God the Father in Christianity. Prayer to the God-Father

Since the time when a person has become intelligent, he began to look for answers to questions about who created everything, about the meaning of his life, and whether he is not alone in the universe. Not finding an answer, people of antiquity came up with gods, each of them knew his part of being. Someone was in charge of creating the Earth and Heaven, some were submissive to the seas, some were the main in the underworld.

As the surrounding world became more aware of the gods, more and more people did not find the answer to the question about the meaning of life. Therefore many old gods were replaced by one God the Father.

Concept of God

Before the appearance of Christianity, people lived for several thousand years with faith in the Creator, who created everything that surrounds them. It was not a single god, since the consciousness of the people of antiquity could not accept that all things are the creation of one creator. Therefore, in every civilization, no matter when and on which continent it was born, there was a God-Father, who had helpers-his children and grandchildren.

In those days, it was customary to humanize the gods, "rewarding" them with personality traits peculiar to humans. So it was easier to explain the natural phenomena and events that took place in the world. The essential difference and obvious advantage of the ancient pagan belief was that God manifests himself in the surrounding nature, in connection with which she was worshiped. At that time, man considered himself one of the many creations created by the gods. In many religions, there was a principle of assigning to the hypostases of the gods a species of animals or birds.

For example, in Ancient Egypt, Anubis was depicted as a man with a jackal's head, and Ra with a falcon's head. In India, the gods were given images of animals living in this country, for example, Ganesha was portrayed as an elephant. All religions of antiquity were characterized by one feature: regardless of the number of gods and the difference in their names, they were created by the Creator, standing above all, which is the beginning of everything and has no end.

The concept of one God

The fact that there is a single God the Father, knew long before the birth of Christ. For example, in the Indian "Upanishads", created in 1500 BC. E., it is said that in the beginning there was nothing but the Great Brahman.

The Yoruba people living in West Africa, in the myth of the creation of the world, say that at first everything was water chaos, which Olorun turned into Earth and Heaven, and on the 5th day he created people by molding them out of the earth.

If we turn to the sources of all ancient cultures, then in each of them there is the image of God the Father, who created all things together with man. So in this concept, Christianity would not have given anything to the new world, if not for one significant difference - God is one, and there are no other gods besides him.

To strengthen this knowledge in the minds of people who professed the faith of many gods from generation to generation was a difficult matter, which is why, in Christianity, the Creator has a triune hypostasis: God the Father, and God the Son (his Word), and the Spirit (the power of his mouth ).

"The Father is the forerunner of all that exists," and "The heavens are created by the Word of the Lord, and all the power of them is by the Spirit of His mouth" (Psalm 32: 6), the Christian religion says.

Religion

Religion is a form of thinking based on belief in the supernatural, having a set of rules that determine the norm of people's behavior and the rituals peculiar to it, helping to understand the world.

Regardless of the historical period and its inherent religion, there are organizations that unite people of the same faith. In ancient times, these were temples with priests, in our time churches with priests.

Religion implies the existence of a subjective-personal perception of the world, that is, of personal faith and an objective general, uniting people of the same faith in a confession. Christianity is a religion consisting of three faiths: Orthodoxy, Catholicism and Protestantism.

God the Father in Christianity, regardless of denomination, is the one creator of all things, Light and Love, who created people in the image and likeness of their own. The Christian religion reveals to the believers knowledge of the one God written in the holy texts. Represents every denomination of his clergy, and the unifying organizations are churches and temples.

History of Christianity before the birth of Christ

The history of this religion is closely connected with the Jewish people, whose founder is the elect of God - Abraham. The choice fell on this particular Aramaic for good reason, since he himself came to know that the idols worshiped by his entourage had nothing to do with holiness.

Through reflection and observation, Abraham realized that there is a true and unique God-Father who created everything on earth and in heaven. He found like-minded people who followed him from Babylon and became the chosen people, called the Israel. Thus, between the Creator and the people an eternal covenant was concluded, the violation of which attracted for the Jews punishment in the form of persecutions and wanderings.

Faith in a single God by the 1st century AD was an exception, since most of the peoples of that time were pagans. The Hebrew holy books about the creation of the world spoke of the Word through which the Creator created everything, and that the Messiah will come and save the chosen people from persecution.

The history of Christianity with the coming of the Messiah

The birth of Christianity took place in the 1st century AD. E. In Palestine, which at that time was under the rule of the Romans. Another connection with the people of Israel is the upbringing that Jesus Christ received as a child. He lived by the laws of the Torah and observed all the Jewish holidays.

