Rational Agnostic
Well-Known Member
In Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits, Nietzsche states:
"On two hypotheses alone is there any sense in prayer, that not quite extinct custom of olden times. It would have to be possible either to fix or alter the will of the godhead, and the devotee would have to know best himself what he needs and should really desire. Both hypotheses, axiomatic and traditional in all other religions, are denied by Christianity. If Christianity nevertheless maintained prayer side by side with its belief in the all-wise and all-provident divine reason (a belief that makes prayer really senseless and even blasphemous), it showed here once more its admirable “wisdom of the serpent.” For an outspoken command, “Thou shalt not pray,” would have led Christians by way of boredom to the denial of Christianity. In the Christian ora et labora ora plays the rôle of pleasure. Without ora what could those unlucky saints who renounced labora have done? But to have a chat with God, to ask him for all kinds of pleasant things, to feel a slight amusement at one's own folly in still having any wishes at all, in spite of so excellent a father—all that was an admirable invention for saints."
I think he makes an excellent point. If God is all-powerful and his will is unalterable, then prayer should be considered futile, and even considered to be blasphemy, as praying to God would imply the belief that God's will can be influenced and changed by the human will, which would directly contradict the teachings of Christianity. Yet if prayer was deemed to be sinful behavior, people would leave Christianity out of boredom, and thus the inventors of Christianity decided that prayer should be allowed, even though it is technically irreconcilable with the nature of the Christian god.
"On two hypotheses alone is there any sense in prayer, that not quite extinct custom of olden times. It would have to be possible either to fix or alter the will of the godhead, and the devotee would have to know best himself what he needs and should really desire. Both hypotheses, axiomatic and traditional in all other religions, are denied by Christianity. If Christianity nevertheless maintained prayer side by side with its belief in the all-wise and all-provident divine reason (a belief that makes prayer really senseless and even blasphemous), it showed here once more its admirable “wisdom of the serpent.” For an outspoken command, “Thou shalt not pray,” would have led Christians by way of boredom to the denial of Christianity. In the Christian ora et labora ora plays the rôle of pleasure. Without ora what could those unlucky saints who renounced labora have done? But to have a chat with God, to ask him for all kinds of pleasant things, to feel a slight amusement at one's own folly in still having any wishes at all, in spite of so excellent a father—all that was an admirable invention for saints."
I think he makes an excellent point. If God is all-powerful and his will is unalterable, then prayer should be considered futile, and even considered to be blasphemy, as praying to God would imply the belief that God's will can be influenced and changed by the human will, which would directly contradict the teachings of Christianity. Yet if prayer was deemed to be sinful behavior, people would leave Christianity out of boredom, and thus the inventors of Christianity decided that prayer should be allowed, even though it is technically irreconcilable with the nature of the Christian god.
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