Seminar 13
By Moussa Ndiaye
PRAYER
The Primitive Prayer
The Evolution of Prayer and Magic
Prayer and the Alter Ego
1. Moral/ethical prayer
2. The social repercussions of prayer
3. The realm of prayer
4. Mysticism, Ecstasy and Inspiration
5. Prayer as a personal experience
6. Condition for the effectiveness of prayer
WRITING 91
THE PRIMITIVE PRAYER – P.994
P.994 – §6 The function of early evolutionary religion is to preserve and increase the essential social, moral, and spiritual values which are slowly taking shape. This mission of religion is not consciously observed by mankind, but is mainly accomplished through the function of prayer. The practice of prayer represents the involuntary, but nevertheless personal and collective effort of a given group to ensure (to actualize) the conservation of higher values. Without the safeguard of prayer, all religious holidays would quickly revert to the status of mere vacation days.
P.995 – §1 Religion and its acts, the chief of which is prayer, are allied only to those values enjoying general social recognition, collective approval. That is why, when a primitive man tried to satisfy his less noble feelings or his purely selfish ambitions, he was deprived of the help of religion and the aid of prayer. If an individual proposed to do something antisocial, he was forced to seek the help of non-religious magic, to resort to sorcerers and, therefore, to be deprived of the help of prayer. Prayer thus became very early a powerful instigator of social evolution, moral progress and spiritual fulfillment.
P.995 – §2 However, the primitive mind was neither logical nor consistent. Primitive humans did not perceive that material things were beyond the realm of prayer. These simple souls saw that food, shelter, rain, game and other material goods increased social well-being; therefore they began to pray for these physical blessings. This constituted a perversion of prayer, but encouraged the effort to achieve these material goals through ethical and social actions. While debasing the spiritual values of a people, this prostitution of prayer nevertheless had the direct effect of raising its economic, social and ethical mores.
P.995 – §3 It is only in the most primitive type of mind that prayer is a monologue. It early becomes a dialogue and quickly grows to the level of collective worship. Prayer signifies that the premagical incantations of primitive religion have evolved to the level where the human mind recognizes the reality of beneficial powers or beings capable of uplifting social values and increasing moral ideals; moreover, he recognizes that these influences are superhuman and distinct from the self-conscious human ego and its mortal companions. True prayer therefore does not appear until the action of religious ministry is seen as personal.
P.995 – §4 Prayer has little connection with animism, but such beliefs may exist alongside emerging religious sentiments. In many cases, religion and animism have had entirely separate origins.
P.995 – §5 In mortals who have not been delivered from the primitive shackles of fear, there is a serious danger that all prayers will lead to a morbid sense of sin, to an unwarranted conviction of guilt, real or imagined. . However, in modern times, it is unlikely that many people will spend enough time in prayer to come to such hurtful thoughts about their unworthiness or guilt. The dangers accompanying the distortion and perversion of prayer are constituted by ignorance, superstition, crystallization, devitalization, materialism and fanaticism.
THE EVOLUTION OF PRAYER – P.995
P.995 – §6 The first prayers were simply verbal wishes, the expression of sincere desires. Prayer then became a technique for obtaining the cooperation of spirits. Then she attained the higher function of helping religion to preserve all values worth preserving.
P.995 – §7 Both prayer and magick arose as a result of human reactions of adjustment to the Urantian environment; but, apart from this general relationship, they have little in common. Prayer has always indicated a positive action on the part of the ego who utters it; it has always been psychic and sometimes spiritual. Magic has generally meant an attempt to manipulate reality without affecting the ego of the manipulator, the practitioner of magic. Despite their independent origins, magic and prayer were often linked in their later stages of development. Starting from formulas and passing through rituals and incantations, magic has sometimes risen, by the elevation of its aims, to the threshold of true prayer. Prayer has sometimes become so materialistic that it has degenerated into a pseudo-magical technique to avoid the expenditure of effort required to solve Urantia’s problems.
P.996 – §1 When man learned that prayer could not compel the gods, he gave it more the character of petition, of seeking favor. But the most authentic prayer is in reality a communion between man and his Author.
P.996 – §2 The appearance of the idea of sacrifice in a religion inevitably undermines the superior efficacy of true prayer, in that humans seek to substitute the offerings of material goods for that of the consecration of their own will to do the will of God.
