What is prayer?

And why it only works some of the time

I was inspired to write this post after reading the comment section on one of Rod Dreher’s substack posts, which explains the controversy around Metropolitan Hilarion, (erstwhile) leader of the Russian Orthodox Church in Hungary and some of his own personal struggles and challenges connected to that. Almost everyone, including me, urged Rod to pray and that got me thinking, why do we actually do that?

What is the role of prayer, why do we do it and who do we actually talk to, when we pray? Does it work most of the time, some of the time, or is it just placebo or confirmation bias?

You will obviously get different answers depending on the religious background or lack thereof, of the person you’re talking to, but there are some generalities that seem to apply universally.

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So, what is prayer, actually?

At a fundamental level, it is a plea to a higher power to alter our fate or that of someone else. We know instinctually, that events follow each other along a pre-set pattern and that certain outcomes are baked into the cake, so to speak. Call it fate, call it karma or whatever you like, but current actions have consequences in the future and the very circumstances we were born into, largely determine our life path. In actual fact, despite the illusion of free will, we have very little say and control over how our life turns out.

We don’t decide where and when we are born and to what parents. We don’t decide the nation and city we are born in, our social class, the wealth and influence of our parents, our local and national community. Some are seemingly born lucky, others drew the short stick in this game of life and start off with massive disadvantages from the start, some aren’t even born and are aborted in vitrio.

Who determines who lives and dies, who has fortune and fame, who has misfortune and obscurity? It is easy to say, that we are the makers of our own fate, but real life doesn’t bear that out. Very rarely does someone rise above the disadvantages they were saddled with from birth and it is very hard for those that were born into wealth and power to fall down from that high station. It does happen obviously, but even that seems arbitrary, with hard work and determination playing only a minor role and luck, being in the right place at the right time, seemingly crucial.

Why is that? Why are opportunities abundant for some and nonexistent for others?

Our ancestors saw the work of spirits behind luck and misfortune and invented rudimentary forms of religion and magic to influence their fate. Thus, they painted their desired outcome, usually a plentiful bounty in the hunt, on cave walls and presumably performed rituals to make it happen. Similarly, fertility symbols were created and used to enable the blessing of children and in agricultural times, a plentiful harvest.

With the rise of the first civilisations in Mesopotamia, along with agriculture, all the accoutréments of modern life were invented, such as writing, medicine, beer brewing and wine making, astrology and astronomy, time keeping, mathematics and so on.

Astronomy helped predict the coming of the floods and the rainy season, astrology aimed to decipher the intention of the gods, by watching their movements in the heavens, trying to learn the patterns that drove them.

As religion became codified and organised, with temples, priests and scripture, the appropriate way to address the gods was established. Approximately 6000 years ago, with the rise of Sumer, people started establishing a personal relationship with their gods. People made a habit of praying to them daily, with different types of deities deemed appropriate for different purposes, depending on their assigned roles. Some specialized in providing good health, others were for good fortune, a plentiful harvest and so on. We still see this specialization in Hinduism today and to a lesser extent in Christianity, where different saints and angels are assigned different roles and prayed to according to their assigned roles.

In Sumer and in most other ancient civilisations, people believed that their fate was predetermined, woven by the gods or the fates, as a sort of matrix or lattice of reality. It was believed, that prayer could help convince a deity to change the fate of a mortal and provide a more beneficial outcome, if the appropriate propitiations and rituals were performed. People also had personal gods, to whom they confessed their sorrows and inner thoughts and believed that they would be listening to them, providing comfort.

Even today, prayer is a central part of the human experience. Most peope alive today pray, with some regularity, using different methods and rituals, but there are always some commonalities.

However, we never actually examine what goes on during prayer, so let me take this opportunity, to examine it in detail.

Simply put, prayer is our way of communicating with a higher power, be it a deity, angel, saint or God, with a capital G. However, the targets of prayers don’t live in the same world, the same reality, we do, so how does our message get across? Does it always get across, when does it and when doesn’t it and why are prayers only answered sometimes?

Those are difficult question to grapple with, but we must tackle them to the best of our abilities, for knowledge is the path to salvation.

