Pure Prayer
Photo by I Am Nobody
This six-part series explores pure prayer from the correlative standpoints of Isaiah, Psalms, the early Christians, the Hasidic Masters, Christian Science, Vedic Science, Metaphysical Science, Transcendental Judaism and Advaita Vedanta.
Here are some examples of names for pure prayer in various traditions:
•true prayer
•inner prayer
•effective prayer
•metaphysical prayer
•scientific prayer
•spiritual prayer
•right knowing
•prayer from the depths
•prayer from the heart
•transcendental prayer
•luminous meditation
Pure Prayer: Part I includes selections from the Bible and from the Praktikos, a guide to ascetic life, compiled by Christian mystic Evagrius Ponticus.¹ They are from the tradition of the Desert Elders beginning in the 3rd century.
This Part I also includes additional selections from Prayer in St. Isaac of Ninevah in the 7th century.
O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
— Psalm 96:9 JPS
Enter thou into thy chambers
and shut thy doors.
— Isaiah 26:20 JPS
When thou prayest enter into thy closet,
and when thou hast shut thy door,
pray to thy [Father-Mother]
which is in secret;
and thy [Father-Mother]
which seeth in secret
shall reward thee openly.²
— Matthew 6:06 KJV
The one who truly prays is the one who
has seen the place of God.
This is what it means to be a…mystic.
Not only do these two activities and states
coincide at their highest states,
they also coincide every step of the way.³
— Desert Elder
Growth in pure prayer
leads to deepened regard
for the dignity of one’s fellow being.
Theologically the idea is founded
on the view of every person
as the image of God.⁴
— Desert Elder
By true prayer one becomes
the equal of an angel.
By one’s contemplation one also becomes
a temple of God.
Finally, it elevates one
to the knowledge of
the very Trinity itself.⁵
— Desert Elder
[Pure] prayer is the rejection
[the transcendence] of concepts.⁶
— Desert Elder
Happy is the one
who becomes free of all matter
and is stripped of all at the time of prayer.⁷
— Desert Elder
Happy is the one
who attains to complete unconsciousness
of all sense experience at the time of prayer.⁸
— Desert Elder
Prayer is the laying aside—
[the transcendence]—of thoughts.⁹
— Desert Elder
True wisdom is gazing at God.
Gazing at God is silence of the thoughts.
Stillness of mind is tranquility
which comes from discernment.¹⁰
— St. Isaac the Syrian
We pray with words
until the words are cut off
and we are left in a state of wonder.¹¹
— St. Isaac the Syrian
Luminous meditation on God
is one of the highest stages of prayer:
from thence, there is only one step
to mystical wonder,
a state when the intellect
is totally withdrawn from this world
and entirely captivated by God.¹²
— St. Isaac the Syrian
Spiritual prayer,
which begins beyond the borders of pure prayer,
is the descent of mind
to a state of peace and stillness:
it is synonymous with teoryia-contemplation…
the vision of God…
In this state, the soul rushes forward
and becomes as one drunken in awestruck wonder
of one’s continual solicitude for God.¹³
— St. Isaac the Syrian
From here onwards one finds
the senses continuously stilled
and the thoughts bound fast
with the bond of wonder;
one is continually filled
with a vision replete with the praise
that takes place without the tongue’s movement.
Sometimes, again, while prayer remains for its part,
the intellect is taken away from it
as if into heaven, and tears fall like fountains of waters,
involuntarily soaking the whole face...¹⁴
— St. Isaac the Syrian
Very often one will not be allowed
even to pray: this in truth
is the state of cessation above prayer
when one remains continually in amazement
at God’s work of creation—
like people who are crazed by wine...¹⁵
— St. Isaac the Syrian
Not only do the lips
cease from the flow of prayer and become still,
but the heart too dries up from all thoughts,
due to the amazement that alights upon it...
Blessed is the person who has entered this door
in the experience of his own soul,
for all the power of ink, letters and phrases
is too feeble to indicate the delight of this mystery.¹⁶
— St. Isaac the Syrian
The mystical experience…
is of a very active and dynamic nature.
