Razmik Markosyan 

A few months ago a fragment of my autobiographical book (almost ready for publication) came out under the title "The prayer of death making me live".

This fragment of my book is very dear to me. I mean not only its biographical significance, but also the revelation of those moral values in it, that have many layers inside, which I still intend to disclose. The work to be initiated by me is greatly encouraged and promoted by all those written and oral heartfelt feedback that I got in connection with coming out of this publication.

Lots of readers, familiar and unfamiliar to me, told me with surprise that they had never taken a vow too, even specially not recurring to it.

Simply, their Christian instinct acted right. Not swearing is piety, self-respect. "But let your statement be, 'Yes, yes ' or 'No, no'; anything beyond these is of evil", Matthew 5:37. Many people confuse swearing with giving promises. But giving a promise, deifnitaly, is quite another thing. It can be unaccepted, condemned in case of dishonesty or breaking a promise, which is quite another problem of dimension and talking point. Whereas swearing, especially on something or "pledging" of some person or phenomenon (for instance, on  parents or on their grave) is a mere idolatrous manifestation. "And if a soul sins, and hears the voice of an oath, and is a witness, whether he has seen or known of it; if he does not tell of it, then he shall bear his iniquity", Leviticus 5:1.

And have you ever thought about the funny reality that the president of a Christian country takes office by holding non-Christian (to put it mildly and not say anti-Christian) inauguration? The newly-elected president takes an oath putting his hand on the Constitution, as well as on the Holy Scripture, which rejects swearing. There is a country which has gone even further: the president on his "crowning" day swears on Holy Trinity... Nevertheless, may be there is some need for inspiring trust?  The Holy Book never leaves any question without answer. In similar cases solemn agreement between human beings or between God and a human being is reached. When the God wants a person to believe in him or trust him, he does not swear but comes to a solemn agreement with him (let's remember the rainbow following the Great Flood which was not the pawn for the God's word but the pledge-the sign reminding of the covenant). The covenant, in contrast to prayer, deep inside is a strictly Christian, sensible and conscientious phenomenon. It's no coincidence that the Old and New testaments of the Bible are called "Covenants": "the Old Covenant" and "the New Covenant".

The written and oral discussions about this publication caused a more profound study of these and similar phenomena, for which once again I express my thanks.