Is Praying/Supplication Petty?

sandandfoam said:

As I see it the whole of nature prays to God. Why would I be any different?

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I would not use the word pray as prayer implies some for of supplication or communication with a response,

I have always said that existence worships god by default just because it exists but not that it prays.

Sterling Archer said:

I would not use the word pray as prayer implies some for of supplication or communication with a response,

I have always said that existence worships god by default just because it exists but not that it prays.

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Worship is prayer. Praise is prayer. It is communication from the one to the other. Prayer is a form of meditation. Do you meditate? It sets the mind in intention towards unity. Asking for things is only one type of prayer.

Sterling Archer said:

I would not use the word pray as prayer implies some for of supplication or communication with a response,

I have always said that existence worships god by default just because it exists but not that it prays.

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I wouldn't agree with your blog that

"...Islam is indeed barbaric and uncivilized ..."

So at some point you considered yourself a Muslim and then rejected that but
I think you have to look at the spirituality of a religion first and then acknowledge there are set backs in it's organization and implementation of it's laws... but the spiritual verities of the core are still there regardless. Baha'is as you may know have suffered a great deal in Iran in the past century or so and more recently but we never attack the spiritual truths of Islam.

But prayer as someone above already wrote is like a conversation with God... We have that in the Baha'i Faith...While we have needs and are motivated to pray for our community..our loved ones and friends and in adversity ourselves.. it is always with the understanding that God's Will be done

Sterling Archer said:

I would not use the word pray as prayer implies some for of supplication or communication with a response,

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Is your view the only valid one?

arthra said:

I wouldn't agree with your blog that

"...Islam is indeed barbaric and uncivilized ..."

So at some point you considered yourself a Muslim and then rejected that but
I think you have to look at the spirituality of a religion first and then acknowledge there are set backs in it's organization and implementation of it's laws... but the spiritual verities of the core are still there regardless. Baha'is as you may know have suffered a great deal in Iran in the past century or so and more recently but we never attack the spiritual truths of Islam.

But prayer as someone above already wrote is like a conversation with God... We have that in the Baha'i Faith...While we have needs and are motivated to pray for our community..our loved ones and friends and in adversity ourselves.. it is always with the understanding that God's Will be done

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A religion constitutes of the people that make it. I am already finishing a post about this by the way.

Religions are no more barbaric than it's people and their behavior which is justified through the religion. I could say the same about Hindus, Christians and Jews.

When Christians and Muslims behave civilized it is not because of their faith but lack there of. If one is a true Muslim or Christian as defined with absolute certainty in the literature which is designated as being "The Word of God" then truly such a person would be utterly despicable by our standards.

A Muslim is a submitter as defined by the Qur'an and if the Qur'an is taken with total absolution by a Muslim then I am afraid to say Islam is barbaric. I do not mean that as an insult just as a definition of fact.

Do you know of Islamic morals and ethics and its relation to humanity? You can find good things but also VERY negative things. Anything that arose from a though for more than a millenium could not be modern although applicable.

Name me something Islam teaches which another source could not have taught especially if it predates islam.

Morality, science and government can already be ruled out by the way. The Hindus can take credit for this if they like on a religious standpoint, all other religions cannot though.

sandandfoam said:

Is your view the only valid one?

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It is the most widely accepted definition.

Oxford dictionaries...

"a solemn request for help or expression of thanks addressed to God or an object of worship."

Webster....
"an address (as a petition) to God or a god in word or thought "



It is all the same. Worship and prayer are 2 entirely different things as many fail to accept. One is charity with no expectation of a return request and the other is a job demanding return payment.

Windwalker said:

Worship is prayer. Praise is prayer. It is communication from the one to the other. Prayer is a form of meditation. Do you meditate? It sets the mind in intention towards unity. Asking for things is only one type of prayer.

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The dictionary disagrees with you still.

Sterling Archer said:

The dictionary disagrees with you still.

