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Lauryn Hill: Revolution
The Philosophy and Spiritual Message of Lauryn Hill
I. Revolution, like impatriotion, must first take place in the mind and heart, when you revolutionize, you have a revolutionary way of thinking, believe it or not, selflessness is revolutionary, because it’s the hardest and most challenging thing to be, to be a person who considers righteousness over oneself, that’s revolutionary, when we see these revolutionaries manifesting themselves throughout history, they were able to prioritize what needed to be done over what benefited them first and foremost. And not that it didn’t benefit them, but it benefitted a higher portion of themselves as opposed to their limited flesh experience, and they saw the importance and the value in sowing to the spiritual part of man, to the eternal part of man, as opposed to the temporary part of man. -Lauryn Hill
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This website seeks to explain the philosophy, spirituality, and power of Lauryn's artistry and philosophy in spreading the message of our Father in Heaven, God, to the masses. In shedding her old artistry for this new walk, she has become a prophet and messenger for the Word of God the Father, Jesus Christ. Lauryn Hill remains one of the most powerful artists in the world today. A world class singer with a unique, mercurial, and transcendent voice of unparalleled quality, a songwriter of some of the most profound and emotional material in modern music, a producer of uncanny reserve and control, a stage performer lovingly referred to as one of the “hottest mc’s” on the mic, and a profound poet, Lauryn has recently added the title of philosopher to her list of achievements. Lauryn’s career as the sex symbol siren with the magnificent voice was eschewed, by her, in the year 2000, when she disappeared from public view into a reclusive hideaway in Miami and Jamaica with her family (the Marley’s, yes of Bob Marley lineage, and the Hill’s), her spiritual advisor, and her bible. She returned in 2001 with a serious of guerilla performances, as if on a whim, before surfacing in July 2001 to record the Unplugged 2.0 performance which has become a spiritual, poetic, and philosophical benchmark to those who do not consider themselves to be a part of the masses. Aside from this, she has recorded relatively little since. She was attacked and insulted by the press for delivering this truth, and since that recording has appeared relatively little, doing more unannounced guerilla performances, a tour on Smokin Grooves, Kool Nu Jazz Fest, a recording on Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ Soundtrack, a few released pirated studio performances, and a recent appearance on Mos Def’s Def Poetry Jam. But most importantly is how she has used her voice, her poetry, her spirituality, and her God-given message to deliver a ministry of such power, love, and expression that she has been compared to Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, and several other powerful African American speakers both past and present, and has allowed herself to become, through God, one of the most powerful messengers in the world today. This website seeks to explain her message aside from what simple lyrics can do, by analyzing each song as it appears and providing a detailed explanation of the idea behind the song, as well as providing her personal message from interviews and other wise. It is imperative to first study the lyric, the music, and then read the explanations. ____________________________ LAURYN ON HONESTY:
Honesty is like oxygen, and when you deprive the world of oxygen, you get nothing but death. Honesty is what we weep for as a people have misconstrued weeping and the expression of emotion as weakness, but it’s courage. It’s strength. But if we’ve been wired backwards, if we’ve been told left was right and right was left, then what do you have but a nice mess, a bunch of people persecuted for being. We can change that, by virtue of the fact that God Is.
Like a fallen fighter who comes back to fight another day, for all intensive purposes, I’m not supposed to be here. The things that were said about me, done to me, were aimed at breaking my spirit, robbing me of all love, but I’m here.
LAURYN ON LOVE
I want to be comformed to love, to be love incarnate, and to not listen to people who would say there’s something wrong with being love. We talk about professionalism (appearance and behavior in life), but what does any of that have to do with a real exchange. We behave as professionally (socially) as we need to, you are profession as you need to be, but sincerity shouldn’t offence, it doesn’t confuse or complicate things, if anything it’s broken down and made the environment more comfortable for everyone else, so what does a lack of professionalism (social acceptability) do, what is the cost of your lack of professionalism in life (social acceptability). I believe a world can exist on honesty, I believe it, I just do, I’m a believer.
