The text of the prayer of our father in Russian and its meaning. give us our daily bread for this day

Hieromartyr Vladimir (Bogoyavlensky)
Our Father. Conversations on the Lord's Prayer
About the Fifth Petition of the Lord's Prayer

Matt. 6:12. “And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.”

The union connects the fifth petition of the Lord's Prayer with the fourth, which was the subject of our last conversation. And this is absolutely consistent, as it should be. Every day we need both of these together - both in giving us daily bread to nourish our mortal body, and in the forgiveness of sins to maintain the life and benefit of our immortal soul. “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? "(Matt. 16, 26). When, with a pure, unspoiled conscience, we read the words of the fifth petition: “and forgive us our debts,” then at the same time, in the depths of our soul, in our conscience, we hear the voice of God, Who, as it were, tells us this: what right do you have to turn to Me with such a request, as to your Father, and how can you expect success from it, you who have sinned so often and so grievously against Me and so boldly violated My fatherly rights and your filial duties? Yes, Father, we say to this, it is true, and we are deeply aware and feel it. Many and grievous are our sins; we are unworthy to be called Your children and have every reason to fear lest these sins put up a wall between us and You and hide Your face from us. But with a contrite heart, however, we dare to stand before You and cry from the depths of our souls: do not enter into judgment with Your unworthy children, do not turn Your face away from us, remove from us everything that separates us from You and makes it impossible to see You! Descend to us by your inexpressible mercy and leave, forgive us our sins! Our Church understands this petition in this and not another sense, and to the question of what we ask in the fifth petition, it answers: we pray in it to the Heavenly Father that He does not pay attention to our sins, does not get angry with us for them. and for their sake did not refuse us our request. By ourselves, of course, we are not worthy of this, since we always sin a lot and seriously and deserve only punishments, but He can and wants to do all this for us out of His mercy alone.

Thus, this petition is based on a humble consciousness and confession that we are great sinners before God and deserve only punishment. Therefore, a Pharisee cannot pray this prayer in a Christian way, who justifies himself, leaves his debts to himself, or when he brings a prayer to God, he settles accounts with Him, covering his sins with the good that he has done, and he even makes an account of God, finds a surplus and sues God, so to speak, demanding payment for the surplus. The fifth petition rather suggests the heart of a publican, which, in the consciousness of its many and great sins, does not find any means to get rid of them, except for the grace of God alone. “God,” he says, “be merciful to me, a sinner!”

Brethren! How many reasons we have to pay especially strict attention to this word - "ours" and to ask God for forgiveness of "our" sins! They all fall on us, they are all responsible for us, these sins, not only our own, committed by us personally, but also the sins of our brothers, and not only in the sense that our brothers, like us, need grace-filled help and forgiveness of sins, and our brotherly love should prompt us to ask God for this for them, but also in the fact that their sins, together with ours, accuse us before God, add an extra layer to the mass of our sins, increase our guilt, making our responsibility heavier at the Last Judgment. No man lives for himself alone, and no one commits sins for himself alone.

We can never make good what we have done wrong, and we can never repay or repay what we owe our God, for every day increases the amount of our sins and makes us more and more guilty before His judgment. God alone can be our guarantor and answerer; He alone can free us from the answer, lay off our debts, make use of His highest royal right of pardon and say: “Forgiveness, deducted from the account!” For otherwise He Himself cannot do anything here, otherwise the Almighty God Himself cannot free us from our sins. And God Himself cannot completely remove, destroy, destroy the evil done by you, make it, so to speak, undone, unfulfilled. This is the only, holy limitation that He Himself made for His omnipotence. This is the most serious and most terrible side of sin, that God Himself, with all His omnipotence, has no more means to blot out or destroy our sins, as soon as we forgive them, leave them without penalty.

That is why we ask in this prayer that He leave us beyond His penalty, despise our sins, using His great mercy, and take into account the redemptive merits of our Savior, Who Himself taught us to pray: “Father, forgive us our debts nay more, Who offered Himself as a sacrifice and became our Redeemer. Grant us by our own experience to know, to experience for ourselves the justice of that truth, that "and" "for even if sin is multiplied, grace is abundant" (Rom. 5:20).

If our Heavenly Father really manifests and gives such grace, listening to your, friend, prayer, and calms and pacifies your soul with the forgiveness of your sins, then try to take closer to your heart and pronounce with due reverence those words that the Teacher taught to His disciples in fifth petition, commanding to speak thus: "Father, forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors."

What do these words express, and in what sense should we use them? Not, of course, in the sense that we want to offer our readiness to forgive our offenders here to God as an incentive and a basis for which He is obliged to forgive us too. Nor is it that we ask our Heavenly Father here to forgive us to the same extent and degree as we forgive our offenders. In this case, we would make a very bad and wrong calculation, demanding from our debtors some hundreds of pennies, while we ourselves owe our Heavenly Father ten thousand talents. Rather, we express here before God our heartfelt readiness, in gratitude for His mercy on us, to forgive our debtors or offenders on our part. Thus, in the words of the fifth petition, “as we also forgive our debtors,” the Lord requires of us that we, on our part, be ready to forgive and sincerely do good to those who sin against us.

But how strongly, however, brethren, the dryness and coldness of our heart is revealed by the fact that every time we read the Our Father, we must express our readiness to be merciful to our neighbors according to the special command of the Lord in certain words. Indeed, such a promise is contained not only in this petition, but in every petition of this prayer. So, for example, when reading the fourth petition: “Give us our daily bread today,” we express the same promise, that is, our readiness to distribute this bread to others, to share it with those who need it. But the Savior here does not force us to express this promise in any special, direct language. He leaves it to us to mean it in his prayer. And only here, in this fifth petition, He does not leave it to our own discretion. Here He charges us with the obligation to express it in direct and definite terms. He knows that it is often very difficult for a person to give something to his brothers out of the rich stock of blessings and gifts received from the hands of his Heavenly Father, but it is incomparably more difficult for us even after the richest mercy shown to us by God, voluntarily and wholeheartedly forgive offenses to others.

