Weak Prayer Yields Weak Results
On Kierkegaard & Nietzsche's views on Prayer and mistaking God for Santa Claus
I find one’s faith to be extremely personal. More personal than one’s sex life. The way religion is talked about on the internet, which is mostly used to scold people, replace having an identity, and self-advertise as a “good person”, makes me sick. I don’t write about religion often because I find it distasteful to talk about publicly, despite what the scriptures say.
However, I’ve always found Prayer to be fascinating. What is it exactly? Is God actually listening? How would you even know? Are people wasting their time? Does it work? How do you know if it works?
Regardless, there’s irrefutable evidence that Prayer has major physical and mental benefits:
Therefore, we know Prayer does something. Whether or not Prayer works is a different question entirely. And there’s no way to prove whether or not it does.
Prayer is often associated with saying specific prayers before bed, a Christian sitting in a pew holding rosary beads, or a Jew rocking back and forth while holding a box. I find these rituals unappealing.
I think about what Jesus said at The Sermon on the Mount:
“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.
But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.
Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.” -Matthew 6:5-8
Challenging the necessity to pray at a certain place has implications about God’s omnipresence and appeals to people (like myself) who are allergic to arbitrary rules. Requiring a ritual pushes away people who otherwise may be interested. “Do I really want to be one of those people?”
How to pray is a different question.
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock on the door and the door will be opened to you.” -Matthew 7:7
This has implications about God’s omniscience, but I suspect “Ask and it will be given to you” is often interpreted to mistake God for an ATM machine or personal Santa Claus. And there’s nothing wrong with asking God for help with physical needs, but I’d like to think God rolls his eyes when billions of people are asking him for billions of dollars.
This type of Prayer reflects the darker elements of religion, which is when belief in God is used as a coping mechanism or a belief in magic to soothe the psychic pain of the masses. The purpose of Prayer is less about getting what you want and more about who you can become.
“Buddy, who are you to be telling people how to pray? What are you, a pastor now? Am I witnessing the fuckboy to moralist pipeline?” No. I’m a Christian and a sinner, and I find Prayer to be immensely transformative. The most I can do is speak from experience.
I’ve found that Prayer only works when you humble yourself before God in a way you shouldn’t before anyone else, for the sake of maintaining your dignity. This means fully admitting your flaws with such ruthless honesty that it unearths a permanent psychological shift. I believe being aggressively vulnerable before God in such a way, privately, is when he (I don’t capitalize the H, sorry) actually knows you’re serious. Given he already knows what you need, he’s simply waiting for you to truly ask. And only then does God begin to Act on your behalf.
When I admit my flaws before God, things begin to change. In due time, the circumstances that stem from the flaw begin to resolve themselves. Yes — in mysterious ways. I’ve seen God rearrange the world to my benefit in ways I couldn’t have possibly predicted or arranged myself.
“How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out.” -Romans 11:33
What I’m describing is confirmed in the scriptures.
“But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’
I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” -Luke 18:13-14.
Praying for your problems to magically go away is easy. Setting your delusions on fire and shattering your ego before a force higher than yourself is difficult. Admitting your flaws to yourself, and to God, in your own mind, pulls apart elements that need to be sorted. I believe Prayer requires existential and emotional digging, which results in an extinguishing, and eventually a cleansing. Prayer is supposed to be painful.
I’m arrogant, but not arrogant enough to think I’m the first person to think of Prayer in this way. I’m well-read in Søren Kierkegaard but I was unaware he sees Prayer in exactly the same way as I do until looking further.
Kierkegaard saw Prayer as a deeply personal and inward act that transforms the person praying rather than evoking actions from God. He believed Prayer requires surrender and authentic self-examination.
“Prayer does not change God, but it changes the one who prays.” -Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing
“Prayer is a silent surrendering of everything to God.” -The Prayers of Kierkegaard
Kierkegaard believes Prayer bridges what he called the infinite qualitative difference between finite humans and infinite God. This requires humility and intimacy between the person and God, without ritual.
His philosophy of faith is one of a passionate yet subjective leap amid existential despair. In The Sickness unto Death Kierkegaard describes 3 types of existential despair:
Being unaware of having a Self
Not wanting to be one’s Self
Feeling unlike one’s Self
He believed Faith is the opposite of Despair, of which Prayer is the bridge. Kierkegaard believes Prayer demands both inwardness and decisive commitment, countering the superficial elements of religion by emphasizing individual struggle and self-becoming before God. Prayer causes one to confront despair through trust, aligning the Self with God’s will in a life of spiritual authenticity.
Nietzsche, unsurprisingly, had very different thoughts on Prayer:
The Value of Prayer — Prayer has been devised for such men as have never any thoughts of their own, and to whom an elevation of the soul is unknown, or passes unnoticed; what shall these people do in holy places and in all important situations in life which require repose and some kind of dignity?
In order at least that they may not disturb, the wisdom of all the founders of religions, the small as well as the great, has commended to them the formula of prayer, as a long mechanical labour of the lips, united with an effort of the memory, and with a uniform, prescribed attitude of hands and feet — and eyes! They may then, like the Tibetans, chew the cud of their "om mane padme hum," innumerable times, or, as in Benares, count the name of the God Ram-Ram-Ram (etc., with or without grace) on their fingers; or honour Vishnu with his thousand names of invocation, Allah with his ninety-nine; or they may make use of the prayer-wheels and the rosary: the main thing is that they are settled down for a time at this work, and present a tolerable appearance; their mode of prayer is devised for the advantage of the pious who have thought and elevation of their own.
But even these have their weary hours when a series of venerable words and sounds, and a mechanical, pious ritual does them good. But supposing that these rare men — in every religion the religious man is an exception — know how to help themselves, the poor in spirit do not know, and to forbid them the prayer-babbling would mean to take their religion from them, a fact which Protestantism brings more and more to light. All that religion wants with such persons is that they should keep still with their eyes, hands, legs, and all their organs: they thereby become temporarily beautified and — more human-looking! -The Gay Science, Section 28
It’s hard for me to disagree with this, as his views closely align with mine in ‘using God as Santa Clause.’ I’m unaware of any other places Nietzsche discussed “the religious man”, who he stated is rare. If you know of any other places where he expanded, please let me know — but this exception is worth noting.
Given Nietzsche said “these rare men-in every religion the religious man is an exception-know how to help themselves”, there is a connection between Nietzsche’s dismissive view of Prayer as such and Kierkegaard’s emphasis on Prayer as a personal exaltation.
To humble yourself before God requires self-knowing, extreme humility, and a willingness to destroy one’s delusions about life and themselves in a full admission of one’s flaws in a personal communion with God, and only then asking for his assistance with said flaws. This, in my experience, is the only time Prayer actually works, and when God begins to take you seriously.
Simply profound. I’ve read this twice and will continue to reread it. It is a salve on the current discourse
I appreciate this post very much. One of my favorites from you.