“After This Manner Therefore Pray Ye”: Puritan Perspectives On The Lord’s Prayer -- By: Brian Golez Najapfour

Journal: Puritan Reformed Journal
Volume: PRJ 04:2 (Jul 2012)
Article: “After This Manner Therefore Pray Ye”: Puritan Perspectives On The Lord’s Prayer
Author: Brian Golez Najapfour


“After This Manner Therefore Pray Ye”:
Puritan Perspectives On The Lord’s Prayer

Brian G. Najapfour

Let us have a great esteem of the Lord’s prayer; let it be the model and pattern of all our prayers.

—Thomas Watson

When Jesus says, “After this manner therefore pray ye,” what does He mean? Is He telling His disciples to pray the exact words of the Lord’s Prayer, to use this prayer as a pattern, or perhaps both? In other words, is the Lord’s Prayer a set form (a set order of words to pray), a pattern (a sample of prayer), or both? This article, after briefly surveying some works on the Lord’s Prayer from patristic to Puritan periods, will deal with these questions, specifically focusing on how the Puritans understood Jesus’ words concerning how to pray.

Panorama Of The Lord’s Prayer From Church Fathers To Puritans

A wealth of commentary on the Lord’s Prayer exists in the patristic period. Richard Stuckwisch says, “Treatises on the Our Father [i.e., the Lord’s Prayer]—whether in the form of catecheses, sermons, lectures, or written commentaries—are not uncommon in the history of the church, especially after the fourth century.”1 Church father Tertullian, for example, wrote a tract called On Prayer2 (c. AD 192), in which he expounded the Lord’s Prayer. Origen’s On Prayer3 (c. AD

233) also contains an exposition of Our Father. Likewise, Cyprian had a treatise On the Lord’s Prayer4 (c. AD 252). Other church fathers touched on the Lord’s Prayer in their catechetical lectures, sermons, and commentaries of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke.5 Medieval theologians such as Thomas Aquinas also devoted pages to Pater Noster,6 and the Reformers wrote often about this prayer. Luther elucidated it in his An Exposition of the Lord’s Prayer for the Simple Laymen7 (1519), Personal Prayer Book8 (1522), Large and Small Catechisms (1530), and A Simple Way to Pray9 (1535). Calvin discussed it in his Institutes of the Christian Religion10 and gave comments on it in his Harmony of the Gospels.You must have a subscription and be logged in to read the entire article.
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