Daily prayers in Advent with Leonard Cohen and USPG: (22) 24 December 2023

‘Silent Night, Holy Night’ … the icon illustrating this year’s Christmas greetings from the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies, Cambridge

Patrick Comerford

This has been the shortest possible Advent in the Church Calendar and we have come to the end of the countdown to Christmas. Today is the Fourth Sunday of Advent and Christmas Eve (24 December 2023).

Later this morning, I plan to be at the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles, Stony Stratford, and tonight I hope to be at the Midnight Eucharist in Saint George’s Church, Wolverton. But, before today begins, I am taking some time for prayer, reflection and reading this morning.

Throughout Advent this year, my reading and reflection each day include a poem or song by Leonard Cohen. These Advent reflections are following this pattern:

1, A reflection on a poem or song by Leonard Cohen;

2, the Gospel reading of the day in the Church of England lectionary;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

Leonard Cohen with Jennifer Warnes, ‘Silent Night, Holy Night’ (Brighton)

The Songs and Poems of Leonard Cohen: 22, ‘Silent Night, Holy Night’:

Just ten days before Christmas in 1979, Leonard Cohen and Jennifer Warnes performed ‘Silent Night, Holy Night’ with Raffi Hakopian on the violin, in the Dome Theatre, Brighton, on 15 December 1979.

I had been at one of Leonard Cohen’s two back-to-back concerts in Dublin a day earlier (14 December) in the National Stadium on the South Circular Road.

These three concerts, two in Dublin and the one in Brighton at which he sang ‘Silent Night,’ came at the end of a two-month demanding and even gruelling tour of Europe that year. Beginning on 13 October, it included 51 concerts in England, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, France, Holland, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland and Ireland.

The programme in Brighton that night shortly before Christmas 44 years ago included: Bird on the Wire; Hey That’s No Way to Say Goodbye; Memories; Suzanne; Billy Sunday (The Blues by the Jews); Joan of Arc; I Tried to Leave You; and, to end the evening, Silent Night, Holy Night.

There is a sound recording of it HERE

The Annunciation (see Luke 1: 26-38) depicted in a window in Saint Mary’s Church, Bletchley (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Luke 1: 26-38 (NRSVA):

26 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, 27 to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28 And he came to her and said, ‘Greetings, favoured one! The Lord is with you.’ 29 But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. 30 The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God. 31 And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. 32 He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. 33 He will reign over the house of Jacob for ever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’ 34 Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be, since I am a virgin?’ 35 The angel said to her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. 36 And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. 37 For nothing will be impossible with God.’ 38 Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’ Then the angel departed from her.

The Annunciation (see Luke 1: 26-38) depicted in a panel in the altar in Saint Mary’s Church (the Hub), Market Square, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Today’s Prayers (Sunday 24 December 2023):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Love at Advent and Christmas.’ This theme is introduced today:

This week we centre our thoughts on love, particularly God’s love for us and His call to us to love one another.

Read 1 John 4: 7-17

The Bible talks often about love. We are told in this passage that ‘God is love’ and that it was this love that propelled him to send his Son to be our Saviour. Love is at the heart of the Christmas story, and it is the foundation of our Christian faith.

It is important to remember that the Christmas story is connected to God’s bigger story of love and redemption traced through the Bible. As we look back and remember the first advent this week, we can see God’s promise of redemption fulfilled and we know that a new era of God’s restoration has been ushered in. What can we do now as we wait for the second Advent of Christ? The answer is beautifully simple: we are to do what he does – love.

When he was asked which commandment is the greatest, Jesus answered, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself’” (Matthew 22: 37-40). And so, this Advent, let us ask how we can love God and love our neighbour more fully.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (24 December 2023, Advent IV, Christmas Eve) invites us to pray in these words:

May the joy of the angels,
the eagerness of the shepherds,
the perseverance of the wise men,
the obedience of Joseph and Mary
and the peace of the Christ-child be yours this Christmas
and the blessing of God Almighty,
the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit,
be among you and remain with you always. Amen.

The Collect:

God our redeemer,
who prepared the Blessed Virgin Mary
to be the mother of your Son:
grant that, as she looked for his coming as our saviour,
so we may be ready to greet him
when he comes again as our judge;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

Heavenly Father,
who chose the Blessed Virgin Mary
to be the mother of the promised saviour:
fill us your servants with your grace,
that in all things we may embrace your holy will
and with her rejoice in your salvation;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Eternal God,
as Mary waited for the birth of your Son,
so we wait for his coming in glory;
bring us through the birth pangs of this present age
to see, with her, our great salvation
in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Collect on Christmas Eve:

Almighty God,
you make us glad with the yearly remembrance
of the birth of your Son Jesus Christ:
grant that, as we joyfully receive him as our redeemer,
so we may with sure confidence behold him
when he shall come to be our judge;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

The Annunciation icons by Ian Knowles facing each other in the nave of Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Daily prayers in Advent with Leonard Cohen and USPG: (21) 23 December 2023

‘And what can I tell you my brother, my killer’ (Leonard Cohen) … ‘Cain, where is Abel thy brother?’ or ‘De Profundis’ (1943), by Arthur Szyk

Patrick Comerford

This has been the shortest possible Advent in the Church Calendar and we have come to the final countdown to Christmas. Tomorrow is the Fourth Sunday of Advent and Christmas Eve (24 December 2023).

Later this evening, I plan to attend the Service of Nine Lessons and Carols in Holy Trinity Church, Old Wolverton, at 6 pm. Before today begins, however, I am taking some time for prayer, reflection and reading this morning.

Throughout Advent this year, my reading and reflection each day include a poem or song by Leonard Cohen. These Advent reflections are following this pattern:

1, A reflection on a poem or song by Leonard Cohen;

2, the Gospel reading of the day in the Church of England lectionary;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ is the sixth track on Leonard Cohen’s album, ‘Songs of Love and Hate’ (1971)

The Songs and Poems of Leonard Cohen: 21, ‘Famous Blue Raincoat’:

‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ was recorded by Leonard Cohen as the sixth track on his third studio album, Songs of Love and Hate (1971). By 1971, I had already become an avid reader of Leonard Cohen’s poems, and I listened to this album throughout that summer of 1971. I was in my late teens, and it was a summer that became nothing less than life-changing in terms of my spiritual growth and maturity.

‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ has no Christmas associations, and has few Biblical or religious allusions. But it is written in the cold at ‘four in the morning, the end of December.’

‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ offers perhaps the clearest synthesis of Cohen the poet-novelist and Cohen the singer-songwriter, as he relays a vividly characterised tale of adultery, regret and loneliness.

The poem or song is written in the form of a letter, and many of the lines are in amphibrachs. The original recording starts in the key of A minor, but switches to C major during the choruses. Cohen said, ‘That’s nice. I guess I got that from Spanish music, which has that.’

The lyrics include references to the German love song ‘Lili Marlene,’ to Scientology, to efforts to give up drugs, and to the bohemian lifestyle on Clinton Street in Manhattan, where Cohen lived in the 1970s when it was a lively Latino area.

This is a very personal song in a form of a letter from one side of a love triangle to another, invoking multiple images including the first biblical murder of Abel by his brother Cain. The letter is addressed to an unnamed man who, we learn, once unsuccessfully tried to prise away Jane, the wife of the narrator, a fictionalised version of the singer himself.

It is an elegiac description of a tortured, twisted love triangle, involving the song’s narrator, a woman named Jane, and an unnamed male figure who is addressed but identified only briefly as ‘my brother, my killer.’

The letter is curiously brotherly in tone, even conciliatory towards the narrator’s rival. The tragedy in the story was never the infidelity, but the way in which the narrator was resigned to the decay of his marriage. ‘Thanks, for the trouble you took from her eyes, I thought it was there for good, so I never tried,’ he concedes in an arresting line that distils the heart of marital despair and miscommunication.

Cohen’s words are rich in their ambiguity. Was there ever a second man? Is he an alter-ego, an abstract spectral presence? Is ‘going clear’ a euphemism for sex, or a reference to a stage of scientology, in which Cohen dabbled at the time?

Cohen provided little elucidation, and in an interview in 1994, he admitted: ‘It was a song I’ve never been satisfied with. I’ve always felt that there was something about the song that was unclear.’

The second, unnamed male figure, Cohen’s nemesis, comrade, brother – perhaps even his alter ego – wears the ‘famous blue raincoat … torn at the shoulder.’ The ‘famous blue raincoat’ once belonged to Cohen himself, but was stolen in the early 1970s from the New York apartment of his lover, Marianne Ihlen. In the liner notes to the album The Best of Leonard Cohen (1975), which includes the song, Cohen wrote:

‘I had a good raincoat then, a Burberry I got in London in 1959. Elizabeth thought I looked like a spider in it. That was probably why she wouldn’t go to Greece with me. It hung more heroically when I took out the lining, and achieved glory when the frayed sleeves were repaired with a little leather. Things were clear. I knew how to dress in those days. It was stolen from Marianne’s loft in New York City sometime during the early ’70s. I wasn't wearing it very much toward the end.’

The stolen blue raincoat serves as image of things stolen, things we miss once we realise they are gone forever, people who disappear from our lives, friends, companions and lovers we lose, things that vanish from our very beings, from our deepest souls: ‘I guess that I miss you, I guess I forgive you.’

Cohen said in 1994 that ‘it was a song I’ve never been satisfied with.’ Yet, ‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ is widely considered one of Cohen’s best songs. Ron Cornelius, who played guitar on Songs of Love and Hate, once said: ‘If I had to pick a favourite from the album, it would probably be ‘Famous Blue Raincoat’.’ Far Out and American Songwriter have included the song in their lists of the 10 greatest Leonard Cohen songs.

‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ has been recorded by many artists, including Joan Baez and Tori Amos, Glen Hansard and Damien Rice, who performed the song at the concert ‘Tower of Song: A Memorial Tribute to Leonard Cohen’ in 2017.

The song also provides the title for Jennifer Warnes’s album of cover versions of Cohen’s songs. In 1986, she gave an emotive, jazz-inflected rendition – a version that Cohen worked on himself, and one that he said he preferred to the original. She adapted the lyrics slightly so that the narrator is recast as an observer rather than a participant in the affair. ‘My woman’ becomes ‘some woman’, and the letter is no longer signed-off by ‘L Cohen’ but ‘a friend’.

Cohen never wrote a song that more perfectly encapsulates the regret and loneliness in a tale of adultery and lost love. The singer even forgives his rival:

Yes, and thanks, for the trouble you took from her eyes
I thought it was there for good so I never tried

‘And what can I tell you my brother, my killer’ (Leonard Cohen) … the Sacrifice of Abel (Genesis 4: 2) in a window in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Leonard Cohen, Famous Blue Raincoat:

It’s four in the morning, the end of December
I’m writing you now just to see if you’re better
New York is cold, but I like where I’m living
There’s music on Clinton Street all through the evening

I hear that you’re building your little house deep in the desert
You’re living for nothing now, I hope you’re keeping some kind of record

Yes, and Jane came by with a lock of your hair
She said that you gave it to her
That night that you planned to go clear
Did you ever go clear?

Ah, the last time we saw you you looked so much older
Your famous blue raincoat was torn at the shoulder
You’d been to the station to meet every train, and
You came home without Lili Marlene

And you treated my woman to a flake of your life
And when she came back she was nobody’s wife

Well I see you there with the rose in your teeth
One more thin gypsy thief
Well, I see Jane’s awake
She sends her regards

And what can I tell you my brother, my killer
What can I possibly say?
I guess that I miss you, I guess I forgive you
I’m glad you stood in my way

If you ever come by here, for Jane or for me
Well, your enemy is sleeping, and his woman is free

Yes, and thanks, for the trouble you took from her eyes
I thought it was there for good so I never tried

And Jane came by with a lock of your hair
She said that you gave it to her
That night that you planned to go clear

Sincerely, L Cohen

An icon of the Birth of Saint the Baptist (see Luke 1: 57-66) from the Monastery of Anopolis in the Museum of Christian Art in Iraklion, Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 1: 57-66 (NRSVA):

57 Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. 58 Her neighbours and relatives heard that the Lord had shown his great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her.

59 On the eighth day they came to circumcise the child, and they were going to name him Zechariah after his father. 60 But his mother said, ‘No; he is to be called John.’ 61 They said to her, ‘None of your relatives has this name.’ 62 Then they began motioning to his father to find out what name he wanted to give him. 63 He asked for a writing-tablet and wrote, ‘His name is John.’ And all of them were amazed. 64 Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue freed, and he began to speak, praising God. 65 Fear came over all their neighbours, and all these things were talked about throughout the entire hill country of Judea. 66 All who heard them pondered them and said, ‘What then will this child become?’ For, indeed, the hand of the Lord was with him.

