Lord's Prayer

The Lord's Prayer, also known by its incipit Our Father, is a central Christian prayer attributed to Jesus. It contains petitions to God focused on God's holiness, will, and kingdom, as well as human needs, with variations across manuscripts and Christian traditions.
Two versions of this prayer are recorded in the gospels: a longer form within the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew, and a shorter form in the Gospel of Luke when "one of his disciples said to him, 'Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples. Scholars generally agree that the differences between the Matthaean and Lucan versions of the Lord's Prayer reflect independent developments from a common source. The first-century text Didache reports a version closely resembling that of Matthew and the modern prayer. It ends with the Minor Doxology.
Theologians broadly view the Lord's Prayer as a model that aligns the soul with God's will, emphasizing praise, trust, and ethical living. The prayer is used by most Christian denominations in their worship and, with few exceptions, the liturgical form is the Matthean version. It has been set to music for use in liturgical services.
Since the 16th century, the Lord's Prayer has been widely translated and collected to compare languages across regions and history. The Lord's Prayer shares thematic and linguistic parallels with prayers and texts from various religious traditions—including the Hebrew Bible, Jewish post-biblical prayers, and ancient writings like the Dhammapada and the Epic of Gilgamesh—though some elements, such as "Lead us not into temptation," have unique theological nuances without direct Old Testament counterparts. Music from 9th century Gregorian chants to modern works by Christopher Tin has used the Lord's Prayer in various religious and interfaith ceremonies.

Texts

The text of the Lord's Prayer shown here is from the New International Version.

Matthew 6:9-13	Luke 11:2-4
Our Father in heaven,	Father,
hallowed be your name,	hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,	your kingdom come.
your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.	Give us each day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.	Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.	And lead us not into temptation.

Initial words on the topic from the Catechism of the Catholic Church teach that it "is truly the summary of the whole gospel".
The first three of the seven petitions in Matthew address God; the other four are related to human needs and concerns. Matthew's account alone includes the "Your will be done" and the "Rescue us from the evil one" petitions. Both original Greek texts contain the adjective ; while controversial, 'daily' has been the most common English-language translation of this word. Protestants usually conclude the prayer with a doxology, a later addition appearing in some manuscripts of Matthew. The Eastern Orthodox version is: For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory: of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.

Relationship between the Matthaean and Lucan texts

In biblical criticism, the absence of the Lord's Prayer in the Gospel of Mark, together with its occurrence in Matthew and Luke, has caused scholars who accept the two-source hypothesis to conclude that it is probably a logion original to the Q source. According to W.D. Davies and Dale Allison, it is also possible than one version was present in Q and another from the M source or the L source, though they do not view the notion that Luke's version used Matthew as plausible. The common source of the two existing versions, whether Q or an oral or another written tradition, was elaborated differently in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke.
Marianus Pale Hera considers it unlikely that either of the two used the other as its source and that it is possible that they "preserve two versions of the Lord's Prayer used in two different communities: the Matthean in a Jewish Christian community and the Lucan in the Gentile Christian community". Davies and Allison find this theory to be possible as well.
If either source built on the other, Joachim Jeremias attributes priority to Matthew on the grounds that "in the early period, before wordings were fixed, liturgical texts were elaborated, expanded and enriched". On the other hand, Michael Goulder, Thomas J. Mosbo and Ken Olson see the shorter Lucan version as a reworking of the Matthaean text, removing unnecessary verbiage and repetition.
The Matthaean version is the one most common in general Christian usage.

Greek texts

Liturgical text	Codex Vaticanus text	Didache text
πάτερ ἡμῶν ὁ ἐν	πατερ ημων ο εν	πατερ ημων ο εν
ἁγιασθήτω τὸ ὄνομά σου	αγιασθητω το ονομα σου	αγιασθητω το ονομα σου
ἐλθέτω ἡ βασιλεία σου	ελθετω η βασιλεια σου	ελθετω η βασιλεια σου
γενηθήτω τὸ θέλημά σου ὡς ἐν οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ	γενηθητω το θελημα σου ως εν ουρανω και επι γης	γενηθητω το θελημα σου ως εν ουρανω και επι γης
τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον	τον αρτον ημων τον επιουσιον δος ημιν σημερον	τον αρτον ημων τον επιουσιον δος ημιν σημερον
καὶ ἄφες ἡμῖν	και αφες ημιν	και αφες ημιν
καὶ μὴ εἰσενέγκῃς ἡμᾶς εἰς πειρασμόν ἀλλὰ ῥῦσαι ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ τοῦ πονηροῦ	και μη εισενεγκης ημας εις πειρασμον αλλα ρυσαι ημας απο του πονηρου	και μη εισενεγκης ημας εις πειρασμον αλλα ρυσαι ημας απο του πονηρου

The majority percentage of the verbs are aorist imperatives. In the first part of the prayer there are third person passive imperatives, while in the last one there are second person active imperatives.