O Merciful Father and Lord! How often and how grievously we sin before Thee by so reluctantly forgiving our debtors and so little assimilating Thy love for our enemies! But be patient and do not enter into judgment with Your servants. Along with the old debts, leave us the new ones that we commit daily, as well as this heavy debt of our dry, callous and unpeaceful heart. Grant us, through Thy inexhaustible mercy and love, the consolation of the daily forgiveness of our sins, and with the fire of Thy love warm our cold, frozen hearts. Amen.

Archpriest Oleg Stenyaev, rector of the Church of the Nativity of St. John the Baptist in Sokolniki, answers questions from believers

The Christmas fast will end, ahead is Great Lent. But the sin of laziness, overeating, praying for the unworthy, distracted attention during worship, and many other annoying vain sins are repeated again and again. How to live and win?

Sins are repeated because sin as an act is born from a propensity that lives in a person. With sin as an act, we deal with confession, and with the inclination to sin - in Communion, otherwise it would be illogical: confess in sins, but receive communion for the remission of sins ... For the remission of what sins, if you just confessed? In confession, responsibility for sin as a specific act is removed, and in Communion, an inclination to sin is caught. Remember the thanksgiving prayers for Holy Communion: “To my fellow worker; rather, go into my heart, into all the compositions, into the womb, into the heart. The thorns of all my sins have fallen. Purify the soul, sanctify the thoughts. Approve the compositions with the bones together. Feelings enlighten a simple five. Nail me to Your fear…” This, of course, must be remembered.

Do I need to turn to an Orthodox psychologist to eradicate my sins?

Psychology is an alternative to spirituality. Psychology as a science arose after the First World War, when many people became disillusioned with Christianity because the Christian peoples of Europe were at war with each other. Many atheists appeared, but they had to somehow solve their spiritual problems, and then psychology became in demand. By the way, normal Orthodox psychologists say: “We are assistants to priests, we just take care of souls, we tell people how to do the right thing.” And many really work under the guidance of experienced Orthodox priests.

The Holy Fathers often interpret the same event in Scripture in different ways. How to figure out who is right?

Let me explain with a specific example. Here is the prophecy of Jacob regarding Dan - the ancestor of the tribe of Dan, the fifth son of Jacob from Valla, Rachelina's servant: "Dan will be a snake on the road, an asp on the way, stung the horse's leg, so that his rider will fall back" (Gen.49,17). There is an interpretation that these words are about the Antichrist, who will come from the tribe of Dan. It is the Antichrist, and not Christ, for the Savior is from the house of David, and even if we take the Talmudic words about Christ, it is directly written there that He is from the royal house. And the Antichrist will be from the tribe of Dan, that is, from the tribe that does not even have the right to claim any honors. But there is an opinion that the words of Jacob refer to the man of God Samson - he was also from the tribe of Dan and was like a snake on the road for the Philistines, and he overturned both horse and rider and fought by the grace of God. That is, the same prophecy can have two meanings. And when we see different interpretations among the Holy Fathers, in fact they are not mutually exclusive, but complementary, for this prophecy speaks of the cunning and militancy of Dan's descendants. But to understand this, you need to mature. The worst thing is when a person has read the work of one Holy Father or one Orthodox book and thinks that he knows everything, comprehended the truth of God and does not want to listen to anyone else.

And a word about interpretations and understanding. We all know the prayer "Our Father" well - wake up at night, tell without hesitation, without hesitation. That's right, without hesitation ... But in vain. I will draw your attention to only one line: "And leave us our debts, as we leave our debtors." We ask the Heavenly Father to leave, i.e. forgive us all our debts - sins - and to reinforce the request we say: “... as if we leave our debtors”, that is, “just as we forgive our debtors”, among which are offenders, enemies, traitors ... But do we really forgive them in fact - from a pure heart, not remembering the past, not trying to take revenge or hurt at a meeting? Thinking? That's just it, that we do not always and not everyone forgive. But we ask the Lord to forgive us in the same way that we forgive. That is, if we have not forgiven, then the Lord will not forgive us. That's what you need to remember, and not thoughtlessly drumming out the words of prayer. Now there is a triumph ahead - the Nativity of Christ, joy, joy, that the Savior has come into the world. But not far off is Forgiveness Sunday and Great Lent. Prepare your soul for repentance and purification.

Recorded by Irina NIKOLAEVA

Our Father,

When the skies rumble and the oceans roar, they call to You: Our Lord of hosts, Lord of the powers of heaven!

When the stars fall and fire bursts out of the earth, they say to You: Our Creator!

When the flowers open their buds in spring, and the larks gather dry blades of grass to build a nest for their chicks, they sing to you: our lord!

And when I raise my eyes to Your throne, I whisper to You: Our Father!

There was a time, a long and terrible time, when people called You the Lord of hosts, or the Creator, or Lord! Yes, then man felt that he was only a creature among creatures. But now, thanks to Your Only Begotten and Greatest Son, we have learned Your real name. Therefore, I, together with Jesus Christ, decide to call You: Father!

If I call you: Vladyko I fall prostrate before You in fear, like a slave in a crowd of slaves.

If I call you: Creator I am moving away from You as the night is separated from the day, or as a leaf is torn from its tree.

If I look at You and say to You: Mister then I am like a stone among stones, or a camel among camels.