The ultimate goal of any prayer
is in fact this spiritual state,
when prayer ceases and gives place
to what Isaac [of Nineveh] calls pure prayer,
meditation, wonder or inebriation.
In this state, a person’s intellect is ravished,
and one remains silent
before the Mystery
that surpasses all human understanding.¹⁷
— St. Isaac the Syrian
Pure Prayer: Part II includes selections from Your Word Is Fire: The Hasidic Masters on Contemplative Prayer and from Pinchas Shapiro of Koretz. Hasidic Judaism is an Orthodox movement that emerged in Eastern Europe in the 18th century.
In such prayer
you may come to transcend time…
There all things are as one;
Distinctions between ‘life’ and ‘death,’
‘land’ and ‘sea,’
have lost their meaning.
None of this can happen
as long as you remain
attached to the reality
of the material world.
[Because] here you are bound
to the distinctions
between good and evil…¹⁸
A person should be so absorbed in prayer
that one is no longer aware of one’s own self.
There is nothing…but the flow of Life;
all one’s thoughts are with God.
One who still knows how intensely one is praying
has not yet overcome the bonds of self.¹⁹
As a person begins to pray…
the Presence of God comes
into the [awareness of the] person.
Then it is the Presence
[of Shekinah, the feminine aspect of God]
herself who commands the voice;
it is she who speaks the words
through the person.
One who knows in faith
that all this happens within
will be overcome with trembling
and with awe. ²⁰
When you speak,
[know] that the World of Speech
is at work within you,
for without that presence,
you would not be able to speak at all.
Similarly, you would not think at all
were it not for the World of Thought within you.
A person is like a ram’s horn;
the only sound you make
is that which is blown through you.
Were there no one blowing into the horn,
there would be no sound at all.²¹
When a person says the words of prayer
so that they become a throne for God
an awesome silent fire takes hold of them.
Then they know not where they are;
they cannot see, they cannot hear.
All this happens in the flash of an instant—
as they ascend beyond the world of time.²²
There are times when the love of God
burns so powerfully within your heart
that the words of prayer seem to rush forth,
quickly and without deliberation.
At such times
it is not you yourself who speak;
rather it is through you
that the sounds are spoken.²³
As long as you can still say the words…
by your own will,
know that you have not yet reached
the deeper levels of prayer.
Be so stripped of selfhood
that you have neither
the awareness nor the power
to say a single word on your own.²⁴
The small ratzon [the apparent human will]
meets the great ratzon [the Will of God].
The depths of the heart meet the depths of all.
And the desire to be blessed
unites with the Source of all blessings.
The meeting between the depths of the heart
and the depths of divinity fulfills our desire.
We are not who we were
when we ventured on this journey.²⁵
— Melila Hellner-Eshed
The ancient Hebrew canonical text,
the Zohar, refers to two kinds of prayer.
Those that are words of the mouth
and "the Prayer of Silence,"
those that are the secret meditations of the heart.
The Prayer of Silence is said to be a silent,
unexpressed and inexpressible type of Prayer
which conceals the Mystery of Perfect Union
in the Divine Essence.
Further, that the Prayer of Silence
is actually spoken by the Divine Voice within us.²⁶
— Hans W. Nintzel
People think they pray to the Divine One.
But this is not the case.
For prayer itself is of the essence of Divinity.²⁷
— Pinchas Shapiro
Pure Prayer: Part III includes Christian Science teachings from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries.
[Scientific] prayer cannot change
the Science of Being,
but it tends to bring us
into harmony with it…²⁸
In order to pray aright,
we must enter into the closet
and shut the door.
