4 self. Thus, Ames believes that he has refuted the spiritistic view of religion when he has proved that the child or the savage cannot attain the conception of "the closely articulated and unified self." The truth is that one may have a predominantly emotional or volitional consciousness of oneself and of other self, human and divine. The records of primitive religious rites and the expressions of developed religious experience alike confirm the belief that such a personal consciousness, however fragmentary and confused, is involved in prayer. 6 The teaching of this paper stands, therefore, in complete opposition to the view that a God is merely a "central object" of attention and to all the theories which identify religion with magic, sacrament with charm, and prayer with incantation or impersonal ejaculation. It may well be true that magic antedates religion, and it is certain that prayers may be combined with incantation but the historically later experience is not necessarily identical with that on which it follows; and prayer and incantation, though directed to the same object, are utterly diverse in nature,—in Leuba's words, "they combine but never fuse." The difference between magic and religion may be insisted on with the greater vigor since it is taught by scholars who differ widely in their views of the relation between the two. Frazer, who believes that religion arises later than magic through a tardy recognition of the inherent falsehood and barrenness of magic, naturally asserts "a fundamental . . . opposition of principle between magic and religion." But Lang and Leuba and Jevons, who reject this intellectualist account of the origin of religion, hold with equal vigor the belief that the difference between prayer and charm or incantation is "essential, fundamental, as little to be ignored as it is possible to bridge." The dis 4 The Psychology of Religious Experience, 1910, p. 972, etc. Cf. Irving King, "The Differentiation of the Religious Consciousness" in Psychological Review, Monograph Supplement, 1905, pp. 2, 20, etc. Ames, op. cit., pp. 97 ff., 106, 120, 172 ff., 311. 6 See J. H. Leuba, The Psychological Origin and the Nature of Religion, pp. 65 ff.; and M. Jastrow, as cited below, p. 492, and footnote. 7 The Golden Bough, second edition, p. xvi. Cf. F. B. Jevons, who quotes these words, op. cit., p. 94. 8 F. B. Jevons, An Introduction to the Study of Comparative Religion, 1908, p. 71. Cf. p. 104. tinction may be briefly formulated in the following statements:An incantation is conceived as coercing the divine power for human ends, in a mechanical, non-personal fashion. For example, an incantation or the wearing of an amulet is supposed mysteriously and, as it were, mechanically, irrationally, without intervening conscious process, to influence the superhuman, controlling powers. Prayer, on the other hand, even though directed to the same end as that of the magical incantation, is the address of spirit to spirit; a personal attitude by which the divine self is conceived to be affected in essentially the way in which one person is affected by another. The confusion of prayer with incantation seems to be closely connected, as effect or cause, with the very prevalent misconception which identifies prayer with petition. From this point of view prayer is synonymous with request or supplication, a begging, beseeching, besieging, demanding attitude of human self to superhuman power. This conception falsifies the history of religion and unduly narrows the meaning of prayer, which, as communion with God, may take on any form of personal intercourse. Unquestionably this has been the teaching of the church. "To speak boldly," says Clement of Alexandria, "prayer is conversation and intercourse with God." 10 "Prayer," says St. Thomas, "is the ascent of the soul to God." " Sabatier repeats almost the words of Clement when he describes prayer as "intercourse with God, ... intimate commerce, . . . interior dialogue." 12 And the outcome of that most penetrating study of personal religion, William James's The Varieties of Religious Experience, is a similar definition of prayer as "every kind of inward communion or conversation with the power recognized as divine." 13 Thanksgiving and penitence, as well as petition, are forms of 'See Leuba, op. cit., pp. 12 ff., 49 ff.; Tiele, Elements of the Science of Religion, vol. ii, pp. 16, 135 ff.; Wundt, Völkerpsychologie, Mythus und Religion, 2ter Teil, pp. 182 ff. 10 Stromata, vii, 242 d. "Summa theologica, secunda secundae, quaest. lxxxiii, art. i, 2. 12 Esquisse d'une philosophie de la religion, pp. 24-26, quoted by James, as cited below, pp. 464–465. 13 The Varieties of Religious Experience, 1902, p. 464; cf. p. 477, note 2. 4 self. Thus, Ames believes that he has refuted the spiritistic view of religion when he has proved that the child or the savage cannot attain the conception of "the closely articulated and unified self." The truth is that one may have a predominantly emotional or volitional consciousness of oneself and of other self, human and divine. The records of primitive religious rites and the expressions of developed religious experience alike confirm the belief that such a personal consciousness, however fragmentary and confused, is involved in prayer. 5 6 The teaching of this paper stands, therefore, in complete opposition to the view that a God is merely a "central object" of attention and to all the theories which identify religion with magic, sacrament with charm, and prayer with incantation or impersonal ejaculation. It may well be true that magic antedates religion, and it is certain that prayers may be combined with incantation but the historically later experience is not necessarily identical with that on which it follows; and prayer and incantation, though directed to the same object, are utterly diverse in nature,—in Leuba's words, "they combine but never fuse." The difference between magic and religion may be insisted on with the greater vigor since it is taught by scholars who differ widely in their views of the relation between the two. Frazer, who believes that religion arises later than magic through a tardy recognition of the inherent falsehood and barrenness of magic, naturally asserts "a fundamental . . . opposition of principle between magic and religion." But Lang and Leuba and Jevons, who reject this intellectualist account of the origin of religion, hold with equal vigor the belief that the difference between prayer and charm or incantation is "essential, fundamental, as little to be ignored as it is possible to bridge." The dis ... 