But if I open my mouth and whisper: Father love will take the place of fear, the earth will, as it were, become closer to heaven, and I will go for a walk with you, as with a friend, in the garden of this world and share your glory, your strength, your suffering.

Our Father! You are the Father for us all, and I would humiliate both You and myself if I called You: My Father!

Our Father! You care not only about me, a single blade of grass, but about everyone and everything in the world. Your goal is Your Kingdom, not one person. Selfishness in me calls You: My Father, but love calls: Our Father!

In the name of all people, my brothers, I pray: Our Father!

In the name of all the creatures that surround me and with whom You wove my life, I pray to You: Our Father!

I pray to You, Father of the universe, only one thing I pray to You: let the dawn of that day come soon, when all people, living and dead, together with angels and stars, animals and stones, will call You by Your true name: Our Father!

Who is in heaven!

We raise our eyes to heaven whenever we call on You, and lower our eyes to the ground when we remember our sins. We are always at the bottom, at the very bottom because of our weakness and our sins. You are always on top, as it corresponds to Your greatness and Your holiness.

You are in heaven when we are not worthy to receive You. But You joyfully come down to us, to our earthly dwellings, when we eagerly strive for You and open the doors to You.

Although You condescend to us, You are still in heaven. In heaven you live, in heaven you walk, and together with heaven you descend into our valleys.

Heaven is far, too far from the man who rejects You in spirit and heart, or who laughs when Your name is mentioned. However, heaven is close, very close to a person who has opened the gates of his soul and is waiting for You, our dearest Guest, to come.

If we compare the most righteous person with You, then You rise above him, like heaven above the valley of the earth, like eternal life above the kingdom of death.

We are from perishable, mortal material - how could we stand on the same peak with You, Immortal Youth and Strength!

Our Father Who is always above us, bow down to us and lift us up to Yourself. What are we, if not tongues, created from the dust of Your glory for the sake of! The dust would be silent forever and could not pronounce Your name without us, Lord. How could dust know You, if not through us? How could You work miracles if not through us?

Oh our Father!

hallowed be thy name;

You do not become holier from our praises, however, by glorifying You, we make ourselves holier. Your name is wonderful! People bicker about names - whose name is better? It is good that Your name is sometimes remembered in these disputes, because at the same moment the speaking tongues fall silent in indecision because all the great human names, woven into a beautiful wreath, cannot be compared with Your name, Holy God, Most Holy!

When people want to glorify Your name, they ask nature to help them. They take stone and wood and build temples. People adorn altars with pearls and flowers, and kindle fires with plants, their sisters; and they take incense from the cedars, their brothers; and give strength to their voices by the ringing of bells; and call upon the animals to glorify your name. Nature is pure like Your stars and innocent like Your angels, Lord! Have mercy on us for the sake of pure and innocent nature, singing with us Your holy name, Holy God, Most Holy!

How can we praise Your name?

Maybe innocent joy? - then have mercy on us for the sake of our innocent children.

Maybe suffering? - then look at our graves.

Or self-sacrifice? - then remember the torment of the Mother, Lord!

Your name is harder than steel and brighter than light. Good is the man who puts his hopes in You and becomes wiser by Your name.

Fools say: "We are armed with steel, so who can fight back?" And You destroy kingdoms with tiny insects!

Terrible is Your name, Lord! It illuminates and burns like a huge fiery cloud. There is nothing holy or terrible in the world that is not associated with Your name. O Holy God, give me as friends those who have Your name cut into their hearts, and as enemies those who do not even want to know about You. For such friends will remain my friends to death, and such enemies will fall on their knees before me and submit as soon as their swords are broken.

Holy and terrible is thy name, Holy God, Most Holy! May we remember Your name in every moment of our life, and in moments of joy and in moments of weakness, and remember it in our hour of death, our Heavenly Father, Holy God!

let your kingdom come;

May Your Kingdom come, O Great King!

We are sick of kings who only imagined themselves to be greater than other people, and now lie in their graves next to beggars and slaves.

We are sick of the kings, who yesterday announced their power over countries and peoples, and today are crying from a toothache!

They are disgusting, like clouds that bring ashes instead of rain.

“Look, here is a wise man. Give him the crown!" the crowd shouts. The Crown doesn't care whose head it's on. But You, Lord, know the price of the wisdom of the wise and the power of mortals. Do I need to repeat to You what You know? Do I need to say that the wisest among us ruled over us madly?

“Look, here is a strong man. Give him the crown!" - the crowd shouts again; this is a different time, a different generation. The crown passes silently from head to head, but you, Omnipotent, you know the price of the spiritual power of the exalted and the power of the strong. You know about the weakness of the strong and those in power.

We have finally understood, having endured suffering, that there is no other king but You. Our soul longs for Your kingdom and Your dominion. Wandering everywhere, haven't we received enough insults and wounds, living descendants on the graves of small kings and the ruins of kingdoms? Now we pray to You for help.

Let it appear on the horizon Your Kingdom! Your Kingdom of Wisdom, Fatherland and Strength! May this land that has been a battlefield for thousands of years become a home where You are the host and we are the guests. Come, King, an empty throne awaits You! Harmony will come with You, and beauty will come with harmony. All other kingdoms are disgusting to us, so we are waiting now You, Great King, You and Your Kingdom!

may Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven;

Heaven and earth are Your fields, Father. On one field You sow stars and angels, on the other thorns and people. The stars move according to Your will. The angels play on the stars like a harp, according to Your will. However, a person meets a person and asks: “What is the will of God?»

How long does a man not want to know Your will? How long will he humiliate himself before the thorns under his feet? You created man to be equal to the angels and stars, but behold, he and thorns surpass him.

But you see, Father, a man, if he wants to, can praise Your name better than thorns, just like angels and stars. O Thou Spirit-giver and Voledavche, give man Thy Will.

Your will wise, clear and holy. Your will moves the heavens, so why not the same will move the earth, which in comparison with the heavens is like a drop in front of the ocean?

You never get tired, creating with wisdom, our Father. There is no place for stupidity in Your plan. Now You are as fresh in wisdom and goodness now as You were on the first day of creation, and tomorrow You will be the same as today.

Your will holy, for it is wise and fresh. Holiness is as inseparable from You as air is from us.

Anything unholy can ascend to heaven, but nothing unholy will ever descend from heaven, from Your throne, Father.

We pray to You, our Holy Father: make it so that soon the day will come when the will of all people will be wise, fresh and holy, like Your will, and when all creatures on earth will move in harmony with the stars in heaven; and when our planet will sing in choir with all your amazing stars:

God teach us!

God, lead us!

Father save us!

give us our daily bread this day;

He who gives the body also gives the soul; and whoever gives air, he also gives bread. Your children, merciful Giver, expect everything they need from You.

Who will brighten their faces in the morning, if not You with Your light?

Who will watch over their breath at night when they sleep, if not You, the most indefatigable of all watchmen?

Where would we sow our daily bread if not in Your field? How could we be refreshed if not by Your morning dew? How would we live without Your light and Your air? How could we eat if not with the mouth that You gave us?

How could we rejoice and thank You that we are full, if not with the spirit that You breathed into lifeless dust and created a miracle from it, You, the most amazing Creator?

I beg you not for my bread, but about our bread. What is the use if I had bread, and my brothers were starving next to me? It would be better and more just if You would take away from me the bitter bread of a selfish person, for a satisfied hunger is sweeter if shared with a brother. It cannot be Your will that one person thanks You, and hundreds curse You.

Our Father, give us our bread so that we may glorify You with a united choir and that we may joyfully remember our Heavenly Father. Today we pray for today.

This day is great, many new creatures were born today. Thousands of new creations, which did not exist yesterday and which will not exist tomorrow, are born today under the same sunlight, fly together with us on one of Your stars, and together with us say to You: our bread.

Oh great Master! We are Your guests from morning to evening, we are invited to Your meal and we are waiting for Your bread. No one but You has the right to say: my bread. He is yours.

No one but You has the right to tomorrow and to tomorrow's bread, only You and those of today's guests whom You call.

If, by Your will, the end of today will be the dividing line between my life and death, I will bow before Your holy will.

If it be Your will, I will again be tomorrow the companion of the great sun and a guest at Your table, and I will repeat my gratitude to You, as I repeat constantly from day to day.

And I will bow before Your will again and again, as the angels do in heaven, The bestower of all gifts, bodily and spiritual!

and forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors;

It is easier for a man to sin and break Your laws, Father, than to understand them. However, it is not easy for You to forgive us our sins if we do not forgive those who sin against us. For You founded the world on measure and order. How can there be balance in the world if You have one measure for us, and we another for our neighbors? Or if You give us bread and we give our neighbors a stone? Or if You forgive us our sins, and we punish our neighbors for their sins? How then would measure and order be preserved in the world, O Legislator?

Yet You forgive us more than we can forgive our brothers. We defile the earth every day and every night with our crimes, and You greet us every morning with the clear eye of Your sun and every night You send Your merciful forgiveness through the stars that stand as holy guardians at the gates of Your Kingdom, our Father!

You shame us every day, Most Merciful, for when we are waiting for punishment, You send us mercy. When we are waiting for Your thunder, You send us a peaceful evening, and when we are waiting for darkness, You give us sunshine.

You are eternally exalted above our sins and always great in Your silent patience.

Hard for a fool who thinks he will disturb You with foolish words! He is like a child who angrily throws a pebble into the waves to drive the sea away from the shore. But the sea will only wrinkle the surface of the waters and continue to irritate infirmity with its great power.

Look, our sins are common sins, we are all together responsible for the sins of all. Therefore, there are no pure righteous on earth, for all the righteous must take upon themselves some sins of sinners. It is hard to be an immaculately righteous person, for there is not a single righteous person who does not bear the burden of at least one sinner on his shoulders. However, Father, the more a righteous person bears the sins of sinners, the more righteous he is.

Our Heavenly Father, You, who send bread from morning to evening to your children and accept their sins as payment, lighten the burden of the righteous and dispel the darkness of sinners!

The earth is full of sins, but full of prayers; it is full of the prayers of the righteous and the despair of sinners. But isn't despair the beginning of prayer?

And in the end, you will be the winner. Your Kingdom will stand on the prayers of the righteous. Your will will become law for men, just as Your will is law for angels.

Otherwise, why then would You, our Father, hesitate to forgive the sins of mortals, because by doing so You give us an example of forgiveness and mercy?

and lead us not into temptation,

Oh, how little it takes for a man to turn away from You and turn to idols!

He is surrounded by temptations like storms, and he is weak, like foam on the crest of a stormy mountain stream.

If he is rich, he immediately begins to think that he is equal to You, or puts You after him, or even decorates his house with Your images as luxury items.

When evil knocks at his gates, he is tempted to bargain with You or reject You altogether.

If You call him to sacrifice himself, he is indignant. If You send him to die, he trembles.

If You offer him all earthly pleasures, in temptation he poisons and kills his own soul.

If You reveal to his eyes the laws of Your care, he grumbles: "The world is wonderful in itself, and without the Creator."

We are embarrassed by Your holiness, O our Holy God. When You call us to the light, we, like night moths, rush into the darkness, but, rushing into the darkness, we seek the light.

Before us is a network of many roads, but we are afraid to reach the end of at least one of them, because temptation awaits and beckons us at any edge.