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Dictionaries are not what you turn to understand something, anything for that matter, in depth. You go to the authorities in those given fields. Dictionaries are not the authority of the meaning of words. I hardly consider this the end of the discussion of that word or how it is used in practice.

Sterling Archer said:

It is the most widely accepted definition.

Oxford dictionaries...

"a solemn request for help or expression of thanks addressed to God or an object of worship."

Webster....
"an address (as a petition) to God or a god in word or thought "



It is all the same. Worship and prayer are 2 entirely different things as many fail to accept. One is charity with no expectation of a return request and the other is a job demanding return payment.

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What could a dictionary usefully say of prayer?
If you wish to understand I suggest poetry

[FONT=garamond, times new roman]
I cannot teach you how to pray in words.
God listens not to your words save when He Himself utters them through your lips.
And I cannot teach you the prayer of the seas and the forests and the mountains.
But you who are born of the mountains and the forests and the seas can find their prayer in your heart,
And if you but listen in the stillness of the night you shall hear them saying in silence,
"Our God, who art our winged self, it is thy will in us that willeth.
It is thy desire in us that desireth.
It is thy urge in us that would turn our nights, which are thine, into days which are thine also.
We cannot ask thee for aught, for thou knowest our needs before they are born in us:
Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all." [/FONT]

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If you wish to attempt to beat another with something heavy - a dictionary is not the worst choice.

Windwalker said:

Dictionaries are not what you turn to understand something, anything for that matter, in depth. You go to the authorities in those given fields. Dictionaries are not the authority of the meaning of words. I hardly consider this the end of the discussion of that word or how it is used in practice.

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The same can be said for anything then. Prayer is not a complex institution of some sort.

Worship and prayer are 2 different matters which is the main reason they are treated as such and you are repeatedly stating they are the same.

Sure you can say that. But it is like saying Black and White are the same color which is nonsensical. Bring forth evidence before you make assertions with no justifications.

Prayer is not praise also.

Let's start with a common source.....

Prayer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Worship - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Both have lengthy articles which discuss the individual aspects of the two.

sandandfoam said:

What could a dictionary usefully say of prayer?

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A lot, especially considering you do not even know the definition of the word.

If you wish to understand I suggest poetry

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I love poetry but sadly it does not express the actual meaning of a word, it convolutes it.

it is like giving a person a lengthy list of items which make up a car instead of telling him it is just a car.
You are using superfluous complexity to avoid simplicity which is usually a good sign of a lack of basis for an argument.

If you wish to attempt to beat another with something heavy - a dictionary is not the worst choice.

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So if we are to discuss the meaning of a word it is wrong to use a dictionary?

So much epic failure int hat statement.

If that is the case then I would not require the Bible to refute Christianity, the Bhagavad Gita to refute Hinduism, The Tawrah to refute Judaism nor listen to a single word of Dawkins to refute any claims by him.

I will let you spot out the fallacy of that statement.

Sterling,
Words are vehicles of communication not repositories of meaning. I have a particular understanding of prayer that I do not believe is unique to me.
If you were interested in communicating with me I would be happy to try and share my understanding. However, I do not perceive interest in communication, your perception of

So much epic failure int hat statement.

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indicates you would like to 'beat' me in a competitive exchange and you understand your view to be the only valid one. That's fine, but I think the world is much more interesting than you allow.

sandandfoam said:

Sterling,
Words are vehicles of communication not repositories of meaning. I have a particular understanding of prayer that I do not believe is unique to me.
If you were interested in communicating with me I would be happy to try and share my understanding. However, I do not perceive interest in communication, your perception of

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Prayer is not defined by your not created. If this was the case then I declare the meaning if buttocks to be defined to me concrete.

Semantics is not a good argument and I will repeat myself with that clearly.

indicates you would like to 'beat' me in a competitive exchange and you understand your view to be the only valid one. That's fine, but I think the world is much more interesting than you allow.

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I am not a competitive person and I hath expressed this before which is why I do not debate often.

You fail because you simply wish to ignore the basic definition of a word. I am not asking you to accept my own definition of a word, I am asking you to accept the etymology of it.