P.996 – §3 When religion is devoid of a personal God, its prayers are carried over to the levels of theology and philosophy. When, in a religion, the highest concept of God is that of an impersonal Deity, as in pantheistic idealism, this concept does provide a basis for certain forms of mystical communion, but it is fatal for the power of the true prayer, which always represents the communion of man with a personal and superior being.
P.996 – §4 In the early days of racial evolution, and even today in the daily experience of average mortals, prayer is to a large extent a phenomenon of the relationship between man and his soul. subconscious. But there is also a realm of prayer where intellectually alert and spiritually progressive individuals attain more or less contact with the super-conscious levels of the human mind, the realm of the indwelling Thought Adjuster. Further, there is a definite spiritual phase of true prayer concerning its reception and recognition by the spiritual forces of the universe; this phase is entirely distinct from all human and intellectual associations.
P.996 – §5 Prayer contributes greatly to the development of the religious feeling of an evolving human mind. It exerts a powerful influence to prevent the isolation of the personality.
P.996 – §6 Prayer is one of the techniques associated with the natural religions of racial evolution which is also part of the experiential values of the higher ethically excellent religions – the religions of revelation.
PRAYER AND THE ALTER EGO – P.996
P.996 – §7 When children first learn to use language, they are prone to think aloud, to express their thoughts in words, even when no one is around to hear them. At the dawn of their creative imagination, they show a tendency to converse with imaginary companions. In this way, an ego that begins to hatch seeks to maintain communion with a fictional alter ego. By this technique, the child learns early to convert his monologues into pseudo-dialogues where this alter ego makes responses to his thoughts expressed aloud and the expression of his wishes. A very large part of the reflections of adults are carried on mentally in the form of conversations.
P.996 – §8 The primitive form of prayer was much like the semi-magical recitations of the Toda tribe of today, prayers which were addressed to no one in particular. Through the emergence of the idea of an alter ego, these prayer techniques tend to be transformed into communications of the dialogue type. Over time, the concept of the alter ego was elevated to a higher status of divine dignity, and prayer as a religious act came into being. This primitive type of prayer is destined to evolve through many phases and through long ages before it reaches the level of intelligent and truly ethical prayer.
P.997 – §1 The conception of the alter ego by successive generations of praying mortals evolves through ghosts, fetishes, and spirits, to polytheistic gods, and finally to the One God, one being. divine that incorporates the highest ideals and most sublime aspirations of the praying ego. This is how prayer does indeed function as the most powerful religious act to uphold the higher values and ideals of those who pray. From the moment man conceives an alter ego until the concept of a divine Heavenly Father arises, prayer is always a practice that makes you more sociable, more moral, and more spiritual.
P.997 – §2 The simple prayer of faith manifests in human experience a powerful evolution by which ancient conversations with the fictitious symbol of the alter ego of primitive religion have been elevated to the level of communion with the spirit of the Infinite, at the level where one is sincerely aware of the reality of the Eternal God and the Paradise Father of all intelligent creation.
P.997 – §3 Apart from dealing with the higher self in the experience of prayer, it must be remembered that ethical prayer is a splendid way of uplifting the ego and strengthening the self for a better life. and higher accomplishments. Prayer prompts the human ego to seek help in both directions: for material assistance by tapping into the subconscious reservoir of mortal experience, and for inspiration and guidance by going to the super-frontiers. consciousnesses where the material makes contact with the spiritual, with the Monitor of Mystery.
P.997 – §4 Prayer has always been and always will be a dual human experience: a psychological process combined with a spiritual technique. These two functions of prayer can never be entirely separated.
P.997 – §5 Enlightened prayer must recognize not only an outward and personal God, but also an inclusive and impersonal Deity, the indwelling Adjuster. When a man prays, it is quite right that he strive to grasp the concept of the Universal Father on Paradise; but, for most practical purposes, a more effective technique will be to return to the concept of a nearby alter ego, just as the primitive mind used to do, and then recognize that the idea of this alter ego was at first a mere fiction which then evolved into the truth that God indwells mortal man by the factual presence of the Adjuster; so that man can thus speak, so to speak face to face, with a real and authentic divine alter ego who dwells within him and who is the very essence and presence of the living God, the Universal Father.
- ETHICAL PRAYER – P.997
P.997 – §6 No prayer can be ethical if the supplicant seeks selfish advantage over his fellows. Selfish, materialistic prayer is incompatible with ethical religions that are based on divine, selfless love. Such unethical prayer reverts to primitive levels of pseudo-magic, unworthy of advancing civilization and enlightened religions. Selfish prayer transgresses the spirit of all ethics based on loving justice.