LAURYN ON CARNAL LUST
I. Adam Lives In Theory
To hear Adam Lives in Theory click: http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/10/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+adamlivesintheory.mp3
Adam lives in theory trying to turn stone into bread, masquerading like he's got it figured out/Cut off from the sunshine only smart in his own head/Leaving his descendents to hope in doubt/Left to his devices, those worthless sacrifices, praying to the altar of his self/Making pilgrimages thinking he's religious, like he's got all the light and no one else/He takes the unsuspected 'cause he knows they're not connected, and he shows them how to be just as he is/Virtually real and commercially appeal to the lust of all the people where he lives/Eve was so naive, blinded by the pride and greed, wanting to be intellectual/Drifting from the way she got turned out one day and now she thinks that she's bisexual/Caught up in emotion, burning up in her devotion to the king of exploitation in the field/She handed him her virtue, 'cause he told her 'I won't hurt you,' so she laid with him to see how good it feels/Now can you tell me what, what we gonna do now, where we gonna go now, what we gonna say now , now can you tell me what, what we gonna do now, where we gonna go now, what we gonna say now,
Now after the sensation and the empty fornication she brought infection home into her bed/Quickly multiplying, now the three of them are dying by the poison she perceived to be good head/Now Eve and her husband are perverted in their judgment 'cause everything appeared to be the same/They entertained suggestions,'/ next time just use protection'/Desiring to cover up their shame/But much to their demise poor decision closed their eyes to the very antidote to their dilemma/Burning in their lust, both of them adulterous, destroying the original agenda, praying to the sky in order to maintain a lie/They exhausted every possible conclusion/They can't even entertain the solution in a brain filled with vain information and pollution/Hiding from the truth, he provided an excuse to explain away his desperate situation/When confronted blamed his wife, giving birth to carnal life, refusing to acknowledge what he'd done/Now, if we can't agree with who created us to be who says we're guilty everyone before his eyes/Making no exception since the day of our conception, predisposed to hating truth and loving lies/Then can you tell me what, what we gonna do now, where we gonna go now, what we gonna say nowThen can you tell me what, what we gonna do now, where we gonna go now, what we gonna say now
Stop walking in pride, let the thief be crucified, unlearn everything you know and let Him teach you/Line upon line and precept upon precept/Say goodbye to this decaying social system/He wants to know how far we're willing to go, if we love Him like we say we do, He'll try us/Just you don't regress or slip into hopelessness/Once He's satisfied it's love He won't deny us/And then He'll tell us what, what we gonna do now, where we gonna go now, what we gonna say nowHe'll tell us what, what we gonna do now, where we gonna go now, what we gonna say now
Explanation: Adam Lives In Theory was one of Lauryn’s first true parables. The idea takes Adam and Eve and makes them into modern day people. As in historical biblical stories, Eve took the apple from the serpent and gave it to Adam thus condemning man. This time, the two are placed in modern day context. And the apple is applied in regards to carnal lust and sins of the flesh. Eve, in this story accepts the apple, which is sexual intercourse and then condemns herself, her husband Adam, and her lineage with a sexually transmitted disease, Lauryn aptly comparing the apple to “good head (fellatio)”
“Drifting from the way she got turned out one day and now she thinks that she's bisexual/Caught up in emotion, burning up in her devotion to the king of exploitation in the field/She handed him her virtue, 'cause he told her 'I won't hurt you,' so she laid with him to see how good it feels/ Now after the sensation and the empty fornication she brought infection home into her bed/Quickly multiplying, now the three of them are dying by the poison she perceived to be good head/”.
Lauryn claims that all of her songs are about problem, cause, and solution. She explains the problem: man’s carnal lust. The cause: man’s pride, his lack of spiritual pleasure, and his need to fit into society, as well as his belief in the pollution that society preaches as true: “They can't even entertain the solution in a brain filled with vain information and pollution/Hiding from the truth, he provided an excuse to explain away his desperate situation/”. The solution, she explains quite simply in the final verse of the song: “Stop walking in pride, let the thief be crucified, unlearn everything you know and let Him teach you/Line upon line and precept upon precept/Say goodbye to this decaying social system/He wants to know how far we're willing to go, if we love Him like we say we do, He'll try us/Just you don't regress or slip into hopelessness/Once He's satisfied it's love He won't deny us/”. She instructs that we should stop walking in pride, and except the fact that everything we know could potentially be a lie. She says let the thief be crucified, the thief who didn’t believe in Jesus on the cross still resides in each of us, and must be crucified for us to truly believe. Unlearn all the pollution that society has taught us and let God reteach us by releasing our faith in society, which she calls a decaying social system. She then explains the God wishes to know how far we’ll go, that’s he testing our faith. If we do not regress, which means to fall backwards into sin that we’ve escaped, then we’ll satisfy his test of our love, and he will tell us where to go, what to do, and what to say at all times in life. This song like any parable is applicable to any situation, but she chooses to focus specifically on carnal lusts and acceptability as that is what is driving the world masses at this time.
LAURYN ON SPIRITUALITY AND RELIGION
II. Oh Jerusalem
To listen to Oh Jerusalem
http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/09/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+ohjerusalem.mp3
Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Realizing that there's no place else to go and there's nobody I know who can help me/Textbook solutions are so improbable 'cause everybody else is just as empty/Naked as the day that I was born, I try to hide behind education and philosophy/Hopeless explanation, to describe a situation/I can't see because the world's on top of me/Oh wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from the body of this death/Freeing me from dust and the superficial trust of an enemy that seeks to take my breath/Failing to connect 'cause I'm morally defect by reason of the god inside my head, causing me to see only what pertains to me, believing I'm alive when I'm still dead/Limited to earth, unable to find out my worth 'cause I can't see past my own vanity/If I'm not included then I just have to remove it from my mind because it has to be insanity
Oh wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from the body of this death/Can I even factor that I've only been an actor in the staged interpretation of this day/Focused on the shadow with my back turned to the light, too intelligent to see it's me in the way/What a paradox, having God trapped in a box/All this time professing to be spiritual, naturally pretending that I'm actually defending God, thru my facade, only material
Oh Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved from thy deception/How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee/Oh Jerusalem, keeping thee from perfection/Submit to truth, leave the deception of thy youth so we can walk in the council of authority/Forget the proof, a generation so aloof, only following the steps of the majority/Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not to thine own understanding/in all thy ways, acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy paths/Be not wise in thine own eyes or You can't follow Him/we judge and condemn, just as ignorant as them who religion tells us that we should ignore/Perpetrating, we're in covenant with Him, exposed by the very things that we adore/We grin and shake hands then lay ambush for the man who has a different point of view than us/Infuriated 'cause he doesn't understand, bringing up those things we don't want to discuss/Wise to do evil, we don't know how to do good/Walking on in darkness, running from the light/Led to believe because we live in neighborhoods, telling us what's going on will be alright
Oh so repressed, so convinced that I was blessed when I played with my game of monopoly/oh to suggest, that my life is still a mess would reveal the pride I'm hiding is what's stopping me/Oh Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness that thou mayest be saved from thy deception/How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee, Oh Jerusalem, keeping them from perfection/Abide in me, and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except in the vine/I am the vine, ye are the branches/he that live in me, and I in Him the same bring forth much fruit/For without me you can do nothing, Oh Jerusalem/Your traditions have deceived you/I've chosen you, you haven't chosen me/that whatsoever you ask in my name He may give to you/But in vain they call my name, teaching doctrines just the same, justified amongst themselves/But God knoweth the heart/What man esteems as smart is an abomination to Emmanuel/Just repent, turn from selfish motivation so iniquity will not cause your demise/Make you a new heart and a new spirit for why will ye die?/Oh Jerusalem, please tell me why?/I have no pleasure in the death of Him that dieth, says the Lord God wherefore turn yourselves and live/It's not the talkers, but the walkers in His word/Are the only ones the Father will forgive/Oh
Jerusalem, wash thine heart from from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved from thy deception/How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee, Oh Jerusalem/Providing you no protection, Oh Jerusalem, Oh.. ya.. oh.. Jerusalem oh.. ya.. oh
Explanation: Oh Jerusalem is one of her most spiritually based songs, it’s last verse even going so far as to include John 15:4-5: “Abide in me and I in you, as the branch cannot bear, fruit of itself except in the vine”, Ezekiel 18:30-33: “30Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways, saith the Lord GOD. Repent, and turn yourselves from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin. 31Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?32For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord GOD: wherefore turn yourselves, and live ye”, as well as Matthew 15:9 and Mark 7:7, which both say, “But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men” or as Mark puts it, “Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men”, as well as Luke 16:5, “And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God”.
Explanation: Although the considerations of this work are quite complex, the message is very simple. Ignore everything you’ve been taught and seek God, similar to the message in Adam Lives in Theory. This time, Lauryn, analyzes the things that are wrong with society in as much as there is nowhere she can go, no source of knowledge, and no place that she can search out that will present to her the truth as she needs it. This is consideration, she explains that, if this is true, then it must be true, that all knowledge, philosophy, and consideration of man is useless, and that the only knowledge one should seek out is God’s, “so that we can walk in a capsule of authority”. In the final verse, she uses a conglomeration of bible verses delivered either in the voice of God, and explanation of the voice of God, of Jesus, to explain that unless you live, breathe, and exist in God, and finally, unless you seek out God at all times and seek his knowledge, then you will die, and that is all, succumbing to the universally true principle that God’s knowledge is above ours, his ways above ours. This song simply states that we must seek God. The problem is that man exalts himself. The cause is that man believes his knowledge is great. The solution, humbling yourself enough to know that only God’s knowledge is great, and then seeking it out.
LAURYN ON SOCIETY AND SOCIETIES WOES
III. Freedom Time
http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/10/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+freedomtime.mp3
Everybody knows that they're guilty, everybody knows that they've lied/Everybody knows that they're guilty, yes resting on their conscience, eating their insides. It's freedom, said it's freedom time now, It's freedom, said it's freedom time now. Time to get free, oh give yourselves up now, it's freedom, said it's freedom time, There's a war in the mind over territory for the dominion/Who will dominate the opinion, schisms and -isms/Keeping us in forms of religion, conforming our vision to the world church's decision/Trapped in a section, submitted to committee election/Moral infection, epidemic lies and deception/Insurrection of the highest possible order/Distorting our tape recorders from hearing like under water/Beyond the borders fond of sin and disorder, bound by the strategy of systemic depravity/Heavy as gravity, head-first in the cavity without a bottom/A fate worse than Sodom/What's got 'em drunk off the spirits, truth comes we can't hear it 'when you've been programmed to fear it/I had a vision I was falling in indecision, appalling, calling religion some program on television/How could dominant wisdom be recognized in a system of antichrists and majority rules/Intelligent fools/PhDs in illusion, masters of mass confusion, bachelors of past delusion/Now who you choosin, the head or the tail/The bloodshed of the male, or confidence in the veil/Conferences at Yale discussing doctrines of Baal, causing people to fail, keeping the third in jail/His word has nailed everything to the tree, severing all of me from all that I used to be/Formless and void, totally paranoid, enjoyed darkness as/Lord keeping me from the sword, I was blocked from mercy, bitter than cerasee/hungry and thirsty for good meat we would eat and still dine at the table of deceit/How incomplete/From confrontation to retreat, we prolonged the true enemies' defeat/Destitute of necessity /Causing desperation to get the best of me/Punishment till there was nothing left of me, realizing the unescapable death of me/No options in the valley of decision/The only doctrine supernatural circumcision/Inwardly only water can purge the heart from words/The fiery darts thrown by the workers of the arts/Iniquity, shapen in, there's no escaping when your whole philosophy is paper thin/In vanity, the wide road is insanity/Could it be all of humanity? Picture that/Scripture that! The origin of man's heart is black/How can we show up for an invisible war/Preoccupied with a shadow, making love with a whore, aching in sores/Babylon the great mystery, mother of human history, system of social sorcery/Our present condition needs serious recognition/Where there's no repentence there can be no remission, and that sentence more serious than Vietnam, the atom bomb, and Saddam, and Minister Farrakhan/What's going on? What's a priority to you? By what authority do we do/The majority hasn't a clue/We've majored in curses, search the chapters, check the verses, recapture the land, remove the mark from off our hands, so we can stand in agreement with His command/Everything else is damned, let them with ears understand. Everything else is damned, let them with ears understand It's freedom, said it's freedom time now, It's freedom, said it's freedom time now. It's freedom, I'm a be who I am, it's freedom time, said it's freedom time
Everybody knows that they've lied, Everybody knows they've perpetrated inside Everybody knows that they're guilty yes, resting on their conscience, eating their insides. Get free, be who your supposed to be, freedom, said it's freedom time now, freedom, said it's freedom time, freedom, freedom time.
