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On the Sacraments

St Ambrose of Milan, tr. Thompson, 1919

Book 5, 4. Exposition of the Lord’s Prayer

Now, what remains save prayer? And think not that it is a matter of little worth, to know how to pray. The holy Apostles said to the Lord Jesus: Lord teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.¹ Then the Lord says a prayer, Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name; thy kingdom come; thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth. Give us this day our daily² bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors. And let us not be led into temptation,³ but deliver us from evil. Thou seest how short the prayer is and full of all excellencies! What grace in the first word!

O man, thou didst not dare to raise thy face to heaven, thou didst direct thine eyes to the earth, and suddenly thou didst receive the grace of Christ; all thy sins were forgiven. From a bad servant thou becamest a good son. Therefore be bold, not because of thy own action, but because of the grace of Christ. For by grace are ye saved,⁴ says the Apostle. Therefore there is no arrogance here, but faith; to proclaim what thou hast received is not pride, but devotion. Therefore raise thy eyes to the Father who has begotten thee through the laver, to the Father who has redeemed thee through the Son, and say Our Father. A good boldness⁵ that, but modest. Thou calledst him “Father” as a son; but do not claim anything specifically for thyself. He is the Father of Christ alone specially, he is Father of us all in common, because he begot him alone, us he created. Therefore say thou also through grace, Our Father, that thou mayest deserve to be a son. Commend thyself by fixing thy looks and regards on the Church.⁶

Our Father, which art in heaven. What is in heaven? Hear the scripture saying: The Lord is high above all heavens. And everywhere thou findest it written that the Lord is above the heaven of heavens,⁷ as if there were not in heaven angels too, as if there were not in heaven dominations too,⁸ but in those heavens of which it was said: The heavens declare the glory of God.⁹ Heaven is there where guilt hath ceased, where crimes keep holiday. Heaven is where there is no stroke of death.

Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. What is hallowed? Is it as if we desired that he should be hallowed who says: Ye shall be holy, for I am holy,¹⁰ as if any hallowing could accrue to him from our prayer? Not at all. But may it be hallowed in us, that its hallowing may reach us.

Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come. As if the kingdom of God were not eternal. Jesus himself says: To this end was I born,¹¹ and dost thou say to the Father, Thy kingdom come, as if it had not come? But the kingdom of God then comes, when you have obtained his grace. For he himself says: The kingdom of God is within you.¹²

Thy kingdom come; thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth. Give us this day our daily bread. By the blood of Christ all things are set at peace, whether in heaven or on earth.¹³ Heaven is hallowed, the devil is cast down. The place of his resort is that place,¹⁴ where is also the man whom he has deceived. Thy will be done, etc., i. e. let there be peace on earth as in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread. I remember my sermon when I was dealing with the Sacraments.¹⁵ I said to you that before the words of Christ that which is offered is called bread: when the words of Christ have been uttered, it is no longer called bread, but is named body. Why then in the Lord’s Prayer, which follows afterwards, does he say: Our bread? He called it bread indeed, but he called it ἐπιούσιον,¹⁶ that is supersubstantial. It is not the bread which passes into the body, but that bread of eternal life,¹⁷ which supports the substance of our soul. Therefore in Greek it is called ἐπιούσιον. The Latin, however, calls this bread “daily” which the Greeks call “coming.” For the Greeks call the coming day τὴν ἐπιοῦσαν ἡμέραν. Therefore what the Latin and what the Greek text said seem both useful. The Greek indicated both in one expression,¹⁸ the Latin said “daily.”

If it is daily bread, why dost thou take it once a year,¹⁹ as the Greeks in the East are accustomed to do? Take daily what is to profit thee daily. So live that thou mayest deserve to receive it daily. He who does not deserve to receive it daily, does not deserve to receive it once a year; as holy Job offered sacrifice daily for his sons, lest perchance they should have done any sin in heart or word.²⁰ Therefore dost thou hear that as often as sacrifice is offered, the Lord’s death, the Lord’s resurrection, the Lord’s ascension and the remission of sins is signified,²¹ and dost thou not take this bread of life daily? He who has a wound needs a medicine. The wound is that we are under sin; the medicine is the heavenly and venerable sacrament.

Give us this day our daily bread. If thou receivest daily, “this day” is “daily” to thee. If Christ is for thee “this day,” he rises again for thee “daily.” How? Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.²² Therefore “this day” is when Christ rises again. Yesterday and to-day he himself is,²³ says the Apostle Paul. But in another place he says, The night is far spent, the day is at hand.²⁴ Yesternight is far spent, the present day is at hand.

There follows: Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors. What is the debt but sin? Therefore if thou hadst not borrowed money at interest, thou wouldst not now be in want; therefore sin is imputed to thee. Thou hast had money, wherewith thou wast born rich. Thou wast rich, being made in the image and likeness of God.²⁵ Thou hast lost what thou hadst, that is humility; whilst thou desirest to indicate thy pride, thou hast lost money, thou hast become naked as Adam,²⁶ thou hast accepted from the devil a debt which was not necessary. And therefore thou who wast free in Christ hast become a debtor to the devil. The enemy held thy bond, but the Lord crucified it, and blotted it out²⁷ with his blood. He took away thy debt, he restored thy liberty.

