Matthew 6.11 – Our Daily Bread

“Give us this day our daily bread.”

Matthew 6.11

Matthew 6.11 uses a word – epiousion, that appears nowhere else in other Greek texts outside of the Bible (see Luke 11.3), and was probably created by the author of Matthew to teach an idea to his audience that they would have understood but that is lost to modern readers.

Matthew 6.11 Τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον·

Τὸν ἄρτον= the bread (Accusative/Sing/Masc); ἡμῶν= our (Genitive/Plural) τὸν ἐπιούσιον = ἐπι (upon)+ οὖσαν =participle of εἰμί= “being” translators have chosen to go with appropriate to what is “coming on” (happening), i.e. suitable (apt) for the coming day. See: https://biblehub.com/greek/1967.htm

δὸς=give (second person singular imperative of δίδωμι didomi);  ἡμῖν =to us (dative/plural); σήμερον=today

οὖσαν = present participle of εἰμί eimi = “to be, to exist”

Translations of Matthew 6.11:

Τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον.

The bread of us the epiousion give to us today.

Give us today our epiousion bread.

Give us today the bread, the “being upon” bread.

Reading Matthew 6.11 makes more sense if we understand that the author of Matthew had a Jewish background and used Jewish texts from the Hebrew Bible to make his point. Reading the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, the Septuagint, can be helpful here. One reference that is important is the text where Yahweh/Jehovah makes his name known to Moses when Moses asks God what name he should tell the Israelites when they ask him the name of the God that has come to liberate them from Pharaoh.

Exodus 3.14 Septuagint

καὶ εἶπεν ὁ θεὸς πρὸς Μωυσῆν ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ ὤν καὶ εἶπεν οὕτως ἐρεῗς τοῗς υἱοῗς Ισραηλ ὁ ὢν ἀπέσταλκέν με πρὸς ὑμᾶς

καὶ εἶπεν ὁ θεὸς πρὸς Μωυσῆν=And God said to Moses; ἐγώ εἰμι = I am; ὁ ὤν = the being – ὤν is the present participle of εἰμι – “to be/to exist”; καὶ εἶπεν οὕτως=and he said in this manner/thus; ἐρεῗς=say; τοῗς υἱοῗς Ισραηλ= to the sons of Israel; ὁ ὢν=the being; ἀπέσταλκέν με πρὸς ὑμᾶς= has sent me to you all.

Translation: And God said to Moses, I am THE EXISTING (the being One), and he said, thus tell the sons of Israel, THE EXISTING One has sent me to you all.

Reading the Greek helps us to see that by using the participle of eimi, both the writer of Matthew 6.11 and the author/translator of Exodus 3.14 are speaking about the same idea, that this bread that we are asking God for is connected to the God that spoke to Moses in the desert all those years ago. We are to ask God for the epiousion bread, or rather, the “Yahweh bread,” the bread that has his being upon it, so that we might have life.