An icon of Saint John the Baptist in a small chapel in Georgioupoli in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Saturday 23 December 2023):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), has been ‘The Joy of Advent.’ This theme was introduced last Sunday.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (23 December 2023) invites us to pray reflecting on these words:

‘Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near’ (Philippians 4: 4-5).

The Collect:

O Lord Jesus Christ,
who at your first coming sent your messenger
to prepare your way before you:
grant that the ministers and stewards of your mysteries
may likewise so prepare and make ready your way
by turning the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just,
that at your second coming to judge the world
we may be found an acceptable people in your sight;
for you are alive and reign with the Father
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

We give you thanks, O Lord, for these heavenly gifts;
kindle in us the fire of your Spirit
that when your Christ comes again
we may shine as lights before his face;
who is alive and reigns now and for ever.

Additional Collect:

God for whom we watch and wait,
you sent John the Baptist to prepare the way of your Son:
give us courage to speak the truth,
to hunger for justice,
and to suffer for the cause of right,
with Jesus Christ our Lord.

Collect on the Eve of Advent 4:

God our redeemer,
who prepared the Blessed Virgin Mary
to be the mother of your Son:
grant that, as she looked for his coming as our saviour,
so we may be ready to greet him
when he comes again as our judge;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

Leonard Cohen, ‘Famous Blue Raincoat’ (Live in Dublin)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Daily prayers in Advent with Leonard Cohen and USPG: (20) 22 December 2023

Leonard Cohen’s ‘Who by Fire’ is inspired by a traditional Yom Kippur prayer … ‘Jews Praying in the Synagogue on Yom Kippur,’ Maurycy Gottlieb (1856-1879), Vienna, 1878, Tel Aviv Museum of Art

Patrick Comerford

We are in the final stages of countdown to Christmas, with just three days to go to Christmas Day. The last week of Advent began on Sunday with the Third Sunday of Advent or Gaudete Sunday (17 December 2023), and this is a very short Advent this year.

Before today begins, I am taking some time for prayer, reflection and reading this morning.

Throughout Advent this year, my reading and reflection each day include a poem or song by Leonard Cohen. These Advent reflections are following this pattern:

1, A reflection on a poem or song by Leonard Cohen;

2, the Gospel reading of the day in the Church of England lectionary;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

‘Who in the sunshine, who in the night time’ (Leonard Cohen) … in the streets of Prague at night (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The Songs and Poems of Leonard Cohen: 20, ‘Who By Fire’:

‘Who by Fire’ by Leonard Cohen was released in 1974 on the B side of the album New Skin for the Old Ceremony, sung as a duet with Janis Ian.

‘Who by fire’ is inspired by the Hebrew prayer Unetanneh Tokef (ונתנה תקף‎) chanted in the synagogue on Rosh Hashanah, the first day of the Jewish New Year, and especially on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. The prayer describes God reviewing the Book of Life and deciding the fate of each and every soul for the year to come – who will live, and who will die, and how.

Jewish tradition dates this prayer to the 11th century when, it is said, Rabbi Amnon of Mainz was punished for not converting to Christianity by having his hand and feet cut off on Rosh Hashanah.

As he was dying from his wounds, he had a vision of God sitting and writing in a book. In his dying hours, Rabbi Amnon wrote the prayer that begins with ‘Who by fire? And who by water?’ The prayer concludes:

Who will live and who will die;
Who in his due time and who not in his due time;
Who by water and who by fire,
Who by the sword and who by beasts,
Who by famine and who by thirst,
Who by earthquake and who by plague,
Who by strangling and who by stoning.
Who will rest and who will wander,
Who will be tranquil and who will be harassed,
Who will be at ease and who will be troubled,
Who will be rich and who will be poor,
Who will be brought down and who will be raised up?
But Repentance, Prayer and Charity avert the severe decree.

In Jewish tradition, the Book of Life lays open between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, and the greeting among Jews in those days is: ‘May your name be written in the Book of Life.’

Leonard Cohen heard this traditional prayer as a child in the synagogue. In Montreal In his own words, he recalls the tradition: ‘On Rosh Hashanah will be inscribed and on Yom Kippur will be sealed how many will pass from the earth and how many will be created; who will live and who will die; who will die at his predestined time and who before his time; who by water and who by fire, who by sword, who by beast, who by famine, who by thirst, who by storm, who by plague, who by strangulation, and who by stoning.

‘Who will rest and who will wander, who will live in harmony and who will be harried, who will enjoy tranquillity and who will suffer, who will be impoverished and who will be enriched, who will be degraded and who will be exalted.’

At the age of 39, the poet and singer was famous but unhappy and imagined he had reached a creative dead end. In October 1973, he left his home on the Greek island of Hydra for the chaos and bloodshed of the Sinai desert during the Yom Kippur War.

Cohen travelled around the war front with of local musicians, entertaining the troops. In his book Who by Fire, the journalist Matti Friedman told the story of those weeks Cohen spent in the Sinai, with a kaleidoscopic depiction of a harrowing, formative moment for both a country at war and a singer at a crossroads.

The war transformed Cohen. Instead of abandoning his music career, he returned to Hydra and to his family, had a second child, and released his album New Skin for the Old Ceremony. References to war can be heard in a number of the songs, including ‘Lover, Lover, Lover,’ written during fighting, and ‘Who by Fire,’ inspired by the Yom Kippur prayer about human mortality.

The traditional catalogue or listing includes deaths that are natural, accidental, punishment, by decree, and that are unjust. Like the original, Cohen’s Who by Fire,’ tells of a litany of ways and reasons one might meet their death: to this he adds avalanche, greed, hunger, suicide, drugs and the abuse of political power, to the original prayer, and even the cruelty of failures in love: ‘Who by his lady’s command.’

When Cohen introduced the song live in Melbourne, in March 1980, he explained the melody is based on the one he ‘first heard when I was four or five years old, in the synagogue, on the Day of Atonement, standing beside my tall uncles in their black suits.’

