I have long been fascinated by the challenge of translating poetry from other languages into English. Often when this is done the poetic meter is lost, and with it much of its feeling and emotion. Jesus spoke Aramaic but his sayings were translated into the Greek in common use at the time. Translated back into first century Aramaic it is often found to have been memorable poetry.

What follows is my best attempt at keeping both the meter and the rhyme of the Aramaic Lord’s prayer without losing the meaning. The actual rhyme sounds are different – for example the ‘dear’, ‘here’ and ‘revered’ rhymes were ‘…mak’, ‘…thek’ and ‘…nek’ in the original. The layout is my own, to show how it flows.

Father of heaven
…may your name be held dear,
…your kingdom come here,
…your will be revered,
as in your heaven
so in Earth.

And let us plead
for enough bread
for our day’s need.

Forgive all we owe,
as we forgive those,
those debtors of ours.

From testing
keep us;
from evil
protect us.

The final words acknowledging the eternal kingdom, power and glory of God are probably a later addition, lacking the Aramaic feel and rhymes.