Concerning Prayer – Matthew 6:5-15

Concerning Retaliation

5 “And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. 6 But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

7 “When you are praying, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard because of their many words.

8  Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

9     “Pray then in this way:

          Our Father in heaven,

          hallowed be your name.

10        Your kingdom come.

             Your will be done,

             on earth as it is in heaven.

11        Give us this day our daily bread.

12         And forgive us our debts,

              as we also have forgiven our debtors.

13        And do not bring us to the time of trial,

but rescue us from the evil one.” 14  For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you;  15 but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

What to do with this educator’s commentary

This commentary invites you as a teacher to engage with and interpret the passage. Allow the text to speak first. The commentary suggests that you ask yourself various questions that will aid your interpretation. They will help you answer for yourself the question in the last words of the text: ‘what does this mean?’

This educator’s commentary is not a ‘finished package’. It is for your engagement with the text. You then go on to plan how you enable your students to work with the text.

Both you and your students are the agents of interpretation. The ‘Worlds of the Text’ offer a structure, a conversation between the worlds of the author and the setting of the text; the world of the text; and the world of reader. In your personal reflection and in your teaching all three worlds should be integrated as they rely on each other.

In your teaching you are encouraged to ask your students to engage with the text in a dialogical way, to explore and interpret it, to share their own interpretation and to listen to that of others before they engage with the way the text might relate to a topic or unit of work being studied.

Structure of the commentary:

The World Behind the Text

See general introduction to Matthew.

The World of the Text

Text & textual features

This text is in the section on the Early Galilean Ministry (Matthew 4:12 – 10:42) and is part of the Great Sermon of Ch 5-7. It falls in the middle of the middle – within a section entitled ‘righteousness in acts directed to God’ (Byrne, p. 54). The passage begins with a clear set of contrasting statements – in the form of a set of instructions: when you…don’t do…instead…

The text is very graphic and dramatic : ‘do not stand at street corners to pray where one will be seen by others, but go into your room and shut the door’, ‘do not heap up empty phrases in prayer’, although here it is the Gentiles (non-Jews) whose behaviour is to be avoided.

Matthew says Jesus calls God ‘Father’ in each of the elements of this passage – ‘pray to your Father’, ‘your Father knows what you need’, pray to ‘Our Father’, and the Father will forgive. This use of ‘father’ can be seen as natural in the patriarchal culture in Jesus’ time, it also avoids Matthew needing to use the term ‘God’ forbidden in his Jewish community.

The instruction on how to pray (v 9-13) contains seven petitions.

The verses of the prayer are similar to a Jewish prayer used in the synagogue liturgy called Avinu Malkeinu, which means ‘Our Father Our King.’

In the verses after this passage Jesus will go on to extend his teaching on relationships to include loving your enemies and praying for those who persecute you (Mt 5:43-44)

Characters & Setting

Jesus and the disciples are on the mountain, where Jesus ‘sat down’ and taught them (5:1-2).

Jesus is the Teacher and Interpreter of the Torah – and this text (6:5-15) addresses one of the three areas traditionally associated with religious practice – almsgiving, prayer and fasting.  These practices have become the standard Lenten practices within Catholicism.

While ‘hypocrite’ was used to describe an actor with a mask which conveyed a particular character, Matthew uses it to describe the insincere or ‘showy’ actions of some in the community. For Jesus this behaviour was to be avoided at all costs.

Ideas/phrases/concepts

This text is part of a long section on Jesus teaching his disciples – and carries evidence of difficulties with the local Jewish community.

Praying to the Father is not a matter of using lots of words, ‘empty phrases’, to persuade God of one’s need.

The first part of the prayer is about acknowledging God, and the second part is about our behaviour.

The prayer begins by talking about God – it calls God ‘Our Father’. Calling God ‘Our Father’ we remember two things: that God is ‘our’ God: a God for all people, and that God is like the perfect father – loving and protecting us.

To pray to God as ‘our Father’ is to be very aware of our relationship with Jesus. Christian prayer is the prayer of Jesus drawing his disciples with him towards God (p. 110, Fallon, Matthew).

The prayer tells us that God’s name is holy. Jew do not say God’s name; when they come to God’s name in the Bible they say Adonai, which means Lord, or Ha Shem, which mean ‘the name’.

The prayer then has a list of petitions (prayers that ask for something – see above).

(ii) Geography:

The Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5-7) takes place on a mountain in Galilee. It is unlikely that this siting is historically accurate as Matthew has gathered the saying together to frame his writing. Today the Sermon on the Mount is remembered on the Mount of the Beatitudes on the north west shore of the Sea of Galilee. The Church of the Beatitudes is at its summit.

The significance of Matthew placing this teaching block on a mountain should not be overlooked: it continues to allude to Jesus as the new Moses. Just as Moses gave the Israelites the 10 commandments, so now Jesus is giving a new law.

Given the rural setting for the ‘Sermon on the Mount,’ it is appropriate to consider that those gathered around him are the poor villagers in the area: farmers, fishers and their families, along with those who follow Jesus throughout his ministry. 

Questions for the teacher:

World in Front of the Text

Questions for the teacher:

Meaning for today/challenges

The prayer has a strongly masculine sense of God. This can be uncomfortable but Jesus could not have used anything other than a masculine title for God, given the patriarchal society he grew up in.

What do we do to bring about the ‘kingdom’? do we try to make a place for all?

How do we go about obtaining our ‘daily’ bread – what we need for the day, rather than stocking up, and perhaps having others miss out.

In the petition about forgiving debts, do we realise that this is conditional on being able to forgive others and reconcile?

Can we acknowledge our weakness and remember our total dependence on God? We need protection from the evil one and the powers of evil.

Church interpretation and usage

Prayer should be sincere, personal communion with God, and it should be brief because it is for our good, not God’s, since God already knows what we need.

This passage is used in the liturgy on Ash Wednesday, one of the days in Lent, and in 11^th week in Ordinary time on Year 1.

The ‘Our Father’ or Lord’s Prayer is an element of the Eucharistic liturgy, as part of the communion rite. It is a prayer in its own right, and part of the formal prayers used to recite and meditate on the mysteries of the rosary – essentially the events in the life of Jesus.

It is also said by other Christian denominations so connects us to all those who call Jesus, the Christ.