word fixes this.
\fnPar
Speaking personally, considering \Iesous' teaching in general, the idea that he's speaking here of
some sort of spiritual bread has a certain appeal.
}
\fi