Explanation: Freedom Time, just likes it’s lyrics suggest, indicate a need for freedom, the fact that one must search out freedom. She plain and simply attacks, most scathingly societal structure, and anaylytically states what's the problem. She then goes on to state the cause. Finally, she provides the solution: "Our present condition needs serious recognition/Where there's no repentence there can be no remission, and that sentence more serious than Vietnam, the atom bomb, and Saddam, and Minister Farrakhan/What's going on? What's a priority to you? By what authority do we do/The majority hasn't a clue/We've majored in curses, search the chapters, check the verses, recapture the land, remove the mark from off our hands, so we can stand in agreement with His command/Everything else is damned, let them with ears understand. " The mark on our hands refers to a biblical reference. Obviously she instructs that we should seek out the knowledge in the bible: search the chapters, check there verses. By doing this we can: recapture the land stolen from us, both territorially and spiritually, and remoke the mark that curses our hands and our works. She says everything else be damned so that they with ears can understand.
IV. Social Drugs http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/09/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+socialdrugs.mp3 These social drugs, These social drugs
Afraid to address, All the reality before me, Too proud to confess, That im addicted to a lie, So I seek temporary feelings, To replace reality, Though the truth is telling me I should die, BUT IVE BEEN TAUGHT TO LOVE IT, sedate and don't confront it, I hate it when I found out, That I can't do what I wanted, This emotional tantrum, Has become somewhat of an anthem playing everytime I need to take a little trip,
To hide this condemnation, I find a combination, of manmade stimulation,
to deny my situation, Now this unreality, is distorting what I see, Reporting back to me, a sense of false security So in my imagination, Oh I must find a recreation, desperately in search of ways, to alter my sensations, theres no equilibrium, inebriated till im numb, intoxicated till im dumb, just to avoid confrontation
these social drugs
messing with my mind
these social drugs
telling me im fine
now this chemical analogy, is our emotional reality, these political
traditional and ethical stimulants, and the social etiquette, wont let us be too upset with the way things really are, you're taught to camaflouge regret
and the religious structure, tell us GOD want us to suffer, to suppot a situation, we all know is obligation, and if you shun an obligation, they'll just gun your reputation, like mob intimidation, to enforce participation
see they need to keep us fiends, to their lies and broken dreams, and if you find another means, you're told you're being too extreme, and if you wanted to get clean, they'll just pull those social strings holding up their social norms
defying noble things now were all stuck in tradition, unable to state out position, to afraid to contradict the expectations of the system oh and the harsh reality is they've made grace for you and me instead of saving you and me theyre just enslaving you and me!!!
these social drugs ,messing with my head, won't take me down, know what I mean Explanation: Social Drugs in one of her most profound recordings. In it she first take a personal look at what's going wrong with her life and the way society has infected and affected her. Finally, in the second verse she analyzes how society needs to keep us fiends to their lies and broken schemes, and how they manipulate us into believing their version of religion, spirituality, and life. She takes the song into an edgier ground introducing the rock drums, then ends by saying the social drugs won't take her down. V. Mystery of Iniquity To hear the song, click: http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/09/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+mysteryofiniquity.mp3 It's the mystery of Iniquity
It's the Misery of Iniquity
It's the History of Iniquity
And It All, All falls Down
I'm Tellin You All, it all Falls Down Children Eat Your Bread
Little Children Eat Your Bread
Cause It All, All Falls Down
I'm tellin You all, It All Falls Down Y'all can't handle the truth in a courtroom of lies
Perjures the jurors witnesses spies
Crooked lawyers false indictments publicized
It's entertainment the arraignments the subpoenas
High profile gladiators in blood thirsty arenas
Enter the dragon black robe crooked balance
Souls bought and sold and paroled for 30 talents
Court reporter catch the circus on a paper
File it in the system
Not acknowledged by the Maker
Swearing by the bible
Blatantly blasphemous
Publicly perpetrating that in God we trust
Cross examined by a master manipulator the faster intimidator
