I Am My Prayer

We talked at our weekly cursio 4th day conversation about why we pray when our prayer should be to ask that "God's will be done." I read somewhere that the idea of petitionary prayer is transformative, i.e., we pray to ask that we be conformed to God's will. I read an interview with Levinas in which he explained the "transformative" nature of prayer in a profound way. Is it Righteous to Be? p.256-57.

Levinas, a Jew, was born in Lithuania. He said that as a child there, there was no connection between Christianity and Judaism. He knew about Christianity only from stories about the Inquisition, the Crusades, the suffering of the Marrano Jews in Spain.

When he moved to France he had a more substantial contact with Christians, and one formative event was attending the Christian funeral of his friend's small child. "It was still some time before May 1940, and yet already everything was in question." (Meaning the uncertainty of the status of the Jews was very much in the air.)

While in the Church of St. Augustine at the funeral he happened to see "a fresco of Hannah bringing the small Samuel into the temple. It was my world! Especially Hannah! A completely extraordinary figure of a woman, with her prayer, the misunderstanding with Eli ["Are you drunk?"], and her answer: 'No, my Lord, I am a woman of sorrowful spirit. I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but have poured out my soul before the Lord" (1 Samuel 1:15). She speaks the authentic prayer of the heart, the prayer of the soul. It is a concrete relation, the mise-en-scene of a soul. Hannah is this prayer." (emphasis added)

Prayer, then, is a "concrete relation," a "mise-en-scene," meaning that prayer is what situates us and pulls everything together into a meaning in the "drama" of our lives. Prayer is extremely practical, both an experience and "practice" in which we relate to God all that pains us, all that we find joy in, all that we yearn for. "Hannah is this prayer." Through prayer, we can and do become our prayer. We are our prayer.

This it seems, is what Paul means when he says, "I no longer live, but Christ lives in me." Gal.2:20.

And what Thomas More means when he says: "Only God is loved right throughout and that's my-self."

Hannah's song of thanksgiving to God for having heard her earlier prayers, is full of joy and confidence and has much in common with Mary's magnificat. Hannah is, reputedly, the model for Jewish prayer. You can read Hannah's song of thanksgiving here. You can listen to first Samuel here.