4 The Psychology of Religious Experience, 1910, p. 972, etc. Cf. Irving King, "The Differentiation of the Religious Consciousness" in Psychological Review, Monograph Supplement, 1905, pp. 2, 20, etc. Ames, op. cit., pp. 97 ff., 106, 120, 172 ff., 311. 6 See J. H. Leuba, The Psychological Origin and the Nature of Religion, pp. 65 ff.; and M. Jastrow, as cited below, p. 492, and footnote. 7 The Golden Bough, second edition, p. xvi. Cf. F. B. Jevons, who quotes these words, op. cit., p. 94. 8 F. B. Jevons, An Introduction to the Study of Comparative Religion, 1908, p. 71. Cf. p. 104. tinction may be briefly formulated in the following statements:An incantation is conceived as coercing the divine power for human ends, in a mechanical, non-personal fashion. For example, an incantation or the wearing of an amulet is supposed mysteriously and, as it were, mechanically, irrationally, without intervening conscious process, to influence the superhuman, controlling powers. Prayer, on the other hand, even though directed to the same end as that of the magical incantation, is the address of spirit to spirit; a personal attitude by which the divine self is conceived to be affected in essentially the way in which one person is affected by another. The confusion of prayer with incantation seems to be closely connected, as effect or cause, with the very prevalent misconception which identifies prayer with petition. From this point of view prayer is synonymous with request or supplication, a begging, beseeching, besieging, demanding attitude of human self to superhuman power. This conception falsifies the history of religion and unduly narrows the meaning of prayer, which, as communion with God, may take on any form of personal intercourse. Unquestionably this has been the teaching of the church. "To speak boldly," says Clement of Alexandria, "prayer is conversation and intercourse with God." 10 "Prayer," says St. Thomas, "is the ascent of the soul to God." " Sabatier repeats almost the words of Clement when he describes prayer as "intercourse with God, . . . intimate commerce, . . . interior dialogue.' And the outcome of that most penetrating study of personal religion, William James's The Varieties of Religious Experience, is a similar definition of prayer as "every kind of inward communion or conversation with the power recognized as divine." 13 11 " 12 Thanksgiving and penitence, as well as petition, are forms of 'See Leuba, op. cit., pp. 12 ff., 49 ff.; Tiele, Elements of the Science of Religion, vol. ii, pp. 16, 135 ff.; Wundt, Völkerpsychologie, Mythus und Religion, 2ter Teil, pp. 182 ff. 10 Stromata, vii, 242 d. "Summa theologica, secunda secundae, quaest. lxxxiii, art. i, 2. 12 Esquisse d'une philosophie de la religion, pp. 24-26, quoted by James, as cited below, pp. 464–465. 13 The Varieties of Religious Experience, 1902, p. 464; cf. p. 477, note 2. intercourse with God "common in the most primitive faiths." We may, therefore, profitably widen and deepen our conception of prayer if we bring together illustrations of its different forms from different stages of the religious experience. Fundamental to all is the prayer which expresses not petition, nor penitence, nor thanksgiving, but the mere sense of fellowship. A seemingly perfect example are the prayers, quoted by Tylor, addressed by the Samoyed woman on the steppes of Asia to the sun: "When thou risest, I too rise from my bed; when thou sinkest down, I too get me to rest." 14 I know of nothing to compare with this except the naïveté, sophisticated to be sure in comparison with this utter simplicity, of what may be named the narrative portions of St. Augustine's Confessions. Like the Samoyed woman, St. Augustine is, as it were, assured of God's interest, of his companionship, and talks to him as simply as to a sympathetic human hearer. Next to these, and still at a far remove from prayers of petition, one may group the prayers of reverent contemplation, of adoration, prayers in which the emphasis falls, not on human need, or weakness, or satisfaction, but on the divine completeness and greatness, the prayers in which, to use Everett's fine phrase, the feelings of the worshipper centre in God. An example of such prayer is found in the opening lines of a Babylonian hymn to the Sun God: O Shamash! out of the horizon of heaven thou issuest forth, The door of heaven thou dost open. O Shamash! over the world thou dost raise thy head; O Shamash! with the glory of heaven thou coverest the world. 15 Countless illustrations of these prayers of confidence and adoration may be found in the Hebrew scriptures and in the writings 14 E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture, vol. ii, pp. 291-292. Cf. D. G. Brinton, Religions of Primitive People, 1897: "The earliest hymns and prayers do not, as a rule, contain definite requests but are general invitations to the gods to be present." 15 Quoted and translated from Sir H. C. Rawlinson, The Cuneiform Inscriptions of Western Asia, 20(2) K 3343, by M. Jastrow, The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria, 1898, p. 301. Like all these hymns to Shamash, this hymn passes into an incantation,-in Jastrow's words (p. 293, etc.), a probable “concession made to the persistent belief in the efficacy of certain formulas.” |