He continued: ‘It’s a liturgical prayer that talks about the way in which you can quit this vale of tears. It’s according to a tradition, an ancient tradition that on a certain day of the year, the Book of Life is opened, and in it is inscribed the names of all those who will live and all those who will die, who by fire, who by water.’

The line: ‘And who shall I say is calling?’ can be understood in the context of hearing the Shofar or liturgical horn being blown on Rosh Hashanah. It is a symbolic wake-up call, stirring those who hear it to mend their ways and to repent: ‘Sleepers, wake up from your slumber! Examine your ways and repent and remember your Creator.’ Who is calling? At one level, it is my own heart calling me to Repentance, Prayer and Charity. But, ultimately, it is God who is calling us to Repentance, Prayer and Charity.

It is not surprising that as families in Israel tried to come to terms with the Hamas massacres on 7 October, Leonard Cohen’s ‘Who By Fire’ was given new lyrics in memory of the 1,200 people murdered in southern Israel.

Meanwhile, Leonard Cohen’s 1973 visit to the frontlines of the Yom Kippur war is being dramatised for a new limited TV series next year (2024) from Keshet International and Sixty-Six Media. Who by Fire: Leonard Cohen in the Sinai is an adaptation of Matti Friedman’s book.

As we come to the end of a year that has been shrouded in hatred, war and death – from the increasing hatred here and across Europe towards refugees and migrants, to the wars in Ukraine, Russia, Gaza, Israel and the West Bank – there is an urgency to the words of the prayer from the Yom Kippur afternoon service and in Leonard Cohen’s song.

Teach us to number our days, O Lord, that we might apply our hearts unto wisdom.

‘And who shall I say is calling?’ (Leonard Cohen) … a shofar or ritual horn in the Casa de Sefarad or Sephardic Museum in Córdoba (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Leonard Cohen, Who By Fire:

And who by fire, who by water
Who in the sunshine, who in the night time
Who by high ordeal, who by common trial
Who in your merry merry month of May
Who by very slow decay
And who shall I say is calling?

And who in her lonely slip, who by barbiturate
Who in these realms of love, who by something blunt
And who by avalanche, who by powder
Who for his greed, who for his hunger
And who shall I say is calling?

And who by brave assent, who by accident
Who in solitude, who in this mirror
Who by his lady’s command, who by his own hand
Who in mortal chains, who in power
And who shall I say is calling?
And who shall I say is calling?

And who by fire who by water
Who in the sunshine, who in the night time
Who by high ordeal, who by common trial
Who in your merry merry month of May
Who by very slow decay
And who shall I say is calling?
And who shall I say is calling?

‘For the Mighty One has done great things for me, / and holy is his name’ (Luke 1: 49) … an image of Mary in a quiet corner at the High Leigh Conference Centre in Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 1: 46-56 (NRSVA):

46 And Mary said,

‘My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
48 for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 His mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
52 He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
55 according to the promise he made to our ancestors,
to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’

56 And Mary remained with her for about three months and then returned to her home.

The words of the canticle Magnificat carved on the wooden screen at the west end of the monastic church in Mount Melleray Abbey, Cappoquin, Co Waterford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Friday 22 December 2023):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘The Joy of Advent.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (22 December 2023) invites us to pray in these words:

We pray that the joy of the Lord will be evident in our hearts and homes this Advent.

The Collect:

O Lord Jesus Christ,
who at your first coming sent your messenger
to prepare your way before you:
grant that the ministers and stewards of your mysteries
may likewise so prepare and make ready your way
by turning the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just,
that at your second coming to judge the world
we may be found an acceptable people in your sight;
for you are alive and reign with the Father
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

We give you thanks, O Lord, for these heavenly gifts;
kindle in us the fire of your Spirit
that when your Christ comes again
we may shine as lights before his face;
who is alive and reigns now and for ever.

Additional Collect:

God for whom we watch and wait,
you sent John the Baptist to prepare the way of your Son:
give us courage to speak the truth,
to hunger for justice,
and to suffer for the cause of right,
with Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

Leonard Cohen, ‘Who by Fire’ (Live in London)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Daily prayers in Advent with Leonard Cohen and USPG: (19) 21 December 2023

‘And twenty-seven angels from the Great Beyond … In the Tower of Song’ (Leonard Cohen) … angels in a window by Ninian Comper in the south porch in Saint Mary’s Church, Bletchley (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the final stages of countdown to Christmas, with just four days to go to Christmas Day. The last week of Advent began on Sunday with the Third Sunday of Advent or Gaudete Sunday (17 December 2023), and this is a very short Advent this year.

Before today begins, I am taking some time for prayer, reflection and reading this morning.

Throughout Advent this year, my reading and reflection each day includes a poem or song by Leonard Cohen. These Advent reflections are following this pattern:

1, A reflection on a poem or song by Leonard Cohen;

2, the Gospel reading of the day in the Church of England lectionary;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

‘I’m just paying my rent every day / In the Tower of Song’ (Leonard Cohen) … the Shard at London Bridge at night (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The Songs and Poems of Leonard Cohen: 19, ‘Tower of Song’:

‘Tower of Song’ by Leonard Cohen is the keynote work on his 1988 album I’m Your Man. In a readers’ poll in 2014, Rolling Stone listed it as the eighth favourite Cohen song.

The origins of ‘Tower of Song’ are described in Ira Nadel's Cohen memoir Various Positions (1996). Cohen wanted to ‘make a definitive statement about the heroic enterprise of the craft’ of songwriting. In the early 1980s, he called the work ‘Raise My Voice in Song.’ His concern was with the ageing songwriter, and the ‘necessity to transcend one’s own failure by manifesting as the singer, as the songwriter.’

Cohen had abandoned the song, but then one night in Montreal he finished the lyrics, called an engineer and recorded it in one take with a toy synthesiser.

Cohen later revised the song, which contains the self-deprecating claim,

I was born like this, I had no choice
I was born with the gift of a golden voice.

Cohen was constantly aware of his reputation as a ‘flat singer’ among critics. But his audiences responded with warmth and humour when he sang or spoke these lines in his concerts.

Cohen admired for Hank Williams, a songwriter he refers to in the song, describing how, when they are both dead and have passed to the their eternal reward, Hank Williams is ‘coughing all night long … a hundred floors above me.’

