I was about to promote an upcoming talk at the I-CANN group in Surfers Paradise last week when I was called home to Melbourne. 

My 92-year-old father is withdrawing from the world and is now in Palliative Care. So the talk has been postponed and I’m here watching my father sleep, mumble, sing, connect and dream his way through this transition into ‘the next world’. It is an intense time for all concerned.

And perhaps it is also the right time to talk about prayer. I’ve been meaning to share some thoughts about the Lord’s Prayer. Perhaps a strange topic for me since I come from a Jewish family, but it was actually my mother who, many years ago, introduced me to the symbolic meaning of this prayer, and recently that interpretation has returned to the forefront of my awareness.

According to metaphysical teachers, ‘the LORD’, in the Bible, should be translated as ‘the LAW’, meaning Universal Law, Natural Law, Cosmic Law… and therefore the Lord’s Prayer is about the impersonal Laws that govern us all, and how to live in harmony with them; It’s not about a deity but a set of principles.

I’ll take the prayer line by line, and share my understanding. I hope you find this interesting and useful. (Do let me know.)

‘Our Father, which art in Heaven’

There are three levels of consciousness: the Conscious, Subconscious and Superconscious. Florence Scovell Shinn explains these three levels of mind beautifully in her book, The Game of Life and How to Play It:

‘The CONSCIOUS mind is the mortal mind. It is the human mind and sees life as it appears to be. It sees death, disaster, sickness, poverty and limitation of every kind, and it impresses the Subconscious.

‘The SUBCONSCIOUS mind is simply power without direction. Whatever man feels deeply or images clearly is impressed upon the subconscious mind and carried out in minutest detail without questioning.

‘The SUPERCONSCIOUS is the God mind within each man, and is the realm of perfect ideas, the perfect pattern, the Divine Design. When the [Conscious and] Subconscious [are] flooded with the perfect ideas of the Superconscious, ‘I and the Father are One.’’

‘Heaven’ is the realm of the Superconscious, of those divine ideas, so ‘Our Father, which art in Heaven’ is a direct reference to the Superconscious, the Source Mind, the First Cause, the realm of the Perfect Plan.

And perhaps ‘Our’ brings this home personally to us – we’re talking about our intimate connection to this Source of Everything.

‘Hallowed be Thy Name’

The Name indicates the Nature; the two are intrinsically connected, so this line acknowledges the holiness of our Divine Nature.

‘Thy Kingdom come’

We are declaring that we want the divine design to rule.

‘Thy Will be done’

We hear people saying, ‘It’s God’s will’, but what is God’s will? 

Metaphysicians like Florence Scovell Shinn, Eliabeth Behrend, Thomas Troward, Raymond Holliwell and Charles F Haanel say that God’s will for us is His Perfect Divine Design; it’s not illness or tragedy – that’s our creation when we are blocking the flow. As parents, we know that we only want the best our children. Why would God, the Creator of all, want any different? 

Others say that God’s will is exactly what is happening now: 

“You might ask, ‘How can I know if something is God’s will?’ My answer is, ‘If it were not God’s will, it wouldn’t exist even for an instant, so if something happens, it must be His will. If you truly enjoyed God’s will, you would feel exactly as though you were in the kingdom of heaven, whatever happened to you or didn’t happen to you.’”

 – Meister Eckhart, German theologian, philosopher, mystic

Thus, you can either read ‘They will be done’ as ‘Open the way for the perfect design’ or ‘Let me see how this serves me’.

‘On Earth as it is in Heaven’ 

If ‘Heaven’ is the causal plane of the Divine Idea, then ‘Earth’ is the material plane of results or effects; therefore, may the perfect Divine Ideal be manifest in our physical lives.

‘Give us this day our daily bread’

This one is pretty straightforward but it doesn’t just mean food; it means having all of our needs met – physical, mental, spiritual, etc. As Dr Demartini says, we need both support and challenge to grow, so our ‘daily bread’ refers to the physical, mental and spiritual food and conditions that will aid our growth.

