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Prayers

Prayer to find a husband

A young woman’s prayer from the Russian Orthodox prayer book. She asks God to make her ready for marriage, and to give her a husband who is honest and devout.

Picture: Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Rebecca and Eliezer, about 1660

The words of the prayer

Plain English

O all-good Lord,I know that my great happiness depends on this:that I love You with all my soul and all my heart,and do Your holy will in everything.Guide my soul Yourself, O my God,and fill my heart.I want to please You alone,for You are my Maker and my God.

Keep me from pride and from love of self.Let good sense, modesty and chastity adorn me.Idleness displeases You and breeds vices:give me a love of hard work,and bless the work I do.

Your law bids people live in honourable marriage.So lead me, Holy Father,to this calling You have made holy,not to please my own desirebut to fulfil Your purpose.For You Yourself said: It is not good for man to be alone.And when You had made him a wife to help him,You blessed them to grow, to multiply and to fill the earth.

Hear my humble prayer,sent up to You from the depths of a young woman’s heart.Give me a husband who is honest and devout,so that he and I, in love and in harmony,may glorify You, the merciful God,Father, Son and Holy Spirit,now and ever, and for ever and ever.Amen.

Traditional wording

O All-Good Lord, I know that on this depends my great happiness,that I love Thee with all my heart and all my soul,and fulfil Thy holy will in all things.Do Thou Thyself guide my soul, O my God, and fill my heart:I desire to please Thee alone,for Thou art my Creator and my God.

Preserve me from pride and self-love;let reason, modesty, and chastity adorn me.Idleness offends Thee, and engenders vice;give me then a desire for diligence and bless my labours.

Inasmuch as Thy law commands men to live in honourable matrimony,so bring me, O Holy Father, to this calling which Thou hast consecrated,not for the satisfaction of my desires,but unto the fulfillment of Thy purpose;for Thou Thyself hast said: It is not good for man to be alone,and having made woman for an help meet unto him,Thou didst bless them to be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.

Hearken unto my humble prayersent up to Thee from the depths of a maiden's heart:give me a spouse, honourable and pious,that together with him in love and concord we may glorify Thee,the Compassionate God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,now and ever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.

Plain English by Wiser Walk, from the Russian of the Orthodox prayer book. How the wording is made. Traditional wording: George Lardas, Trebnic Prayers, St Nicholas Orthodox Church, McKinney, Texas.

When it is said

It is a prayer for home, in the voice of a young woman who hopes to marry.

Most of it asks God to shape her own heart: to love Him first, to be kept from pride, to be given a love of work. Only at the end does she ask for a husband.

The prayer book prints a one-line prayer before it: “Lord, give me a husband pleasing to You and pleasing to me.”

Where it comes from

No author known

Where it comes from

A Russian prayer book prints it as a “prayer of a maiden for marriage”. Its source is the prayers printed with a book by Archpriest Dimitry Sokolov, “The purpose of woman according to the teaching of the Word of God”. No one is named as the prayer’s author, and its date is not known.

Azbyka.ru, Prayers of a maiden for marriage; Azbyka.ru, Dimitry Sokolov, The purpose of woman

Who was Dimitry Sokolov?

A priest of the Russian Church in St Petersburg. He served the church of the Winter Palace, and wrote textbooks on the faith. From 1857 to 1862 he taught religion at the city’s Mariinsky Institute. His book on women opens with the verse the prayer quotes: “It is not good for man to be alone.”

Russian Wikipedia, Dmitry Pavlovich Sokolov (archpriest); Azbyka.ru, Dimitry Sokolov, The purpose of woman

The Scripture in it

The LORD God also said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make for him a suitable helper.”

Genesis 2:18 Quoted “It is not good for man to be alone”: the prayer gives these as God’s own words.

God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”

Genesis 1:28 Echoed God blessed them: be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth.

Jesus declared, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’”

Matthew 22:37 Echoed To love God with all your heart and all your soul.

Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.

In Russian

О, Всеблагий Господи, я знаю, что великое счастие мое зависит от того, чтобы я Тебя любила всею душею и всем сердцем моим, и чтобы исполняла во всем святую волю Твою.

Управляй же Сам, о Боже мой, душею моею и наполняй сердце мое: я хочу угождать Тебе Одному, ибо Ты Создатель и Бог мой.

Сохрани мя от гордости и самолюбия: разум, скромность и целомудрие пусть украшают мя.

Праздность противна Тебе и порождает пороки, подай же ми охоту к трудолюбию и благослови труды моя.

Поскольку же Закон Твой повелевает жить людям в честном супружестве, то приведи мя, Отче Святый, к сему освященному Тобою званию, не для угождения вожделению моему, но для исполнения предназначения Твоего, ибо Ты Сам сказал: нехорошо человеку быть одному и, создав ему жену в помощницу, благословил их расти, множитися и населяти землю.

Услышь смиренную молитву мою, из глубины девичего сердца Тебе возсылаемую; дай мне супруга честнаго и благочестиваго, чтобы мы в любви с ним и в согласии прославляли Тебя, милосерднаго Бога: Отца и Сына и Святаго Духа, ныне и присно и во веки веков. Аминь.

From the prayer book on Azbyka.ru, a Russian Orthodox website, in Russian with some Church Slavonic forms.

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Berean Standard Bible