The lyrics also hint at Cohen’s social conscience, and his engagement with the Jewish mystical concept of tikkum olam or divine justice:

The rich have got their channels in the bedrooms of the poor
And there’s a mighty judgement coming

In this song, he also expresses his religious hopes for eternal life, not just for himself but also for these he loves and has loved in the past:

I see you standing on the other side
I don’t know how the river got so wide
I loved you baby, way back when
And all the bridges are burning that we might have crossed
But I feel so close to everything that we lost
We’ll never, we'll never have to lose it again

Now I bid you farewell, I don’t know when I’ll be back
They’re moving us tomorrow to that tower down the track
But you’ll be hearing from me baby, long after I’m gone
I’ll be speaking to you sweetly from a window
In the Tower of Song

Cohen recited the lyrics of Tower of Song’ in full when he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

‘Tower of Song’ has been covered by many artists, notably on the tribute albums I’m Your Fan, with separate covers by Robert Forster and by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, and on Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man, with separate covers by Martha Wainwright and U2.

The song appears on Marianne Faithfull’s album Vagabond Ways and on Tom Jones’s album Spirit in the Room. Shaar Hashomayim Choir, Willie Nelson, Céline Dion, Peter Gabriel and Chris Martin performed the song at the concert Tower of Song: A Memorial Tribute to Leonard Cohen, in Montreal in 2017.

Tower of Song: The Songs of Leonard Cohen is a tribute album to Leonard Cohen, released in on A&M Records in 1995. It takes its name from this song by Cohen on his album I’m Your Man. Oddly, though, the song ‘Tower of Song’ does not actually appear on this tribute album.

The tribute album Tower of Song included Elton John, Sting with the Chieftains, Billy Joel, Peter Gabriel and Bono of U2. The album was the initiative of by Cohen’s manager, Kelley Lynch, who, a decade later, was found liable for fraud, having drained almost all of Cohen’s life savings.

‘I don’t know how the river got so wide … And all the bridges are burning that we might have crossed’ (Leonard Cohen) … London Bridge and the River Thames at night (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Leonard Cohen, Tower of Song:

Well my friends are gone and my hair is grey
I ache in the places where I used to play
And I’m crazy for love but I’m not coming on
I’m just paying my rent every day
In the Tower of Song

I said to Hank Williams, ‘How lonely does it get?’
Hank Williams hasn’t answered yet
But I hear him coughing all night long
Oh, a hundred floors above me
In the Tower of Song

I was born like this, I had no choice
I was born with the gift of a golden voice
And twenty-seven angels from the Great Beyond
They tied me to this table right here
In the Tower of Song

So you can stick your little pins in that voodoo doll
I’m very sorry, baby, doesn’t look like me at all
I’m standing by the window where the light is strong
Ah they don’t let a woman kill you
Not in the Tower of Song

Now you can say that I’ve grown bitter but of this you may be sure
The rich have got their channels in the bedrooms of the poor
And there’s a mighty judgement coming, but I may be wrong
You see, you hear these funny voices
In the Tower of Song

[Bridge]

I see you standing on the other side
I don’t know how the river got so wide
I loved you baby, way back when
And all the bridges are burning that we might have crossed
But I feel so close to everything that we lost
We’ll never, we’ll never have to lose it again

Now I bid you farewell, I don’t know when I’ll be back They’re moving us tomorrow to that tower down the track
But you’ll be hearing from me baby, long after I’m gone
I’ll be speaking to you sweetly from a window
In the Tower of Song

Yeah my friends are gone and my hair is grey
I ache in the places where I used to play
And I’m crazy for love but I’m not coming on
I’m just paying my rent every day
In the Tower of Song.

‘Mary set out and … she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth’ (Luke 1: 39-40) … the Visitation in the triptych in the Lady Chapel in Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 1: 39-45 (NRSVA):

39 In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, 40 where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. 41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leapt in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit 42 and exclaimed with a loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. 43 And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? 44 For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leapt for joy. 45 And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.’

The Presentation depicted in a window in Saint Mary the Great Church, Saffron Walden (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Today’s Prayers (Thursday 21 December 2023):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘The Joy of Advent.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (21 December 2023) invites us to pray in these words:

We ask you God to heal us, restore our relationships, and finish Your good work in us. Mend this broken world so joy can be felt by all nations.

The Collect:

O Lord Jesus Christ,
who at your first coming sent your messenger
to prepare your way before you:
grant that the ministers and stewards of your mysteries
may likewise so prepare and make ready your way
by turning the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just,
that at your second coming to judge the world
we may be found an acceptable people in your sight;
for you are alive and reign with the Father
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

We give you thanks, O Lord, for these heavenly gifts;
kindle in us the fire of your Spirit
that when your Christ comes again
we may shine as lights before his face;
who is alive and reigns now and for ever.

Additional Collect:

God for whom we watch and wait,
you sent John the Baptist to prepare the way of your Son:
give us courage to speak the truth,
to hunger for justice,
and to suffer for the cause of right,
with Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow

Leonard Cohen, ‘Tower of Song,’ Live in London

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Daily prayers in Advent with Leonard Cohen and USPG: (18) 20 December 2023

‘You who build the altars now / To sacrifice these children / You must not do it anymore’ (Leonard Cohen) … the Sacrifice of Abraham depicted in the East Window in Holy Trinity Church, Old Wolverton (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the final stages of countdown to Christmas, with just five days to go to Christmas Day. The last week of Advent began on Sunday with the Third Sunday of Advent or Gaudete Sunday (17 December 2023), and this is a very short Advent this year.

I have spent a few days in Dublin, and after an evening flight from Birmingham I got back to Stony Stratford late last night. Before today begins, I am taking some time for prayer, reflection and reading this morning.

Throughout Advent this year, my reading and reflection each day includes a poem or song by Leonard Cohen. These Advent reflections are following this pattern:

1, A reflection on a poem or song by Leonard Cohen;

2, the Gospel reading of the day in the Church of England lectionary;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

‘xxx’ (Leonard Cohen) … Abraham preparing for the sacrifice of Isaac … a stained glass window in Saint John’s Church, Wall, near Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Songs and Poems of Leonard Cohen: 18, ‘Story of Isaac’:

The poem and song ‘Story of Isaac’ by Leonard Cohen was first recorded by Judy Collins on her album Who Knows Where the Time Goes, released in December 1968, and it was the second track on Leonard Cohen’s second album, Songs from a Room, released in April 1969.

