Online Encyclopedia
Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.
PRAYER (from Lat. precari, entreat; I...
Online EncyclopediaEncyclopedia Home :: POL-PRE
del.icio.us it!
|
See also:PRAYER (from See also:Lat. precari, entreat; Ital. pregaria, Fr. priere) , a See also:term used generally for any humble See also:petition, but more technically, in See also:religion, for that mode of addressing a divine or sacred See also:power in which there predominates the See also:mood and intention of reverent entreaty. Prayer and its Congeners.—Prayer in the latter sense is a characteristic feature of the higher religions, and we might even say that See also:Christianity or Mahommedanism, ritually viewed, is in its inmost essence a service of prayer. At all stages of religious development, however, and more especially in the See also:case of the more See also:primitive types of cult, prayer as thus understood occurs together with, and shades off into, other varieties of observance that See also:bear obvious marks of belonging to the same See also:family. Confining ourselves for the moment to forms of explicit address, we may See also:group these under three categories according as the power addressed is conceived by the applicant to be on a higher, or on much the same, or on a See also:lower See also:plane of dignity and authority as compared with himself. (r) Only if the deity be regarded as altogether See also:superior is there See also:room for prayer proper, that is, reverent entreaty. Of this we may perhaps roughly distinguish a higher and a lower type, according as there is either See also:complete confidence in the divine benevolence and See also:justice, or a disposition to suppose a certain arbitrariness or at any See also:rate conditionality to attach to the granting of See also:requests. In the first case prayer will be accompanied with disinterested See also:homage, praise and thankgiving, and will in fact tend to lose its distinctive See also:character of entreaty or petition, passing into a mystic communing or converse with See also:God. In the second case it will be supported by See also:pleading, involving on the one See also:hand self-abasement, with See also:confession of sins and promises of repentance and reform, or on the other hand self-See also:justification, in the shape of the expression of faith and recitation of past services, together with reminders of previous favour shown. (2) If, however, the worshipper See also:place his god on a level with himself, so far at any rate as to make him to some extent dependent on the service See also:man contracts to render him, then genuine prayer tends to be replaced by a See also:mere bargaining, often conjoined with flattery and with insincere promises. This spirit of do ut See also:des will be found to go closely with the See also:gift-theory of See also:sacrifice, and to be especially characteristic of those religions of See also:middle grade that are given over to sacrificial See also:worship as conducted in temples and by means of organized priesthoods. Not but what, when the high gods are See also:kind for a See also:consideration, the lower deities will likewise be found addicted to such See also:commerce; thus in See also:India the hedge-See also:priest and his See also:familiar will bandy conditions in spirited See also:dialogue audible to the multitude (cf. W.'Crooke, Things See also:Indian, s.v. "See also:Demonology," pp. 132, 134). (3) Lastly, the degree of dependency on human See also:goodwill attributed to the power addressed may be so See also:great that, instead of See also:diplomatic politeness, there is See also:positive hectoring, with dictation, threats and abuse. Even the See also:Italian See also:peasant is said occasionally to offer both abuse and See also:physical violence to the See also:image of a recalcitrant See also:saint; and antiquity wondered at the bullying manner of the Egyptians towards their gods (cf. See also:Iamblichus, De mysteriis, vi. 5-7). This See also:frame of mind, however, is mainly symptomatic of the lower levels of cult. Thus the Zulu says to the ancestral See also:ghost, " Help me magical formulas mostly assume the See also:tone of an actual or virtual imperative, " As I do this, so let the like happen," " I do this in See also:order that the like may happen," and so on. Now it is easy to " See also:call See also:spirits from the vasty deep," but disappointed experience shows that they will not always come. Hence such imperatives have a tendency to dwindle into optatives. " Let the demon of small-pox depart!" is replaced by the more humble " See also:Grand-See also:father Smallpox, go away!" where the affectionate appellative (employed, however, in all likelihood merely to cajole) signalizes an approach to the genuine spirit of prayer. Again, the magician conscious of his limitations will seek to supplement his See also:influence —his mana, as it is termed in the Pacific—by tapping, so to speak, whatever See also:sources of similar power See also:lie See also:round about him; and these the " magomorphism " of primitive society perceives on every hand. A notable method of borrowing power from another magic-wielding agency is simply to breathe its name in connexion with the spell that stands in need of reinforcement; as the name suggests its owner, so it comes to stand for his real presence. It is noticeable that even the more highly See also:developed forms of liturgical prayer tend, in the recitation of divine titles, attributes and the like, to See also:present a survival of this magical use of potent names. Prayer as a See also:Part of See also:Ritual.