Prayer comes from a Latin word meaning to ask or plea. So how can you define it as worship?

Praying etymology

Have you not seen archaic English before? I myself have not only seen it but use it frequently.

Sterling Archer said:

If one is a true Muslim or Christian as defined with absolute certainty in the literature which is designated as being "The Word of God" then truly such a person would be utterly despicable by our standards.

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A Muslim is a submitter as defined by the Qur'an and if the Qur'an is taken with total absolution by a Muslim then I am afraid to say Islam is barbaric. I do not mean that as an insult just as a definition of fact.

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I would suggest you get your facts straight..:thud:

The idea I'm presenting is not novel. Nor can I claim credit for it.
For example Evagarius (c.348 - 99) taught that prayer was not a conversation with God but a 'shedding of thoughts'. (Armstrong, 2009, p.112). I think that centering prayer is a modern manifestation of this approach.
Prayer is most simply defined as "the lifting of the heart and mind to God" (McGinn, 2006,p.79 'The Essential Writings of Christian Mysticism').
No matter what your dictionary says these people are and were talking about prayer. That you don't wish to engage with this stream of thought is neither their fault nor mine.
Why is it important to you to deny the validity of what they suggest?

Monotheist 101 said:

I would suggest you get your facts straight..:thud:

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So you are saying a Muslim doe snot abide by the Qur'an? That is all that I am implying as a fact. The rest is debatable but the concept of ibadah in accordance to the Qur'an is something I doubt a shaykh would deny

sandandfoam said:

The idea I'm presenting is not novel. Nor can I claim credit for it.
For example Evagarius (c.348 - 99) taught that prayer was not a conversation with God but a 'shedding of thoughts'. (Armstrong, 2009, p.112). I think that centering prayer is a modern manifestation of this approach.
Prayer is most simply defined as "the lifting of the heart and mind to God" (McGinn, 2006,p.79 'The Essential Writings of Christian Mysticism').
No matter what your dictionary says these people are and were talking about prayer. That you don't wish to engage with this stream of thought is neither their fault nor mine.
Why is it important to you to deny the validity of what they suggest?

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This is a WHOLE other issue then. Christian perspective of prayer is entirely different as I am just referring to prayer from a non-theistic perspective.

What would Christian dogmatism concern with what prayer is on a non-theistic level?

These are 2 separate issues. I am not making a case for Christians, I am making a case for people of EVERY religion. You are implying that only the Christian concept of prayer counts as prayer.

Breaking news! Christians did not invent prayer. I am only concerned with prayer in accordance to what it defines itself as which is supplication. This is why I made it beyond clear in my thread title by writing "Praying/Supplication" as they are essentially the same thing.

Whatever Christians or Muslims have to say about it is irrelevant. Whether it by a prayer or dua it does not matter. The concept of praying/supplicating is the issue.

You must have skipped over the entire OP. No wonder this conversation is not heading anywhere and you keep pulling semantical arguments from religious theology which is of no concern here.

So to be clear........Christian theology is of no concern here or any other religion as I am only concerned with prayer(as in supplication) in its default definition. You cannot assign Christian creed to the word and make it universally binding, this is a major fallacy.

Sterling Archer said:

So you are saying a Muslim doe snot abide by the Qur'an? That is all that I am implying as a fact. The rest is debatable but the concept of ibadah in accordance to the Qur'an is something I doubt a shaykh would deny

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Thats not the part I disagreed with..

..and if the Qur'an is taken with total absolution by a Muslim then I am afraid to say Islam is barbaric. I do not mean that as an insult just as a definition of fact.

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Anywho, how is life?

Monotheist 101 said:

Thats not the part I disagreed with..

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That is the only relevant part than . If you wish to discuss why Islam is peaceful and not the things I claim it is(along with religion altogether) then that is a whole other debate.

Anywho, how is life?

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Pretty good, made some iced coffee and I am kicking back while finishing some reading.