Passage

Matthew 6.12

Book: Matthew · ASV

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV (ASV)

"10. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth. 11. Give us this day our daily bread."

"12. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors."

"13. And bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. 14. For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you." (Matthew 6:10-14, ASV)

WEB (WEB)

"10. Let your Kingdom come. Let your will be done, as in heaven, so on earth. 11. Give us today our daily bread."

"12. Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors."

"13. Bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the Kingdom, the power, and the glory forever. Amen.’ 14. “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you." (Matthew 6:10-14, WEB)

KJV (KJV)

"10. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. 11. Give us this day our daily bread."

"12. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors."

"13. 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. 14. For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you:" (Matthew 6:10-14, KJV)

YLT (YLT)

"10. 'Thy reign come: Thy will come to pass, as in heaven also on the earth. 11. 'Our appointed bread give us to-day."

"12. 'And forgive us our debts, as also we forgive our debtors."

"13. 'And mayest Thou not lead us to temptation, but deliver us from the evil, because Thine is the reign, and the power, and the glory, to the ages. Amen. 14. 'For, if ye may forgive men their trespasses He also will forgive you, your Father who [is] in the heavens;" (Matthew 6:10-14, YLT)

Setting

Speaker: Jesus, teaching the disciples the model prayer within the Sermon on the Mount
Audience: the disciples (proximately) and the larger crowd (Mt 5:1; 7:28)
Location: the mountain in Galilee where the Sermon on the Mount is delivered
Time period: early in the Galilean ministry, c. AD 28-29

Theological reading

Matthew 6:12 is the forgiveness petition of the Lord's Prayer, deploying the verb [[G0863 - aphiemi|aphiēmi]] (G863), "to forgive, release, send away", under a debt-metaphor that the immediate sequel (vv. 14-15) and the parallel parable (Matt 18:21-35) develop into a covenantal structure of mutual remission. The petition is two-clause: a request (aphes hēmin ta opheilēmata hēmōn, "forgive us our debts") and a warrant (hōs kai hēmeis aphēkamen tois opheiletais hēmōn, "as we have forgiven our debtors").

The warrant-clause is not a transactional bribe, the disciple does not earn divine forgiveness by forgiving others, but a diagnostic: the disciple who has truly received divine forgiveness will extend it; the disciple who refuses to extend it has not yet received it in the way it was given (cf. the unmerciful servant of Matt 18:23-35, who is judged precisely on this failure). Jesus's own gloss in vv. 14-15 confirms the reciprocity is constitutive, not optional: "if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if you forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."

The Lucan parallel (Lk 11:4) substitutes hamartias ("sins") for Matthew's opheilēmata ("debts"), proving the two terms are interchangeable in Jesus's idiom, Matthew preserves the debt-metaphor that Luke renders explicit. The lexical choice underwrites the entire NT theology of forgiveness as remission-of-debt, which the Pauline summary at Eph 1:7 / Col 1:14 takes up via the noun-cognate aphesis.

Key words

G0863 - aphiemi, aphiēmi, the load-bearing verb. The petition and the warrant use the same lexeme, lexically locking together divine and human forgiveness.
opheilēma (G3783), "debt, what is owed", the metaphor through which Matthew frames the offense.

Quoted in

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.