Well, therefore, does he say: And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors. Mark what thou sayest. As I forgive so do thou also forgive me. If thou hast forgiven, thou doest well in suing²⁸ that it be forgiven thee. If thou dost not forgive, how canst thou sue him, that it may be forgiven thee?

And let us not be led into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Mark what he says: And let us not be led into temptation which we cannot endure.²⁹ He doth not say: “Lead us not into temptation,” but as an athlete he wishes such a trial as human nature can bear: that each may be delivered from evil, that is from the foe, from sin.

But the Lord who has taken away your sin, and pardoned your faults, is mighty to defend and guard you against the wiles of the devil your adversary, that the foe who is wont to beget guilt may not creep upon you. But he who commits himself to God fears not the devil. For if God is for us, who is against us?³⁰ To him, therefore, be praise and glory from the ages and now, always, and for ever and ever.—Amen.

Notes

Lk. xi. 1.
quotidianum. So Vulgate in Lk., but supersubstantialem in Mt. (see § 24, note). In the following clause the author follows the version in Mt., reading debita (“debts”).
The Old Latin version of this clause; found in Cyprian, de Or. Dom. 7, and still earlier in Tertullian. See Introd. p. xli.
Eph. ii. 8.
praesumtio. For the idea cf. the prologue to the Lord’s prayer in the Roman Canon, audemus dicere (“we are bold to say”), which is found also in the Eastern rites, and is alluded to by Cyril of Jerusalem, Jerome, and others.
i. e. by using the words “Our Father,” which implies the Church, we commend ourselves as members of it.
In the former part of this passage the author has in mind Ps. cxiii. (cxii. Vulg.) 4, which is here freely rendered. The words “the Lord is above the heaven of heavens” appear to correspond to no single passage, but represent the sense of such passages as Ps. lvii. (lvi. Vulg.) 6; Ps. lxviii. 33 (lxvii. 34, Vulg.); 2 Chron. vi. 18 (cf. 2 Chron. ii. 6; 1 Kings viii. 27).
The passage is obscure, and the sense would be improved by reading “quasi non in caelis ubi et angeli, quasi non in caelis ubi et dominationes,” implying that He is not in the heavens where the angels are, but in the higher heaven. The emphasis is on the fact that the Lord is “above the heavens.”
Ps. xix. (xviii. Vulg.) 1.
Lev. xi. 44; xix. 2; xx. 7.
Jn. xviii. 37.
Lk. xvii. 21.
Cf. Col. i. 20.
Another reading is: ubi versatur? ubi et homo. “Where does he resort? There, where man is.”
Cf. iv. 4. 14, 19; iv. 5. 25.
The reference of ἐπιούσιος to οὐσία (“essence,” “being,” “existence”) is due to Origen (or one of his Alexandrian teachers), and descended from him to later commentators. The Old Latin Version (as all the older versions) adopts the other sense and renders quotidianum (“daily”). Jerome changed this to supersubstantialem in Mt., but retained quotidianum in Lk. The liturgical form is universally quotidianum. Cf. Lightfoot, On a fresh revision of the N. T. pp. 195 f. If the word supersubstantialis was due to Jerome, the fact furnishes a presumption that our author wrote after him. Here an Old Latin text of the prayer is used by the author; accordingly, quotidianum alone is recognized as the actual current reading (T.). Ambrose discusses the interpretation of the word, and gives Origen’s view in de Fide, iii. 15. 127. For Origen see de Orat. 27. The closest parallel, however, to this section is in Cyril of Jerusalem, Cat. xxiii. 15.
Cf. Jn. vi. 48-50.
The writer means that ἐπιούσιον is capable of a twofold interpretation. (1) “Bread which contributes to existence” (Origen), which the writer, like Origen, explains as that “which supports the substance of the soul.” (2) “Bread for the coming day” (τὴν ἐπιοῦσαν ἡμέραν), which in the Latin Version is represented by quotidianum (“daily”). This latter rendering leads him to speak of “daily communion.”
Similarly Augustine (de Serm. Dom. in monte, ii. 7. 26) complains that many in the East do not communicate daily, though our Lord speaks of “daily bread.” Chrysostom in several of his homilies complains of the neglect of communion at Constantinople, and in one passage (in Heb. xvii. 4) he asserts that many communicate once a year, others twice, others often. These strictures on Eastern practice may just possibly show an acquaintance on the part of the author with Chrysostom’s writings, in which case they are a further indication of the date of de Sacramentis. Ambrose (de Paenitentia, ii. 9. 89) similarly refers to those who abstain from communion.
Job i. 5.
The writer is probably referring to the Anamnesis, the words of which he has quoted above (iv. 6. 27). For elevatio of the “ascension” cf. Acts i. 9 (Vulg.); elevatus est.
Ps. ii. 7.
Heb. xiii. 8.
Rom. xiii. 12.
Gen. i. 26.
Gen. iii. 7.
Cf. Col. ii. 14.
bene convenis. Another reading is bene convenit, “it is right and proper that it be forgiven thee.”
Cf. 1 Cor. x. 13. The words quam ferre non possumus (“which we cannot endure”) here are explanatory, and not a part of the Lord’s Prayer, as the author quotes the full text of that prayer without them in v. 4. 18. But the words are found in some texts of the Lord’s Prayer, and are quoted by Jerome, Hilary, and Ps. Aug., Serm. lxxxiv. For the reading “let us not be led” (ne patiaris induci nos) see note on v. 4. 18.
Rom. viii. 31.