| Nightwish – Amaranth Lyrics | 8 years ago |
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@[pencils3:18929] I love this interpretation--although I would offer an inversion of what it's about. The story of Lucifer (at least, the usual version) is a very human one, of self-destructive pride and the petulant anger that masks regret. I'm with you 100% on the first stanza, but I suggest that rather than God needing someone to blame for the rebellion, that *Lucifer* "[needed] someone to blame" for his sense of being denied what he deserved. To the narcissist, any failure *must* be someone else's fault. Depending on the version, Lucifer's narcissistic rage either turns on God at once, or turns on humanity first (see Dogma) and then shifts to Heaven when he's told to cut it out. To clarify my point, a brief digression: if you posit a generally good God (without which, let's be honest, the Universe is a pretty terrifying place), then the Christian notion of Hell makes no sense--*unless* it's a mechanical consequence of how the Universe is built. That is to say, if the natural consequence of Lucifer's fall is the creation of something deliberately antithetical to Heaven. If you've ever met a narcissist, you know it doesn't take any actual hostility on Heaven's part; one party's wounded pride is all it takes to start a "war between him and the day." As you pointed out, though, it's not a war he can actually win, himself. It's not clear whether "you believe but what you see" and "you receive but what you give" are supposed to have an implied negative (e.g. "you believe/receive [only] what you see/give"), or not (e.g. "you believe/receive [all except] what you see/give"). The first kind of makes more sense intuitively, but it's grammatically kind of a stretch. Either way, my intuition is that the bulk of the song is *addressing* Lucifer, urging him to let go of his petty dispute, and embrace God. After all, if you start from assuming a Creator Being that transcends the very notions of time and space (which, in Torah, introduces itself essentially as The Thing That Is), what could be more eternal, Never-Fading? Narcissism is ultimately a coping mechanism for self-loathing, and rejection from the divine is plenty of cause for "rain in [one's] heart," which in the case of someone coldly refusing to acknowledge them, could be called "tears of snow-white sorrow." Conversely, recall where Lucifer lives according to Dante. I'm not sure what I'd do with the "wandering pack," although it's worth noting that in the usual versions, most of the angels who fell did so for pretty stupid reasons, like experimenting with avarice and lust. Lucifer's rebellion was much more personal, and in some accounts, even philosophical, which certainly sets him apart. The rest of the stanza could be another injunction to end the conflict on the grounds that "the ones, whoever dare" (to set aside anger and defensiveness) are to be admired. In Tolkien's Middle Earth mythology, obviously based strongly on Lucifer's Fall, his Lucifer-analogue begins a discordant song because he wants spitefully to sing something different, something original, "something untouched" by the God-analogue's creative influence. I wonder if that might not be the point in the bridge--and, of course, as an angel, a divine being, Lucifer must always know that "the never fading" and the rest of the Host calls to him, always, even if he's forever too angry and too despairing to listen. PS: Regarding "in the land of daybreak," I'm less inclined to read it as referring to actual geography. It's worth remembering that Lucifer is the Morning Star (Venus, to the Romans). There's one biblical passage that refers to Lucifer as Son of the Dawn, as well. |
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