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First, it is useful exercise to recap all the different types of prayers that are out there, which, roughly speaking, are:

• Adoration (Worship or Praise):

  • Purpose: To honor and glorify the divine, recognizing the greatness and holiness of the deity without asking for anything in return.

  • Example: The Christian "Gloria" or Hindu bhajans that exalt the attributes of a god or goddess.

• Confession (Repentance):

  • Purpose: To admit sins or wrongdoings and seek forgiveness from the divine.

  • Example: The Christian "Act of Contrition" or the Jewish "Vidui" (confessional prayer).

• Thanksgiving:

  • Purpose: To express gratitude to the divine for blessings and gifts received.

  • Example: The Christian "Grace" before meals or the Hindu "Pradakshina" (circumambulation of temples).

• Supplication (Petition or Intercession):

  • Purpose: To ask the divine for help, guidance, or intervention in specific matters, either for oneself or others.

  • Example: The Christian "Lord's Prayer" or Islamic "Dua" for personal requests.

• Meditation:

  • Purpose: To focus the mind and heart on the divine, often in a state of silent reflection or contemplation.

  • Example: Buddhist "Metta Bhavana" (Loving-kindness meditation) or Christian contemplative prayer.

• Dedication (Consecration or Commitment):

  • Purpose: To devote oneself or others to the service of the divine.

  • Example: Christian baptismal vows or Hindu "Sankalpa" (a vow or intention made to perform certain actions).

• Mantra:

  • Definition of Mantra: A mantra is a sacred sound, syllable, word, or group of words believed to have spiritual and psychological power. Mantras are often repeated during meditation, rituals, and prayer.

  • Purpose: Mantras can serve various purposes, such as focusing the mind, invoking a deity, expressing devotion, or achieving a specific spiritual or worldly goal.

  • Examples:

    • Hinduism: The "Gayatri Mantra" is a revered Vedic chant invoking the sun deity for wisdom and enlightenment.

    • Buddhism: The "Om Mani Padme Hum" mantra is used to invoke the blessings of the bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokiteshvara.

    • Jainism: The "Namokar Mantra" pays homage to the spiritual leaders and teachers in Jainism.

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What are the commonalities between all these different types of prayer?

Let me simplify it, by concentrating on the basic elements of commonality.

There is a prayer (worshipper) and a prayee (usually a deity, saint, or a group of them).

First, the worshipper prepares for the prayer, creates the right environment, does the prescribed preparation, such as ritualistic purification and washing, etc. Generally, there is an accepted convention in each faith as to what needs to be done in terms of preparation, such as bowing or kneeling. Then, the worshipper invokes the intended target of the prayer through various means, either by saying their name, usually in different forms and using honorifics. Chanting or singing is believed to enhance the effectiveness of the prayer. This is due to the vibrational principle I explored in my last couple of posts, with the intended effect being a harmonization of the devotee with the frequency of the deity. This effect can be enhanced through various supplementary tools. Apart from chanting the holy name of the deity or saint, one can use visual cues, either in the mind’s eye (visualisation) or through consecrated objects that are meant to connect to the deity or saint. A consecrated holy object dedicated to a particular deity acts as a gateway that links them to the worshipper across the vastness of time and space, in terms of energetics, merging the energy fields of the two.

Many other methods are used to enhance the effectiveness of prayer. Fire and smoke are seen as transformative and link the devotee to the unseen. Prayer beads and mills can be used to great effect, with a numerological element, the number of times a prayer is said, further linking the devotee to the deity.

In all cases, the objective of invocation is to link to the deity and open a channel of communication. Whether this is fully or only partially effective, depends significantly on the devotee and the kind of relationship they have with the deity. Simply put, a relationship is built up over a lifetime and is often inherited through successive generations.

A successful invocation will generally involve some sort of noticeable change in the atmosphere of the prayer space or room. Those sensitive to it, will feel a divine presence or even see it through their spiritual sight. Saints in particular are prone to visions of deities or other saints at this point. Some will even experience two-way communication and hear the voice of the divine in various ways. Some hear a clear or even booming voice, others will see visions of various events, or simply receive intention or thought, or the divine radiance and the accompanying peace, love and bliss of the deity.