P.997 – §7 Prayer must never be so prostituted as to become a substitute for action. All ethical prayer is a spur to action and a guide to progressive effort toward idealistic goals of higher self attainment.
P.998 – §1 In all your prayers be fair. Do not expect God to show partiality, to love you more than his other children, your friends, your neighbors and even your enemies. But the prayer of natural or evolved religions does not begin by being ethical, as it is in later revealed religions. Any prayer, whether individual or community, can be either selfish or altruistic, that is to say, one can center the prayer on oneself or on others. When prayer seeks nothing for the prayer or for his companions, then such an attitude of the soul tends toward the levels of true worship. Selfish prayers involve confessions and pleas, and often consist of requests for material favors. Prayer is a little more ethical when it deals with forgiveness and seeks wisdom to increase self-mastery.
P.998 §2 Prayer of the unselfish type brings strength and consolation, while materialistic prayer is bound to disappoint and disillusion its authors as the progress of scientific discoveries demonstrates that man lives in a physical universe of law and order. The childhood of an individual or a race is characterized by primitive selfish and materialistic prayers. And, to a certain extent, all of these pleas are effective in that they invariably lead to the efforts that help to obtain the answers to such prayers. The real prayer of faith always helps to advance the technique of life, even if such requests are not worthy of spiritual recognition. But advanced spiritual people must take great care when trying to dissuade primitive or immature thinkers from making such prayers.
P.998 – §3 Remember that while prayer does not change God, it very often effects great and lasting changes in one who prays with faith and confident expectation. Prayer has engendered much mental peace, gladness, calmness, courage, self-control and fairness in men and women of the evolving races.
- Social Resistance to Prayer
P.998 – §4 In ancestor worship, prayer leads to the cultivation of ancestral ideals. But, as an aspect of Deity worship, prayer transcends all such practices, for it leads to the cultivation of divine ideals. As the concept of the alter ego of prayer becomes supreme and divine, so human ideals accordingly rise from the purely human level to the celestial and divine levels, and the result of all such prayers is the beautification of human character and the profound unification of human personality.
P.998 – §5 But prayer need not always be individual. Group or assembly prayer is very effective, in the sense that its repercussions greatly increase sociability. When a community devotes itself to a common prayer for moral uplift and spiritual upliftment, these devotions react upon the individuals who compose the group; their participation makes them all better. Even an entire city or nation can be helped by these devotional prayers. Confession, repentance, and prayer have led individuals, cities, nations, and entire races to mighty efforts at reform and to courageous acts valiantly performed.
P.998 §6 If you really want to overcome the habit of criticizing a friend, the quickest and surest way to effect this change in attitude is to establish the habit of praying for that person every day of your life. life. But the social repercussions of these prayers largely depend on two conditions:
1. The person being prayed for should know that they are being prayed for.
2. The person praying should come into close social contact with the person for whom he is praying.
P.999 – §2 Prayer is the technique by which any religion sooner or later becomes an institution. Over time, prayer becomes associated with many secondary factors, some of which are helpful and others clearly harmful, such as priests, sacred books, worship rituals and ceremonies.
P.999 – §3 But men of more spiritually enlightened minds should be patient and tolerant of less gifted intellects who crave symbolism to mobilize their restricted spiritual insight. The strong should not look down on the weak. Those who are conscious of God without symbolism must not deny the ministry of symbol grace to those who find it difficult to worship Deity and to revere, without forms or rites, truth, beauty and goodness. In the prayer of worship most mortals imagine some symbol of the object-goal of their devotions.
- THE FIELD OF PRAYER – P.999
91:6.1 (999.4) Unless connected with the will and actions of the personal spirit forces and the material overseers of a realm, prayer cannot have any direct effect on your physical environment. The realm of prayerful supplication has well-defined limits, but these limits do not apply equally to the faith of those who pray.
91:6.2 (999.5) Prayer is not a technique of cure for real and organic illnesses, but it has been instrumental in bringing about an overflow of health and in curing many mental, emotional, and nervous disorders. Even in the case of actual bacterial diseases, prayer has often enhanced the effectiveness of other remedies applied. Prayer has turned many irritable and disgruntled invalids into paragons of patience and made them inspirations to all other suffering humans.
