Well… I was going to start with a different word to kick things off this year, but had to switch topics after reading an article today about the Opening Prayer of the 117^th Congress. There are many things to pick apart in that prayer, but what I want to focus on is the conclusion of the prayer. Upon finishing the prayer, the Representative praying said Amen and Awoman. Some of you may be like “OK, no big deal”, but if you are like me, you are scratching your heading going “What in the world”. So I am going to take some time to define the word Amen so you too can scratch your head at this bizarre conclusion.

We most often hear the word Amen at the conclusion of prayers and being incorporated into songs as a form of exaltation. But where does it come from and what does it mean. When you consult Merriam-Webster, you get a definition that does not really define it well {—used to express solemn ratification (as of an expression of faith) or hearty approval (as of an assertion)}. To make matters even more confusing, it say that it is coming from the Greek word Amen, from the Hebrew Amen. This is half true and half misleading. The Greek word for Amen is not the same as the Hebrew word Amen. But, in order to define this, I need to quickly cover the difference between translation and transliteration.

When we talk about the translation from one language to another, you are trying to take the meaning of a word in one language and find a word that is closest to it in the language you are translating to. Transliteration, on the other hand, does not define the word for you, but instead brings over the original word in the script of the language you are moving it to. Amen is the transliteration of the original Hebrew to the Greek. It was then transliterated to Late Latin and then into English. So, this means that we have to go back to the Hebrew to define it. But, before we do that, let’s take a look at some of the English definitions that roll in for this.

Granted, Webster usually does a word justice in its definition. But, in this case, it falls a little short. So looking around a little, you get a few definitions that help define this word for how we use it today. One common definition is “So be it”. This is coming from the French translation of Ainsi soit-il. Other definitions pull things like Verily, Truly, and Surely. These are coming from the uses of Amen in the Greek form. This is because the Greek Amen is not the same as the Hebrew Amen as I stated earlier. The Greek Amen takes these meanings on for the transliterated word of Amen because it is barrowing those terms from the Greek word Ginomai, which is what is chosen for a Greek translation. This Greek word means to take on, or came to pass, but lacks the heart of what has “become” and is most likely why it was passed over in later uses for a transliteration of Amen instead of a translation. So, now to the heart of the matter; what Amen means in the Hebrew.

When you go back to the original use of Amen in Hebrew, you get a lot of modern day translations funneling back to this term. But, this term has a root of its own in the Hebrew language; as that is where it originated. The word Amen is an English scrip transliteration of the Hebrew; which is only three characters. These three characters are actually the verb rooted from another word that has the same characters plus two more, that word is Emunah. These word look really different to us, but they are the same word with an extra “nh” on the end (with an assumed vowel after the n). Also, keep in mind that vowels don’t really exist inside of Hebrew words, but when it needs to start with a vowel sound it has a special character that looks like an ‘x’ and can mean “a, e, i, o, or u”. So, these two words would look more like xmn and xmnnh.

So, in saying all of this, the Hebrew root of Amen, Emunah, has a pretty neat definition. This word means faith or trust. Which means that when we say Amen, especially after a prayer, we are saying that we trust God in all that we have just said. Or to put it another way, we have faith (a term I will be defining soon for you guys) that God will carry out what is best. This is also why it rolls into definitions like truly and surely, as there is faith and trust that what was said, God will listen and do what is right. Or to look to our common definition from the French of “So be it”, we see a finiteness that puts the trust in God that he will take care of it.

So, back to the head scratcher, why in the world would we ever generate the word awomen. I am not going to speculate (you can do that on your own), but one thing is for sure; we have lost the heart and meaning of amen. And it is sad and baffling when this prayer came from a United States Representative who is also a church pastor.