We must close the lips
and silence the material senses.²⁹
— Mary Baker Eddy
Our [Scientific] thinking
is not about Truth, [it] is Truth Itself.³⁰
— Martha Wilcox
The Christian Science treatment
is the conscious realization and utilization
of God’s power
by the individual giving the treatment,
because Christian Science treatment
is the operation of the divine Mind…
It is absolutely necessary, therefore,
for the individual to note
what constitutes the divine…
Mind knows the perfection
of its own ideas—and to Mind
there is nothing but perfection…
[You] must understand yourself
to be the functioning of that Mind,
which was also in Christ Jesus…
Mind, conscious of its own perfect Self,
is a Christian Science treatment.³¹
— Martha Wilcox
Prayer at its highest and purest
isn't a tool of the human mind.
And it doesn't just go to the Almighty.
It starts from the Almighty.
God, the one Mind of the universe,
knows the perfection of Its own creation.
That divine knowing
is at the heart of pure prayer.
Mind knows Its offspring—you and me—
as flawless, whole, well, and free.
From God's point of view,
that's the only knowing going on.
Seen in this light,
prayer is not an iffy mental exercise
that might or might not work.³²
– Channing Walker
[Scientific] prayer is shutting the door
on the possibility of the problem.³³
— Clarence Steves
In pure prayer there is no element
of fear, fluctuation, or doubt.³⁴
— Violet Ker Seymer
True prayer is to know, and to know is TO BE.³⁵
— Kenneth B. Adams
When [thought] is lost
in the eminence of [divine] Mind,
the healing takes place.³⁶
— attributed to Mary Baker Eddy
Pure Prayer: Part IV includes the teachings of Vedic sage and seer Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in the 20th and 21st centuries. He explains that there are different levels of prayer, each with a different degree of effectiveness.
Prayer on the verbal level
has its effectiveness;
prayer on the mental level is more effective;
prayer from the transcendental area of life
has maximum effectiveness,
because on that level
thought has a frictionless flow—
it travels instantly throughout Nature…
[Transcendental prayer] is instantly heard
and instantly responded [to]…³⁷
— Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
Ask, and it will be given to you;
seek, and you will find;
knock, and it will be opened to you.
Matthew 7:7 ESV
Knocking at the door of God
means that you bring your consciousness
on that omnipresent level of Being
which is infinite and which encompasses
the whole field of Creation.³⁸
— attributed to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
Recourse to higher intelligence
and higher power lies within us.
Since our nervous system allows us to transcend,
we can align ourselves
with the source of all there is…
It is the absolute, which is us.
We adopt the absolute’s perspective.
This is surrendering our small ego to the absolute.³⁹
— Dr. Tony Nader
[In higher states of consciousness]
one’s life becomes the prayer,
the prayer that sings the Glory of God...
When the individual pulsates in God Consciousness…
that is the glory of God
pulsating in the world…
And this is the resonance of prayer.⁴⁰
— Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
Pure Prayer: Part V reiterates the essential point for healing. It comes to us from the teachings of Christian Science and of Metaphysical Science. Here we find that even a conscious glimpse of the Absolute is enough to change our experience in the relative.
[Metaphysical, pure] prayer is
the recognition
of the divinity of humanity…
We think that it takes human doing
to effect change
[but]…if you do absolutely nothing
[other than consciously acknowledge
the divine fact],
the human [picture] will change.⁴¹
— Betty Albee
If you seem to be experiencing
an inharmonious condition
and can realize the truth
about yourself
as one actually is in heaven,
governed and controlled
by the Principle of good,
the apparent negative condition
will vanish and you will witness
harmony instead of discord.
This is called healing—
it is proof that reality
must be here
or you could not experience it.⁴²
— Vivian May Williams
Become so conscious of the oneness,
the allness of divine Love that the problem,
the patient, the practitioner, all disappear,
and leave only the Love of God
experiencing its own loveliness...
Live your prayer,
be your prayer,
be the presence of prayer,
so that your living is praying
and your prayer is living.
Pray without ceasing.
Be your prayer.
Let your very presence be prayer.
All you come in touch with
will feel that something holy
has touched them.⁴³
— Clarence Steves
Hold thought steadfastly
to the enduring, the good, and the true,
and you will bring these
into your experience proportionably
to their occupancy of your thoughts.⁴⁴
— Mary Baker Eddy
When you understand
that Mind is One and All,
then you must admit
that everything in your world
comes to you as consciousness.
