amen

Forms

āmēn (not comparable)^[1] It is indeclinable.^[2][3] Ausonius and Prudentius scan it with a long first vowel, Paulinus of Nola with a short one.^[4][2] Medieval spellings include amhn and amin.^[5]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Koine Greek ἀμήν (amḗn, “truly, so be it”), borrowed from Biblical Hebrew אָמֵן (ʾāmēn, “truly, so be it”).^[1][6][3] Cognate with Aramaic אַמִין (ʾamīn), Classical Syriac ܐܰܡܺܝܢ (ʾamīn) and Arabic آمِين (ʔāmīn).^[1] The 9th-century writer Walahfrid Strabo already noted that Greeks, Latins and barbarians had borrowed it from the Hebrews.^[5][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first author is Tertullian, who speaks of “the mouth with which you have uttered amen to the Holy One”.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The Church Fathers explained it rather than translate it: Ambrose glosses it as “it is true”, and Jerome notes that Aquila rendered it as “faithfully” and the Septuagint, at the end of the psalms, as “so be it”.^[3] In the Vulgate the people answer amen, Christ begins sayings with amen dico vobis, doubled in John, and doxologies close with it.^[4][3] The Vulgate also uses it, after the Hebrew, as an adjective “faithful” and a noun “truth”, and in Revelation as a name, “He that is True”.^[4] It appears at the end of Christian epitaphs.^[3]

In the Middle Ages it closed prayers, books, poems, letters and charters, and was used as a noun, “the amen”.^[5][7] Roger Bacon distinguished three uses: an adverb meaning “truly”, a noun meaning “without defect”, which he derived from a supposed ⟨a⟩ “without” and ⟨menos⟩ “defect”, and a verb meaning “let it be”.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 160–220 AD – Tertullian writes of saying amen.^[3][6]
• c. 310–394 AD – Ausonius ends a verse with it, with a long first vowel.^[3][4][6]
• 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses it as a response, in Christ's sayings and in doxologies.^[4][3][6]
• 2nd quarter of the 9th century – Walahfrid Strabo explains its Hebrew origin.^[5][6]

Meanings

Adverb

1. So be it (in answer to, or at the end of, a prayer or blessing).^[4][5][8]
2. Truly, verily: amen dīcō vōbīs, “verily I say to you”.^[4][3]

Noun

1. (Vulgate) Truth, faithfulness; as a name, He that is True.^[4]
2. (Medieval Latin) The word amen itself; the closing amen.^[5]

Related words

• English amen

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d e f Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
8. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson