Doxology

From the same root as “dogma,” the ancient formation doxa, “that which seemed to one,” came by the fourth century b.c. to identify the “reputation” or “fame” of another. The extension to gods or God (“His fame”) was made in Septuagint translation and in magical Greek papyri, and from this came in the Greek of the patristic period both verbal and nominal forms associated with the uttering of praise in general (doxologia). More specifically, the Gloria in Excelsis (adapted from Luke 2:14, in the Apostolic Constitutions) and the Gloria Patria (a Trinitarian liturgical conclusion for Psalms, enlarged with an anti-Arian counter-clause) are called greater and lesser, while in English Reformation circles the Doxology refers to a refrain which closed three hymns by Thomas Ken.

The Lord's Prayer|The Lord’s Prayer is traditionally concluded with the doxology: “For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen” (Matt 6:13n). It does not appear in some old Gr. MSS. In a different arrangement, it is in 1 Chronicles 29:11.

Paul uses the doxology rather sparingly as well as briefly. Nor does he subscribe to formula but to the spontaneous outburst of his soul at spiritual peaks. (Rom 11:36; 16:27; Eph 3:21; 1 Tim 1:17). The longest and most comprehensive doxology in the NT, and one frequently used as a benediction by pastors, is in Jude 24, 25.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915)

A hymn or liturgical formula expressive of praise to God, as the Gloria in Excelsis (an expansion of Lu 2:14), sometimes called the Greater Doxology, and the Gloria Patri ("Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, world without end, Amen") also known as the Lesser Doxology.

The clause, "as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be," was probably added to the original simple formula to emphasize the church’s dissent from the Arian conception of Christ.

The term is applied in particular to the concluding paragraph of the Lord's Prayer|Lord’s Prayer (Mt 6:13 margin, "For thine is the kingdom," etc.; compare 1Ch 29:11, and see Lord's Prayer).

To the same general class belong Ps 41:13; 72:18 f; 89:52; Ro 16:27; Eph 2:20; 1Ti 1:17; Jude 1:25; Re 5:13 f; 19:1-3, and the modern stanza beginning "Praise God, from whom all blessings flow."