When it is said
It is said before lessons or study, at school, in church school or at home. Today’s Russian prayer book puts it first among its prayers before study.
O Heavenly King, the prayer to the Holy Spirit, may be said in its place. The Jordanville Prayer Book, printed for the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, gives the two as a choice.
When the lesson is over, its partner follows: the prayer after study.
Where it comes from
No author known
Who wrote it?
No one knows. It is a prayer of Russian schools, known by the 1890s. Catechisms, the books that teach the faith to children, print it with its partner for after lessons. Both are printed in Archpriest Gregory Cheltsov’s Law of God, in its 45th edition in 1916.
His95, a Russian history teaching site, citing G. Cheltsov, Law of God (Petrograd, 1916)
In a novel of 1897
The Polish writer Stefan Żeromski opens a village school day with this prayer in his novel Syzyfowe prace (Sisyphean Labours), published in 1897. A pupil stands and recites it aloud. At its first words the whole class jumps to its feet, and they sit down again only when it ends.
What the words mean
“The powers of our souls”
The prayer asks the Spirit to strengthen “the powers of our souls”. Archpriest Seraphim Slobodskoy’s Law of God, a Russian catechism for family and school, names them: the mind, the heart and the will. The “understanding” the Spirit gives, he explains, is a quickness to grasp what is taught.
Seraphim Slobodskoy, The Law of God: the prayer before lessons
The Scripture in it
The proverbs of Solomon: A wise son brings joy to his father, but a foolish son grief to his mother.
And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.
In Church Slavonic
Преблагий Господи, низпосли нам благодать Духа Твоего Святаго, дарствующаго смысл и укрепляющаго душевныя наши силы,
дабы, внимающе преподаваемому нам учению, возросли мы Тебе, нашему Создателю, во славу, родителем же нашим на утешение, Церкви и отечеству на пользу.
From the Russian Orthodox prayer book on Azbyka.ru, a Russian Orthodox website: “Prayers of a student”.