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Therion – Der Mitternachtlöwe Lyrics 17 years ago
More gnostic themes from Therion, in particular connected to Revelations. Ariel is an angel in Christian mysticism whose name literally means "Lion of God." (The song name means "The Lion Midnight.") In short, they're conflating him with the gnostic Demiurge, the Satan-like "God" that created the physical universe and is the source of evil as he leaves our souls trapped in the crude matter of creation.

Abaddon appears in Revelations and stuff about it as the "angel of the abyss," who some equate to Satan and others as the keeper of the gate to Hell who keeps Satan entrapped until the day of Armageddon.

I'm not sure about the stuff about the "three treasures," or the Eagle or Paroketh, but that's what I was able to find on the other stuff.

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Therion – The Perennial Sophia Lyrics 17 years ago
It's based on gnostic ideas, largely Christian but also derived from Greek mystery cults. Basically, the mystery cult relies on gnosis (direct, personal knowing of divinity, similar to enlightenment) for its practitioners, who receive important secret wisdom from the gnosis experience. The Greeks had a mystery cult devoted to Orpheus, and later on early Christians picked up the idea.

Gnostic Christianity holds that the true God (from which Christ comes) has a female aspect, a divinity known as Sophia, whose name means "wisdom" -- to know her through gnosis is literally to be enlightened about the true, dual nature of divinity and the true nature of the universe. One of her titles is "Revealer of Perfect Mysteries," meaning she's the ideal figure for a mystery cult to revolve around.

"Shekinah" is repeated several times because it refers to the idea of the "in-dwelling" of the divine Spirit in the believer. Gnosticism holds that there is a dual nature to reality, the crude world of matter, and the luminous world of spirit. Our souls, the divine spark of the Spirit within us, are trapped within our flesh and the deceptive material world, which blinds us to the true nature of the universe. By achieving gnosis, we can escape from the material world and become one with the spiritual when we die. The failure of "normal" Christianity is to acknowledge only the masculine half of the divine; knowledge of Sophia is required for gnosis as well.

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Leaves' Eyes – Senses Capture Lyrics 18 years ago
Every single time I listen to this, I keep hearing "the eyes of star-lit heavens" as "the eyes of star-lit terrors"... Makes it a much more interesting song, really.

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Splashdown – A Charming Spell Lyrics 18 years ago
The song questions "Wiccans" and "witches" who go on about having awesome powers, as of the sort that comes to Wicca and witchcraft after watching "The Craft" or "Charmed," and who don't actually know anything about Wicca or witchcraft. The "charming spell" refers to controlling spells like love spells, which this sort are initially attracted to but Wicca considers forbidden because of the bad karma incurred from trying to bind and control someone's will (which all such spells involve). Someone who claims to be Wiccan but wants to do a love spell is just proving that they don't know a thing about Wicca (see the somewhat condemning tone of the song as a whole, including the line, "Go ask your Goddess if you've served her well," suggesting that even the would-be Wiccan's goddess would condemn such actions). Almost everything else is a further reference to magical tools and practices in modern witchcraft.

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Ayreon – The Mirror Maze Lyrics 18 years ago
The Hippie and Futureman find themselves broken by the Mirror Maze, because they can't face up to what their lives really mean, what caused them to become as they are. Meanwhile, the Knight and Roman come together to confront their fears and pains in the Mirror Maze and manage to overcome them, becoming more whole from the experience.

Personally, I kind of suspect the Knight is meant to be Lancelot, as the whole of this album is a Chapel Perilous experience, something Lancelot went through, and the Knight clearly evokes "The Final Experiment" album, which takes place largely in Camelot.

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Ayreon – The Shooting Company of Captain Frans B. Cocq Lyrics 18 years ago
The song title is also the name of a Rembrandt painting also known as "The Night Watch." As the "narrator" of The Universal Migrator continues backwards in time, he finds one of his previous incarnations was one of the members of the titular shooting company.

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Iced Earth – Order Of The Rose Lyrics 18 years ago
This is meant to evoke the Rosicrucians, a real-world mystery order like the Bavarian Illuminati or the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Their "secret history" supposedly traces them back to the secret lore of ancient Egypt (which fits in with the Egyptian theme of the Setians), but also into various mid-Asian mountain ranges like in Tibet, where their Ascended Masters went into hiding -- corresponding to the hiding places of the "ten thousand" Setians and their leaders. In other words, the Rosicrucians (also known as the "Order of the Rose and the Cross") are the Setians' tool for manipulating humanity from the shadows, especially given that the Setians have established human religions to fracture humanity and the Rosicrucians portray themselves as a Christian mystery order (hence the "...and the Cross").

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Edguy – Save Me Lyrics 18 years ago
Pretty self-explanatory. Someone who's become closed-off, unemotional from the experiences of growing up in a cold and indifferent world, but who still holds onto the (possibly pointless) hope that there's someone they'll run into who he'll love, and can help fill in the holes in his psyche.

A seemingly common state. I know this song speaks perfectly clearly to me, and reminds me of times where I'd suddenly get the urge to go out for a walk, even at 3am, because I somehow "knew" that I'd find someone else who was just looking in the same way.

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Angra – Nova Era Lyrics 18 years ago
Makes me think of concepts of illumination and enlightenment, described by evoking the image of a new age -- the "Nova Era" -- that is characterized by that illumination becoming widespread. Think of the concept of the "Age of Aquarius" popularized in some New Age thought and mysticism.

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Dream Evil – The Book of Heavy Metal (March of the Metallians) Lyrics 18 years ago
It's metaphor for how to achieve immense success and immortality in music, and particularly in genres like rock and metal, where you're pressured to make a Faustian bargain to devote yourself to the image and the style at the sacrifice of other interests and parts of your self.

The part that begins "Some twenty years ago, the gods put down their feet..." is about how some of the most popular heavy metal bands thus far came around or reached their peaks about 20 years ago, and their popularity has defined the sound of what is "metal" to some degree or another forever after. You can't be "metal" unless you follow this pattern, in music, style, and behavior. It's why so many metal songs share certain traits, like the strong tendency to throw in guitar solos even when they'd be pointless, or how a lot of bands always have at least one guy who has shoulder-length or longer hair. If you don't fit the template, you're not "metal."

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Nightwish – She Is My Sin Lyrics 18 years ago
An incredibly powerful temptation, pretty obviously in the form of a woman that the "narrator" lusts after but shouldn't have for whatever reason, that said narrator can't help but want to indulge in. A wish to be able to guiltlessly go about this particular indulgence, which is overpowering in its appeal and draw.

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Nightwish – Wish I Had an Angel Lyrics 18 years ago
The people who say the song's lyrics are "meaningless" or "irrelevant" to life are absolutely hilarious. Really. Lines that are obviously about stuff like betrayal, envy, lust, loneliness... What kind of lives do these people lead that they don't share in any of that at all? Wow.

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Iron Savior – Machine World Lyrics 18 years ago
Huh. My bad. It's not on a far-future Earth, but another world in the Andromeda galaxy. Turns out it's part of a great huge story. And the life it's manipulating and exterminating is on other planets, where the machines believe any technological developments beyond a certain point create a risk to their survival and evolution.

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Iron Savior – Machine World Lyrics 18 years ago
Some kind of AI consciousness has arisen on a far-future Earth, and is trying to understand the nature of its existence, why it was created. It is completely amoral about its search, willing to fabricate and manipulate new life, and exterminate it, just to see if there's any insight to be had. It doesn't think it'll actually find out, for it's been searching for an absurdly long time, but can't stop the search.

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Ayreon – Valley Of The Queens Lyrics 18 years ago
The Egyptian's will to live has been extinguished by the trials of the Electric Castle, and so she is yet another to lay herself down to rest and give up her life, just as the Highlander had done before.

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Ayreon – Tunnel Of Light Lyrics 18 years ago
From the previous song, "The Decision Tree," the Highlander has chosen to be the one who lays down his long and weary life to allow the other seven to go on to the Electric Castle. The others, the Egyptian, Roman, Knight, Indian, and Futureman, are the most empathetic and outgoing of the others and offer their prayers for the Highlander's passing into the most beautiful of afterlives they each know. The Barbarian offers no good wishes because he doesn't respect the Highlander for giving up, and the Hippie is too far into his own inner world to really contribute.

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Ayreon – The Two Gates Lyrics 18 years ago
It's a classic problem: evil and self-destruction are veiled in beautiful, seductive guises. The Barbarian believes that the more beautiful of the two gates will lead to what he wants, but all it offers him is cold oblivion.

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Ayreon – The Decision Tree (We're Alive) Lyrics 18 years ago
I love the contrast between the Barbarian and the Highlander in this one. The Barbarian comes off as more of a braggart than one who has actually accomplished anything, while the Highlander is a weary veteran who's seen the horrors of all the Barbarian extols. I imagine the Highlander is actually a greater warrior, and would be respected by the Barbarian if he hadn't turned his back on all things martial.

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