epiousios (ἐπιούσιος)
- Language: Greek
- Romanized: epiousios
- Original script: ἐπιούσιος
- Gloss: daily, necessary, coming-day, or supersubstantial
The disputed word in the Lord’s Prayer petition for bread, treated in Our Daily Bread. It appears only in Matthew and Luke’s versions of the prayer, and ancient readers already struggled to translate it — a difficulty that opens the door to the entire textual argument.
Concordance Aid
Reading Note
Example passages: Matthew 6:11; Luke 11:3; Jerome’s Vulgate renderings; the Gospel according to the Hebrews fragment.
Epiousios is the word that refuses to sit still. Ancient translators could hear daily bread, necessary bread, coming-day bread, or bread with a deeper theological weight. That uncertainty is not clutter around the petition; it is part of the petition’s history.
Translation Range
Daily, necessary, for the coming day, essential, supersubstantial. Nearby interpretive words include Latin quotidianum, supersubstantialem, and crastinum.
Not To Be Confused With
Epiousios is not simply a standard Greek word for “daily.” The familiar English wording is an interpretive settlement, not a transparent lexical fact.
Translator’s Choice
This is the central translator’s choice in the Lord’s Prayer. “Daily” emphasizes present dependence; “necessary” emphasizes need; “coming-day” or “tomorrow’s” emphasizes kingdom hope; “supersubstantial” emphasizes theological and sacramental reception.
Modern Caution
Do not use the disputed word to make a modern nutrition claim. Its force is textual, devotional, and theological before it is ever useful for thinking about modern food habits.
Related entries
- Ton Arton Hemon Ton Epiousion — the full Matthean petition
- Quotidianum — Jerome’s Lucan rendering (“daily”)
- Supersubstantialem — Jerome’s Matthean rendering (“supersubstantial”)
- Mahar — the reported Aramaic reading (“tomorrow”)
- Crastinum — Jerome’s Latin gloss for the mahar reading