Friday, March 24, 2017

Beginning ~ with its strangeness



The Lord's Prayer is Christianity’s greatest prayer.  It is also Christianity’s strangest prayer.  It is prayed by all Christians but it never mentions Christ.  It is prayed in all churches but it never mentions Church.  It is prayed on all Sundays but it never mentions Sunday.  It is also called the “Lord’s Prayer” but it never mentions “Lord.”



The Greatest Prayer: Rediscovering the Revolutionary Message of the Lord's Prayer ~ by John Dominic Crossan, 2010
Crossan intimately explores the revolutionary meaning of the cornerstone of Christian faith: The Lord’s Prayer.
I'm especially intrigued by this sentence, also near the beginning of the book:
"Just as the content of the Lord's Prayer is deeply embedded in the biblical tradition of justice, so is its format deeply embedded in the biblical tradition of poetry" (p. 3).
Biblical poetry is created with parallelism, about which Crossan says:
"...the parallelism creates a vibration of thought, a metronome in the mind" (p. 4).


Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Fridays.  Click here for today's Mister Linky.

1 comment:

Helen's Book Blog said...

It's funny, the Lord's Prayer is the one prayer I know :-)