And the path that leads to You is blocked by many temptations and many, many failures. Before finding temptation, it seems to us that You accompany us like a bright cloud. However, when the temptation begins, You disappear. We turn around in anxiety and silently ask ourselves: what is our mistake, where are you, are you or are you not?

In all our temptations, we ask ourselves, "Are You really our Father?" All our temptations throw into our minds the same questions that the whole world around us asks us day after day and night after night:

"What do you think of the Lord?"

"Where is He and who is He?"

"Are you with Him or without Him?"

Give me strength Father and Creator mine, so that at any moment of my life I can respond correctly to every possible temptation.

The Lord is the Lord. He is where I am and where I am not.

I give Him my passionate heart and stretch out my hands to His holy garments, I reach out to Him like a child to a beloved Father.

How could I live without Him? This means that I could live without myself.

How can I be against Him? This means that I myself will be against myself.

A righteous son follows his father with reverence, peace, and joy.

Breathe Your inspiration into our souls, Our Father, that we may become Your righteous sons.

but deliver us from the evil one.

Who will free us from evil if not You, our Father?

Who will reach out to drowning children if not their father?

Who cares more about the cleanliness and beauty of a house than its owner?

You created us from nothing and made something out of us, but we are drawn to evil and again turn into nothing.

We warm the snake in our hearts, which we fear more than anything in the world.

With all our strength we rise up against darkness, but nevertheless darkness lives in our souls, sowing microbes of death.

We are all unanimously against evil, but evil is slowly creeping into our home and, while we are shouting and protesting against evil, it takes one position after another, getting closer and closer to our heart.

Oh, Most High Father, stand between us and evil, and we will lift up our hearts, and evil will dry up like a puddle on the road under the hot sun.

You are high above us and do not know how evil grows, but we suffocate under it. Behold, evil grows within us day by day, spreading its bountiful fruit everywhere.

The sun greets us every day with "Good morning!" and asks what can we show our great King? And we demonstrate only the old broken fruits of evil. O God, truly dust, motionless and inanimate, is purer than a man who is in the service of evil!

Look, we built our dwellings in the valleys and hid in the caves. It is not at all difficult for You to command Your rivers to flood all our valleys and caves and wipe out humanity from the face of the earth, having washed it from our dirty deeds.

But You are above our anger and our advice. If you had listened to human advice, You would have already destroyed the world to the ground and You Yourself would have perished under the ruins.

O wisest among fathers! You smile forever in Your divine beauty and immortality. Look, stars grow from your smile! With a smile You turn our evil into good, and graft the Tree of Good on the tree of evil, and with infinite patience You ennoble our uncultivated Garden of Eden. You patiently heal and patiently build. You are patiently building Your Kingdom of goodness, our King and Our Father. We pray to You: deliver us from evil and fill us with good, for You abolish evil and fill up good.

For yours is the kingdom,

The stars and the sun are citizens of Your Kingdom, Our Father. Inscribe us also in Your shining army.

Our planet is small and gloomy, but this is Your work, Your creation and Your inspiration. What else can come out of Your hands but something great? But still, by our insignificance and darkness, we make our dwelling place small and gloomy. Yes, the earth is small and dark whenever we call it our kingdom and when we in madness say that we are its kings.

See how many among us are those who were kings on earth and who now, standing on the ruins of their thrones, are surprised and ask: “Where are all our kingdoms?” There are many kingdoms that do not know what happened to their kings. Blessed and happy is the man who looks into the heavenly heights and whispers the words that I hear: Yours is the Kingdom!

What we call our earthly kingdom is full of worms and fleeting, like bubbles in deep water, like clouds of dust on the wings of the wind! Only You have the true Kingdom, and only Your Kingdom has a King. Take us off the wings of the wind and take us to You, merciful King! Save us from the wind! And make us citizens of Your eternal Kingdom near Your stars and sun, among Your angels and archangels, let us be near You, Our Father!

and strength

Yours is the power, for Yours is the Kingdom. False kings are weak. Their royal power lies only in their royal titles, which are truly Your titles. They are wandering dust, and dust flies where the wind takes it. We are only wanderers, shadows and flying dust. But even when we wander and wander, we are moved by Your strength. By Your power we were created and by Your power we will live. If a person does good, he does it by Your power through You, but if a person does evil, he does it by Your power, but through himself. Everything that is done is done by Your power, whether used for good or misused. If a man, Father, uses Your power according to Your will, then Your power will be Yours, but if a person uses Your power according to his own will, then Your power is called his power and will be evil.

I think, Lord, that when You yourself dispose of Your power, then it is good, but when the poor who borrowed power from You proudly dispose of it as their own, it becomes evil. Therefore, there is one Owner, but there are many evil stewards and users of Your power, which You mercifully distribute at Your rich meal to these unfortunate mortals on earth.

Look at us, Almighty Father, look at us and do not rush to bestow Your power on the dust of the earth until palaces are ready for it: good will and humility. Good will - to use the received divine gift for good deeds, and humility - to remember forever that all the power in the universe belongs to You, the great Powergiver.

Your power is holy and wise. But in our hands Your power is in danger of being defiled and can become sinful and insane.

Our Father, Who art in heaven, help us to know and do only one thing: to know that all power is Yours, and to use Your strength according to Your will. Look, we are unhappy, because we divided what is indivisible with You. We separated strength from holiness, and separated strength from love, and separated strength from faith, and finally (and this is the first reason for our fall) separated strength from humility. Father, we beseech you, unite all that your children have divided out of ignorance.

We beseech Thee, exalt and defend the honor of Thy strength, which has been abandoned and dishonored. Forgive us, for although we are such, we are Your children.

and glory forever.

