Question
Peter
It is custom among Christians at least to press the palms of the hands
together while praying.
Who knows where this custom comes from,what the original significance
was and how it became part of the prayer ritual?
Sufis often refer to strange situations developing after importing
unknown techniques from other countries,but they seldom explain
further and in detail....
Peter
Martin Edwards
It was common among several of the pagan mystery religions from which
Christianity derives. It has no real significance except that you are
praying and not doing something else.
******Martin Edwards.******
Come on! Nobody's gonna drive that lousy freeway
when you can take the Red Car for a nickel.
-Eddy Valiant
Peter
is,in ancient tradition,part of something else".
Unfortunately,he does not say part of what else...
Peter
George
news:h26asug6h254356pr...@4ax.com...
> According to IS "all prayers are accompanied by this gesture,which
> is,in ancient tradition,part of something else".
> Unfortunately,he does not say part of what else...
>
> Peter
Which is why so many people suspect he was full of sh*t. Personally I am
undecided. Muslim prayers are accompanied by upraised hands and when its
done you wipe your hands across your face as if you collected rain or
blessings. I have asked about this and haven't had it adequetly explained to
me. If you do bow your head and put your hands together it is a good way to
concentrate.
Peace
azo charif
a form of a mental image ,a sound and an action in the form of a hand
gesture and body posture ,all in one alignment(three in one=trinity in
unity) ,in order to be effective (buddhists mean the same thing when they
talk of the alignment of the mandala ,the mantra, and the mudra.)..that is
the law of the creative process where an idea turns into concrete image and
the concrete image materialises as physical entity.. the form of a
particular hand gesture and body posture is unique to each type of wish and
depends on its corresponding psycholgical parameters>example :wish of
unification will have a kneeling posture with the forefinger pointing
upwards ..
As to the origin, i was just *telepathicaly*-:) informed that all hand
gestures rituals were systemetized (as part of their social communication
dispay routines) by the homo habilus more than a million years ago .....
and only the man of knowledge knows best.
regards
azonews:jnq9sukaehtnpbq4c...@4ax.com...
Martin Edwards
>gestures rituals were systemetized (as part of their social communication
>dispay routines) by the homo habilus more than a million years ago .....
>and only the man of knowledge knows best.
>regards
>azo
This may or may not be true, but there is no way to find out.
Muhamad
Praying with palms pressed or clasped is a later Christian practice.
Originally it was with hands raised upwards, not dissimilar to today's
Muslim practice. See Paul's letter to Timothy (Timothy 2:8): "I will
therefore that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath &
doubting". See also Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians, Chapters 2 & 3,
where Clement of Rome (30-100 C.E.) wrote to the Corinthians to "stretch
forth your hands to God Almighty, beseeching Him to be merciful unto you"
and urged them in "lifting up pure & undefiled hands unto Him". Writings by
another early Church father Origen as well as early Christian art similarly
depict praying with raised hands.
Before the Christian era, praying with raised hands was practised by the Old
Testament prophets. Two examples among others are in 1 Kings 8:22-23: "And
Solomon...spread forth his hands toward heaven: And he said, Lord God of
Israel, there is no God like thee" and in Psalm 28:2: "Hear the voice of my
supplications, when I cry unto thee, when I lift up my hands toward thy holy
oracle".
Similar praying gesture was adopted by the ancient Egyptians, the ancient
Indians (evolved into the present "namaste" greeting), the Mayans, the
Aztecs - among others. The universality of the gesture may point to the
"technology" of praying which we modern primitives have forgotten or
misunderstood or ignored as less compelling than our hard technology.
Gurdjieff who studied with the Sufis, in Ouspensky's In Search of the
Miraculous, hinted at stretched hands functioning as a transmitter-receiver
device to send or receive unspecified energy waves. These energy waves are
said to be the foundation of such practices as calling/invoking baraka
(blessing), Mesmerism and healing by laying of hands.
In the Muslim tradition, the raised hands in prayer (doa') is claimed to be
for catching the celestial blessings invoked by the prayer and its
affirmation (the word "amin" in Arabic or "amen" in English). The prayer is
closed by wiping the hands across the face, said to distribute the blessings
to the personality.
The foregoing may be among the factors alluded to by Idries Shah. God knows
best.
Rgds
Muhamad
azo charif
question(of course it may be wrong after all),here it is:
some of the hand gestures found in many magical and religeous rituals may
have been a
part of a very simple hypnotic procedure, based on simple
conditioning principles ,which all hypnotists and witchdoctors use at one
time or
another..most of us here know
about post-hypnotic suggestion: you get a subject hypnotized and then
suggested to give a certain response after coming out of the trance whenever
a given cue or cues were presented as stimuli or elicited by the subject
himself as responses.......
when i was a teenager i used to have a friend who started to suffer panic
attacks soon after his 12th birthday...in the local culture panick attacks
are interpreted as attacks by evil spirits or geniis and the only remedy is
to find good geniis who could fight them. the boy was taken to the local
witchdoctor and was given a short prayer phrase ,a calling on a certain
genii to defend him, which he had to repeat ,while forming a particular hand
configuration ,whenever he felt like he is going to have a panick attack
..and it worked which ,of course ,reinforced further his belief in the power
of geniis..
by now iam sure you guessed what exactly happened:
the witchdoctor hypnotized the boy and SUGGESTED to him that after he is
out of the trance and during his day to day life the panick attacks will
vanish whenever he calls on the
genii so and so ,while forming with his hands a certain gesture...
A very simple answer and there may be no need for any exotic or esoteric
explanations..
and only the man of true knowledge knows best.
regards
azo
Martin Edwards <Martin....@btinternet.com> wrote in message
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