This song has also been covered by a number of musicians including Suzanne Vega, Linda Thompson, the Johnstons, Pain Teens and Roy Buchanan.

‘Story of Isaac’ is of the Biblical story in Genesis 22 of Isaac’s planned sacrifice by his father Abraham, but told now from Isaac’s perspective. It is also an anti-war song, specifically about the Vietnam war, and it’s a story about the children being sacrificed on behalf of the older generation.

Almost 20 years after it was first recorded, Cohen explained to John McKenna of RTÉ in 1988 that ‘Story of Isaac’ was an anti-war protest song. But he added, ‘I was careful in that song to try and put it beyond the pure, beyond the simple, anti-war protest, that it also is. Because it says at the end there the man of war the man of peace, the peacock spreads his deadly fan. In other words it isn’t necessarily for war that we’re willing to sacrifice each other.’

He added: ‘We’ll get some idea – some magnificent idea – that we’re willing to sacrifice each other for; it doesn’t necessarily have to involve an opponent or an ideology, but human beings being what they are we’re always going to set up people to die for some absurd situation that we define as important.’

The song is a commentary on the nature of sacrifice and faith, and the idea that we may think God is asking us to give up something we love in order to serve a higher purpose. The song also touches on themes of war and violence, as well as the relationship between father and son.

Overall, the message of the song is one of questioning and reflection on the nature of sacrifice and faith, and the idea that sometimes we may be called on to give up something we love in order to serve a greater good.

According to Leonard Cohen, the song is ‘about those who would sacrifice one generation on behalf of another.’

In another interview, he reflected: ‘There’s a story in the Bible about Isaac, how his father summoned him to go and climb a mountain, how his father built an altar there after he had been commanded to offer up his son. And just at the last moment before he was about to sacrifice Isaac, an angel held the hand of the father. But today the children are being sacrificed and no one raises a hand to end the sacrifice. And this is what this song is about.’

Rabbi Aubrey Glazer, formerly of Congregation Beth Sholom in San Francisco, discusses ‘Story of Isaac’ and many other poems by Leonard Cohen in his book Tangle of Matter & Ghost: Leonard Cohen’s Post-Secular Songbook of Mysticism(s) Jewish and Beyond (2017). The book is part of a series, ‘New Perspectives in Post-Rabbinic Judaism.’ Glazer notes the sudden and effective change of perspective as father and son ascend up the mountain and have a bird’s-eye view of the valley now far below. They are so high up that it takes a full minute for the bottle to fall and shatter, but Abraham calms his young son with a warm touch.

The tension is heightened, however, by Isaac’s continuing confusion over whether the scene was hurtling towards life, power and triumph, symbolised by the eagle; or towards imminent death, captured by the vulture. Either way, Abraham is secure in Isaac’s compliance and certain their destiny is firmly in God’s hands.

A stunning change of time and place juxtaposes the Biblical story with the still-unfolding tragedy between the descendants of Abraham. Cohen brings this ancient tale right up to the present, as he, through the voice of Isaac, begs us to tear down the altars upon which the children of our age are still sacrificed to settle age-old grievances.

He crystallises the parent’s grief and ambivalence by describing his ‘trembling hand,’ even as Abraham, and so many today, stands in awe of the divine command he believes he is obeying.

Cohen, whose father, like Abraham in this poem/song, also had blue eyes, always returned to his own Judaism. He refers to one of the most poignant messages of this Biblical passage, and one that recurs throughout the history of the Abrahamic people: this is a story of brothers. Earlier in the Biblical narrative, Isaac’s half-brother Ishmael was banished. Although they later come together to bury their father (Genesis 25), the effects of Ishmael’s exile and Isaac’s near-sacrifice reverberate through time.

Cohen deftly expresses the pain and power in this eternal family feud. In the end, he prays for mercy as these brothers take up arms against each other, and on which side one stands determines who is cast as the ‘man of peace’ and who is the ‘man of war.’

In Cohen’s telling, this tale becomes an anti-war hymn and a cautionary warning against all the ways we still sacrifice our children. Cohen expressed this in a BBC interview: ‘Just at the last moment before he was about to sacrifice Isaac, an angel held the hand of the father. But today the children are being sacrificed and no one raises a hand to end the sacrifice. And this is what this song is about.’

The near-sacrifice of Isaac, or the Akedah as it is known in Jewish tradition, is a gripping, chilling and troubling story, and a story that seems to ask more questions than it answers.

Each time I hear it, I am listening in horror as Abraham seems to be preparing to sacrifice his only son. And the story comes with all the gruesome details, as Abraham climbs the mountain, builds the altar, arranges the wood, binds his son, places him on the altar, and takes the knife into his hand. The looming tragedy is averted only at the very moment second.

But at a time when child-sacrifice was a cultural norm in that part of the ancient world, when people believed that sacrificing their first-born children was a way of appeasing the gods, this story turns those old superstitions on their head.

Abraham knows the old ways. But his relationship with God becomes a startling new relationship, founded on love. And this God is different from all the so-called gods. No, he does not demand human sacrifice. No, he does not have a mean and violent, capricious streak.

Instead, this God that Abraham has begun to get to know, wants a relationship with us that is built not on fear and brutalism, but on love and on freedom.

The child who was at risk is saved, the child who was bound up is set free, the child who was the victim of old-fashioned, out-dated superstitions now becomes part of the relationship between God and humanity and the promise for the future that is sealed not by sacrifices like this, but by love.

How could Abraham hav forgotten God’s earlier promise so soon, the promise made to Abraham and Sarah that they would have children and through them they would be the spiritual ancestors of all nations?

And it is a story that challenges us to reassess our own notions about God.

Are our relationships with God founded on fear or on love?

Do we believe in a god who would treat us as slaves who must obey, or as faithful partners who are caught up in his love?

Once again, we are offered a choice between death and life, between slavery and freedom, between blind obedience and love.

