In reality, everything is not as it really is
In his “Confessions,” St. Augustine describes the teachings of St. Ambrose in the following way: “I also rejoiced that I was asked to read the books of the Old Testament with different eyes than before, these books seemed absurd to me, and I exposed the imaginary thoughts of Your saints, who actually thought not at all like that. I listened with pleasure to how Ambrose often repeated in his sermons to the people, diligently recommending as a rule: “The letter kills, but the spirit gives life.” When, removing the mysterious veil, he explained in a spiritual sense those passages that, being understood literally, seemed to me to be a preaching of perversity, then nothing in his words offended me, although I still did not know whether these words were true.” It would seem that this is the answer to all the perplexities! Indeed, this argument can most often be heard in response to the question why words about hatred and enmity are heard in a Christian church. An allegorical, spiritual explanation of the Psalms sounds much more convincing than a description of the harsh realities of the era in which the psalms were written. One can name many Christian authors, starting with Origen and ending with St. Theophan the Recluse, who interpreted the Psalter in that “life-giving key” about which St. Augustine writes. And, of course, such patristic interpretation is necessary for the correct understanding of any sacred text.
But, unfortunately, today all this brilliant argumentation “from the fathers” is sometimes broken by one moment of a cultural and psychological nature. The fact is that modern man has neither the skill nor the taste for such exegesis. Moreover, today's reader sometimes even experiences some kind of latent hostility to the allegorical reading of Scripture. The words “interpretation” and “lie” for him, if not synonyms, are somewhere nearby in the same conceptual series and evoke associations with crafty legal chicanery, only deployed on a different plane. “The law is a drawbar...”, “priests can interpret whatever they want, as they need...” - these arguments can often be found among the modern average person on Orthodox forums on the Internet. You can explain the Scripture “from the fathers” to such a person for as long as you like, but this will not impress him much. In the era of information technology, even more or less literate people have well learned that, if desired, any meaning can be derived from any text. Therefore, any mention of allegorical meanings is often perceived with reflexive mistrust.
Unfortunately, there is some truth in such a biased attitude. And before offering an allegorical interpretation, it is necessary to first explain: what is the value of this text in itself and why does it need to be interpreted at all? Why, despite such difficult and rough passages for our understanding, did the Church still introduce it into its worship?
Effective psalms for removing severe damage
If a child begins to ignore the opinion of his parents, becomes addicted to alcohol, loses interest in life, is deeply depressed, he suffers from negative attachments that interfere with his development as a person. In this case, parents are recommended to read Psalm 90 of David. The sincere request heard in this psalm will save the young man from the induced negativity and protect him from further attacks. The text of the prayer is read on the water 12 times:
Living in the help of the Most High, he will settle in the shelter of the Heavenly God. Says the Lord: Thou art my Protector and my Refuge, my God, and I trust in Him. For He will deliver you from the snare of the trap, and from rebellious words, His splash will overshadow you, and under His wing you hope: His truth will surround you with weapons. Do not be afraid from the fear of the night, from the arrow that flies during the day, from the thing that passes in darkness, from the cloak, and from the demon of the midday. Thousands will fall from your country, and darkness will fall at your right hand, but it will not come close to you, otherwise you will look at your eyes, and you will see the reward of sinners. For You, O Lord, are my hope, You have made the Most High your refuge. Evil will not come to you, and wound will not approach your body, as His Angel commanded you to keep you in all your ways. They will lift you up in their arms, but not when you dash your foot on a stone, step on an asp and a basilisk, and cross a lion and a serpent. For I have trusted in Me, and I will deliver, and I will cover, and because I have known My name. He will call to Me, and I will hear him: I am with him in sorrow, I will destroy him, and I will glorify him, I will fill him with long days, and I will show him My salvation. The one who prays calls on the power of the Most High, who will not be afraid of enemies. They have no power over him, for the village of God is in his love, sincerity and boundless spirituality. Man proclaims it as his hope and salvation. A guiding star that can lead you to the kingdom of light:
You will pass both the dragon and the lion without loss. Those who love Me and trust in Me, I will deliver and protect. He who calls to Me, I will hear. I will be with him in tribulation, I will give him long life, I will glorify him and give him My salvation.
