Shameful Prayer

One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.” Luke 11:1  NIV

Teach us – Do you find it odd that the disciples asked Yeshua to teach them to pray?  We know, of course, that they knew prayers.  Every man in the Jewish culture of that age knew ritual prayers.  We explain the disciple’s request by suggesting that the disciples observed the intensity and depth of Yeshua’s prayers, and they wanted to pray like that.  They weren’t asking for the words of prayer nor for the ritual of various prayers.  They were asking to be taught how to feel those words and rituals.  At least, this is what we are usually told about this request.  The fact that Yeshua answers them with a formulaic model of prayer actually suggests that our typical explanation isn’t correct.  If I ask you to teach me how to feelthe intensity of prayer, I don’t expect you to give me a patterned formula which I memorize and repeat ad nauseam.  I expect you to instruct me in emotional connection.  But this is not what Yeshua does.  He offers what appears to be another ritual prayer.  Odd, wouldn’t you say?  Perhaps even stranger when this disciple suggests that John also taught his followers certain prayers.

And that’s not the only odd thing here.  This story is recorded only in Luke, a gospel whose intended audience is not Jewish.  Think about that for a moment.  If the Jewish disciples were so concerned about prayer intensity, wouldn’t you expect this story to show up in Matthew?  Why is it in Luke, a gospel specifically not directed to Jews?  Since Luke’s story is for Gentiles, Yeshua’s answer makes more sense.  Gentiles had no ritually patterned prayers that captured the essential elements of Man’s dependency.  The “Lord’s” prayer isn’t really for a spiritually conscious Jew at all.  It’s for the rest of us, those who didn’t grow up in the spiritually rich environment of the synagogue.  The Lord’s prayer is for everyone except Jews.

Now we see that Luke’s story can’t be about training in prayer intensity.  If there is anything in the Jewish world that approaches heightened spiritual intensity, it is prayer—the ritual prayers spoken (or whispered) with the concentration of the entire being.  Jews don’t need that kind of training.  What Luke is doing is putting prayer training for Gentiles in the mouth of a disciple’s request so that readers long afterward can begin to follow the rich history of Jewish prayer—with the Messiah’s endorsement.  This story isn’t an introduction to a new prayer.  It is an invitation to become involved in the canopy of Jewish prayer.  But why refer to John?  Well, that’s another investigation.

I need to realize this if I am going to find my way back to being human.  “To live without prayer is to live without God, to live without a soul.”[1]  Heschel is right, but he writes within the Jewish ethos.  I am a Gentile.  I can’t just step into that Jewish world and feel at home.  I need a way to ease into that praying intensity.  Unless I can find a gentle way in, I will be overwhelmed by my unworthiness and prayer will become an expression of my shame.  It will be a spotlight illuminating all my failures.  I will stand in the dock naked and accused.  As a result, I will avoid prayer.  And since I don’t come from a culture where prayer is a familiar respite, an encouraging draught, praying may terrify me.  It’s the ritual pattern that makes entry into prayer possible.  Yeshua offers a ritual pattern—to us—and maybe to his disciples, just as John apparently did.  But Luke sees this from a non-Jewish perspective—just what I need.

Topical Index:  ritual, Gentile, shame, teach, Luke 11:1

[1] Abraham Heschel, Between God and Man: An Interpretation of Judaism (Free Press Paperbacks, 1959), p. 211.