Your glory is eternal, like You, our King, our Father. It exists in You and does not depend on us. This glory is not from words, like the glory of mortals, but from a true, imperishable essence, such as You. Yes, it is inseparable from You, as light is inseparable from the hot sun. Who has seen the center and halo of Your glory? Who has become glorious without touching Your glory?

Your brilliant glory surrounds us from all sides and looks at us silently, slightly smiling and slightly surprised at our human cares and grumblings. When we fall silent, someone secretly whispers to us: you are the children of the glorious Father.

Oh, how sweet is this secret whisper!

What can we desire more than to be children of Your glory? Isn't that enough? Without a doubt, this is enough for a righteous life. However, people want to be fathers of glory. And this is the beginning and apogee of their misfortunes. They are not content to be children and partakers of Your glory, but want to be fathers and bearers of Your glory. And yet You alone are the only bearer of Your glory. There are many who misuse Your glory, and there are many who have fallen into self-deception. There is nothing more dangerous in the hands of mortals than glory.

You show Your glory, and people argue about theirs. Your glory is a fact, and human glory is just a word.

Your glory always smiles and comforts, but human glory, separated from You, frightens and kills.

Your glory feeds the unfortunate and leads the meek, but human glory is separated from You. She is Satan's most powerful tool.

How ridiculous people are when they try to create their own glory, outside of You and apart from You. They are like some fool who couldn't stand the sun and tried to find a place where there is no sunlight. He built himself a hut without windows, and entering it, stood in the darkness and rejoiced that he had been saved from the source of light. Such is the fool and such is the inhabitant of darkness, he who tries to create his glory outside of Thee and apart from Thee, Immortal Fountain of Glory!

There is no human glory, just as there is no human power. Yours is the power and the glory, Our Father. If we do not receive them from You, we will not have them, and we will wither and be carried away by the will of the wind, like dry leaves that have fallen from a tree.

We are pleased to be called Your children. There is no greater honor on earth and in heaven than this honor.

Take from us our kingdoms, our strength and our glory. Everything we once called our own lies in ruins. Take from us what was Yours from the beginning. Our whole history has been a foolish attempt to create our kingdom, our strength and our glory. Quickly finish our old story where we struggled to become masters in Your house, and start a new story where we will try to become servants in the house that belongs to You. Indeed, it is better and more glorious to be a servant in Your kingdom than to be the most important king in our kingdom.

Therefore, make us, Father, servants of Your kingdom, Your power and Your glory in all generations and till the end of time. Amen!

How many times it happened: we started fasting and promised to improve, but the holy days passed, and we, looking back at ourselves, were convinced that nothing had been achieved. This is because a solid foundation was not laid in our fast - repentance, reconciliation with God, reconciliation with one's neighbor and mutual forgiveness. After the word "Lord" the second word is "forgive". God wants to teach us the secret of this word, which, like Adam's cry, opens the doors of paradise. Adam wept, and God became incarnate and crucified for his sins. Adam wept, and the doors of paradise were opened.

The Church tells us that mutual forgiveness is deep and high, so that we don’t have an easy attitude to this, endless phone calls, and someone from the outside said with irony: “Well, today is the day of forgiveness for the Orthodox.” In order not to pester with holy, vainly spoken words to everyone in a row, to people who know nothing about God, but so that peace is asked from the Lord in the heart, this is - first of all - then the Lord will give the necessary words. Even if we don’t have the opportunity to meet with whomever we need, as they say, the heart sends a message to the heart.

Throughout Great Lent, we will ask for forgiveness from God, endlessly repeating: "Lord, have mercy! Lord, forgive!" And the Lord will say to us: "Why do you call Me "Lord, Lord!" - and do not do what I say?" And the Lord says quite clearly that if we forgive others, then God forgives us, and if we do not forgive others, then God does not forgive us. And it means that if we pray this prayer, being in enmity, in a quarrel with any person, we ask God not to forgive us. And if we say: “I will never forgive for what he did to me,” and we pray the Lord’s prayer: “And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors,” understanding the meaning of the words that we utter We consciously pray to God that He will never forgive us for anything.

We all remember the story of Presbyter Titus of the Caves, whose memory, together with all the venerable fathers who shone in the feat of fasting, was celebrated yesterday by the Church. The Monk Titus had a great friendship with the deacon Evagrius, but then this friendship, as often happens, turned into a strong enmity. When the Monk Titus fell seriously ill and was already dying, he sent to Evagrius to ask for forgiveness, but Evagrius did not want to be reconciled. The Pechersk brethren forcibly brought him to the dying man. The Monk Titus with tears asked him for forgiveness, but Evagrius was silent at first, and then suddenly began to speak furiously, recalling his long-standing grievances, and, becoming more and more hardened, said that he would not forgive Titus either in this century or in the future. After these words, he fell down dead, struck by an angel, and the Monk Titus at the same moment received healing.

There is an ancient custom on Mount Athos, according to which one who does not want to be reconciled with his brother, when he reads the prayer "Our Father", omit the words in it: "and forgive us our debts." This prayer, as the holy fathers say, is a brief record of the entire Gospel, and it reveals to us that everything in our salvation depends on God, and from us, from our faith, only one thing is required in the end - the forgiveness of others. And therefore, everything else that we ask the Lord for in this prayer is connected with this petition of ours. One experienced priest said to his spiritual son: "The next time you read the Lord's Prayer, don't say, 'Thy will be done!' but say, 'My will be done! : "What are you teaching me ?!" - answered: "Isn't that what you do every time you say one thing with your tongue, and in your heart you implore the Lord to do everything according to your will?"

