Nietzsche on Prayer

P

Prince_James

Plutarch (Mickey's Dog)
Registered Senior Member
According to an essay by H.L. Mencken (http://www.geocities.com/danielmacryan/nietzsche11.html):

Prayer, for instance, is an excceedingly important feature of Christian worship and any form of worship in which it had no place would be necessarily unchristian. But upon what theory is prayer based? Examining the matter from all sides you will have to conclude that it is reasonable only upon two assumptions: first, that it is possible to change the infallible will and opinion of the deity, and secondly, that the petitioner is capable of judging what he needs. Now, Christianity maintains, as one of its main dogmas, that the deity is omniscient and all-wise, and, as another fundamental doctrine, that human beings are absolutely unable to solve their problems without heavenly aid i.e. that the deity necessarily knows what is best for any given man better than that man can ever hope to know it himself. Therefore, Christianity, in ordaining prayer, orders, as a condition of inclusion in its communion, an act which it holds to be useless. This contradiction, argues Nietzsche, cannot be explained away in terms comprehensible to the human intelligence.

What say you to this?

Also, does anyone have the exact Nietzsche quote on prayer? I used to have a bookmark stuck in a book for it, but I lost it.
 
Who said prayer was a necessary for worship?

Worship is the public acknowledgment of the characteristics of God through praise. Prayer is a different thing all together. Prayer is a method of having a relationship with God. A private communication. Being in communication with God gives us benefits far and beyond anything that we might include in a prayer. Also if you think that prayer is only used as a form of petition to God then your sadly limited in your understanding. When we pray our focus is on God and the benefits that come are not sports cars money and success, But peace, perseverance and wisdom.

Of course Gods will shall be done and it is His will to give to those who ask and to reveal to those who seek.


All Praise The Ancient Of Days
 
prayer actually deals with a wide range of values and qualities - in other words just because someone prays, it doesn't mean that every one prays in the same consciousness - a good amount of scriptural study is spent examining the differences between the prayers of different personalities to determine what object is more valuable than another.

for instance prayers for material benedictions (health, wealth, relationships based on body and ancenstory etc) are all useless because the medium that one accepts such benedictions (ie the corporeal body) is destined to die (no matter how rich, healthy or well loved you are).

Therefore the highest grade of worshipper is one who does not pray to god for material benedictions, but prays for the opportunity to render service.

The principle behind this is that being socialized (that is having an innate spontaneous attraction to) around service to god is sufficient to qualify one for entering the eternal realm, whereas material boon exaccerbate one's attrcation to the mundane sphere which is essentially punishing due to its ephemeral nature.
 
Lightgigantic and Adstar:

Can it truly be said that prayer for faith and service to God (which is essentially what both are you claiming is superior prayer) is anything but redundant? To pray is to -begin- that very same thing we are asking God to bestow upon us, no? Moreover, there is no reason if it is ultimately God's will, will be done (although I am not sure if Lightgigantic, you would claim this would be the case).
 
Prince_James said:
Lightgigantic and Adstar:

Can it truly be said that prayer for faith and service to God (which is essentially what both are you claiming is superior prayer) is anything but redundant? To pray is to -begin- that very same thing we are asking God to bestow upon us, no? Moreover, there is no reason if it is ultimately God's will, will be done (although I am not sure if Lightgigantic, you would claim this would be the case).
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there is the problem fo r th e conditioned soul of existing in the medium of illusion (despite moments of clarity that can result in a clear understanding of god, the material atmosphere, and the living entities relationship with both)

the prayer for service is the prayer to be more firmly fixed in that medium of clarity

as for god's will, its the case that if god reveals himself to his devotee, then it will be sufficient to override anything that may appear as superior in the material world .
In other words generally we are not attracted to god,mainly becase we have no perception of him, thus the default position is that we are attracted to something in this material world - but if go dreveals himself, then whatever we may have thougt as supremely attractive pales in comparison - at such a point there are no more "austerities" inspiritual life, because one natural perceives spiritual life as fully relishable and whatever is thrown at one in the name of material life, a sick and sorry substitute
 
So basically, it is to strengthen ones resolve?

And one one gets acquainted to God, it is the equivalent of spiritual champagne compared to dirty water, in essence?
 
Prince_James said:
So basically, it is to strengthen ones resolve?
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its more than just one's personal resolve since it innvolves two entities (the living entity and god) - just like you cannot really say that the success of an agreeable relationship between two people is fully dependant on the resolve of one party

And one one gets acquainted to God, it is the equivalent of spiritual champagne compared to dirty water, in essence?
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yes, although gold compared to lead would be a more apt analogy (since champagne is primarily rotten water anyway)
 
So basically you envision prayer as the method whereby you solidify a relationship with God?
 
Prince_James said:
So basically you envision prayer as the method whereby you solidify a relationship with God?
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yes, but in the presence of other things, namelythe cultivation of false ego, it can quickly degenerate into mere lip service (even in our noraml dealings, we tend to only appreciate the words of a sincere person and not a crooked one)
 
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