Wizja groźnych i destrukcyjnych sił natury w dawnych modlitwach

Abstract

The article analyses the contents of the Polish prayer books that were first issued, or re‑issued (in their entirety or partially), during the Enlightenment. The characteristics encompasses prayers to be recited on the occasion of storm, drought, flood, and during the aftermath of the mentioned events. Among the prayers included in the author’s reflections are those of supplication, told in hope that God should protect a believer from the elements, as well as thanksgiving sighs to the Creator after a bout of “violent bad weather”. Pervasive in the author’s reflections are the pictures of threatening — hostile and destructive — phenomena and natural forces, as well as different ways of expressing human fears and anxieties resulting form such threats, in prayer expressions and utterances. Both the attitudes and perceptions of believers faced with unpredictable, hostile natural phenomena, are adequately described in the text of the article. Moreover, the considerations highlight the role of the discussed prayer books’ contents in familiarizing the unfriendly reality that evokes fear, which in the context of images enrooted in biblical tradition, lead to imbuing them with features of sacred space.