If you do not turn from Mind, cause,
to consider effect, you will experience
as effect only that which is true, beautiful and satisfying.
If ‘all is Mind,’ what is there to turn to
and where can you turn?
If ‘all is Mind,’
that Mind cannot be conscious of
anything but itself as evidence.⁴⁵
— Martha Wilcox
Going through to the absolute
is the way to handle every appearance of
evil or limitation.
This is true whether you are confronted
with a case appearing to be complex,
or are forced to deal with several diverse cases.
The cases are not essentially different;
and infinite good, appearing infinitely,
is the remedy for every ill.⁴⁶
— Robert Booker
Become conscious for a single moment
that Life and intelligence are purely spiritual—
neither in nor of matter—
and the body will then utter no complaints.
If suffering from a belief in sickness,
you will find yourself suddenly well.⁴⁷
—Mary Baker Eddy
Pure Prayer: Part VI comes to us from the teachings of non-duality in Transcendental Judaism and Advaita Vedanta.
[Pure] prayer goes beyond the scope of emotion;
it is the approach of the human to the transcendent.⁴⁸
— Abraham Joshua Heschel
When I touch the transcendent…
I am not only experiencing my own essence;
I am also experiencing yours.
They are not two different essences
that happen to be the same,
they are the One Essence.⁴⁹
— Daniel L Lieberman
The ultimate form of healing is to feel
their being as your being,
that's the real healing.
You're not really healing their body
or even their mind.
You're taking them to their true
nature.
You're enabling them to feel the wholeness
that they already are—
not the wholeness
that they're going to become
as a result of your healing.
The wholeness that they already are,
that's the real healing.⁵⁰
— Rupert Spira
References
[1] The Desert Fathers, Mysticism: Evagrius Ponticus and John Cassian, a web-based bibliography on the emergence of early Christian cosmology • https://desertfathers.blogspot.com/2014/02/mysticism-evagrius-ponticus-and-john.html • 01.23.2022
[2] [Father-Mother] replaces “Father”
[3] Evagrius Ponticus, The Praktikos & Chapters On Prayer, (Cistercian Publications, 1972), p. xcii • [one] replaces “man”
[4] Ibid., p. 75 • [being] replaces “man,” [every person] replaces “man”
[5] Ibid., p. 48 • [one] replaces “a monk” and “he” and “him”
[6] Ibid., p. 48 • [transcendence] replaces “rejection”
[7] Ibid. p. 75 • [one] replaces “spirit”
[8] Ibid., p. 75 • [one] replaces “spirit,” [sense] replaces “sensible”
[9] Evagrios [Evagrius ] Ponticus, On Prayer 61, in the Philokalia, http://truthisone.org/docs/majorpaths/ceasingthoughts/nothoughts-christianity.htm • 05.18.2002
[10] St. Isaac the Syrian in the Sebastian Brock translation of Homily 64 • http://truthisone.org/docs/majorpaths/ceasingthoughts/nothoughts-christianity.htm • 05.18.2002
[11] St. Isaac the Syrian recorded by Evagrios [Evagrius ]of Ponticus, On Prayer 61 • http://truthisone.org/docs/majorpaths/ceasingthoughts/nothoughts-christianity.htm • 05.18.2002 • for further study: https://saintsophiadc.org/prayers-st-isaac-syrian/• 01.12.2022 • see also the section entitled, The Highest Stages of Prayer, https://jbburnett.com/resources/alfeyev_prayer-in-isaac-syr.pdf • 01.12.2022
[12] Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev, Prayer in St Isaac of Nineveh Paper, delivered at the Conference on Prayer and Spirituality in the Early Church, Melbourne, Australia, August 1995. Based on Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev, The Spiritual World of Isaac the Syrian (Cistercian Publications, Kalamazoo, Michigan, 2000). • https://jbburnett.com/resources/alfeyev_prayer-in-isaac-syr.pdf • 05.22.2022