—An exactly converse See also:process must now be glanced at, whereby, instead of growing out of it, prayer actually generates spell. In advanced religion, indeed, prayer is the chosen vehicle of the See also:free spirit of worship. Its mechanism is not unduly rigid, and it is largely autonomous, being rid of subservience to other ritual factors. In more primitive ritual, however, set forms of prayer are the See also:rule, and their See also:function is mainly to accompany and support a ceremony the See also:nerve of which consists in See also:action rather than speech. Hence, suppose genuine prayer to have come into being, it is exceedingly See also:apt to degenerate into a mere piece of formalism; and yet, whereas its See also:intrinsic meaning is dulled by repetition according to a well-known pyschological See also:law, its virtue is thereby hardly lessened for the undeveloped religious consciousness, which holds the saving See also:grace to lie mainly in the repetition itself. But a See also:formula that depends for its efficacy on being uttered rather than on being heard is virtually indistinguishable from the self-sufficient spell of the magician, though its origin is different. A See also:good example of a degenerated prayer-ritual comes from the See also:Todas (see W. H. R. See also:Rivers, The Todas, ch. x.). The prayer itself tends to be slurred over, or even omitted. On the other hand, great stress is laid on a preliminary See also:citation of names of power followed by the word idith. This at one See also:time seems to have meant " for the See also:sake of," carrying with it some See also:idea of supplication; but it has now lost this See also:connotation, seeing that it can be used not merely after the name of a god, but after that of any sacred See also:object or incident held capable of imparting magic efficacy to the formula. Even the higher religions have to fight against the tendency to " vain repetitions " (often embodying a certain sacred number, e.g. three), as well as to the use of prayers as amulets, medicinal charms, and so on. Thus, See also:Buddhism offers the striking case of the praying-See also:wheel. It remains to add that throughout we must carefully distinguish in theory, however hard this may be to do in practice, between legitimate ritual understood as such, whether integral to prayer, such as its verbal forms, or See also:accessory, such as gestures, postures, See also:incense, oil or what not, and the formalism of religious decay, such as generally betrays itself by its meaninglessness, by its gibberish phrases, sing-See also:song intonation and so forth. Silent Prayer.—A small point in the See also:history of prayer, but one that has an interesting bearing on the subject of its relation to magic, is concerned with the See also:custom of praying silently. Charms and words of power being supposed to possess efficacy in themselves are guarded with great secrecy by their owners, and hence, in so far as prayer verges on spell, there will be a disposition to mutter or otherwise conceal the sacred formula. Thus the prayers of the Todas already alluded to are in all cases uttered " in the See also:throat," although these are public prayers, each See also:village having a See also:form of its own. At a later See also:stage, when the distinction between magic and religion is more clearly recognized II or you will feed on nettles "; whilst the still more primitive Australian exclaims to the " dead hand " that he carries about with him as a kind of See also:divining-See also:rod, " See also:Guide me aright, or I throw you to the See also:dogs." So far we have dealt with forms of address explicitly directed towards a power that, one might naturally conclude, has See also:personality, since it is apparently expected to hear and See also:answer. At the primitive stage, however, the degree of personification is, probably, often far slighter than the words used would seem to suggest. The verbal employment of vocatives and of the second See also:person may have little or no personifying force, serving primarily but to make the See also:speaker's wish and idea intelligible to himself. When the rustic talks in the See also:vernacular to his See also:horse he is not much concerned to know whether he is heard and understood; still less when he mutters threats against an absent See also:rival, or kicks the See also:stool that has tripped him up with a vicious " Take that!" These considerations may help towards the understanding of a second class of cases, namely forms of implicit address shading off into unaddressed formulas. Wishings, blessings, cursings, oaths, vows, exorcisms, and so on, are uttered aloud, doubtless partly that they may be heard by the human parties to the rite, but likewise in many cases that they may be heard, or at least overheard, by a consentient deity, perhaps represented visibly by an idol or other cult-object. The ease with which explicit invocations attach themselves to many of these apparently self-contained forms proves that there is not necessarily any perceived difference of kind, and that implicit address as towards a " something not-ourselves " is often the true designation of the latter. On the other hand, there is See also:reason to believe that the magical spell proper is a self-contained and self-sufficient form of utterance, and that it lies at the See also:root of much that has become address, and even prayer in the fullest sense. From Spell to Prayer.—Of course to address and entreat a See also:fellow-being is a See also:faculty as old as that of speech, and, as soon as it occurred to man to treat sacred See also:powers as fellow-beings, assuredly there was a beginning of prayer. We do not know, and are not likely to know, how religion first arose, and the See also:probability is that many springs went to feed that immense See also:river. Thus care for the dead may well have been one amongst such See also:separate sources. It is natural for sorrow to cry to the newly dead "Come back!" and for bereavement to add " Come back and help!" Another source is mythologic See also:fancy, which, in answer to childlike questions; "Who made the See also:world?" "Who made our See also:laws?" and so on, creates " magnified non-natural men," who presently made their See also:appearance in ritual (for to think a thing the See also:savage must See also:dance it); whereupon See also:personal intercourse becomes possible