After reading this psalm, water acquires healing, energy-cleansing properties. They drink it, wash their face, hands, and feet with it. The reading of the psalm should be included in a cycle of other healing prayers that help rid the child of damage and the evil eye.
The protection of children and other family members from witchcraft and corruption can be built on the reading of other psalms. Their reading is used if there is a need for prevention and treatment of the spiritual and physical shell of a person.
The Psalms are compared to a strong defense that evil forces cannot break through.
Throughout life, the psalms safely protect a person from diseases associated with disruption of the internal secretion organs and other misfortunes. The peculiarity of the psalms lies in the poetic form of presentation. The smaller the verse, the more energy is concentrated in it. The following psalms have worked well:
- Asaphah No. 49, beginning with the words “The Lord is the God of Gods; He calls the earth from the east to the west...”;
- David No. 53 “My God! May Your name be my salvation, may Your power justify me...”;
- David No. 58 “Deliver me from my enemies, O my God! Protect me from those who rise up against me...";
- David No. 63 “God, hear my voice when I present my complaints...”;
- David #139 “Deliver me, O Lord, from the evil man.”
Reading these Holy texts brings peace of mind and peace. Pain and anxiety go away. The heart is freed from the power of sadness. Beneficial processes are launched that remove negative phenomena accumulated in the family.
We need to support this endeavor and turn to God, not only to those who are concerned about the spiritual health of the family, but also to other members. Going to church will be beneficial for a teenager. There, a young rebellious soul can join a powerful Christian egregor, which will give strength to resist the temptations that stand in the way of any young man, choose the path of life and follow it to achieve his true goal.
If the case is advanced, the negative attachments are very strong, then a prayer service is ordered in 9 churches, or in a monastery a special cleansing ritual called Sorokoust. This is the most powerful tool in the fight against corruption, which frees a person from all negative programs.
The great spiritual law of existence
When discussing the psalms, each of us can rightly ask: “What does this have to do with me and my prayer? How can a modern person compare himself with the same King David or Solomon? Those in their passions and desires could really turn around like a king. The current reader of the Psalter lives quietly and peacefully in his two-room apartment, does not want to go to war against anyone, is concerned only with the thought of who to borrow money from and where to give it back later. And he’s not even going to take away his neighbor’s wife - he’d like to somehow sort out his own... Most people successfully avoid the temptation of wealth, power, extraordinary talents and supernatural abilities. Home, work, simple entertainment, vacation, trip to the sea, or at best abroad; then again - home, work. And so all my life.
But there is one spiritual law that operates in each of us, regardless of our position in society. This law was very precisely formulated by the Monk Mark the Ascetic. Answering the disciples’ question about where the various sorrows come from, St. Mark says: “The cause of every sorrowful incident is the thoughts of each one. I could point to words and deeds as the cause, but they are not born before thoughts, and therefore I attribute everything to thoughts. Thought precedes; then, through words and deeds, communication between man and man is formed.” In other words, everything that happens to a person in his life is strictly determined by the processes that occur in his soul. What happens in his mental sphere determines his entire external life, his words, actions and their consequences. To put it even more simply, a person lives his entire life inside himself, in his thoughts.
And the main value of the Psalter in the Christian tradition lies precisely in the fact that it is an accurate, complete and voluminous picture of the human soul. According to the words of Saint Athanasius the Great, “in this book, the whole of human life is measured and described in words - both mental dispositions, and movements of thoughts, and beyond what is depicted in it nothing more will be found in a person.”
Wealth and poverty, fame and obscurity, power and anarchy do not change anything in this picture. After all, every person has his own personal kingdom, where God called him to be a king and a military leader at the same time. This kingdom is the world of our thoughts and internal motivations, our heart. It is here that we simply must exercise our power over passions; it is on this field that we must fight the spirits of evil.
What icons protect the family
To protect the family, you need to have Christian icons in your home. For high-quality protection and quick disposal of damage, you need to purchase several strong icons from this list:
- Seven-shot icon of the Mother of God;
- Softening Evil Hearts;
- image of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker;
- image of the Holy Great Martyr Artemy;
- image of the Holy Trinity;
- the face of Matrona of Moscow;
- image of John the Baptist;
- an icon depicting Antipas the Holy Martyr;
- Alexander Svirsky;
- Efim the Venerable.
