Bible Lexicons

ἐπιούσιος, ἐπιούσιον, a word found only in Matthew 6:11 and Luke 11:3, in the phrase ἄρτος ἐπιούσιος ([Peshitta] Syriac oNQNSd 4MXL [] the bread of our necessity, i. e. necessary for us (but the Curetonian (earlier) Syriac reads )NYM) [] continual; cf. Lightfoot as below, I. 3, p. 214ff; Taylor, Sayings of the Jewish Fathers, p. 139f); Itala (Old Latin)panis quotidianus). Origen testifies (de orat. 27) that the word was not in use in ordinary speech, and accordingly seems to have been coined by the Evangelists themselves. Many commentators, as Beza, Kuinoel, Tholuck, Ewald, Bleek, Keim, Cremer, following Origen, Jerome (who in Matt. only translates by the barbarous phrasepanis supersubstantialis), Theophylact, Euthymius Zigabenus, explain the word by bread for sustenance, which serves to sustain life, deriving the word from οὐσία, after the analogy of ἐξουσιος, ἐνουσιος. But οὐσία very rarely, and only in philosophic language, is equivalent to ὕπαρξις, as in Plato, Theact., p. 185 c. (app. to τό μή εἶναι), Aristotle, de part. anim. i. 1 (ἡ γάρ γένεσις ἕνεκα τῆς οὐσίας ἐστιν, ἀλλ' οὐχ ἡ οὐσία ἕνεκα τῆς γενέσεως; for other examples see Bonitz's Index to Aristotle, p. 544), and generally denotes either essence, real nature, or substance, property, resources. On this account Leo Meyer (in Kuhn, Zeitschr. f. vergleich. Sprachkunde, vii., pp. 401-430), Kamphausen (Gebet des Herrn, pp. 86-102), with whom Keim (ii. 278f. (English translation, iii. 340)), Weiss (Matthew, the passage cited), Delitzsch (Zeitschr. f. d. luth. Theol. 1876, p. 402), agree, prefer to derive the word from ἐπειναι (and in particular from the participle ἐπων, ἐπουσιος for ἐποντιος, see below) to be present, and to understand it bread which is ready at hand or suffices, so that Christ is conjectured to have said in Chaldean דְּחֻקָּנָא לַחְמָא (cf. חֻקִּי לֶחֶם my allowance of bread, Proverbs 30:8) or something of the sort. But this opinion, like the preceding, encounters the great objection (to mention no other) that, although the iota ἰ in ἐπί is retained before a vowel in certain words (as ἐπίορκος, ἐπιορκέω, ἐπιόσσομαι, etc. (cf. Lightfoot, as below, I. § 1)), yet in ἐπειναι and words derived from it, ἐπουσια, ἐπουσιωδης, it is always elided. Therefore much more correctly do Grotius, Scaliger, Wetstein, Fischer (De vitiis lexamples etc., p. 306ff), Valckenaer, Fritzsche (on Matthew, p. 267ff), Winer (97 (92)), Bretschneider, Wahl, Meyer (Lightfoot (Revision etc., Appendix)) and others, comparing the words ἑκούσιος, ἐθελούσιος, γερούσιος (from ἑκών, ἐθελων, γέρων, for ἑκοντιος, ἐθελοντιος, γεροντιος, cf. Kühner, 1: § 63, 3 and § 334, 1 Anm. 2), conjecture that the adjective ἐπιούσιος is formed from ἐπιών, ἐπιοῦσα, with reference to the familiar expression ἡ ἐπιοῦσα (see ἄπειμι), and ἄρτος ἐπιούσιος is equivalent to ἄρτος τῆς ἐπιουσης ἡμέρας, food for the morrow, i. e. necessary or sufficient food. Thus, ἐπιούσιον, and σήμερον, admirably answer to each other, and that state of mind is portrayed which, piously contented with food sufficing from one day to the next, in praying to God for sustenance does not go beyond the absolute necessity of the nearest future. This explanation is also recommended by the fact that in the Gospel according to the Hebrews, as Jerome testifies, the word ἐπιούσιος was represented by the Aramaic מְחַר, quod dicitur crastinus; hence, it would seem that Christ himself used the Chaldaic expression לִמְחַר דִי לַחְמָא. Nor is the prayer, so understood, at variance with the mind of Christ as expressed in Matthew 6:34, but on the contrary harmonizes with it finely; for his hearers are bidden to ask of God, in order that they may themselves be relieved of anxiety for the morrow. (See Lightfoot, as above, pp. 195-234; McClellan, The New Testament, etc., pp. 632-647; Tholuck, Bergpredigt, Matthew, the passage cited, for earlier references.)