> It’s not about the wisdom we glean. It’s about what wisdom we grow.

I think the author does a good job of actually testing the original point—questioning if all but a handful of books are a worthless distraction. I think the entire piece has almost nothing to do with prayer. The monks are used as a thought experiment around the value of thought for the sake of thought.

Most likely these were set prayer phrases, like recitations of the Psalms, and not a meandering, "Dear God/Santa, here is my Christmas list and help my dog and heal granny" kind of prayers. So the content is already set to lead ones focus to "heavenly" thoughts above the toxicity of the worldly plane.

I think the easiest way to think of it is having a single word mantra that you repeat while you meditate to keep your focus on meditation and not let your mind wander in different directions.

If you try the single word mantra thing you’ll probably find that it’s not exactly enough to keep your focus. But it’s an easy way to explain that it’s less like “praying” than about the recitation of the prayer because focusing your mind on the recitation will help you focus.