It is imperative to purchase a personalized icon for each family member. They should be placed in the corner of the room facing east. There they light church candles and pray to improve their affairs. Soon this place of worship will acquire a strong connection with the Higher Powers. Then every appeal uttered in prayer will be immediately heard, and the help will be effective and visible.
Who is guilty?
The psalms are not just prayer: in them, as if in a mirror, a person’s own inner world is revealed to him - from the heights of godlikeness to the depths of sin. But the experience of the experience found in this mirror can be very different. Someone will be horrified by what he sees there, and in a prayer of repentance he will ask the Lord to heal those dark sides of his soul that were revealed to him in the psalms. And someone may react the same way as the character in Krylov’s famous fable “The Mirror and the Monkey”:
What kind of face is that there?
What antics and jumps she has!
I would hang myself from boredom
If only she was even a little like her.
“It can’t be, it’s not me!” - such a cry of a sick soul is familiar to every Christian. This is a natural reaction to sin, to evil in oneself. But what to do next: “consider the gossips to work” or “turn on yourself” is a difficult question, especially for a person who has not yet taken root in the church tradition. Some people will be outraged by words about revenge heard in an Orthodox church, while others may find in them justification for their unpeaceful spiritual dispensation. After all, sometimes we so want to seal everyone whom we consider “enemies of truth and all humanity,” starting from the powers that be and ending with the host of the next vulgar TV show with his attacks on the Church. There would be righteous anger, but there would be enemies, not our own, but God’s.
But this is a fundamentally wrong view. The Monk Cassian the Roman directly calls it the most obscene interpretation of Scripture: “Some, trying to excuse this destructive disease of the soul, attempt to belittle it [obscenity] with the help of the most obscene interpretation of the Scriptures, saying: it does not matter if we are angry with our brethren who sin, since God Himself is inflamed with anger and rage against those who either do not want to know Him, or, knowing Him, do not honor Him as they should, as, for example: and the wrath of the Lord burned against His people (Ps 105:40), or as in another place where the prophet prays, saying : God! Do not reprove me in Your wrath, and do not punish me in Your anger (Ps. 6:2). And they do not understand that at the same time as through this they give people the freedom to act on this passion to their own destruction, they also impiously attribute impure carnal passion to the infinite God, the Source of all purity.”
Therefore, any attempt to read the psalms “in the Old Testament manner,” turning one’s anger outward, towards people, no matter what they are, is a departure from the Gospel back into the world of Old Testament relations. It is no coincidence that after each kathisma during the home reading of the Psalter there are special prayers that give the soul the right mood in which it is only possible to perceive the “psalms of damnation” without harm to oneself. These prayers contain requests for the healing of the soul, for the correction of life, for the forgiveness of the sins of the reader. But there is not a single request to punish or punish any people, be they personal enemies of the person praying or people who hate God. And if in these prayers there are expressions taken from the Psalter, such as: draw your sword and block the path of those who pursue me (Ps 34:3), then they are directed exclusively against demons, which is obvious from the context of these prayers.
What prayers will help protect a teenager from negativity?
A woman who wishes her children happiness must take them to church and perform the baptismal ritual. By doing this, she entrusts the fate of her children into the hands of the Lord, who will take care of them. All baptized people have a Guardian Angel who protects them from harm. The heavenly protector will look after the teenager, protecting him from bad deeds and negative attachments. If a mother is very worried about her grown-up son or daughter, she can ask the icon of the Mother of God for protection from all troubles:
Oh, Most Holy Lady Theotokos, heavenly queen! Save and have mercy on us, your sinful servants (I list my name and the names of loved ones) from vain slander and from all sorts of troubles, misfortunes and sudden deaths. Have mercy in the daytime hours, morning and evening, and protect us at all times - standing, sitting, walking on every path, sleeping in the night hours. Provide, intercede, cover and protect, Lady Theotokos, from all enemies - visible and invisible, from every evil situation, in every place and at every time - be our Mother of Grace, an insurmountable wall and a strong intercessor. Always now, forever and forever! Amen!
This is a very powerful prayer that does good. It is read every morning to remove any type of damage. It cleanses perfectly and helps get rid of any disease.