What remains for us after this from the Lord's Prayer, from the Gospel? Isn't it said: "Whoever removes even one word from this book of life, the Lord will subtract - blot out - his name from the book of life"? We cannot enter Great Lent without forgiving each other, neither confession nor communion is possible, and the Lord expels those who have not reconciled with each other from the church. If you remember in prayer, He says, that your brother has something against you, leave the temple, go, first be reconciled with your brother, and then offer your sacrifice, prayer. Maybe we really, without reconciling with each other, should not enter the temple? Perhaps it would be better to stand on the street, as in the ancient Church, at the entrance to the temple, purely penitent and weeping people stood and asked forgiveness from all who entered it? Personally, they probably did not offend anyone, but our every sin is to offend everyone, even a person we do not know.

To penetrate the mystery of forgiveness, it is necessary to have a deep sense of sin. And during the entire Lent, we will pray this main Lenten prayer: "Lord, give me the sight of my sins!" We need to make sure from our own experience that faith does not eliminate defeat, to understand why the promised Messiah is revealed to us by the suffering Servant, and the slain Lamb - the Conqueror of sin and death, and that forgiveness will always be an integral part of our life on earth. Only when we recognize our sinfulness, and only when we hate sin, can we forgive another person wounded by sin. So painfully, to deathly anguish, every person needs forgiveness, and what a miracle, an incomprehensible gift - forgiveness! If God had not said: "I forgive!" - I wouldn't exist. God forgives us not because He is indulgent towards sin, but because He takes sin very seriously and sees that sin means the death of a person, and by His love He takes upon Himself the consequences of our sin. Forgiveness is the hardest thing to do: it means taking on the consequences of another person's sin. If someone with a light heart, without hesitation, forgives, for example, on behalf of the innocently murdered of their unrepentant murderers, and at the same time does not want to forgive his friend for one insulting word, can this be called Christian forgiveness, and does it lead to more more affirmation of evil?

The Monk Seraphim of Sarov, when the Lord revealed to him that the bishops and other clergy of our Church would depart from the purity of Orthodoxy, for three days and three nights he prayed to the Lord for the forgiveness of these people, that the Lord would send him into eternal torment instead of them, knowing on his own experience, which means the vile touch of the smallest sin and the vile touch of demons. But the Lord said: "I will not have mercy, because they will teach the doctrines and commandments of men." Where there is no God and His righteousness, where there is only human, there is no forgiveness. And this means that if we are looking for true forgiveness of each other, the truth should not be sacrificed, the truth should not suffer, the principles of the Gospel cannot be shaken. False, easily given forgiveness is indifference to good and evil, and this means the victory of evil, reconciliation with evil and acceptance of it. This is what we should think about today, before entering into Great Lent. Mutual forgiveness comes at a cost to us. The Holy Fathers say that to forgive people is a greater miracle than the creation of heaven and earth. Christ prays on the Cross for the forgiveness of all people, and those who crucify Him: "Father, forgive them, they do not know what they are doing!" And our forgiveness of other people is our participation in God's forgiveness.

But why does St. Philaret of Moscow say these words often repeated by us: "Love (that is, forgive) your enemies, defeat the enemies of the Fatherland, and abhor the enemies of God"? Genuine spiritual relationships with each person can only be personal, just as God has only personal relationships with each person. Another person is revealed to us as a person when we see him separated from sin. Participation in the work of Christ is participation in God's separation of man from sin. The work of the devil is to put the seal of sin on a person forever. If we accept another person, approving the evil that he has, then we ourselves become infected with this evil and turn out to be powerless to help another.

The Savior's Prayer of the Cross is a prayer for the possibility of separating evil from a person, which we contribute to by rejecting all evil, and, therefore, by forgiving this person. Only in this way is our reconciliation with other people and their forgiveness first of all accomplished. Let us stress this with all our might today: love for a world lying in lies and evil is enmity with God, and he who is a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God, and therefore an enemy to every person. And this man, with whom he seemed to have reconciled, but in fact entered into eternal enmity with him, if there is no repentance.

In all Orthodox churches on the eve of Great Lent, the rite of forgiveness is performed. We must come to this service, reconciled with everyone in advance. We will approach the priest and kiss the cross, and this should be the end of everything, the real beginning of the path to forgive each other, which is Great Lent, our whole life. It's so easy to say, "I'm sorry!" - and there is no heart to forgive. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner! Mother of God, forgive and help forgive! In the world of sin, that is, dislike, everyone is to blame for each other. We are expelled from paradise, we are out of paradise, out of life, out of love. And we will approach each other:

Sorry!

For what? You didn't do anything to me, you and I didn't seem to quarrel

Sorry for the hate! I'm sorry I don't love you. Or rather, I love, but not in the way I should love. Not the way Christ says. What is this love? It seems that our relationship is not bad, but you never know what misunderstandings happen! I'm sorry about all this. Although relatives never quarrel - this is a great thing, as St. Macarius the Great testifies. But most importantly - sorry for the dislike.

To forgive to the end means to love a person, at least one person to the end, like Christ, and this means not to exclude anyone from your love. So we can forgive only at Pascha, by Christ crucified God, and by the risen Christ, Who pours love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit. Between me and you is the Cross, on which the sins of all of us, yours and mine. That's why we say: "God will forgive, and you forgive me." At this time, the hymns of Pascha are sung: "And we will forgive those who hate us all by the Resurrection!" It will be light and easy in the temple, as after confession, as before communion - a foretaste of the Paschal light, to which we will go for seven weeks, all our lives.

