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9 The connecting “then” indicates that the following words will express the
trust in a heavenly Father which has been stated in vv. 7–8 to be the basis of
true prayer. The instruction is addressed to the disciples corporately, and
the whole prayer will be phrased in the plural. It is the prayer of a
community rather than an individual act of devotion, even though its
pattern would also appropriately guide the secret prayers in the store-room
(v. 6).
The simple “Father” with which Luke’s version of the prayer begins reflects the
Aramaic vocative ʾabbāʾ which was Jesus’ distinctive approach to God in prayer
(in this gospel see 11:25, 26, and for the Aramaic term see Mark 14:36), which
his disciples were subsequently privileged to share (Rom 8:15; Gal 4:6).⁵
Matthew’s addition of “our” makes the echo of the form ʾabbāʾ less obvious, but
the implication of privileged access to God is equally clear.⁵⁷ For God as the
heavenly Father of disciples see, within this discourse, 5:16, 45, 48; 6:1, 4, 6, 8,
14–15, 18, 26, 32; 7:11. The same language will recur more rarely in the rest of
the gospel (10:20, 29; 13:43; 23:9) and instead from 7:21 onward Jesus will
speak frequently of God as his own Father in a way which seems to exclude
others from that special relationship (notably in 11:25–27, see comments there),
and which correlates to the title “(my) Son” applied uniquely to Jesus from 2:15
and 3:17 on. When Jesus prays to God as “Father” (11:25, 26) it is sometimes
explicitly as “my Father” (26:39, 42; Jesus speaks of God as “my Father” a
further 14 times in Matthew) and never in the form “our Father” which he here
teaches his disciples to use. Here are the raw materials for a theological system
which posits a unique filial relationship for Jesus and a derivative relationship
for God’s other “children” into which Jesus introduces them (cf. 11:27) but in
which he does not share with them on the same level. While such a doctrine may
be more fully developed from other parts of the NT, Matthew is content to allow
it to emerge by implication from his usage. But it is primarily here, in the
discourse on discipleship, that this privileged status of the disciples emerges, and
in the family prayer which is at the heart of the discourse it is most appropriately
expressed as their corporate address to God. In well over half the references to
“your Father” in the discourse “in heaven” or “heavenly” is added. It not only
underlines the metaphorical nature of the concept, but also prescribes the
disciple’s attitude to God: he is on the one hand all-powerful and therefore
completely to be trusted but on the other hand to be approached with the
reverence which the following clauses of the prayer will express.
The first three clauses of the Lord’s Prayer are expressed as third-person
imperatives, two of them passive. In a prayer such an imperative is in effect a
plea for God’s action to bring about the desired state of affairs, hence Hagner’s
paraphrastic version using second-person imperatives: “Set apart your holy
name; Bring your eschatological kingdom; Cause your will to be fulfilled.”
(Hagner, 1.144) But perhaps something is lost when the third-person form is
concealed, since the hallowing of God’s name, the acceptance of his kingship
and the doing of his will involve human response (including that of the ones
praying). To speak as Hagner does simply of “the divine passive” runs the
danger of obscuring this human dimension, even though of course the point of
including these wishes in a prayer is that it is by God’s intervention that they are
to be fulfilled.
God’s “name” is a recurrent OT term for God himself as he is perceived and
honored by people. It is frequently described as “holy” (Ps 30:4; 97:12; 103:1;
111:9 etc.) since holiness is a prime characteristic of God himself. The present
clause is not then a request that it be made holy, as the traditional translation
“hallowed” properly means—it is holy already. Rather it is that people may
recognize and acknowledge its holiness, by giving God the reverence which is
his due; cf. Isa 29:23 where to “keep God’s name holy” is further explained by
“stand in awe of the God of Israel.” Compare the concern of the prophets that
God’s name should not be profaned as a result of his people’s sinful behavior
and its punishment (Ezek 20:8–9; 36:20–23; cf. Isa 48:11; 52:5–6). This clause
then is not merely a petition that people in general may come to acknowledge
God, but is itself an expression of that reverence which his holiness requires.
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