YouTube – Leonard Cohen – Hallelujah
The first song I ever learned to play in the guitar is “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen. It is fairly easy to study; it starts with a C major chord and moves in the manner as described in the first verse: F (“the fourth”), G (“the fifth”), A minor (“the minor fall”), and F (“the major lift”). According to Cohen, however, writing and composing the record (which might be considered as belonging in the folk rock genre) proved to be a frustrating and difficult process: “I filled two notebooks and I remember being in the Royalton Hotel (in New York),” he said, “on the carpet in my underwear, banging my head on the floor and saying, ‘I can’t finish this song.’”
And so for years, the singer-songwriter from Canada wrote and rewrote the song’s lyrics, changed its tempo, tinkered countless times with its arrangement. Word has it that Cohen had come up with at least eighty verses for “Hallelujah”; Velvet Underground founder John Cale was faxed fifteen of these verses when he had asked permission from the author to cover the song.
The first original release of “Hallelujah” can be found in the 1984 Leonard Cohen album, Various Positions. A second version was recorded live in 1988, and it is this version which then appeared in the 1994 album, Cohen Live. Cohen sings the words in his deep, almost shattered voice, which then belts out the soaring, triumphant chorus. Lyrically, the record contains various Biblical references and liturgical themes, alluding to the Books of Samuel and Judges as well as containing mentions of the Tetragrammaton name. While some interpreters ascribe various kinds of religious feelings to the song, others still see “Hallelujah” as less holy – with subtle but intentional sexual innuendos.
Whatever it means, “Hallelujah” remains as one of the most hauntingly beautiful and poetic songs I’ve ever heard. Which is probably why over 170 records and cover versions of it exist. With its “unfinished” nature and ever-changing lyrical composition, the song has thus become as open to interpretation as any other – mimicked almost as often as has been that other Cohen single, Suzanne. It has been played in most of this past decade’s saddest TV and movie scenes – in Shrek, Lord of War, Without A Trace, The West Wing, The O.C., ER, Ugly Betty, to name a few. The most popular versions include that of John Cale (in his 1992 live album Fragments of a Rainy Season); late American singer-songwriter Jeff Buckley (in his 1994 album, Grace); Rufus Wainwright, whose version appeared in the soundtrack album of the animated film Shrek; Allison Crowe; k.d. Lang; Bob Dylan; even Bon Jovi and dreadlocked American Idol contestant Jason Castro.
Little-known alt-folk pop band Romantica, from Belfast-slash-Minneapolis, has one of the most unique takes of this phenomenal Leonard Cohen record. It is quick, contemporary, with the rhythm and feel of a rollicking country song. It’s different from the rest. Which fits the essence of what “Hallelujah” is all about. While others are eager to pinpoint to a definitive version of the song, I still think that – like a poem – “Hallelujah” is a piece best described as purgatorial: tough to manage in its black-and-whiteness, and is neither wholly holy nor unholy.
via YouTube – Leonard Cohen – Hallelujah.
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Plato’s Euthyphro
(8a-9d) Euthyphro: no one denies that unjust killings must be punished. Socrates: but there is disagreement about what counts as ‘unjust’. How does Euthyphro know what the gods will make of his particular case? And, again: what is the definition of ‘holiness’. Will it be: ‘what all the gods love’?
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S: So you didn’t answer my question, you man of mystery. I did not ask you what one thing is both holy and unholy, but it appears what is loved by the gods is also hated by them. So it won’t be too surprising if the thing you now undertake – namely, punishing your father – is pleasing Zeus but displeasing to Kronos and Ouranos; is pleasing to Hephaestus but displeasing to Hera; and the same goes for any other gods who may care to take up the matter.
E: I think, Socrates, that here we have something no god would dispute: whoever kills anyone unjustly must pay the penalty.
S: Well now, Euthyphro, have you ever heard any man arguing that one who has murdered or otherwise acted unjustly should not pay the penalty?
E: There are endless disputes about this sort of thing, both in and out of the courts, because wrongdoers will say and do anything to avoid getting punished.
S: Do they admit they have done wrong, Euthyphro, but maintain that, even so, they should not be punished?
E: No, they don’t admit it.
S: So then they don’t say or do just anything. For they don’t go so far as to admit this, nor do they go so far as to deny they should pay the penalty if they did wrong. But I think they do deny wrong-doing, don’t they?
E: That’s how it is.
S: Then they don’t dispute that wrongdoers must be punished, only who did wrong, what they did, and when.
E: You are right.
S: Don’t the gods have the same experience – if indeed they are at odds about justice and injustice, as your argument maintains? Some say that they wrong one another, while others deny it; but none among gods or men goes so far as to say a wrongdoer should not be punished
E: Yes, that is basically true, Socrates.
S: So parties to a given dispute, whether gods or men, dispute about a given action – if in fact the gods ever dispute. Some say the thing was done justly, some unjustly. Isn’t that how it goes?
E: Yes, indeed.
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S: Come now, dear Euthyphro; tell me, that I may be the wiser for it, what proof you can offer that all gods deem this man unjustly killed – this servant-turned-murderer, bound by the master of his victim, who died in bondage before his captor learned from the seers what was to be done – and that all gods consider it right for a son to denounce and prosecute a father on behalf of such a one? Come, show me, if you can, a clear sign that all the gods definitely believe this action to be right. If you can produce an adequate proof of this I will sing praises of your wisdom forevermore.
E: This is maybe not so easily done, Socrates – though I could show you very clearly.
S: I quite understand that you think I’m dull-witted compared to the jury, since obviously you are going to show them that these actions were unjust and hated by all the gods.
E; I will show them clearly, Socrates – if only they will listen to me.
S: They will listen so long as you seem to speak well. But something occurred to me while you were talking – a thought I am even now turning over in my mind: ‘Suppose Euthyphro does show me conclusively that all the gods consider such a death unjust. To what extent will he thereby have taught me the nature of holiness and unholiness? That such a deed is hated by all the gods – so much would seem to follow; but a definition of holiness and unholiness does not. For what is hated by the gods has also been shown to be loved by them.’ So I won’t keep pressing the point. Let us grant, if you like, that all gods consider this thing unjust and hate it. Is this, then, the only amendment we wish to make to our account – namely, that what all gods hate is unholy, whereas what they all love is holy; that what some gods love and some hate is both or neither? Is this how we now wish to define holy and unholy?
E: Is anything stopping us, Socrates?
S: Not as far as I’m concerned, Euthyphro, but consider your own position – see whether this proposal will pave the way to the instruction you promised me.