Affirmative prayer
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Affirmative prayer is a form of
prayer Prayer is an invocation or act that seeks to activate a rapport with an object of worship through deliberate communication. In the narrow sense, the term refers to an act of supplication or intercession directed towards a deity or a deifie ...
or a
metaphysical Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality, the first principles of being, identity and change, space and time, causality, necessity, and possibility. It includes questions about the nature of conscio ...
technique that is focused on a positive outcome rather than a negative situation. For instance, a person who is experiencing some form of illness would focus the prayer on the desired state of perfect health and affirm this desired intention "as if already happened" rather than identifying the illness and then asking God for help to eliminate it.


New Thought

New Thought The New Thought movement (also Higher Thought) is a spiritual movement that coalesced in the United States in the early 19th century. New Thought was seen by its adherents as succeeding "ancient thought", accumulated wisdom and philosophy from ...
spirituality originated during the 1880s and has emphasized affirmative prayer as an essential part of its philosophy. Practitioners among the various New Thought denominations Religious Science, Divine Science and
Unity Unity may refer to: Buildings * Unity Building, Oregon, Illinois, US; a historic building * Unity Building (Chicago), Illinois, US; a skyscraper * Unity Buildings, Liverpool, UK; two buildings in England * Unity Chapel, Wyoming, Wisconsin, US; a ...
may also refer to this form of
prayer Prayer is an invocation or act that seeks to activate a rapport with an object of worship through deliberate communication. In the narrow sense, the term refers to an act of supplication or intercession directed towards a deity or a deifie ...
by such names as "scientific prayer," "spiritual mind treatment" or, simply, "treatment." Within New Thought organizations, centers and churches, the foundational logic of this form of prayer is based on the belief that God is unlimited and plays no favorites, that God has created spiritual laws that are both as mysterious and as constant as scientific principles like
gravity In physics, gravity () is a fundamental interaction which causes mutual attraction between all things with mass or energy. Gravity is, by far, the weakest of the four fundamental interactions, approximately 1038 times weaker than the stro ...
, and thus, if one's prayer is correctly and diligently focused, it will be answered consistently.


Religious Science, Divine Science, and Unity

Affirmative prayer is called "Spiritual Mind Treatment" by practitioners of Religious Science. Affirmative prayer with a Christian theme is a central practice of the
Unity School of Christianity Unity, known informally as Unity Church, is an organization founded by Charles and Myrtle Fillmore in 1889. It grew out of Transcendentalism and became part of the New Thought movement. Unity is known for its ''Daily Word'' devotional publi ...
.


Jewish Science

In the early 1900s, some in the American Jewish community were attracted to the teachings of
Christian Science Christian Science is a set of beliefs and practices associated with members of the Church of Christ, Scientist. Adherents are commonly known as Christian Scientists or students of Christian Science, and the church is sometimes informally known ...
and the New Thought Movement, by the 1920s they were referring to their study by the term '' Jewish Science''. A major figure in this movement was Morris Lichtenstein who together with his wife Tehilla Lichtenstein, published the ''Jewish Science Interpreter'', a periodical featuring much of his own writing. Lichtenstein found affirmative prayer to be particularly useful because, he believed that it provided the personal benefits of prayer without requiring the belief in a supernatural God who could suspend the laws of nature. Lichtenstein considered that affirmative prayer is a method that can access inner power that could be considered divine, but not supernatural. He taught that the origins of affirmative prayer can be found in the
Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...
book of
Psalms The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived ...
, and that affirmations, or affirmative prayer is best offered in silence.


