What Does Matthew 6:12 Mean in the King James?
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
Forgiveness here is release: the prayer places letting go of what others owe alongside asking to be released ourselves.
THE MEANING
The prayer names wrongdoing as debt, a claim that can be released. The reader asks for that release while acknowledging the release extended to those who owe them.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a claim must remain attached to the person who incurred it: a debt can be released without denying that it was owed.
THE ROOT
ἄφες
aphes
GROWS FROM
ἀφίημι
aphiēmi
To send away, leave, or release.
The Greek verb translated “forgive” carries the sense of letting go or sending away. The prayer uses this same verb for the release requested for oneself and the release extended to debtors, joining both acts in one image.
ALSO GROWS
aphesis: Release, remission, forgiveness.
ἄφεσις
This noun makes the connection explicit: forgiveness can name the release of a claim.
apheinai: To let go, leave, or release.
ἀφεῖναι
This form from the same verb family keeps the act concrete: what is held can be let go.
THE PATTERN
Wholeness advances when a claim is released and the person bound by it is set free.
And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubile unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family.The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.THE THREAD
Then the lord of that servant was moved with compassion, and loosed him, and forgave him the debt.The lord releases the very debt owed to him, using the same Greek verb family translated “forgive” here. The debt is real, yet its claim is let go and the debtor is released.
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