Almost every faith tradition in the world includes prayers, in one form or another. Often they are petitions, supplications, or incantations addressed to what is considered to be a superior being or power that is essentially invisible and is supposed to have influence, if not authority, over humans. In the tradition in which I was brought up, a creator-god with unknown contours and ancestral spirits received supplications to intervene in cases of disease or calamity.

Readers of the Holy Bible are well aware of how the various people presented in the Bible prayed in their time. Pagan gods are mentioned, including those of the Egyptians, the Amorites, and the Philistines. And the Israelites addressed their prayers to a God they believed belonged to them alone.

Indeed, the practice of praying must have been common in biblical times, because in the Gospel of Luke, one of Christ Jesus’ disciples asked him to show them how to pray. In response, he gave them what is today known as the Lord’s Prayer. In the Gospel of Matthew, before giving this prayer, Jesus said, “Use not vain repetitions. . . . For your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him” (Matthew 6:7, 8). And long before Christ Jesus’ time, King David sang, “Thou understandest my thought afar off. . . . For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether” (Psalms 139:2, 4).