The Jesus Prayer
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.
, prayed in the Christian East for fourteen centuries
The Prayer Itself
Twelve words. Each one bears the weight of the Gospel.
Lord Jesus Christ, the holy name above every name (Philippians 2:9), confessed slowly and adoringly. Son of God, the divinity of Christ, the great confession of Saint Peter at Caesarea Philippi (Matthew 16:16). Have mercy on me, the cry of the publican, of Bartimaeus, of David in the Psalms, the universal language of the human heart before the throne of God. A sinner, the simple truth that opens the soul to receive the mercy.
There is no sentence in Christian prayer that contains more theology, more humility, and more love in fewer words. The whole Gospel is in it: who Jesus is, who I am, what He has come to do.
Where the Prayer Comes From
The Jesus Prayer was not composed by anyone. It grew, slowly, out of two cries in the Gospels and the silent watching of the Egyptian desert.
The Publican
Luke 18:13
“God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” The first form of the prayer, given by Christ Himself in a parable. The publican stood far off, beat his breast, and went home justified.
The Blind Beggar
Mark 10:47
“Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Bartimaeus by the roadside, the cry that would not be silenced. Christ stopped the procession to hear it.
The Desert Fathers
4th century
Egyptian monks in their cells whispered the Holy Name with each breath. Saint Anthony, Saint Macarius, Saint John Cassian, they handed the prayer down monk to monk for a thousand years before it was ever written.
Mount Athos & Hesychasm
14th century
On the Holy Mountain in Greece, Saint Gregory Palamas (1296,1359) defended and articulated hesychasm, the prayer of stillness, as the way to a real experience of the divine light.
The Way of a Pilgrim
In the middle of the 19th century, an anonymous Russian peasant set out across the steppes of his country with a Bible, a knapsack of dry bread, and a single longing, to learn how to “pray without ceasing” as Saint Paul had told the Thessalonians.
A starets, a holy elder, gave him the Jesus Prayer and a prayer rope. Begin with three thousand a day, the elder said. Then six thousand. Then twelve thousand. Then no number at all, let the prayer pray itself in you.
The pilgrim’s journal, The Way of a Pilgrim (Откровенные рассказы странника, Russian, c. 1865), became the most beloved spiritual classic of the Christian East. It is the book through which the Jesus Prayer reached the West, read by Thomas Merton, Henri Nouwen, and J.D. Salinger’s Franny and Zooey.
How to Pray It
Find a quiet place. A corner where you will not be interrupted. Sit upright, hands resting open on your knees, eyes closed or looking gently downward.
Slow your breath. Breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth. Let the breath itself become a small offering.
Join the words to the breath. On the in-breath: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God. On the out-breath: Have mercy on me, a sinner. Say it without effort, without hurry, without trying to feel anything.
If a prayer rope helps, use one. The chotki has 33, 50, 100, or 300 knots. Slip a knot through your fingers with each prayer. The hand keeps count so the mind can rest.
Distractions will come. They are not failures. When you notice you have wandered, gently return to the prayer. The very act of returning is the prayer.
Mary and the Jesus Prayer
The Jesus Prayer of the Christian East and the Hail Mary of the Christian West are sister prayers. Both are short. Both center on the Holy Name. Both are prayed slowly, often with the breath, often counted on a string of beads or knots. Both have shaped the inner life of saints, Saint Seraphim of Sarov in Russia, Saint Catherine of Siena in Italy, Padre Pio in our own century.
A Catholic who has loved the Rosary all her life will find the Jesus Prayer immediately familiar. An Orthodox monk who has prayed the Jesus Prayer for thirty years will find the Hail Mary natural. Both prayers ask the same thing: that the Holy Name of Jesus, breathed slowly into the soul, might transform that soul into His likeness, through the prayer of His Mother, or directly, as He himself wills.
A Closing Reflection
Every breath you take today, you can pray the Jesus Prayer. The Holy Name has the power to bless every action, every encounter, every silence. There is no place too noisy and no soul too dark. The prayer carries itself, you only have to begin.
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.
, the prayer of the Christian East, prayed by saints for fourteen centuries