Prayers / Ritual texts

[Näre]

How do you find ritual texts/prayers/you name it for your practice? Do you compose them by yourself or find them in a book or the internet? How do you incorporate them into your practice?

This is something I have been struggling with because most of the prayers I find online are Wiccan-inclined (or sometimes towards a specific pantheon) or written in rhyme/some kind of poetic English which would sound a bit pretentious for someone who is not a native speaker or doesn't have a special connection to the language.
However, composing prayers by myself feels a bit forced and weird, there is just too many options: which words (or which language) to use, which issues to address, how to make it a prayer and not just another piece of frantic scribbling in a notebook?

So, any kind of insight into ritual texts and prayers is welcome! :-)

[Thorbjorn]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

I don't compose prayers myself, but if something I find sounds really odd I will change the wording. I search Asatru prayers, Norse prayers, Heathen prayers and Hindu prayers. I've come up with lots of hits. The Hindu prayers are usually always in Sanskrit, which I recite in. Reciting them into English makes some of them sound really... really... uh... well... stupid. Sanskrit is a very poetic and highly inflected language that doesn't always translate well. I've copied these into Word and formatted them on 4x6" pages I use as my prayer books.

[thalassa]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

I do a bit of everything. And I use pretty much everything, not just religious stuff.

I'll get back to this--gotta get the kids ready for school!

[Torey]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

My question for you would be - how formal must your relationship with your gods be?

Is it more important for your communion to be rigid and scripted or is it more important that it simply be genuine and heart-felt?

I do not use pre-written material in my rituals or prayers. Most of what I "say" during any working or interaction with my Gods is spontaneous. Certainly, I have a purpose when initiating contact, but I have no need of scripts and recitations.

[Näre]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

Thanks for your replies!

The Hindu prayers are usually always in Sanskrit, which I recite in. Reciting them into English makes some of them sound really... really... uh... well... stupid. Sanskrit is a very poetic and highly inflected language that doesn't always translate well.

As a former Buddhist, I can relate to this! Sanskrit texts translated to English are certainly not the most spiritually inspiring things out there.

Is it more important for your communion to be rigid and scripted or is it more important that it simply be genuine and heart-felt?

I guess I need both at the moment. Not necessarily a precise ritual liturgy that I just recite and follow the orders but something to give my practice a bit of structure.

[thalassa]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

So, I started keeping this blog for exactly this reason...

Some things are explicitly Pagan of one tradition or another, some are not. Some things are specifically prayers, some are not.

This is a bit about my Pagan lectio divina practice

And this is the first of a set of posts I wrote about writing prayers

[Thorbjorn]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

I guess I need both at the moment. Not necessarily a precise ritual liturgy that I just recite and follow the orders but something to give my practice a bit of structure.

I agree with you. The gods are beyond language and know our intentions for the most part. The structure is for us.

[Näre]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

So, I started keeping this blog for exactly this reason...

Some things are explicitly Pagan of one tradition or another, some are not. Some things are specifically prayers, some are not.

This is a bit about my Pagan lectio divina practice

And this is the first of a set of posts I wrote about writing prayers

Yay, thanks! I followed both.

[Threshold]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

I write my own most of the time. If I feel stuck or blocked then I hit google, or visit the world prayers site, or look into several prayer collection books I have. Sometimes I will take a prayer and then put it into my own words.

I don't pray to specific deities so I don't have any issues related to that to contend with. As in how one would properly address the deity etc.

Wicca rituals don't work at all for my faith...which is why I got into the habit of making up my own.

[LearningMan]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

I've started planning to write my own little recitations for the gods. I plan to say them when certain natural phenomena occur. For example, during every moon phase except for the new moon, I plan to make a little hymn for Djehuty, and when it rains, I'll make a hymn to Tlaloc. Don't ask me what I'll do when the moon is out and it's raining at the same time. I'll probably do something different with Bes, seeing as he's not connected to any natural phenomena I know of.

[DavidMcCann]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

The Greek group Labrys published a good book which I've used: "Hellenic polytheism: household worship". Generally, though, I make it up myself. When I was asking Athena for the right result in the general election, I offered a series of arguments as to why she should do something for a nation that didn't worship her! It seemed the sort of approach that she'd like, and she seems to have listened. I also use Thomas Taylor's 200-year-old translations of the Orphic Hymns. Unfortunately he used the same metre for all of them, and the only tunes that fit are "Abide with me" and "All round the world thy children sing their song." But then I'm so tine deaf that it's not easy to tell which one I'm singing!

[Lydia]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

How do you find ritual texts/prayers/you name it for your practice? Do you compose them by yourself or find them in a book or the internet? How do you incorporate them into your practice?

I was lucky enough to have been given visions of whole rituals by a little-known deity that communicates to me sometimes. Unlike most other rituals, these rituals do not involve any words. All of the rituals that I have been shown require several dedicated people, who do not yet exist, so I can't actually practice any of the rituals for the time being.

[anubisa]

Re: Prayers / Ritual texts

I found this site: http://www.sacred-texts.com/ a while back. I still compose my own prayers to my deities. I feel that makes me closer to them than already composed prayers.