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Lord's Prayer

Our Father, Thou art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy Kingdom come; Thy will be done, as in heaven and on earth. Give us our daily bread today; and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

Father - Father (address - a form of the vocative case). Thou art in heaven - existing (living) in Heaven, that is, Heavenly ( ilk- which the). Yesi- the form of the verb being in the 2nd person of unity. Numbers of the present tense: in modern language we speak you are, and in Church Slavonic - you are. The literal translation of the beginning of the prayer: O our Father, He Who is in Heaven! Any literal translation is not entirely accurate; the words: Father, Dry in Heaven, Heavenly Father - more closely convey the meaning of the first words of the Lord's Prayer. Let it shine - let it be holy and glorified. Like in heaven and on earth - both in heaven and on earth (like - how). urgent necessary for existence, for life. Give - give. Today- today. Like- how. From the evil one- from evil (words crafty, slyness- derived from the words "bow": something indirect, curved, crooked, like a bow. There is also the Russian word "falsehood").

This prayer is called the Lord's Prayer, because our Lord Jesus Christ Himself gave it to His disciples and to all people:

It happened that when He was praying in one place, and stopped, one of His disciples said to Him: Lord! Teach us to pray!

He told them:

When you pray, say: Our Father who art in heaven! Hallowed be thy name; let your kingdom come; may Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven; give us our daily bread for every day; and forgive us our sins, for we also forgive every debtor of ours; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil (Luke 11:1-4).

Pray like this:

Our Father who art in heaven! Hallowed be thy name; let your kingdom come; May Thy will be done both on earth and in heaven; give us our daily bread this day; and forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen (Matthew 6:9-13).

Reading the Lord's Prayer daily, let us learn what the Lord requires of us: it indicates both our needs and our main duties.

Our Father… In these words, we still do not ask for anything, we only cry out, turn to God and call him father.

“Saying this, we confess God, the Lord of the universe, as our Father - and by him we confess that they are removed from the state of slavery and appropriated to God as His adopted children”

(Philokalia, vol. 2)

...Who art thou in Heaven... With these words, we express our readiness to turn away in every possible way from attachment to earthly life as a wanderer and far separating us from our Father and, on the contrary, with the greatest desire to strive for that area in which our Father dwells ...

“Having reached such a high degree of the sons of God, we must burn with such filial love for God, so that we no longer seek our own benefits, but with all our desire to desire the glory of Him, our Father, saying to Him: hallowed be thy name,- by which we testify that all our desire and all joy is the glory of our Father, - may the glorious name of our Father be glorified, reverently honored and bowed down.

Rev. John Cassian the Roman

Let Your Kingdom Come- that Kingdom, "by which Christ reigns in the saints, when, after taking power over us from the Devil and banishing our passions from the hearts, God begins to reign in us through the fragrance of virtues - or that which at a predetermined time is promised to all perfect, all children of God, when Christ says to them: Come, blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world (Matthew 25:34)."

Rev. John Cassian the Roman

The words "Thy will be done" turn us to the prayer of the Lord in the Garden of Gethsemane: Father! Oh, that You would deign to carry this cup past Me! however, not my will, but yours be done (Luke 22:42).

Give us our daily bread today. We ask for the gift of bread, necessary for food, and, moreover, not in large quantities, but only for this day ... So, let's learn to ask for the most necessary things for our life, but we won't ask for everything leading to abundance and luxury, because we don't know, log whether it to us. Let us learn to ask for bread and everything necessary only for this day, so that we do not become lazy in prayer and obedience to God. We will be alive the next day - again we will ask for the same, and so on all the days of our earthly life.

However, we must not forget the words of Christ that Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God (Matthew 4:4). It is even more important to remember other words of the Savior : I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; but the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world (John 6:51). Thus, Christ has in mind not only something material, necessary for a person for earthly life, but also something eternal, necessary for life in the Kingdom of God: Himself, offered in Communion.

Some holy fathers interpreted the Greek expression as "supernatural bread" and attributed it only (or mainly) to the spiritual side of life; however, the Lord's Prayer encompasses both earthly and heavenly meanings.

And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. The Lord Himself concluded this prayer with an explanation: For if you forgive people their trespasses, then your Heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive people their trespasses, then your Father will not forgive you your trespasses. (Matthew 6:14-15).

“The merciful Lord promises us the forgiveness of our sins, if we ourselves show an example of forgiveness to our brethren: leave to us, as we leave. It is obvious that in this prayer with boldness only he who has forgiven his debtors can boldly ask for forgiveness. Whoever, with all his heart, does not let go of his brother who sins against him, he will ask this prayer for himself, not pardon, but condemnation: for if this prayer is heard, then, in accordance with his example, something else should follow, but inexorable anger and indispensable punishment. ? Judgment without mercy to the unmerciful (James 2:13)."

Rev. John Cassian the Roman

Here sins are called debts, because, by faith and obedience to God, we must fulfill His commandments, do good, move away from evil; is that how we do it? By not doing the good that we should do, we become debtors to God.

This expression of the Lord's Prayer is best explained by Christ's parable of the man who owed the king ten thousand talents (Matthew 18:23-35).

And lead us not into temptation. Remembering the words of the apostle: Blessed is the man who endures temptation, for when he is tested he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love him. (James 1, 12), we should understand these words of prayer not like this: “do not let us ever be tempted”, but like this: “do not let us be overcome in temptation.”

In temptation no one say: God is tempting me; because God is not tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone, but everyone is tempted, carried away and deceived by his own lust; lust, having conceived, gives birth to sin, and the sin committed gives birth to death (James 1:13-15).

But deliver us from the evil one - that is, do not let us be tempted by the devil beyond our strength, but with give temptation and relief so that we can endure (1 Corinthians 10:13).

Rev. John Cassian the Roman

The Greek text of the prayer, like Church Slavonic and Russian, allows us to understand the expression from the evil one and personally ( sly- the father of lies - the devil), and impersonally ( crafty- all unrighteous, evil; evil). Patristic interpretations offer both understandings. Since evil comes from the devil, then, of course, in the petition for deliverance from evil lies the petition for deliverance from its culprit.