91:6.3 (999.6) However difficult it may be to reconcile scientific doubts about the efficacy of prayer with the ever-present need to seek help and guidance from divine sources, never forget that sincere prayer of faith is a powerful force for promoting personal happiness, individual self-control, social harmony, moral progress and spiritual fulfillment.
91:6.4 (999.7) Even as a purely human practice, as a dialogue with your alter ego, prayer is a most effective technique of approach to bringing into play the powers of human nature, the reserves of which are accumulated and stored in the unconscious realms of the human mind. Prayer is a sound psychological practice apart from its religious implications and spiritual significance. It is a fact of human experience that most people, if harassed hard enough, will in some way pray to some source of assistance.
91:6.5 (999.8) Do not be so lazy as to ask God to solve your difficulties, but never hesitate to ask him for wisdom and spiritual strength to guide and sustain you as you boldly and courageously attack the problems at hand. .
91:6.6 (999.9) Prayer has been an indispensable factor in the advancement and preservation of religious civilization, and it still has mighty contributions to make to uplift and spiritualize society, provided those who pray are willing to do so. in the light of scientific facts, philosophical wisdom, intellectual sincerity and spiritual faith. Pray as Jesus taught his disciples—honestly, unselfishly, fairly, and without doubt.
91:6.7 (1000.1) But the efficacy of prayer, in the personal spiritual experience of the prayer, does not in any way depend on the intellectual understanding of the worshiper, nor on his philosophical shrewdness, social standing, cultural status or other human acquisitions. The psychic and spiritual accompaniments of the prayer of faith are immediate, personal and experiential. There is no other technique by which each man, independent of all other earthly accomplishments, can so effectively and immediately approach the threshold of the realm where he can communicate with his Maker, where the creature makes contact with the reality of the Creator, with the indwelling Thought Adjuster.
- MYSTICISM, ECSTASY AND INSPIRATION
P.1000 – §2 As a technique for cultivating the consciousness of the presence of God, mysticism is entirely worthy of praise, but if its practice leads to social isolation and culminates in religious fanaticism, it is entirely worthy of praise. objectionable. All too often, the ideas that the overworked mystic believes to be divine inspirations are merely exaltations from the depths of his own mind. The contact of the human mind with its indwelling Adjuster, though frequently fostered by earnest meditation, is far more often facilitated by the sincere and loving service of unselfish ministry to fellow human beings.
P.1000 – §3 The great religious teachers and prophets of old were not outrageous mystics. They were men and women who knew God and served their God best through their selfless ministry to their fellowmen. Jesus often took his apostles apart for short periods to meditate and pray, but most of the time he kept them in service contact with the multitudes. The soul of men needs spiritual exercise as well as spiritual nourishment.
P.1000- §4 Religious ecstasy is permissible when it results from sound antecedents, but this experience is more often the consequence of purely emotional influences than the manifestation of a deep spiritual character. Religious people should not regard every bright psychological presentiment and intense emotional experience as divine revelation or spiritual communication. Genuine spiritual ecstasy is usually associated with great outer calm and near-perfect emotional control. But the true prophetic vision is a supra-psychological presentiment. Such visitations are neither pseudo-hallucinations nor trance-like ecstasies.
P.1000 – §5 The human mind can operate in response to so-called inspiration when it is responsive either to subconscious exaltations or to superconscious stimuli. In both cases, these increases in the content of consciousness appear to the individual as more or less foreign. Unbridled mystical enthusiasm and unbridled religious ecstasy are not credentials of inspiration, so-called divine credentials.
P.1000 – §6 The practical test of all these strange religious experiences of mysticism, ecstasy, and inspiration is to observe whether these phenomena cause one to:
1. Enjoy better and fuller physical health.
2. To act more practically and more effectively in one’s mental life.
3. To make his religious experience social with more fullness and joy. 4. To more fully spiritualize his daily life as he faithfully performs the common duties of ordinary mortal existence.
5. Increase one’s love and appreciation of truth, beauty and goodness.
6. Maintain commonly recognized social, moral, ethical and spiritual values.
7. Develop one’s spiritual insight – one’s awareness of God.
5. PRAYER AS A PERSONAL EXPERIENCE
.1001 – §4 But prayer has no real connection with these exceptional religious experiences. When prayer becomes too aesthetic, when it consists almost exclusively of an admirable and blissful contemplation of the paradisiacal divinity, it loses much of its socializing influence and tends towards mysticism and the isolation of its followers. An excess of solitary prayer presents a certain danger which is corrected and averted by group prayer, collective devotions.