Visitations are not uncommon where people have developed a particularly close relationship with the divine, though these can take various forms. In the Hindu and Buddhist traditions, it is common for deities to offer a boon, when they appear to a devotee (particularly common in tantra) and for some reason goddesses, in other words, various forms of the divine feminine are far more likely to appear and offer blessings or boons. We also see this in Christianity, where the Holy Mother is the most prolific visitor and granter of boons, such as miraculous healing. As I explained in my post on the Divine Feminine, this is due to the nature of the feminine side of God, which is the active, creative principle and takes a much more direct interest in the affairs of devotees.

Advanced forms of prayer exist in Hinduism, particularly tantra, where mantras are used for very specific purposes that may appear esoteric to the outsider, but are really meant to bring devotee and deity closer to each other, in some cases even merging them, so the devotee becomes the living embodiment of the deity. These are very advanced practices, that are rarely discussed outside the esoteric traditions they originate from.

Once the devotee is satisfied, that they have the ear of the deity, they will continue with their intended message, which is usually to ask for a boon or to give thanks. Millennia may have passed since the dawn of civilisation and thus organised religion, but we still have this abiding belief, that deities (which would include angels in the grand scheme of things) and saints can intercede on our behalf and change our fates for the better. As a belief, it is wholly irrational, but it appears ineradicable. Even atheists pray, when they find themselves in foxholes.

So, this begs the question, what accounts for this abiding belief in a higher power, that they can help us out in sticky situations or at least listen to us with intent and empathy? I would actually like to explain this through the philosophical lens of Vedic nonduality (advaita vedanta), minus the complicated Sanskrit terms, so I hope you will bear with me and stay with me on this journey.

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The link between prayer and nonduality

In nondual philosophy, God is the source of all and the final destination as well. From the Godhead, which is unmanifest potentiality, various parts of the Godhead become manifest, which in simple terms leads to the creation of the dualistic universe. The primary parts of the Godhead are God and Goddess, (the divine masculine and feminine) and it is through their separation that the creation of the dualistic universe becomes possible. In the Godhead, nothing is separate, everything exists in union. Through separation, in its primary form, into male and female, the manifest universe becomes a possibility. The intention to create comes from the divine masculine, but it is actually the divine feminine, which becomes the stuff of creation. It is the outflowing, concrete, manifestative aspect of the Godhead that becomes the universe itself.

That is why, in different traditions we see the universe, or nature as our mother, since she is literally that, she is what gives birth to all of us. The divine feminine extends herself into infinity and forms herself into all that we see around us. Everything, that exists in nature, or the dualistic, created universe, is a manifestation of the divine feminine in some form, essentially a portion of her frozen into solidity to manifest an illusory form. All things in nature are various vibrations of her, from the smallest to the largest. In contrast, the divine masculine appears in this universe as consciousness. Wherever something is conscious, it is a manifestation of the masculine side of God, but only in its ineffable, non-material form.

Humans have many layers to them, which I explained in my post on Our Subtle Architecture. But, fundamentally, our personality is made up of two persons, a higher self, which the Greeks called Daemon and a lower self or ego, which they called the Eidolon. There is actually some research to suggest that these two persons inhabit different parts, maybe even hemispheres of our our brain. However, the important bit is this: our ego is, like nature, essentially illusory and created by the conditions present in the physical and subtle-physical (astral) worlds. Our higher self is the one that is from God and is the God-like portion of us, which was created in his image.

This higher Self came from the Godhead and will return to it at the end of time, when this creation ceases to be. Our higher Self is in effect, how God is present in us. It is us, in a very real sense, the real us, in fact, but it is also a portion of God, a small portion of him. In mystical union, the objective is to reunite this small separate portion of God with the whole, but I will write about this some other time. What we should keep in mind, is how this pertains to prayer.

In effect, when we pray, we do so to our higher selves, though, through the principles of nonduality, we can connect to any separate portion of the Godhead in whatever form it appears, anywhere in the universe. Thus we can pray to a living saint, a deceased one, a deity, an angel, or whichever other divine being is willing to hear us. However, prayers are always filtered through our higher selves (in the Jungian sense), so its success will be contingent on how well aligned we are with it. The higher self is the relay station by which other individuated portions of God can be connected to or accessed, explaining phenomena like telepathy or premonition (by receiving a warning from one of our future selves). The big insight of non-duality is that the higher Self we have is ultimately the same one ultimately everyone else has, or at the very lest, it connects to them in a boundless continuum.

