The Lord's Prayer survives in two New Testament forms that scholars have long compared: Matthew's longer version, set within the Sermon on the Mount, and Luke's shorter version, given in response to a direct request from the disciples to be taught to pray. The differences, including Matthew's additional petitions and closing doxology, which most textual scholars regard as a later liturgical addition rather than part of the original text, have made the prayer a standard case study in how the Gospels transmit sayings of Jesus with variation in wording and length rather than as a single fixed quotation.
Structurally, the prayer moves from an address to God as Father through a series of petitions concerning God's name, kingdom and will, then to human need for provision, forgiveness and protection, a movement from praise to petition that later Christian liturgists frequently treated as a model for prayer generally. Its Aramaic substratum, argued for by many scholars on the basis of its rhythm and vocabulary, situates its earliest form in Jesus's own spoken teaching even though it survives only in Greek manuscript transmission. The doxology added to Matthew's version in some manuscripts, for thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, echoes liturgical language found elsewhere in Second Temple Jewish prayer, which is part of why most scholars treat it as an early liturgical addition drawn from surrounding Jewish practice rather than as an interpolation invented without precedent.