‘And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors’

This line refers to the law of Cause and Effect or Karma. What we put out will return to us. Dr Demartini says that ‘equilibration’ is what happens when we realise that we have done what we are accusing others of doing. The key here is the words ‘AS WE’: the law states that we should experience/receive exactly what we give out. (Though it might show up in a different form.)

‘Lead us not into temptation’ 

This is the really interesting one. I wonder if ‘lead’ is the correct translation; it makes more sense, to me, as ‘Let us not fall into temptation’.  

Many of the ‘patriots’/freedom fighters today are making the statement that ‘The trick of the devil is to tell you he doesn’t exist’. I get their point (sugar-coated evil is harder to recognise), but that is to make evil the equivalent of good.  

The story of Genesis teaches us that the Garden of Eden featured two trees: the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. When we eat of the Tree of Life, we experience abundant life, health, Oneness, the perfect plan, etc.; when we eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, we are caught up in duality-consciousness: yes/no, black/white, up/down, in/out, good/bad…  

The significance of gaining the knowledge of good and evil is not that we now have ‘forbidden/hidden knowledge’ (the serpent’s interpretation), but that we have become caught up in a belief in two powers and no longer hold to the understanding that there is ONLY ONE POWER.  

Opposites are an illusion since they are located on a continuum (where does darkness stop and light begin? Where does warmth stop and coolness begin?); in reality, darkness is merely the absence of light, cold is merely the absence of warmth, and fear is merely the absence of love. One power.  

As A Course in Miracles says: 

“The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite.
This course can therefore be summed up very simply in this way:
Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein, lies the peace of God.”  

The belief in two powers equates to a commitment to appearances and the limitations of the sensory world, and a denial of our power as Co-Creators with the Divine. ‘The Fall’ was a fall in consciousness from Oneness to duality-consciousness, hence: ‘Let us not fall into temptation [the sensory delusion].’  ‘But deliver us from evil’  The evil being the belief in two powers; let us not fall for the illusion that evil exists/has power, but instead, call out the good in the situation.  An excellent affirmation is: “As there is only one power, this is here for my good.”

‘For thine is the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory forever.’ 

The praise is not for God; He/She/It doesn’t need it. It’s for us – to raise our vibration. Gratitude and appreciation generate the highest vibrations. They are up there with unconditional love.  

‘Amen.’  

So be it. 

‘Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven (the consciousness of Oneness and Love), and all these things (prosperity, health, love, opportunity) shall be added unto you.’  

If you want another perspective on the idea that the Lord is the Law, here’s one:  

“That intelligence has set in place the principles that govern life. The Deity doesn’t watch over us and judge us any more than It personally directs the movement of every molecule in every cell of every being. The universe is a big place and it works like any big organisation, by hierarchy and delegation. God is too busy to punish anyone; He just sets up the dynamics of evolution through universal laws and stands back emanating divine love. In that divine order, life and death are in perfect balance, conserved throughout time and space.” 
– Dr John Demartini, The Breakthrough Experience 

 For what it’s worth, A Course in Miracles also tells us that, 

‘This is a required course. Only the time you take it is voluntary.’  

So we can dilly-dally in Polarity Land for as long as we want, but eventually we must come to the realisation that there is One Power, and step into our power as Conscious Co-Creators with this Law.  

Jesus did say that we shall do greater things than He. No wonder those messages have been suppressed by those who wish to keep us powerless.  

I’d like to finish with a personal story. I was so deeply impressed by a particular individual, a teacher/inventor/brilliant thinker, that I had become attached to a solution he was offering. When the solution didn’t deliver, I felt extremely disappointed – until I realised that I had put him (and his solution) on a pedestal. I had fallen into temptation. I’d given power to him and his products and services rather than to my Source, the divine within me. He fell off the pedestal as a reminder to me that I need to create from within.  

Life is beautiful.