In order for a prayer to be effective and successful, we must be in alignment with our purpose and calling in life and ultimately, our higher self, through which we carry out God’s will. This principle can be best understood through harmonic resonance. God is One, but many at the same time. We are all part of God, through our higher selves and that is how we connect to the divine. In Advaita Vedanta, God-realization and Self-realisation are essentially synonymous, since by realising the Self, through our alignment with the higher self, we also realise God and align with him.

A common experience of those, that align with the Self is synchronicity, a fact Jung himself noted in his work. This often takes the form of uncanny luck, in that everything in the immediate environment of a person thus aligned comes together to help them on their path. Fortuna or Lady Luck as we might call her is another reminder, that his synchronicity comes from the Divine Feminine. Remember, that she is not only the weaver of this reality, but the very substance it is made of, so to her it is effortless to alter events in this reality to better align with our purpose. There are complicated subtle mechanics within the various sheaths of the body, that explain how we can access our divine feminine nature (this is the same for men and women) and how this can be united with our divine masculine nature (which is consciousness itself, as I have stated before), so that through the union of the two, Self and God-realisation can be achieved. However, that is not the theme of this essay, what we would like to find out here, is how prayer works through this relationship.

In the simplest terms possible, what “we” (and that term in itself is ambiguous) always want, deep down, is to reunite with God through mystical union. When we pray, we might think, that we want to achieve some material aim, but actually we are expressing our desire for divine union. The divine is often game and is happy to indulge us, because ultimately, it is all a play in which we play various pre-assigned roles and there is always room for modifications to our pre-determined life path. The divine enjoys playing with us, so to speak, not in a malicious manner, but in the same way a parent would enjoy playing with their small children, which is also why divine beings like to refer to us as their children. The more we are in alignment with our higher selves and thus the divine, the stronger the relationship is between our needs and wants and the speed and effectiveness by which they are realised. Self- or God-realised people don’t actually need to pray at all, since their souls are in constant communion with God and everything they would ever want or need (which at this point is very little) is given to them freely and without them having to ask for it.

A prayer is an attempt by a devotee not yet aligned with their higher Self, to recreate this communion with God. Outside tools, preparation and rituals are needed to achieve a fraction of the effect that a Self-realised person may achieve without effort. This is rather paradoxical, since the more we are in alignment, the less we are in need of anything, so that praying for things loses its meaning and is replaced by constant communion with God. Thus, prayer usually works best for those that are not in an ego-state, but are innocent like children, basically. The relationship between those that are simple at heart and the divine, is direct and no intermediary is necessary. Those that have built up an elaborate ego-construct over a lifetime will naturally find it much more difficult to align with their higher selves and thus will find their prayer to be a lot less effective. This is also an explanation for why the highly educated and sophisticated tend to be further away from God, whilst simple people often have a relationship with the divine that seems unattainable to them.

In other words, ego gets in the way of alignment with God and thus the effectiveness of prayer. There is in fact an ego-driven version or mockery of prayer, which is black magic. This is when a dark entity is invoked to effect a result that is contrary to divine will. The paradox here, is that someone aligned with divine will, would never pray for an outcome that is opposed to it, simply due to the principles of harmonic resonance. Being aligned with the divine means that God’s will is your will, there is no difference between the two. Being in opposition to God is the height of ego and because you are cut off from God, through your deliberate choice of not aligning with him, two things are true at the same time:

• Prayer doesn’t work for you

• You want things that God and by extension, your higher Self doesn’t, creating a dichotomy, schism or split personality within yourself

This is where things like Schizophrenia, Multiple Personality Disorder and even demonic possession comes in. The further away you are from alignment with God and Divine Will, the more likely it is that you will be afflicted by the above conditions, though I must stress, not always due to your own actions. Very commonly, generational trauma accounts for it and thus it is up to the person with the fractured personality to do the work of re-integrating their fractured personalities into one Self. This task must be undertaken by everyone as our basic task in this life is to re-align with our higher Self and thus God.