Lord's Prayer in Aramaic
Many people want to pray the Our Father in something close to the language Jesus spoke. The text below is the prayer in Syriac — a form of Aramaic — with the script, a transliteration to help you read it aloud, and a plain English meaning. We tell you exactly where it comes from, and we keep the translation honest rather than poetic.
Working with a passage of your own? Aramaic translator translates Classical Syriac (Aramaic) both ways.
Prayer in Classical Syriac (Aramaic)
Matthew 6:9b-13
Transliteration
How to say it
What it means in English
Our Father who is in heaven; may your name be sanctified. May your kingdom come; may your will be done, as in heaven, also on earth. Give us the bread of our need today. Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. Do not bring us into trial, but deliver us from evil, because yours is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever.
The familiar wording (KJV 1611, Matthew 6:9-13, aligned to the Peshitta prayer text shown here):
Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.
A few things worth knowing
- This is the Syriac Peshitta form of Matthew 6:9b-13. Syriac is an Aramaic language, but this is not a recovered recording of the exact Galilean Aramaic Jesus spoke.
- The page begins with the prayer itself, not Matthew's introductory words, 'After this manner therefore pray ye.'
- Popular 'Abwoon' devotional paraphrases, especially expansive renderings such as 'Father-Mother of the Cosmos,' are modern interpretive paraphrases, not literal translations of this Peshitta text.
- The Peshitta line shown includes the doxology, 'for yours is the kingdom, the power, and the glory,' which is absent from some critical Greek editions but present in the Syriac line displayed here.
Why "Aramaic" means Syriac here
Jesus spoke a form of Aramaic, but no one wrote down his exact words in his own dialect. What has survived, and what the Eastern churches have prayed for nearly two thousand years, is the prayer in Syriac — a closely related Aramaic language. That is the text we show: a real, attested form of the prayer in Aramaic, not a modern guess at first-century Galilean speech.
The opening words
The prayer opens ܐܒܘܢ ܕܒܫܡܝܐ — Abun d-bashmaya, "Our Father who is in heaven." You may also see it written Abwoon d'bwashmaya in chant and song; that is the same line, just spelled to match how it is sung. What matters most is that the English beside it stays faithful to what the words actually say.
Where this text comes from
We use Syriac Peshitta, Matthew 6:9b-13, unpointed text in the BFBS/1905 Peshitta tradition, a public-domain edition, so the wording here is stable and free to read, copy, and share. You can check the source for yourself.
More prayers and verses in their original languages
Frequently Asked Questions
- Is the Lord's Prayer in Aramaic the exact language Jesus spoke?
- No. The text shown here is Classical Syriac from the Peshitta, an Aramaic-language Christian tradition. It is close to the Aramaic family of Jesus' world, but it is not a verbatim recording of Galilean Aramaic pronunciation.
- What does Abun d-bashmaya mean?
- It means 'Our Father who is in heaven.' Abun means 'our father,' and d-bashmaya means 'who is in heaven' or 'in the heavens.'
- Is the 'Father-Mother of the Cosmos' version literal?
- No. That is a modern devotional paraphrase associated with mystical readings of the prayer. It may be meaningful to some readers, but it is not a literal translation of the Peshitta Syriac.