“For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!'” (Romans 8:15)
“Abba” (אַבָּא in Aramaic, transliterated into Greek as Ἀββά) is one of the most theologically rich and intimate words in the New Testament.
When Paul wrote those words to believers in Rome, he reached past Greek and grabbed an Aramaic word, Abba, and left it untranslated. He did the same thing in Galatians 4:6. And before Paul ever wrote it, Mark recorded Jesus crying it out in Gethsemane (Mark 14:36). Three times in the New Testament, and every single time, the writer immediately follows it with the Greek translation ho patēr, “the Father.”[1]
That detail alone should make us slow down. Why preserve the original Aramaic word at all?
What Does Abba Mean in Aramaic?
Abba (אַבָּא) is Aramaic, the everyday spoken language of Jesus and first-century Jews in Palestine. It is the emphatic form of ab (“father”), the ordinary relational form used in direct address. A child would use it in the home. So would an adult son. So would an elderly daughter speaking to her aging father. It carried warmth, familiarity, and trust, and it also carried honor and the full weight of a father-child relationship.
The word appears only three times in the Greek New Testament, and every time it appears it is immediately paired with the Greek translation ho patēr (“the Father”):
- Mark 14:36. Jesus in Gethsemane: “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you…”
- Romans 8:15. Believers crying out by the Spirit of adoption.
- Galatians 4:6. The Spirit of the Son in our hearts crying “Abba, Father.”
Why “Abba Means Daddy” Is Wrong
You have probably heard a sermon claim that Abba means “Daddy.” It turns up in print commentaries too, not just from the pulpit.[2] That idea traces back largely to Joachim Jeremias in the mid-twentieth century, and it has stuck in popular preaching ever since.[3] But Jeremias himself softened the claim later in life, and scholars like James Barr, in his now-classic 1988 article “Abba Isn’t ‘Daddy’,” have shown the case does not hold up.[4]
Grown adults used Abba for their fathers throughout life.[5] It was not baby talk. It was the natural, intimate, respectful word for “Father.”
Translating it as “Daddy” sentimentalizes something far more profound. The better picture is intimacy and reverence held together, the same warmth a beloved son has in his father’s presence, without losing the awe of who that Father actually is.
Why Paul Left the Aramaic Untranslated
In the Greco-Roman world, the social and legal distance between slave and master was immense. A slave did not possess the familial standing to address the paterfamilias as a son would.
Paul is writing into that world, and he chooses the word huiothesia, a Roman legal term meaning the formal granting of full sonship, inheritance rights, and family identity. Adopted sons in Rome had every legal standing a natural-born son had.[6]
Then Paul anchors that adoption to a single Aramaic word that Jesus himself used in the darkest moment of his earthly life. The Spirit of the Son, the same Spirit present in Christ as he cried “Abba” in Gethsemane, is now in us, and through him we cry the same word.
That is not “Daddy.” That is something heavier.
Calling God Father in Second Temple Judaism
What makes this even more striking is the Second Temple Jewish backdrop. Israel collectively called God Father at times (Isaiah 63:16; Isaiah 64:8), but individual intimacy with God as “my Father” was comparatively rare and weighty. Jesus not only uses that language personally, he extends participation in that relationship to his followers. Paul’s use of Abba is not merely emotional intimacy. It is participation in the sonship of the Messiah himself.
The Weight of What We Carry
When you say “Father” in prayer, you are not using a polite religious title. You are using a word that carries the weight of a legal declaration, a relational claim, and the reality that the Spirit who was in the Son is now in you, and the cry he made is now yours to make.
That is worth slowing down for.
New field notes when they are ready, along with the research underneath them. No drip sequence, no course, nothing to buy.
Footnotes6
- Anthony Maas, "Abba," in The Catholic Encyclopedia, ed. Charles G. Herbermann et al. (New York: The Encyclopedia Press, 1907–1913).
- Stewart Custer, The Righteousness of God: A Commentary on Romans (Greenville, SC: Bob Jones University Press, 2007), 156.
- Deven K. MacDonald and Ernest van Eck, Allegiance, Opposition, and Misunderstanding: A Narrative Critical Approach to Mark's Christology (Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2018).
- James Barr, "Abba Isn't Daddy," Journal of Theological Studies 39, no. 1 (1988): 28–47, as summarized in MacDonald and van Eck.
- Robert L. Mowery, "Abba," in Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible, ed. David Noel Freedman, Allen C. Myers, and Astrid B. Beck (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 2000), 2–3.
- Michael Downey, The New Dictionary of Catholic Spirituality (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2000), 2.
Sources7
- James Barr, "Abba Isn't Daddy", Journal of Theological Studies 39, no. 1 (1988): 28–47.
- Anthony Maas, "Abba," in The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York: Robert Appleton, 1907). Free full text.
- Robert L. Mowery, "Abba," in Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible, ed. David Noel Freedman, Allen C. Myers, and Astrid B. Beck (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2000), 2–3.
- Deven K. MacDonald and Ernest van Eck, Allegiance, Opposition, and Misunderstanding (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2018).
- Michael Downey, The New Dictionary of Catholic Spirituality (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2000), 2.
- Stewart Custer, The Righteousness of God: A Commentary on Romans (Greenville, SC: Bob Jones University Press, 2007), 156. Listed here as an example of the "Daddy" reading this post corrects, not as support for it. No verified link.
- Michael S. Heiser, "Abba Doesn't Mean 'Daddy'", drmsh.com.