‘Abraham, our Father in Faith,’ by the Liverpool sculptor Sean Rice (1931-1997), in the west apse of the Cathedral of Christ the King, Liverpool (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Leonard Cohen, Story of Isaac:

The door it opened slowly
My father he came in
I was nine years old
And he stood so tall above me
Blue eyes they were shining
And his voice was very cold
Said, ‘I’ve had a vision
And you know I’m strong and holy
I must do what I've been told’
So he started up the mountain
I was running, he was walking
And his axe was made of gold

Well, the trees they got much smaller
The lake a lady’s mirror
We stopped to drink some wine
Then he threw the bottle over
Broke a minute later
And he put his hand on mine
Thought I saw an eagle
But it might have been a vulture
I never could decide
Then my father built an altar
He looked once behind his shoulder
He knew I would not hide
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You who build the altars now
To sacrifice these children
You must not do it anymore
A scheme is not a vision
And you never have been tempted
By a demon or a god
You who stand above them now
Your hatchets blunt and bloody
You were not there before
When I lay upon a mountain
And my father’s hand was trembling
With the beauty of the word

And if you call me brother now
Forgive me if I inquire
‘Just according to whose plan?’

When it all comes down to dust
I will kill you if I must
I will help you if I can
When it all comes down to dust
I will help you if I must
I will kill you if I can
And mercy on our uniform
Man of peace or man of war
The peacock spreads his fan.

‘The peacock spreads his fan’ (Leonard Cohen) … a peacock spreads his fan in a vineyard in Rivesaltes near Perpignan in France (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 1: 26-38 (NRSVA):

26 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, 27 to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28 And he came to her and said, ‘Greetings, favoured one! The Lord is with you.’ 29 But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. 30 The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God. 31 And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. 32 He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. 33 He will reign over the house of Jacob for ever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’ 34 Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be, since I am a virgin?’ 35 The angel said to her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. 36 And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. 37 For nothing will be impossible with God.’ 38 Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’ Then the angel departed from her.

The Annunciation depicted in a panel in the altar in Saint Mary’s Church, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 20 December 2023):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘The Joy of Advent.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (20 December 2023) invites us to pray in these words:

O Lord, help us to see the wonder in your creation, to find the joy amidst the trials. For in you, we can rejoice and be glad. No matter what the world brings, we can find joy in you.

The Annunciation depicted in a stained-glass window in Saint Mary’s Church, Bletchley (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The Collect:

O Lord Jesus Christ,
who at your first coming sent your messenger
to prepare your way before you:
grant that the ministers and stewards of your mysteries
may likewise so prepare and make ready your way
by turning the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just,
that at your second coming to judge the world
we may be found an acceptable people in your sight;
for you are alive and reign with the Father
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

We give you thanks, O Lord, for these heavenly gifts;
kindle in us the fire of your Spirit
that when your Christ comes again
we may shine as lights before his face;
who is alive and reigns now and for ever.

Additional Collect:

God for whom we watch and wait,
you sent John the Baptist to prepare the way of your Son:
give us courage to speak the truth,
to hunger for justice,
and to suffer for the cause of right,
with Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow



Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Daily prayers in Advent with Leonard Cohen and USPG: (17) 19 December 2023

‘Oh Crown of Light, Oh Darkened One’ (Leonard Cohen) … a Torah crown in the Jewish Museum in Vienna (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

We are in the countdown to Christmas, with just six days to go to Christmas Day. The last week of Advent began on Sunday with the Third Sunday of Advent or Gaudete Sunday (17 December 2023), and this is a very short Advent this year.

I have been in Dublin overnight, and I return to Stony Stratford later in the day, with a flight from Birmingham this evening. But, before the day begins, I am taking some time for prayer, reflection and reading this morning.

Throughout Advent this year, my reading and reflection each day includes a poem or song by Leonard Cohen. These Advent reflections are following this pattern:

1, A reflection on a poem or song by Leonard Cohen;

2, the Gospel reading of the day in the Church of England lectionary;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

‘A sip of wine, a cigarette and then it’s time to go’ (Leonard Cohen) … wine at dinner in the Greek Chef, Lichfield, last week (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The Songs and Poems of Leonard Cohen: 17, ‘Boogie Street’:

‘Boogie Street’ first appeared as a song in 2001 on Ten New Songs, an album Leonard Cohen made with Sharon Robinson. On the CD Live in London, he says: ‘Shar Robinson wrote this tune.’ It is not clear whether this means that she wrote the tune and he wrote the words. But the liner notes say ‘Leonard Cohen/Sharon Robinson.’

But the lyrics were first written as a poem and appears in his Book of Longing along with other poems he wrote between 1994 and 1999 while he was on Mount Baldy.

The song, unlike the poem, prefaces as well as ends with the final stanza. That refrain is also included as a bridge or chorus in the middle of the song. As with all of Leonard Cohen’s songs and poems, there is a spiritual message in this song, yet the lyrics are tinged with an element of wry humour.

In the first verses of ‘Boogie Street,’ Cohen sings:

O Crown of Light, O Darkened One,
I never thought we’d meet.
You kiss my lips, and then it’s done:
I’m back on Boogie Street.

Professor Eliot R Wolfson of the University of California Santa Barbara specialises in the history of Jewish mysticism, and is also a poet who has three published collections to his name. He has written about the influence of Jewish mysticism, and particularly Lurianic Kabbalism, on the poetry of Leonard Cohen.

Eliot Wolfson’s study, ‘New Jerusalem Glowing: Songs and Poems of Leonard Cohen in a Kabbalistic Key,’ was published in Kabbalah: Journal for the Study of Jewish Mystical Texts, vol 15 (2006), pp 103-153.

In his commentary on the song ‘Boggie Street’, Wolfson assumes that the singer depicts a state after being unexpectedly struck by ‘the primordial light so bright that it glistens in the radiance of its darkness.’ This carries connotations of the revelation of light in Kabbalah, which springs out from its hiding place and is only to be seen thanks to its ‘concealing and clothing itself.’

Leonard Cohen’s repeated names for the divine in this song or poem – ‘Crown of Light, O Darkened One’ – call to mind the highest Sefirah in the Kabbalistic system: Keter or Crown, the infinite, boundless or Ein Sof, the highest point of the Sefirot.

Each verse of the song offers an initiatory and ephemeral experience of love taking place outside the ordinary world, and each returns the speaker to that ordinary world of ‘Boogie Street.’

As with many of the poems in The Spice-Box of Earth (1967), ‘Boogie Street’ also draws on the traditions in Jewish spirituality of welcoming the ‘Sabbath Queen’ or the ‘Sabbath Bride’ who descends from Heaven to heal the sufferings of the Jews.

