I remember from the seventies when I was a young single Christian, trying to learn the ropes of the Christian life, a question that was before our group was the question of what to do with our feelings, especially the negative ones such as anger, and the ones that harbored unbelief or resentment and that sort of thing. The group I ran with had a number of kids in a Christian Counseling Program that was run jointly with a State University. Feelings may not be evil in themselves but may have within them temptations to sin, to veer away from the will and presence of God. What is it that a Christian is to do with his feelings?
An answer that has come to me, and it is by no means the exhaustive treatment of this subject, is to pray the Psalms of David.
The Psalms were given to the Church to articulate its worship and prayer. And the Psalms are full of every concievable emotion, and even when expressing negative emotions, most of the time the Psalms come to the point of faith and trust in God. I suggest that the Psalms, properly prayed, serve as wonderful and God-given means of processing the feelings that we have as Christians still living as sinners in a broken world, groping forward to save our souls, to find peace, and faith, and hope and love. Here is what St. Basil the Great said about it, "It heals the
old wounds of the soul and gives relief to recent ones. It cures the illnesses and preserves the health of the soul. Every Psalm brings peace, soothes the internal conflicts, calms the rough waves of evil thoughts, dissolves anger, corrects and moderates profligacy." (from http://www.rc.net/wcc/readings/father12.htm )It has all been said before, much better than I could.
In our Orthodox Services the Psalms are sung intentionally without injecting a lot of personal interpretation and feeling into them. They are often chanted in plain chant or read simply. Each word is to be spoken with compunction and the Fathers all oppose rushing the Psalms in the Services. I understand this is to allow the Holy Spirit to apply the Psalms to each individual as it is proper for him to experience it. However, I would suggest that there may be a different approach to the Psalms in some aspects of personal devotion. I would suggest, at least part of the time, the Psalms ought to be prayed purposefully allowing the believers emotions to be brought forth as the Psalm is read or chanted. Then as the words are all siad with compunction, one allows the Spirit to guide the emotions along with the Psalm. If done correctly this can have a marvelous redemptive effect on the emotions and the soul praying the Psalms. I have found that praying the Psalms this way, when faced with emotional burdens, clears the decks so to speak, so that the prayers of the heart with the descent of the nous into the heart can then take place, with the Psalms in this instance prayed quietly, and perhaps even silently.
Of course, the Psalms must be prayed in a Christian context with the mind of the Church. That is to say, the Psalms must be sung through the interpretive grid of the Christian faith, especially keeping in mind the Incarnation, passion, resurrection and ascension of the Lord, and the deepening and intensification of the ethical sense that came as a result. The Psalms are best prayed in the context of the prayers of the Church that give them the proper Christological and Trinintarian setting, such as the Trisagion Prayers, the Our Father, the Magnificat, and so forth. It is my experience that the Psalms prayed in this way do marvels in processing our feelings, and in shepherding our potentially negative emotions into redemptive channels, neither blocking them nor exalting them beyond measure.
I have found that the Psalms prayed for Orthodox Orthros (Morning Prayer, Matins), are especially salutary in this regard. These Psalms are 3, 37 [38], 62 [63], 87 [88], 102 [103], and 142 [143), with the Masoretic numberings in the brackets. (The full text of Matins is availableat http://www.orthodox.net/services/index.html These Psalms, incidentally, are the ones that will be prayed on the Day of Judgment, according to the Tradition of the Church. It makes sense to get ready for that great and terrible Day. In addition is Psalm 50, (51). I suggest memorizing them as well. There is in my experience a more ready access to the heart and to the Lord when the prayers are hidden away in the memory for recall whenever they are needed.
There it is. This is not only a personal, pious opinion but taught, I am told by the Fathers of the Church. See, for example, http://www.pravmir.com/article_376.html . The author states, "When reading prayers, we should try to feel the words of prayer as if they were our own. This way we assimilate the prayerful spirit of the prayer's authors."
But praying the Psalms- to pray the Psalms is to pray with mind of Christ, for the Spirit of Christ inspired them. To pray the Psalms is to pray the prayer of agreement with the church, for all Christians of all ages have prayed and are praying the Psalm. The promises pertaining to prayers of agreement apply to the praying of the Psalms.
What happens if we do not pray our prayers with feeling? Then our feelings become blocked and pent up and are primed to pop out destructively.
Praying the Psalms should be done neither too slow nor too fast.
1) done in a disposition of attentiveness, inner wakefulness, with a fear of God, devoutness, contrition, and humility. 2) Laziness is to be avoided as well as forced and unduly loud chanting (75th canon of Trullo).
3) The proper tempo should be maintained, neither too fast or too slow.
4) Clarity- every verse, phrase and word must be sung in such a way that the meaning of the text is not obscured or altered.
1) done in a disposition of attentiveness, inner wakefulness, with a fear of God, devoutness, contrition, and humility.
2) Laziness is to be avoided as well as forced and unduly loud chanting (75th canon of Trullo).
3) The proper tempo should be maintained, neither too fast or too slow.
4) Clarity- every verse, phrase and word must be sung in such a way that the meaning of the text is not obscured or altered.
No comments:
Post a Comment