Cyprian of Carthage — Treatises Treatise 4

Treatise 4 (Cyprian of Carthage) Home > Fathers of the Church > Treatises (Cyprian of Carthage) > Treatise 4 Treatise 4 On the Lord's Prayer. Argument.— The Treatise of Cyprian on the Lord's Prayer Comprises Three Portions, in Which Division He Imitates Tertullian in His Book on Prayer, in the First Portion, He Points Out that the Lord's Prayer is the Most Excellent of All Prayers, Profoundly Spiritual, and Most Effectual for Obtaining Our Petitions. In the Second Part, He Undertakes an Explanation of the Lord's Prayer; And, Still Treading in the Footsteps of Tertullian , He Goes Through Its Seven Chief Clauses, Finally, in the Third Part, He Considers the Conditions of Prayer, and Tells Us What Prayer Ought to Be. —

1. The evangelical precepts, beloved brethren, are nothing else than divine teachings — foundations on which hope is to be built, supports to strengthen faith , nourishments for cheering the heart, rudders for guiding our way, guards for obtaining salvation — which, while they instruct the docile minds of believers on the earth, lead them to heavenly kingdoms. God , moreover, willed many things to be said and to be heard by means of the prophets His servants; but how much greater are those which the Son speaks, which the Word of God who was in the prophets testifies with His own voice; not now bidding to prepare the way for His coming, but Himself coming and opening and showing to us the way, so that we who have before been wandering in the darkness of death, without forethought and blind, being enlightened by the light of grace , might keep the way of life, with the Lord for our ruler and guide!

2. He, among the rest of His salutary admonitions and divine precepts wherewith He counsels His people for their salvation , Himself also gave a form of praying — Himself advised and instructed us what we should pray for. He who made us to live, taught us also to pray , with that same benignity, to wit, wherewith He has condescended to give and confer all things else; in order that while we speak to the Father in that prayer and supplication which the Son has taught us, we may be the more easily heard. Already He had foretold that the hour was coming when the true worshippers should worship the Father in spirit and in truth ; John 4:23 and He thus fulfilled what He before promised, so that we who by His sanctification have received the Spirit and truth , may also by His teaching worship truly and spiritually. For what can be a more spiritual prayer than that which was given to us by Christ, by whom also the Holy Spirit was given to us? What praying to the Father can be more truthful than that which was delivered to us by the Son who is the Truth, out of His own mouth? So that to pray otherwise than He taught is not ignorance alone, but also sin ; since He Himself has established, and said, You reject the commandments of God , that you may keep your own traditions.

3. Let us therefore, brethren beloved, pray as God our Teacher has taught us. It is a loving and friendly prayer to beseech God with His own word, to come up to His ears in the prayer of Christ . Let the Father acknowledge the words of His Son when we make our prayer , and let Him also who dwells within in our breast Himself dwell in our voice. And since we have Him as an Advocate with the Father for our sins , let us, when as sinners we petition on behalf of our sins , put forward the words of our Advocate. For since He says, that whatsoever we shall ask of the Father in His name, He will give us, John 16:23 how much more effectually do we obtain what we ask in Christ's name, if we ask for it in His own prayer !