P.1001 – §5 There is a truly spontaneous aspect to prayer, for primitive man began to pray long before he had any clear concept of a God. The first men used to pray in two different circumstances: when they found themselves in great distress, they felt an impulse to reach out for help; and when they exulted, they gave way to impulsively expressing their joy.
P.1001 – §6 Prayer is not an evolution of magic; the two arose independently of each other. Magic was an attempt to adapt Deity to circumstances; prayer is the effort to attune the personality to the will of Deity. True prayer is both moral and religious; magic is neither.
P.1001 – §7 Prayer can become an established custom. Many people pray because others do. Still others pray because they fear that something terrible will happen to them if they do not present their supplications regularly.
P.1001 – §8 For some individuals prayer is a quiet expression of gratitude, for others a collective expression of praise, a social devotion. It is sometimes the imitation of the religion of others, whereas true prayer is the sincere and trusting communication between the spiritual nature of the creature and the ubiquitous presence of the spirit of the Creator.
P.1001 – §9 Prayer may be a spontaneous expression of God-consciousness or a meaningless recitation of theological formulae. It can be the ecstatic praise of a God-knowing soul or the servile obedience of a fear-obsessed mortal. It is sometimes the pathetic expression of an ardent spiritual desire and sometimes the shrill clamor of pious phrases. Prayer can be joyful praise or a humble plea for forgiveness.
P.1001 – §10 Prayer can be the childish plea for the impossible or the mature man’s plea for moral growth and spiritual power. A petition can consist of asking for daily bread or incorporate a sincere desire to find God and do His will. It can be an entirely selfish request or a sincere and beautiful gesture toward the realization of selfless brotherhood.
P.1001 – §11 Prayer can be an angry cry for revenge or a merciful intercession for one’s enemies. It can be the expression of a hope to change God or the powerful technique of changing oneself. It can be the obsequious pleading of a lost sinner before a supposedly severe Judge or the joyous expression of a liberated son, son of the living and merciful Heavenly Father.
P.1001 – §12 Modern men are troubled to discuss their matters with God in a purely personal way. Many have abandoned regular prayer; they now pray only under unusual pressure – in an emergency. Man should not be afraid to speak to God, but it would be spiritually childish to undertake to persuade God or pretend to change him.
P.1002 – §1 But true prayer does attain reality. Even when the air currents are ascending, no bird can take flight without spreading its wings. Prayer elevates man because it is a technique of progress by utilizing the ascending spiritual currents of the universe.
P.1002 – §2 Genuine prayer contributes to spiritual growth, changes attitudes, and provides the satisfaction that comes from communion with divinity. It is a spontaneous overflow of God consciousness.
P.1002 – §3 God answers man’s prayer with an increased revelation of truth, an enhanced appreciation of beauty, and an expanded concept of goodness. Prayer is a subjective gesture, but it establishes contact with powerful objective realities on the spiritual levels of human experience; it is a significant attempt by the human to attain superhuman values. It is the most powerful stimulant of spiritual growth.
P.1002 – §4 Words do not matter in prayer; they are simply the intellectual channel through which the river of spiritual supplication happens to flow. The verbal value of a prayer is purely autosuggestive in individual devotions, and socio-suggestive in collective devotions. God responds to the attitude of the soul and not to the words.
P.1002 – §5 Prayer is not a technique for escaping conflict, but rather an incentive for growth in the face of conflict. Pray only for values, not for things; for growth, not for satisfaction.
6.. CONDITIONS OF EFFECTIVENESS OF PRAYER
P.1002 – §6 If you are to achieve effective prayer, you must bear in mind the laws of granted requests:
1. You must qualify as an effective prior by sincerely and courageously confronting the problems of universal reality. You have to have cosmic vigor
2. One must have honestly exhausted all human possibilities of adjustment. One must have been industrious.
3. All wishes of the mind and all desires of the soul must be surrendered to the transforming grasp of spiritual growth. You must have experienced an enhancement of meanings and an elevation of values.
4. One must wholeheartedly choose the divine will. We must annihilate the inert center of indecision
5. Not only do you recognize the Father’s will and choose to do it, but you have wholeheartedly dedicated and dynamically dedicated yourself to the effective execution of that will.
6. Your prayer will seek exclusively for divine wisdom to resolve specific human problems encountered during the Paradise ascension—the attainment of divine perfection.
7. And you have to have faith – living faith
P.1002 – §14 [Presented by the Chief Urantia Midwayer.]
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