Preface.

...but that one must not pray in a false, deceitful, hypocritical, or undevout manner like a heathen Original: Heide. Historically, this referred to non-Jewish, non-Christian polytheists.—this they already believed as Jews beforehand. Or, if Christ Original: Christus. had truly wanted to speak of such faults in prayer, he would perhaps, according to his custom, have preferred to say "like the Pharisees" and not "like the heathen." For the hypocritical Pharisees, who were always boasting with useless and long prayers, would have provided him with examples enough, so that he would not have first needed to seek another example far away among the heathen. Therefore, it is something entirely different and something specific to the heathen of which he now speaks.

Namely, their babbling Original Greek: βαττολογεῖν (battologein). The author highlights this specific Greek verb used in the New Testament to describe repetitive, empty speech in prayer.. He mentions this expressly by name. In this discourse, I must therefore not allow my thoughts to land on anything else. However, babbling—or "prattling much," as it is phrased in the Bible—does not mean to pray without devotion or from a false, deceitful, hypocritical, or otherwise evil heart; rather, it means only a