Matthew 6:13

Sixth petition : consists of two members, one qualifying or limiting the other. μὴ … πειρασμόν, expose us not to moral trial. All trial is of doubtful issue, and may therefore naturally and innocently be shrunk from, even by those who know that the result may be good, confirmation in faith and virtue. The prayer is certainly in a different key from the Beatitude in Matthew 5:10. There Jesus sets before the disciple a heroic temper as the ideal. But here He does not assume the disciple to have attained. The Lord's Prayer is not merely for heroes, but for the timid, the inexperienced. The teacher is considerate, and allows time for reaching the heights of heroism on which St. James stood when he wrote (Matthew 1:2) πᾶσαν χαρὰν ἡγήσασθε, ἀδελφοί μου, ὅταν πειρασμοῖς περιπέσητε ποικίλοις. ἀλλὰ, not purely adversative, cancelling previous clause, but confirming it and going further (Schanz, in accordance with original meaning of ἀλλὰ, derived from ἄλλο or ἄλλα, and signifying that what is going to be said is another thing, aliud, in relation to what has been said, Klotz, Devar. ii., p. 2) = Lead us not into temptation, or so lead us that we may be safe from evil: may the issue ever be beneficent. ῥῦσαι ἀπὸ, not ἐκ; the latter would imply actual implication in, the former implies danger merely. Both occur in N. T. (on the difference cf. Kamphausen, Das G. des H.). τοῦ πονηροῦ, either masculine or neuter, which? Here again there is an elaborate debate on a comparatively unimportant question. The probability is in favour of the masculine, the evil one. The Eastern naturally thought of evil in the concrete. But we as naturally think of it in the abstract; therefore the change from A. V [39] in R. V [40] is unfortunate. It mars the reality of the Lord's Prayer on Western lips to say, deliver us from the evil one. Observe it is moral evil, not physical, that is deprecated. ὅτι σοῦ ἐστιν … Αμήν : a liturgical ending, no part of the original prayer, and tending to turn a religious reality into 2 devotional form.

[39] Authorised Version.

[40] Revised Version.

On Matthew 6:14-15 vide under Matthew 6:12.