' Amen ' would naturally have passed from the synagogues to the churches which took their rise among the synagogue-worshippers, but the Master Himself gave a new emphasis to its value for Chris- tians by the example of His own practice. In this, as in all else. He was no slavish imitator of con- temporary Rabbis. He spoke ' as having authority
and not as the scribes' (Mk l^), and in this capa- city it is not surprising that He found a new use for the word of emphasis, which neither His pre- decessors nor His followers have ventured to imi- tate, though the title applied to Him in Rev Z^^ is founded upon His own chosen practice. In His mouth, by the common evidence of all the Gospels (77 times), the word is used to introduce His own words and clothe them with solemn affirmation. He plainly expressed His dislike for oaths (Mt 5**), and in Dalman's view ( Words of Jesus, 229)— and no one is better qualified to speak on the subject — He found here the word He needed to give the assurance which usually came from an oath. But in doing this ' He was really making good the word, not the word Him,' and it is therefore natural that no other man has ever ventured to foUowHis custom. That it was His habitual way of speaking is doubly plain from a comparison of all four Gospels, even though St. Luke, who wrote for men unacquainted with Hebrew, has sought where possible to replace the word by a Greek equivalent (dXij^ws, etc.). St. John has always doubled the word, probably for emphasis, since Delitzsch's explanation from a word Nroj<= ' I say ' is shown by Dalman (p. 227 f.) to be wrong and based on a purely Babylonian practice.
The rest of the NT presents examples of all the older uses of the phrase, though the earliest is found only in the Jewish Apocalypse (Rev 7^^ 19'*) which has probably been worked up into the Chris- tian Book of ' Revelation,' and in one passage (22^") christianized from it. Here it is perhaps a conscious archaic form, brought in to add to the mysterious language of the vision, which may originally, like the Book of Enoch or Noah, have been ascribed to some earlier seer. The language of St. Paul in 1 Co 14'^ shows that the synagogue practice of saying ' Amen ' as a response early be- came habitual among the worshippers of ' the Nazarene,' even if we had not been led to infer this by the growing reluctance of the Jews to em- phasize this feature of their service. The use (? Jewish) in Rev 5" corresponds with this custom (cf. Ps 106''^). It is plain that the complete absence of the word in Acts — itself a link with the Third Gospel — must be ascribed to the peculiar style and attitude of the author, and not at all to the actual practice in the churches.
Twice in the NT (2 Co l^". Rev 31^) the word ' Amen ' is used as a noun implying the ' Faithful God,' but it is hard to tell whether this is to be understood as a play on words based on Is 65^^ (n^^, 'truth,' being read as jcx, 'Amen'), or whether it is connected with the manner in Avhich the Master employed the phrase as guaranteed by His own authority and absolute ' faithfulness.'
The Church of the Fathers made much of the word ' Amen ' in all its OT uses, and introduced it into their services, not only after blessings, hymns, etc. (cf. Euseb. iv. 15, vii. 9), but after the reception of the Sacrament — a custom to which Justin refers in his [the earliest] account of the manner in which this service was conducted {Apol. i. 64, 66). This is confirmed by Ambrose. The practice is still in vogue in the Eastern Church, was adopted in the Scottish Liturgy of 1637, and dropped only in the 6th cent, by the Western Church. Some- times the 'Amen' was even repeated after the lesson had been read. From the Jews and the Christians it passed over to the Muhammadan ritual, where it is still repeated after the first two siiras of the Qur'an, even though its meaning is wholly misunderstood by the Muslim imams who guess at various impossible explanations. In the Book of Common Prayer it appears in various forms — as the end of the priest's prayer, as the response of the people, or as the unanimous assent
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ANANIAS
of both priest and people. Curiously enough, among Presbyterians it is said by the minister only. One relic of the Gospel language is retained in the Bishops' Oath of Supremacy, which com- mences almost in the style of one of Christ's famous declarations. In legal terminology the term has been introduced to strengthen affirmation, and formed an item in the ' style ' of proclamations until the 16th century. Hogg notes that in Eng- lish, as in Syriac, it has come to mean ' consent,' and has been enabled thus to acquire the sense of 'the very last,' even though it commenced its career as first word in the sentence.
The foregoing remarks may enable the reader to judge of the strange changes to which the mean- ing of this word has been subjected, the important part it has played, and the historical interest which attaches to its every echo.