He Described Forgiveness as Conditioned on Forgiving
Jesus appended a condition to the Lord's Prayer — and only to that petition.
In the Lord's Prayer, Jesus teaches six petitions: hallowed name, coming kingdom, done will, daily bread, forgiven debts, and led not into temptation. Only one of these six petitions receives an immediate follow-up commentary attached to it in the prayer itself. After teaching the disciples to pray 'forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors,' Jesus does not elaborate on the bread petition, the kingdom petition, or the temptation petition. But he breaks the prayer open immediately after its close to re-examine exactly one line: the forgiveness clause. In Matthew 6, after the prayer ends, he says directly: 'For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.' No other petition from the Lord's Prayer is singled out for this kind of standalone amplification. Luke's version of the prayer similarly draws out the reciprocal condition on forgiveness. Across both accounts, forgiveness is the only petition that Jesus treats as requiring additional explanation and the only one he explicitly makes conditional. The bread does not come with a condition. The kingdom does not come with a condition. Forgiveness — and only forgiveness — is given a structure that makes the human act a prerequisite for the divine one.
Red Letter Sources
Matthew 6:12Matthew 6:14Matthew 6:15Luke 11:4
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you:
But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.
Evidence Notes
Matthew 6:9-13 contains six distinct petitions. Matthew 6:14-15 immediately follows and comments exclusively on the forgiveness petition. No parallel commentary on bread (v.11), kingdom (v.10), or temptation (v.13) appears in Jesus's speech. Luke 11:4 includes the forgiveness-conditioned clause inside the prayer itself. The pattern holds across both accounts: forgiveness is the only petition that Jesus explicitly conditions and the only one he returns to after the prayer closes.
Greek Note
Matthew 6:14-15 uses 'paraptomat' (παραπτώματα, trespasses/transgressions) rather than 'opheilēmata' (ὀφειλήματα, debts) used in 6:12 — a small lexical shift that suggests Jesus is deliberately restating and expanding the forgiveness petition rather than simply repeating it, distinguishing the follow-up commentary from the prayer text itself.