A String and a Prayer: How to Make and Use Prayer Beads

by Eleanor Wiley, Maggie Oman Shannon

Eleanor Wiley and Maggie Oman Shannon have taken an ancient practice and made it new. A String and a Prayer recounts the history and symbolism of prayer beads, teaches basic techniques for stringing beads and a host of other objects into prayer beads, and offers a variety of prayers and rituals to use those beads on a daily basis. Beads have appeared throughout history. Prayer beads are used in the spiritual practices of cultures as diverse as the African Masai, Native Americans, Greek and Russian Orthodoxy, as well as the religious rituals of Islam, Hinduism, Christianity, and Buddhism. But prayer is highly personal. By infusing prayer beads with personal associations, we can keep our spirituality fresh. The beads are a device to help build and rebuild meaningful ritual in our lives. With myriad ideas about what makes objects sacred and where to find sacred objects -- from the personal, perhaps beads from a grandmother's broken rosary, to the unusual, maybe seashells from far away found in a thrift store -- A String and a Prayer offers many suggestions for different ways that beads can be made and used, exploring the creative roles they can play in our relationships, ceremonies, and rituals. "You are the expert, trust yourself. Let the instructions be a guide to your own creativity," write the authors.

Genres: Crafts, Religion, Nonfiction, Spirituality, Prayer, Beading

160 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2002

Reviews

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're new to prayer beads, and would like a short (I breezed through it in a couple of hours), inexpensive primer that adequately covers the history of prayer beads in different cultures, the symbolism of their construction, establishing a prayer bead practice, and creating prayer beads for your own personal intentions, this is the book for you. In addition to a broad spectrum of basic information, it includes a few exercises for you to practice crafting your own, a recipe for making your own crushed rose petal beads, and a decent list of resources.

[Felyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting, short book on the many ways we can incorporate prayer in our daily lives through the use of strings of beads. There is no emphasis on the Christian rosary, but instead a general (not generic), tradition-free, personal mindful prayer practice.

There are general instructions given for several kinds of prayer beads, perhaps not ideal for the beginner, but the gaps are easily filled in with a quick Google search or jewelry-making primer. Along with beads that can be worn as necklaces or bracelets, instructions are given on making a pocket/hand-held set of beads and, most intriguing to me, what the authors called "shawl beads." Shawl-style prayer beads are intended to be worn draped around the neck, open-ended, as one drapes a shawl across the shoulders for comfort. One of my issues is that all the photos in the book are black and white, which makes the photos much less useful as examples.

Ideas and suggestions are presented on the different situations for which you may make prayer beads, either for yourself or to gift to others, as well as community-/group-based creations.

Finally, the book ends with poems and prayers across many traditions which can be used as a starting place for your own practice.

[Marjolein · Rating 2 out of 5]

I must have read this book when I bought it many many years ago. I bought it because I am fascinated with beads. I have, at the time, created one or two pieces that could be considered as being inspired by the book. However, the prayer part is not so much my thing. But I can see how the creation and handling of prayer beads could work for people. And I may again make something inspired by this book, something that is not merely jewelry but something more.

[Susan Leutheuser · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent little book full of ideas to make memorable keepsakes using beads and other found items.

[Anna Katherina · Rating 2 out of 5]

It had some beautiful things to say about the nature and importance of Prayer Beads in drawing us closer to our spirituality, and with this nebulously defined "Divine". And I got a few really lovely quotes out of it in this regard... But it was just ok... It wasn't anything special. Once it got into the actual meat of the book, the contents failed to really live up to all the waxing poetic they did at the beginning; it wound up being all the fluff and poeticism of standard spiritualism, without any of the real, solid, grounding grit of actual religion. The result was something a little too simplistic and shallow, and bordering just a little too close to New-Agey and appropriative for my tastes.

The authors tried to give a "history" of Prayer Beads, but it fell flat. They tried to illustrate the various ways they could be used, but wound up talking themselves in circles. They repeated themselves often. And they pulled from too many varied traditions without giving you enough information on any of them to truly understand or fully appreciate the use of Prayer Beads in each. Which of course leads to many of the practices and suggestions being too close to appropriative for comfort- especially once one gets into the prayers section, where they're blatantly giving you decontextualized prayers from all of these various traditions without any rhyme, reason, or explanation (let alone any of the appropriate context necessary to understand them. And contrary to popular belief, that context is actually important for prayer).