[13] Ibid., p. 15 [one’s] replaces “her”
[14] Ibid., p. 16
[15] Ibid. [one] replaces “he”
[16] Ibid., p. 16-17
[17] Ibid., p. 17
[18] Arthur Green & Barry W. Holtz, Your Word Is Fire: The Hasidic Masters on Contemplative Prayer, (Jewish Lights Publishing, 1977), p. 56
[19] Ibid., p. 55 [One] replaces “he,” [one’s] replaces “his”
[20] Arthur Green & Barry W. Holtz, Your Word Is Fire: The Hasidic Masters on Contemplative Prayer, (Jewish Lights Publishing, 1977), p. 61 • [Shekinah] replaces “God,” [the] replaces “his”
[21] Ibid., p. 63 • [know] replaces “think”
[22] Ibid., p. 83 [them] replaces “him,” [they] replaces “he”
[23] Ibid., p. 62
[24] Ibid., p. 59
[25] Lawrence Fine, Eitan Fishbane, and Or N. Rose, Jewish Mysticism and the Spiritual Life, an essay entitled Praying from the Depths by Melila Hellner-Eshed (Jewish Lights Publishing, 2011), p. 145
[26] Hans W. Nintzel, Meditation and the Western Tradition • http://homepages.ihug.com.au/~panopus/parachemy/parachemyv4.htm • 11.29.2003
• see Zohar (Pt. 1, fol 169a)
[27] Jeff Schulman, Create An Opening, https://www.sefaria.org/sheets/518940?lang=bi 04.19.2024
[28] Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 2
[29] Ibid., p. 15
[30] Martha Wilcox, Association Address of 1945, (The Bookmark, 1986), p. 47
[31] Martha Wilcox, Association Address of 1941, Chapter 2: Oneness, (The Bookmark, 1986), p. 21, 23
[32] Channing Walker, From A Distance, Christian Science Journal, April 2005, p. 27 • [Its] replaces “His,” [the Almighty] replaces “Him,” [Its] replaces “His”
[33] Clarence Steves, Selected Addresses of Clarence Steves CSB, (Healing Unlimited, 1999), p. 163
[34] Violet Ker Seymer, Pray without ceasing, Christian Science Sentinel, Editorial, March 19, 1938
[35] Kenneth B. Adams, Christian Science Association Addresses, (Premier Printing Corporation, 1949), p. 171
[36] Mary Baker Eddy as found in Gilbert Carpenter, Course in Divinity and General Collectanea of Items By and About Mary Baker Eddy, (Rare Book Company), p. 237 • [thought] replaces “thinker”
[37] Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Press Conference, July 10, 2002, No Prayer Will Go In Vain, https://youtube.com/watch?v=gG1qmP2qFYg • 06.14.2018
[38] Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Notes from Lecture, Los Angeles, 1967
[39] Nader, Tony. One unbounded ocean of consciousness (Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial Argentina. Kindle Edition), p. 189.
[40] Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Life Becomes A Prayer, Lecture in Rishikesh, 02.02.1968
[41] Betty Albee, Exploring “Right” Accesses New Freedoms, https://youtu.be/Reb0nOF3EPI • 03.16.2022
[42] Vivian May Williams, There is Nothing But God, (The Rare Book Company, 1934), p. 94 • [you] replaces “one,” [yourself] replaces “himself,” [you] replaces “he”
[43] Clarence Steves, Selected Addresses of Clarence Steves CSB, (Healing Unlimited, 1999), p. 163
[44] Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 261
[45] Martha Wilcox, Works on Christian Science, Volume V, Excerpt from Class Teaching, Christian Science Practice, (The Bookmark, 1986), p. 4
[46] Robert Booker, The Magic of Knowing, (The Farallon Foundation, 1955), p. 22
[47] Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 14
[48] Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, Man’s Quest for God, p. 13
[49] David L. Lieberman, Transcendental Judaism: Enlivening the Eternal
Within to Uplift Ourselves and Our World, (Resource Publications, 2023), p. 23
[50] Rupert Spira, The Ultimate Form of Healing, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UXQpzrEgu0 12.27.2023
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