![]() Is it legitimate to think in such dimensions, or is that a false “theologizing” of a word intended only in a straightforwardly earthly sense? There is a fear of such theologizing today, which is not totally unfounded, but neither should it be overstated. Read in the light of Jesus’ great discourse on the bread of life, the miracle of the manna naturally points beyond itself to the new world in which the Logos - the eternal Word of God - will be our bread, the food of the eternal wedding banquet. The Fathers consider different dimensions of the saying that begins as a petition for today’s bread for the poor, but insofar as it directs our gaze to the Father in heaven who feeds us, it recalls the wandering People of God, who were fed by God Himself. This does not remove the straightforward earthly sense of the disciples’ petition that we have just shown to be the text’s immediate meaning. The fact is that the Fathers of the Church were practically unanimous in understanding the fourth petition of the Our Father as a Eucharistic petition in this sense the Our Father figures in the Mass liturgy as a Eucharistic table-prayer (i.e., “grace”). ![]() An example is Saint Jerome’s Vulgate, which translates the mysterious word epiousios as supersubstantialis (i.e., super-substantial), thereby pointing to the new, higher “substance” that the Lord gives us in the Holy Sacrament as the true bread of our life. Some ancient translations hint in this direction. On such a reading, the petition would acquire an eschatological meaning. In that case, it would be an eschatological petition, the petition for an anticipation of the world to come, asking the Lord to give already “today” the future bread, the bread of the new world - Himself. The reference to the future would make more sense if the object of the petition were the bread that really does belong to the future: the true manna of God. But the petition to receive tomorrow’s bread today does not seem to make sense when looked at in the light of the disciple’s existence. The other interpretation maintains that the correct translation is “bread for the future”, for the following day. On this reading, the petition would run as follows: Give us today the bread that we need in order to live. One maintains that the word means “what is necessary for existence”. Today there are two principal interpretations. We have to depend on etymologies and the study of the context. But this one example alone is insufficient to give us any certainty about the meaning of this word, which is at any rate very unusual and rare. Since Origen’s time, it is true, an instance of this word has been found in a papyrus dating from the fifth century after Christ. 254) - says that it does not occur anywhere else in Greek, but that it was coined by the Evangelists. Referring to this word, one of the great masters of the Greek language - the theologian Origen (d. “Daily” renders the Greek word epiousios. (All the pope’s works are copyrighted by the Libreria Editrice Vaticana.) The following is excerpted from the section on the phrase,“Give us this day our daily bread”, in which the Holy Father comments on the meaning of the Greek word epiousios, a word unique to the Gospel. ![]() ![]() Editor’s Note: In Chapter Five of his new book, Jesus of Nazareth, Pope Benedict reflects on the Lord’s Prayer, line by line. ![]()
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