The arrival and departure of ‘Her Majesty’ is marked by ceremonies. When she enters, everybody is happy; when she leaves, there is a strange sadness. But people take comfort in a symbolic ritual that includes inhaling the aroma of spices contained in an ornamental box, often made of silver, the spice box.

Spice-boxes are an essential part of Havdalah (הַבְדָּלָה‎, ‘separation’), the ceremony marking the symbolic end of Shabbat and ushering in the new week. Like kiddush, Havdalah is recited over a cup of wine. The ritual involves lighting a special Havdalah candle with several wicks, blessing a cup of wine and smelling sweet spices – referred to with humour in the words ‘A sip of wine, a cigarette and then it’s time to go.’

In this song, the soul would seem to be suffering from the loss of the Sabbath’s peace and the Sabbath soul called Neshamah yeteirah. Could this also recall Christ’s sense of being abandoned by the Divine as he is dying on the Cross (see Matthew 27: 46 and Mark 15: 34)? In both cases, we can see the song as describing the return of the soul to the body as something that is both painful and difficult.

In an interview with the New York Observer, Leonard Cohen said: ‘The evidence accumulates as you get older that things are not going to turn out exactly as you wish them to turn out, and that life has a dreamy quality that suggests that you have no control over the consequences.’

In an interview with Brian D Johnson in Maclean’s Magazine in 2001, Leonard Cohen said of Boogie Street: ‘… during the day Boogie Street is a scene of intense commercial activity … And at night, it was a scene of intense and alarming sexual exchange.’

Later, he goes on to talk of its metaphorical meaning: ‘Boogie Street to me was that street of work and desire, the ordinary life and also the place we live in most of the time that is relieved by the embrace of your children, or the kiss of your beloved, or the peak experience in which you yourself are dissolved, and there is no one to experience it so you feel the refreshment when you come back from those moments.’

He adds: ‘So we all hope for those heavenly moments, which we get in those embraces and those sudden perceptions of beauty and sensations of pleasure, but we’re immediately returned to Boogie Street.’

‘And oh my love, I still recall the pleasures that we knew / The rivers and the waterfall’ (Leonard Cohen) … the Cascades at Ennistymon, Co Clare (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Leonard Cohen, Boogie Street:

Oh Crown of Light, Oh Darkened One
I never thought we’d meet
You kiss my lips, and then you’re gone
And I’m back on Boogie Street

A sip of wine, a cigarette and then it’s time to go
I tidied up the kitchenette, I tuned the old banjo
I’m wanted at the traffic-jam, they’re saving me a seat
I’m what I am, and what I am is back on Boogie Street

And oh my love, I still recall the pleasures that we knew
The rivers and the waterfall, wherein I bathed with you
Bewildered by your beauty there, I’d kneel to dry your feet
By such instructions you prepare a man for Boogie Street

Oh Crown of Light, Oh Darkened One
I never thought we’d meet
You kiss my lips, and then it’s done
And I’m back, back on Boogie Street

So come my friends, be not afraid, we are so lightly here
It is in love that we are made, in love we disappear
Though all the maps of blood and flesh are posted on the door
There’s no one who has told us yet what Boogie Street is for

Oh Crown of Light, Oh Darkened One
I never thought we’d meet
You kiss my lips, and then it’s done
And I’m back, back on Boogie Street

A sip of wine, a cigarette and then it’s time to go
I tidied up the kitchenette, I tuned the old banjo
I’m wanted at the traffic-jam, they're saving me a seat
I’m what I am …

.

Saint John the Baptist with his parents Zechariah and Elizabeth … a mosaic in the Monastery of Saint John the Baptist, Tolleshunt Knights, Essex (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 1: 5-25 (NRSVA):

5 In the days of King Herod of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly order of Abijah. His wife was a descendant of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. 6 Both of them were righteous before God, living blamelessly according to all the commandments and regulations of the Lord. 7 But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were getting on in years.

8 Once when he was serving as priest before God and his section was on duty, 9 he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to enter the sanctuary of the Lord and offer incense. 10 Now at the time of the incense-offering, the whole assembly of the people was praying outside. 11 Then there appeared to him an angel of the Lord, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. 12 When Zechariah saw him, he was terrified; and fear overwhelmed him. 13 But the angel said to him, ‘Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John. 14 You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, 15 for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He must never drink wine or strong drink; even before his birth he will be filled with the Holy Spirit. 16 He will turn many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. 17 With the spirit and power of Elijah he will go before him, to turn the hearts of parents to their children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.’ 18 Zechariah said to the angel, ‘How will I know that this is so? For I am an old man, and my wife is getting on in years.’ 19 The angel replied, ‘I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. 20 But now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur.’

21 Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah, and wondered at his delay in the sanctuary. 22 When he did come out, he could not speak to them, and they realized that he had seen a vision in the sanctuary. He kept motioning to them and remained unable to speak. 23 When his time of service was ended, he went to his home.

24 After those days his wife Elizabeth conceived, and for five months she remained in seclusion. She said, 25 ‘This is what the Lord has done for me when he looked favourably on me and took away the disgrace I have endured among my people.’

Saint John the Baptist in a window in Saint John the Baptist Church, Coventry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 19 December 2023):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘The Joy of Advent.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (19 December 2023) invites us to pray in these words:

Lord, we ask that your Spirit transform the days leading up to Christmas into a time of holy anticipation. Prepare our hearts as we joyfully await the chance to celebrate the arrival of our King.

Saint John the Baptist in a window in Saint John the Baptist Church, Coventry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2023)

The Collect:

O Lord Jesus Christ,
who at your first coming sent your messenger
to prepare your way before you:
grant that the ministers and stewards of your mysteries
may likewise so prepare and make ready your way
by turning the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just,
that at your second coming to judge the world
we may be found an acceptable people in your sight;
for you are alive and reign with the Father
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

We give you thanks, O Lord, for these heavenly gifts;
kindle in us the fire of your Spirit
that when your Christ comes again
we may shine as lights before his face;
who is alive and reigns now and for ever.

Additional Collect:

God for whom we watch and wait,
you sent John the Baptist to prepare the way of your Son:
give us courage to speak the truth,
to hunger for justice,
and to suffer for the cause of right,
with Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection

Continued Tomorrow



Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Songwriters: Leonard Cohen / Sharon Robinson. Boogie Street lyrics © Emi April Music Inc., Sony/atv Songs Llc