Original Greek text and Syriac and Latin translations

Standard edition of the Greek text

The text given here is that of the latest edition of Greek New Testament of the United Bible Societies and in the Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Graece. Most modern translations use a text similar to this one. Most older translations are based on a Byzantine-type text with ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς in line 5 instead of ἐπὶ γῆς, and ἀφίεμεν in line 8 instead of ἀφήκαμεν, and adding at the end the doxology ὅτι σοῦ ἐστιν ἡ βασιλεία καὶ ἡ δύναμις καὶ ἡ δόξα εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας. ἀμήν.

πάτερ ἡμῶν ὁ ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς
ἁγιασθήτω τὸ ὄνομά σου
ἐλθέτω ἡ βασιλεία σου
γενηθήτω τὸ θέλημά σου ὡς ἐν οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ γῆς
τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον
καὶ ἄφες ἡμῖν τὰ ὀφειλήματα ἡμῶν ὡς καὶ ἡμεῖς ἀφήκαμεν τοῖς ὀφειλέταις ἡμῶν
καὶ μὴ εἰσενέγκῃς ἡμᾶς εἰς πειρασμόν ἀλλὰ ῥῦσαι ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ τοῦ πονηροῦ
Standard edition of the Syriac text of the Peshitta

The Classical Syriac vowels here transcribed as "ê", "ā" and "o/ō" have been raised to "i", "o" and "u" respectively in Western Syriac.

Vulgata Clementina (1692)

There are four editions of the Vulgate: the Sixtine Vulgate, the Sixto-Clementine Vulgate, the Nova Vulgata, and the Stuttgart Vulgate. The Clementine edition varies from the Nova Vulgata in this place only in punctuation and in having "ne nos inducas" in place of "ne inducas nos". The Stuttgart Vulgate has "qui in caelis es" in place of "qui es in caelis"; "veniat" in place of "adveniat"; "dimisimus" in place of "dimittimus"; and "temptationem" in place of "tentationem".

pater noster qui es in cælis
sanctificetur nomen tuum
adveniat regnum tuum
fiat voluntas tua sicut in cælo et in terra
panem nostrum supersubstantialem da nobis hodie
et dimitte nobis debita nostra sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris
et ne nos inducas in tentationem sed libera nos a malo

The doxology associated with the Lord's Prayer in Byzantine Greek texts is found in four Vetus Latina manuscripts, only two of which give it in its entirety. The other surviving manuscripts of the Vetus Latina Gospels do not have the doxology. The Vulgate translation also does not include it, thus agreeing with critical editions of the Greek text.

Liturgical texts: Greek, Syriac, Latin

Patriarchal Edition 1904
Πάτερ ἡμῶν ὁ ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς,
ἁγιασθήτω τὸ ὄνομά σου,
ἐλθέτω ἡ βασιλεία σου,
γενηθήτω τὸ θέλημά σου ὡς ἐν οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς.
τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον
καὶ ἄφες ἡμῖν τὰ ὀφειλήματα ἡμῶν, ὡς καὶ ἡμεῖς ἀφίεμεν τοῖς ὀφειλέταις ἡμῶν.
καὶ μὴ εἰσενέγκῃς ἡμᾶς εἰς πειρασμόν, ἀλλὰ ῥῦσαι ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ τοῦ πονηροῦ.
'''Roman Missal'''

English versions

There are several different English translations of the Lord's Prayer from Greek or Latin, beginning around AD 650 with the Northumbrian translation. Of those in current liturgical use, the three best-known are:

The translation in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England
The slightly modernized "traditional ecumenical" form used in the Catholic, and in many Protestant Churches
The 1988 translation of the ecumenical English Language Liturgical Consultation

All these versions are based on the text in Matthew, rather than Luke, of the prayer given by Jesus.

''Book of Common Prayer'', 1662

Traditional ecumenical version

1988 English Language Liturgical Consultation

The concluding doxology is representative of the practice of concluding prayers with a short, hymn-like verse that exalts the glory of God. Older English translations of the Bible, based on late Byzantine Greek manuscripts, included it, but it is absent in the oldest manuscripts and is not considered to be part of the original text of Matthew 6:9–13. The translators of the 1611 King James Bible assumed that a Greek manuscript they possessed was ancient and therefore adopted the text into the Lord's Prayer of the Gospel of Matthew. The use of the doxology in English dates from at least 1549 with the First Prayer Book of Edward VI which was influenced by William Tyndale's New Testament translation in 1526.
In the Byzantine Rite, whenever a priest is officiating, after the Lord's Prayer he intones this augmented form of the doxology, "For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory: of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto ages of ages.", and in either instance, reciter of the prayer reply "Amen".
The Catholic Latin liturgical rites have never attached the doxology to the end of the Lord's Prayer. The doxology does appear in the Roman Rite Mass as revised in 1969. After the conclusion of the Lord's Prayer, the priest says a prayer known as the embolism. In the official International Commission on English in the Liturgy English translation, the embolism reads: "Deliver us, Lord, we pray, from every evil, graciously grant peace in our days, that, by the help of your mercy, we may be always free from sin and safe from all distress, as we await the blessed hope and the coming of our Saviour, Jesus Christ." This elaborates on the final petition, "Deliver us from evil." The people then respond to this with the doxology: "For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever."