Leonard Cohen: Hallelujah Meaning
Song Released: 1984
Covered By: Rufus Wainwright (2007), Jordan Smith (2015), Pentatonix (2016)
Hallelujah Lyrics
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I feel the beginning is about king David from the Bible. And then maybe Samson and Delilah. The. I'm lost
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Knowing a little about LC's life may be helpful out. He was raised in a conservative Jewish family and his father was a Talmudic Scholar. Early in his life he was an admired and prolific poet. His poems, essays, and interviews made it clear he was in a life long struggle to understand God, which included a few years formally studying Buddhism. But, he always said that he was Jewish and had not abandoned his faith, and while he was not strict in his observance, when he passed away this year we learned he had requested a an Orthodox Jewish service.
So, what does that tell us about the song. 1st it helps to understand the subtle difference between the Jewish and Christian meaning of the word Hallelujah. For Christians it is a word of praise for God, a nown..."I Praise You". But in Hebrew, it is a direction, a verb...(You/We) "Give Praise to God". So, what LC is saying in all the stanzas is that he (we) must still give praise to God, even when we are "cold & broken".
His original recorded version only had the four verses that related to God and the struggle of faith. Years later he added the three new verses clearly related to the joy and pain of human love. In the Jewish faith, the joy in sex is one of God's gifts and to LC it had a spiritual dimension.
LC once claimed to have written many more verses for the song/poem? that were never published.
So, in the end it is an uplifting poem about the struggle to see the and understand the gifts of God. And, while LC was a Jew, he saw this as a common struggle for people of faith. And, as a poet, he would not be upset if you found your own meaning in his words. And, that's why he never bothered to explain them. -
This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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I agree with the first one, but by no means think it has anything to do with Christmas.
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I think it is about our imperfect lives that God will accept in the end.
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I think we needed Mr Cohen's explanation. Why was it never sought? All I can say is the first two verses are spiritual.
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The Lord God the Father the Son & the Holy Spirit have so loved man/woman that all should rejoice for this as well as human loves lost or kept.
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I've read all the interpretations. I wish we had Leonard Cohen's input. I do subscribe to the idea that this is about a broken love. Haunting and melancholy...I really like Pentatonix's a cappella version. Just enjoy it...
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This song is simply about a fight with a spouse/lover.
Verse 1:
Now I've heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you don't really care for music, do you?
It goes like this
The fourth, the fifth
The minor fall, the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah
The writer is saying he thought of his lover as his "god" but everything he does is not very pleasing to her. He even does stuff that would be pleasing to the one true Lord but she still rejects it.
Verse 2:
Your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you
She tied you
To a kitchen chair
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah
Even though he loves his lover, he is a weak man and cheated on his lover, just like David did with Bathsheba (sinned against God), and Samson did by revealing to Delilah the source of his strength. The affair did not end well, and it appears now his lover has found out about it.
Verse 3:
Maybe there's a God above
But all I've ever learned from love
Was how to shoot somebody who outdrew ya
And it's not a cry that you hear at night
It's not somebody who's seen the light
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah
He and his lover are now trading barbs in their argument. "All we ever do now is fight." Nobody wins in a lover's quarrel.
Verse 4:
Baby I have been here before
I know this room, I've walked this floor
I used to live alone before I knew you.
I've seen your flag on the marble arch
Love is not a victory march
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah
He is saying he can live without her, but he doesn't want to. He's telling her that she is claiming that "she won" by kicking him to the curb, but no one is winning because he says they LOVE each other.
Verse 5:
There was a time you let me know
What's really going on below
But now you never show it to me, do you?
And remember when I moved in you
The holy dove was moving too
And every breath we drew was Hallelujah
He is making one more plea to his lover to take him back. Remember the good times. Also throws in one little barb - "You never even try to share your feelings (or sex) with me any more!"
Verse 6:
I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though
It all went wrong
I'll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah
Resignation. He is saying I tried hard to do good in this relationship (other than the affair) and you are not even trying to work this out. "I've done everything I can to make up for my mistake, and if you won't accept it there is nothing else I can do about it. Even though his prior mistake (affair) hurts him, he is moving on with his life with no regrets about the past. -
In "Hallelujah", LC may deal with something he experienced in his private live. He may have fallen in love with a woman who was the partner of somebody else. The attraction was too strong to resist. Quite possibly, for her abandoned partner this was a tragedy. Now, after months or years of deep and hot love,the lovers have drifted apart.
Remorse has gained the upper hand. For LC it is a small comfort that something similar happened to king David.
What he makes of it, is touching and admirable. It's one of the best poems and songs we have. -
How about an opposite interpretation? This song is about the rejection of spiritual communion with God. David plays his heartfelt secret chord for the Lord, who is pleased at David's attempts to worship, since that strokes the Lord's ego, and the Lord praises David's attempts but does not truly appreciate his urgent creative expression. The Lord doesn't care for his music, or even David's love, he only cares for the worship. He does not love him back. So, David takes his unrequited love for the Lord and turns to a woman. She gleefully takes his power, but in return, gives him pleasure and understanding that he did not receive from God. The tying to a kitchen chair and haircut is a metaphor for being humbled by the return of his love. Giving up his power in return for this earthly pleasure brings a Halleluja to his lips and a gratefulness for love and understanding that God could not extract. He now worships her, and her ability to give him pleasure and love. He resists judgement by other people for his decision to worship this woman over God. Then, in the final verses, he describes that it was the lack of God's actual love for him that led him to live a life in pursuit of love in the mortal world instead. He now worships his own creativity (the lord of song) and human love.
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Leonard Cohen is an enlightened man. His song 'Sisters of Mercy' attests to his own experience with unity.
Hallelujah is a song of gratitude. -
A truly great Song has many interpretations.
Ironi and desillusion can also be heard.
But Cohen keeps saying halleluja in spite of all hardship and shortcomings.
I hope the Lord of Song will let him sing forever. -
Hallelujah is one of the most beautiful songs one could ever sing or listen to. But it's not about God, it's about the beauty as well as the Heart break of love between a man and a woman. I could go verse by verse, but if you take the last verse " as I moved inside you" as they reached orgasm together, they sang the hallelujah.
It's beautiful. But it is not a Christmas song. It makes me smile when it shows up on a Christmas album or better yet with a choir singing it. So I am going to go one step further and say God made humans to be sexual beings and I think He smiles everytime this song is sung for His glory. Hallelujah! -
Take the lyrics away and it's a moving tune.
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