According to the Christian scriptures, Jesus is the embodiment of the Word of the Lord in the human body. He was conceived immaculately, to enter the world of people without sin, and after that God the Father showed himself through him. Jesus Christ was called the consubstantial son of God who came to atone for human sins.

The most important tenet of the Christian church is the posthumous resurrection of Christ and his subsequent ascension to heaven.

This was foretold by numerous Jewish prophets for many centuries before the birth of the Messiah. The resurrection of Jesus after death is a confirmation of the promise of eternal life and the incorruption of the human soul that God the Father has given people. In Christianity, his son has many names in the holy texts:

• Alpha and Omega - means that he was the beginning of all things and is his end.
• The light of the world means that it is the same Light that comes from his Father.
• Resurrection and life, which should be understood as salvation and eternal life for those who profess the true faith.

Many names were given to Jesus as prophets, and his disciples and the people around him. All of them corresponded either to his deeds, or to the mission for which he was in the human body.

The development of Christianity after the execution of the Messiah

After Jesus was crucified, his disciples and devotees began to spread the doctrine of him first in the territory of Palestine, but as the number of believers increased, they went far beyond it.

The very concept of "Christian" was applied 20 years after the death of the Messiah and went from the inhabitants of Antioch, who so called the followers of Christ. The apostle Paul played an important role in spreading the teachings of Jesus . It was his sermons that led numerous adherents to a new faith from the pagan peoples.

If before the V century AD. E. The deeds and teachings of the apostles and their disciples spread within the boundaries of the Roman Empire, then they went further - to the Germanic, Slavic and other peoples.

Prayer

Appealing to the gods with requests is a ritual peculiar to believers at all times and irrespective of religion.

One of the significant activities of Christ during his lifetime was that he taught people how to pray properly, and revealed the mystery that the Creator is a triune and represents the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit - the essence of the one and indivisible God. Because of the limited consciousness, people, although they speak of God as one, still divide it into 3 separate individuals, as their prayers say. There are those that are only addressed to God the Father, there is to God the Son and God the Holy Spirit.

Prayer to God the Father "Our Father" sounds like a request directed directly to the Creator. This people, as it were, singled out its primordiality and significance in the Trinity. However, even if manifested in three persons, God is one, and this must be realized and accepted.

Orthodoxy is the only Christian faith that has preserved the faith and teachings of Christ unchanged. This also applies to appealing to the Creator. Prayer to the Lord God the Father in Orthodoxy speaks of the Trinity as one of its hypostases: "I confess to You the Lord my God and the Creator, in the Holy Trinity One, glorified and worshiped Father, and Son and Holy Spirit, all my sins ...".

Holy Spirit

In the Old Testament, the concept of the Holy Spirit is infrequent, but the attitude to it is completely different. In Judaism, it is considered the "breath" of God, and in Christianity - one of its indivisible three hypostases. Thanks to him, the Creator created all that exists and communicates with people.

The concept of the nature and origin of the Holy Spirit was considered and adopted in one of the cathedrals in the 4th century, but long before that, Clement of Rome (1st century) united all 3 hypostases into one whole: "God lives, and Jesus Christ lives, and the Holy Spirit , Faith and hope of the elect. " So God the Father in Christianity officially gained triune unity.

It is through him that the Creator acts in man and in the Temple, and in the days of creation he actively participated in them, helping to create worlds visible and invisible: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. The earth was formless and empty, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the water. "

Names of God

As paganism was replaced by a religion glorifying the one God, people began to wonder how the name of the Creator was to be able to address him in prayer.

Based on the information given in the Bible, God personally named his name to Moses, who recorded it in Hebrew. Due to the fact that this language later became dead, and only consonants were written in names, it is not exactly known how the name of the Creator is pronounced.

The four consonants of YHVH denote the name of God the Father and are the verbal form of havah meaning "to become." In different translations of the Bible, various vowels are substituted for these consonants, which gives completely different meanings.

In some sources he is mentioned as the Almighty, in others - Yahweh, in the third - the Sabaoth, and in the fourth - Jehovah. All names designate the Creator, who created all the worlds, but they have different meanings. For example, Sabaoth means "Lord of Hosts", although he is not the god of war.

Disputes about the name of the Heavenly Father are still being conducted, but most theologians and linguists tend to believe that the correct pronunciation sounds like Yahweh.

Yahweh

This word literally means "Lord", and also "to be." In some sources, Yahweh is associated with the concept of "God Almighty".

In Christianity either use this name, or replace it with the word "Lord."

God in Christianity today

Christ and God the Father, as well as the Holy Spirit in the modern Christian religion, are the foundation of the triunity of the indivisible Creator. Adherents of this faith are more than 2 billion people, which makes it the most widespread in the world.