The only thing it really has going for it, I think, is the unique way it approaches the Prayer Beads themselves once you actually get to the point of properly making them (though the list of color, animal, and other associations they provide is fairly boring and standard). There it at least encourages you to "get a bit weird", for lack of better way of phrasing things- and some of their ideas truly were just weird; for all that I personally appreciate more traditional approaches to Prayer Beads, this non-traditional (and rather strange in some regards) approach to actually making and using your own beads at least sort of makes up for the shallow and near appropriative nature of other areas of the book... I don't know if I personally found it of any use, but it did at least give me some interesting food for thought in places.

It's not a bad book by any means, though. You can, however, ultimately tell the book was written by two "spiritual white women" out of their wheelhouse- and not particularly well in some regards; the writing itself is nice enough, and it flows well enough too. But the organization is odd in some places and they repeat themselves often. They're also fond of using anecdotes of people from their workshops, which gets tiring to read after a while. In general the book just kind of drags after a certain point; you eventually get tired of reading, and it's a struggle to keep going.

I'm not sure I'd honestly recommend it for anyone. I'd almost suggest reading through more of the books in the bibliography they kindly provided in the back of the book before actually picking this one up itself.

[Krishanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

As children, many of us may remember sitting crossed legged on the floor, stringing wooden beads on thin twine at some point during our first years of grade school. Still later, we may have tried our hands a beading on a small bead loom usually found at a local crafts store. A String & A Prayer shows us through the origins, meditative and spiritual aspects of bead work that creating, stringing and using our own prayer beads need not be a tedious, frustrating time consuming exercise in patience.

Authors Eleanor Wiley & Maggie Oman Shannon give us a brief but informative history rich in the origins and religious uses of beads and their cultural importance. They offer references and suggestions about the symbolism of prayer beads through clear, concise correspondences that cover topics from color, number and shape meanings, to stone and animal totems, to charms, amulets, fetishes and talismans.

Included in this useful and personable "how-to" book are 5 types of prayer bead projects from which to choose. From the simple "Circle of Prayer" to Eleanor's "Prayer Bead Shawl" all examples include line drawings or photographs to help guide you visually as you make your prayer beads and compliment their clear step-by-step instructions beautifully. If you choose not create a set of prayer beads exactly as shown, that's okay. The authors encourage beaders to use their own style and intuition when making a set of prayer beads.

Regardless of whether you want to create and string a modest prayer bead bracelet or a prayer bead shawl, there's creative inspiration and wisdom to be found for beaders of all skill levels in A String & A Prayer.


~: Krishanna

[Liaken · Rating 4 out of 5]

For anyone who has ever wanted to make meditation beads, this is a great "get started" book. It goes through the meditation beads from various cultures, talks about significance of numbers, talks about materials to use (including wood, stone, glass, etc.) and what they signify, discusses symbols and amulets, and then gives instructions on how to make a few projects.

It also has stories of people who have made meditation beads for various purposes along with pictures of the beads. Unfortunately, the pictures are all black and white. This is a great loss in the book. Color pictures would have really made this book marvelous.

[Letitia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gave me what I was looking for, some instruction on making prayer beads.
The history and cultural use of prayer beads was also covered, and that was good.
The one thing this book really could have benefited from its color photographs. Black and white pictures of, no doubt, brilliantly colored beads, did the creations no justice what so ever.
Still, a good starting point for anyone interested in taking up beading.

[Ashe · Rating 4 out of 5]

fantastic, detailed history of prayer beads. a few good patterns/instructions. kind of "fluffy" in the middle with color/number/material symbolism, because i already know that stuff. i think if i hadn't known it already i would have found it useful.

[Anita Scholtens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting and helpful. Enjoyed reading about different prayer beads and how to make some for myself.

[Cindy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this book thinking I might have time to add prayer beads to my spiritual practice. Nice idea but I think it'll have to wait until my kids are out of the house!

[Anne · Rating 2 out of 5]

It'd be interesting to have something like this but I've no interest in making my own.

[Mckinley · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overview how history of use followed by making various ones. Would be better with larger, color pictures.

[Wendy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Like the idea/concept, but this book didn't draw me in and meet my expectations.