Serenity Prayer

Versions

The prayer has appeared in many versions. Niebuhr's versions of the prayer were always printed as a single prose sentence; printings that set out the prayer as three lines of verse modify the author's original version. The most well-known form is a late version, as it includes a reference to grace not found before 1951:

A version (apparently quoted from memory) appeared in the "Queries and Answers" column in The New York Times Book Review, July 2, 1950, p. 23, asking for the author of the quotation. A reply in the same column in the issue for August 13, 1950, p. 19, attributed the prayer to Niebuhr, quoting it as follows:

Some twelve-step recovery programs use a slightly different version:

Early history

The earliest recorded reference to the prayer is a diary entry from 1932 by Winnifred Crane Wygal, a pupil and collaborator of Reinhold Niebuhr, quoting the prayer and attributing it to Niebuhr. Several versions of the prayer then appeared in newspaper articles in the early 1930s written by, or reporting on talks given by, Wygal. In 1940, Wygal included the following form of the prayer in a book on worship, attributing it to Niebuhr:

O God, give us the serenity to accept what cannot be changed, the courage to change what can be changed, and the wisdom to know the one from the other.

Wygal was a longtime YWCA official and all early recorded usages were from women involved in volunteer or educational activities connected to the YWCA.

The earliest printed reference, in 1936, mentions that during a speech, a Miss Mildred Pinkerton "quotes the prayer," as if to indicate it was already in a circulation known to the reporter, or that Pinkerton relayed it as a quote, without mentioning its authorship. A 1937 Christian student publication attributed the prayer to Niebuhr in the following form, which matches the other earliest published forms in requesting "courage to change" before petitioning for serenity:

Father, give us courage to change what must be altered, serenity to accept what cannot be helped, and the insight to know the one from the other.

Various other authors also cited Niebuhr as the source of the prayer from 1937 on. The Federal Council of Churches (NCC) included the prayer in a book for army chaplains and servicemen in 1944 and the USO circulated the prayer (with Niebuhr's permission) to soldiers on printed cards during World War Two. In 1950, in response to questions about the already quite widely known prayer's provenance, Niebuhr wrote that the prayer "may have been spooking around for years, even centuries, but I don't think so. I honestly do believe that I wrote it myself." He confirmed this in 1967. His daughter, Elisabeth Sifton, thought that Niebuhr had first written it in 1943, while Niebuhr's wife Ursula believed it had been written in 1941 or '42, adding that it may have been used in prayers as early as 1934.

The Serenity Prayer will be listed under Niebuhr’s name in the next edition of the Yale Book of Quotations, whose author Fred R. Shapiro had first raised doubts about, but was later instrumental in confirming Niebuhr's authorship.

Precursors

Numerous statements of more or less similar sentiments by other authors have been identified and it is likely that more will be found. The prayer has unfortunately also been falsely attributed to a variety of other authors.

Genuine precursors

Epictetus wrote: "Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens. Some things are up to us [eph' hêmin] and some things are not up to us. Our opinions are up to us, and our impulses, desires, aversions—in short, whatever is our own doing. Our bodies are not up to us, nor are our possessions, our reputations, or our public offices, or, that is, whatever is not our own doing."

The 8th-century Indian Buddhist scholar Shantideva of the ancient Nalanda University suggested:

If there’s a remedy when trouble strikes, What reason is there for dejection? And if there is no help for it, What use is there in being glum?

The 11th century Jewish philosopher Solomon ibn Gabirol wrote "And they said: At the head of all understanding – is realizing what is and what cannot be, and the consoling of what is not in our power to change."

The philosopher W.W. Bartley juxtaposes without comment Niebuhr's prayer with a Mother Goose rhyme (1695) expressing a similar sentiment:

For every ailment under the sun There is a remedy, or there is none; If there be one, try to find it; If there be none, never mind it.

Friedrich Schiller advocated the first part in 1801:

"Blessed is he, who has learned to bear what he cannot change, and to give up with dignity, what he cannot save."

Spurious attributions

The prayer has been variously attributed (without evidence) to Thomas Aquinas, Cicero, Augustine, Boethius, Marcus Aurelius, Francis of Assisi, and Thomas More, among others.

Theodor Wilhelm, a professor of education at the University of Kiel, published a German version of the prayer under the pseudonym "Friedrich Oetinger". Wilhelm's plagiarized version of the prayer became popular in West Germany, where it was widely but falsely attributed to the 18th-century philosopher Friedrich Christoph Oetinger.

Use by twelve-step recovery programs

The prayer became more widely known after being brought to the attention of Alcoholics Anonymous in 1941 by an early member. AA's co-founder and staff liked the prayer and had it printed out in modified form and handed around. It has been part of Alcoholics Anonymous ever since, and has also been used in other twelve-step programs. Grapevine, The International Journal of Alcoholics Anonymous, identified Niebuhr as the author (January 1950, pp. 6–7), and the AA web site continues to identify Niebuhr as the author.

The original text for this adapted prayer was:

A slightly different version of the prayer has been widely adopted by Twelve-Step Groups: