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RESEARCH PRODUCT

The Text of the Lord’s Prayer in Marcion’s Gospel

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description

In text-critical studies of the Lukan version of the Lord’s Prayer (Lk 11,2-4), one of the most interesting, and at the same time most problematic, witnesses is Marcion’s Gospel. Scholarship for much of the twentieth century has generally followed the reconstruction of Adolf von Harnack in his magisterial work on Marcion: ... πάτeρ, (έλθάτω) τό άγιον πνeύμα (σου έφ’ ή μας και καθαρισάτω ημάς)* έλθάτω ή βασιλeία σου* τον άρτον σου τον έπιούσιον δίδου ήμίν τό καθ’ ημέραν, (και) άφeς ήμιν τάς άμαρτίας (ήμών) ... (και) μή άφeς ημάς eίσeνeχθήναι eις πeιρασμόν.1 As a result, it has more or less been assumed that this was the wording of the Lord’s Prayer in Marcion’s text.2 A major problem with this assumption, however, is that numerous of these readings are questionable at best. Despite valuable contributions by Joel Delobel and Ulrich Schmid discussing individual elements in Marcion’s text of the Lord’s Prayer,3 considerable lack of clarity remains concerning Marcion’s testi-