between such a being and the tribesmen, the more so because the supporters of law and order, the elders, will wish to See also:associate themselves as closely as possible with the supreme law-giver. From See also:Australia, where we have the best See also:chance of studying rudimentary religion in some bulk, comes a certain amount of See also:evidence showing that in the two ways just mentioned some inchoate prayer is being evolved. On the other hand, it is remarkable how conspicuous, on the whole, is the See also:absence of prayer from the magico-religious ritual of the Australians. Uttered formulas abound; yet they are not forms of address, but rather the self-sufficient pronouncements of the magician's fiat. Viewed analytically in its developed nature, magic is a wonder-working recognized as such, the core of the See also:mystery consisting in the supposed transformation of suggested idea into accomplished fact by means of that See also:suggestion itself. To the magician, endowed in the See also:opinion of his See also:fellows (and doubtless of himself) with this wonderful power of effective suggestion, the output of such power naturally represents itself as a kind of unconditional willing. When he cries " See also:Rain, rain," or otherwise makes vivid to himself and his hearers the idea of rain, expecting that the rain will thereby be forced to come, it is as if he had said " Rain, now you must come," or simply "Rain, come!" and we find as a fact that and an See also:anti-social character assigned to the former on the ground that it subserves the sinister interests of individuals, the overt and as it were congregational nature of the praying comes to be insisted on as a See also:guarantee that no magic is being employed (cf. See also:Apuleius, A pol. S4, " tacitas preces in templo dis allegasti: igitur magus es "), a notion that suffers easy See also:translation into the view that there are more or less disreputable gods with whom private trafficking maybe done on the sly (cf. See also:Horace, Ep. I. xvi. 6o, " labra movet metuens audiri, Pulchra See also:Laverna, da mihi fallere "). Thus it is quite in accordance with the out-look of the classical See also:period that See also:Plato in his Laws (9o9–91o) should prohibit all See also:possession of private shrines or performance of private See also:rites; " let a man go to a See also:temple to pray, and let any one who pleases join with him in the prayer." Nevertheless, instances are not wanting amongst the Greeks of private prayers of the loftiest and most disinterested tone (cf. L. R. Farnell, The See also:Evolution of Religion, p. 202 seq.). Finally we may See also:note in this connexion that in advanced religion, at the point at which prayer is coming to be conceived as communion, silent See also:adoration is sometimes thought to bring man nearest to God. The Moralization of Prayer.—When we come to consider the moral quality of the See also:act of prayer, this contrast between the spirit of public and private religion is fundamental for all but the most advanced forms of cult. In its public rites the community becomes conscious of See also:common ends and a common edification. We may observe how even a very primitive See also:people such as the Arunta of Australia behaves with the greatest solemnity at its ceremonies, and professes to be made " glad " and " strong " thereby; whilst of his countrymen, whom he would not See also:trust to pray in private, Plato testifies that in the temples during the sacrificial prayers " they show an intense earnestness and with eager See also:interest talk to the Gods and beseech them " (Laws, 887). We may therefore assume that, in acts of public worship at any rate, prayer and its magico-religious congeners are at all stages resorted to as a " means of grace," even though such grace do not constitute the expressed object of petition. Poverty of expression is apt to cloak the real spirit of primitive prayer, and the formula under which its aspirations may be summed up, namely, " Blessings come, evils go," covers all sorts of confused notions about a grace to be acquired and an impurity to be wiped away, which, as far back as our clues take us, invite interpretations of a decidedly spiritualistic and ethical order. To explicate, however, and purge the meaning of that " strong See also:heart " and " clean " which the savage after his See also:fashion can wish and ask for, remained the task of the higher and more self-conscious types of religion. A favourite contrast for which there is more to be said is that See also:drawn between the magico-religious spell-ritual, that says in effect, " My will be done," and the spirit of " Thy will be done " that breathes through the highest forms of worship. Such resignation in the See also:face of the divine will and See also:providence is, however, not altogether beyond the See also:horizon of primitive faith, as See also:witness the following prayer of the See also:Khonds of. See also:Orissa: " We are ignorant of what it is good to ask for. You know what is good for us. Give it to us." (See also:Tylor, See also:Prim. Culture, 4. 369.) At this point prayer by a supreme See also:paradox virtually extinguishes itself, since in becoming an end in itself, a means of contemplative devotion and of mystic communing with God, it ceases to have logical need for the petitionary form. Thus on the face of it there is something like a return to the self-sufficient utterance of See also:antique religion; but, in reality, there is all the difference in the world between a suggestion directed outwardly in the fruitless See also:attempt to conjure nature without first obeying her, and one directed towards the inner man so as to establish the See also:peace of God within the heart. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click, and select "copy." Then paste it into your website, email, or other HTML. Site content, images, and layout Copyright © 2006 - Net Industries, worldwide. |
|
|
[back] PRAXITELES |
[next] PRAYER, BOOK OF COMMON |