Spiritualism

The well-known
Theosophist Theosophy is a religion established in the United States during the late 19th century. It was founded primarily by the Russian Helena Blavatsky and draws its teachings predominantly from Blavatsky's writings. Categorized by scholars of religion ...
,
Spiritualist Spiritualism is the metaphysical school of thought opposing physicalism and also is the category of all spiritual beliefs/views (in monism and dualism) from ancient to modern. In the long nineteenth century, Spiritualism (when not lowercase) ...
, and New Thought poet
Ella Wheeler Wilcox Ella Wheeler Wilcox (November 5, 1850October 30, 1919) was an American author and poet. Her works include the collection '' Poems of Passion'' and the poem "Solitude", which contains the lines "Laugh, and the world laughs with you; weep, and you ...
popularized the power of affirmative prayer. After the death of her husband Robert Wilcox, she wrote that she had tried in vain to communicate with his spirit, but only after she composed and recited the affirmative prayer, "I am the living witness: The dead live: And they speak through us and to us: And I am the voice that gives this glorious truth to the suffering world: I am ready, God: I am ready, Christ: I am ready, Robert" was she able to contact him by means of a
Ouija board The ouija ( , ), also known as a spirit board or talking board, is a flat board marked with the letters of the Latin alphabet, the numbers 0–9, the words "yes", "no", occasionally "hello" and "goodbye", along with various symbols and grap ...
, an event she described in her 1918 autobiography, ''The Worlds and I.''


Hoodoo

Affirmative prayer is used by practitioners of
African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
hoodoo, usually in conjunction with its opposite, which is called a ''prayer of removal''. In this folk magic application of the technique, the prayer of removal may be said during a waning moon or at
sunset Sunset, also known as sundown, is the daily disappearance of the Sun below the horizon due to Earth's rotation. As viewed from everywhere on Earth (except the North and South poles), the equinox Sun sets due west at the moment of both the spr ...
or at
ebb tide Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the Moon (and to a much lesser extent, the Sun) and are also caused by the Earth and Moon orbiting one another. Tide tabl ...
("As the sun goes down, this disease is removed from my body") and the affirmative prayer may be said during a waxing moon, at
dawn Dawn is the time that marks the beginning of twilight before sunrise. It is recognized by the appearance of indirect sunlight being scattered in Earth's atmosphere, when the centre of the Sun's disc has reached 18° below the observer's ...
, or at
high tide Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the Moon (and to a much lesser extent, the Sun) and are also caused by the Earth and Moon orbiting one another. Tide tables c ...
("As the sun rises, this day brings me perfect health"). The explanation for this application of affirmative prayer is that God has ordained laws of natural inflow and outflow, and that by linking one's prayer to a natural condition that prevails at the time, the prayer is given the added power of God's planned natural event.


Self-help

William James William James (January 11, 1842 – August 26, 1910) was an American philosopher, historian, and psychologist, and the first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States. James is considered to be a leading thinker of the lat ...
described affirmative prayer as an element of the American metaphysical healing movement that he called the "mind-cure"; he described it as America's "only decidedly original contribution to the systemic philosophy of life." What sets affirmative prayer apart from secular affirmations of the
autosuggestion Autosuggestion is a psychological technique related to the placebo effect, developed by apothecary Émile Coué at the beginning of the 20th century. It is a form of self-induced suggestion in which individuals guide their own thoughts, feelings ...
type taught by the 19th century
self-help Self-help or self-improvement is a self-guided improvement''APA Dictionary of Physicology'', 1st ed., Gary R. VandenBos, ed., Washington: American Psychological Association, 2007.—economically, intellectually, or emotionally—often with a subs ...
author
Émile Coué Émile Coué de la Châtaigneraie (; 26 February 1857 – 2 July 1926) was a French psychologist and pharmacist who introduced a popular method of psychotherapy and self-improvement based on optimistic autosuggestion. Considered by Charles B ...
(whose most famous affirmation was "Every day in every way, I am getting better and better") is that affirmative prayer addresses the practitioner to God, the Divine, the Creative Mind, emphasizing the seemingly practical aspects of religious belief.


See also

*
Jesus Prayer The Jesus Prayer,; syr, ܨܠܘܬܐ ܕܝܫܘܥ, translit=slotho d-yeshu'; syr, label=Amharic, Geez and Tigrinya, እግዚኦ መሐረነ ክርስቶስ, translit=igizi'o meḥarene kirisitosi. "Note: We are still searching the Fathers for t ...
* Affirmations (New Age)


References

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