A 'prayer book' is a book containing prayers and perhaps devotional readings, for private or communal use, or in some cases, outlining the liturgy of religious services. Strictly speaking books containing mainly orders of religious services, or readings for them are "service books" or "liturgical books" not prayer-books, but the term is often used very loosely. Prayer books may be Holy books, as well.
The following are among the many books to which the term may loosely refer in various churches or religions, although in strict usage a prayer book is likely to mean a miscellaneous book of prayers as opposed to the standard service books as listed in the second group below:
Actual prayer books:
- Saint Augustine's Prayer Book, in the Episcopal Church
- Vatican Croatian Prayer Book, a Croatian vernacular prayer book
- Book of Common Prayer (BCP), first published in 1549 for the Church of England
- Siddur, in Judaism
Service & liturgical books:
- Breviary or Missal, in Roman Catholicism
- Agenda (liturgy), in Lutheranism
- Common Worship, in Anglicanism
- Alternative Service Book (adopted in 1980), in the Church of England
- Directory of Public Worship, adopted in certain areas of the Church of England in the 17th century
- Book of Hours
Famous quotes containing the words prayer and/or book:
“After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.”
—Bible: New Testament Jesus, in Matthew, 6:9-13.
the Lord’s Prayer. In Luke 11:4, the words are “forgive us our sins; for we also forgive everyone that is indebted to us.” The Book of Common Prayer gives the most common usage, “forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us.”
“For a good book has this quality, that it is not merely a petrification of its author, but that once it has been tossed behind, like Deucalion’s little stone, it acquires a separate and vivid life of its own.”
—Caroline Lejeune (1897–1973)