Receiving the judge's favor
Deceiving sabers
Doing injury to their neighbors
For status, gratis, apparatus & legal waivers
See the bailiff representing security
Holding the Word of God soliciting perjury
The prosecution, political prostitution
The more money you pay, the further away solution
Legal actors, babylon's benefactors
Masquerading as the agency for the client
Hypocritical giants, morally non compliant
Orally armed to do bodily harm
Polluted recruited & suited judicial charm
And the defense isn't making any sense
Faking the confidence of escaping the consequence
Now the defendant is dependent on a system
Totally void of judgement
Purposely made to twist him
Emotional victim blackmailed by the henchmen
Framed by intentions inventions whereby they lynch men
Enter the false witness slandering the accused
Planting the seed openly
Showing he's being used
To discredit edit headed for the alleged
Smearing the individual fearing the unsuspected
Expert witness the paid authority
Made a priority to deceive the majority
Of disinterested peers dodging duty for years
Hating the process
Waiting to return to their careers
Do we expect a system made for the elect
To possibly judge correct
Properly serve and protect
Materially corrupt, spiritually amuck
Oblivious to the cause
Prosperously bankrupt
Blind leading the blind
Guilty never defined
Filthy as swine
A generation pure in its own mind
Legal Extortion blown out of proportion
In vain deceit the truth is obsolete
Only 2 positions, victimizer or victim
Both end up in destruction
Trusting this crooked system
Mafia with diplomas
Keeping us in a coma
Trying to own a piece of the American Corona
The revolving door, insanity every floor
Skyscraping paper chasing, what are we working for?
Empty traditions, reaching social positions
Teaching ambition to support the family superstition
When the son of perdition is commander in chief
The standard is thief
Brethren can we candidly speak
Woe to the men
Trusting in the chariots them
Leaning on horses they run
To intellectual sources
Counterfeit wisdom creating the illusion of freedom
Confusion consumes them, every word they speaketh entombs them
Outwardly white, internally they're absent of light
Them trapped in the night & bondage to the 'caine in the night (Canaanite)
Under the curse, evil men waxing more worse, faxing the first
Angelic being cast to the earth, it's time for rebirth
Burning up the branch and the root
The empty pursuits'
Of every tree bearing the wrong fruit
Turn and be healed
Let him who stole, no longer steal, oh Israel
Surrender for Jehovah is real
How long will you sleep
Troubled by the thoughts that you keep
The idols you heap
Causing the destruction you reap
Judgment has come
Find it and return to the One
Abandon the flesh
Self-interest "broadway to death"
Pride and the greed hiding subdividing the seed
The knowledge of good and evil is what caused us to lie
Caused us to die
Let your emotions be crucified
Renounce all your thoughts
Repent and let your mind be retaught
You'll find what you sought
Was based on the deception you bought
A perception of naught where the majority remains caught
Loving a lie, not realizing in Adam all die
It's the mystery of Iniquity
It's the Misery of Iniquity
It's the History of Iniquity
Oh And It All, all falls Down
I'm tellin You All, it all Falls Down
Explanation: A scathing attacks against the judicial system, if words had immediate physical power, the United States Judicial system, buildings, and establishments would crumble at the end of the song. In the work she analyzes the hypocrisy, lies, and evil set up in the judicial system as it stands, by talking clearly about everything that is wrong with it, from the give and take game playing, the high profile celebrity excusals, the fact that juries may not be given access to TRUE information and sometimes don't care even if they are, all the way to the system's awareness of these flaws and refusal to correct them. Probably spawning from her court room drama with her former music providers and band, New Ark Entertainment, after they sued her for relatively unimportant song credits (to be sure, none of the song they sued for were the most major songs, and none from the New Ark staff sued for complete credits, simply for a line or two or a chord change). With this in consideration, it's easy to see how Lauryn was moved to expose the flaws within the judicial systems and society's acceptance of it.
Lauryn first starts by exposing the problem, the causes of the problem, and finally the solution to that problem:
"it's time for rebirth
Burning up the branch and the root
The empty pursuits'
Of every tree bearing the wrong fruit
Turn and be healed
Let him who stole, no longer steal, oh Israel
Surrender for Jehovah is real
How long will you sleep
Troubled by the thoughts that you keep
The idols you heap
Causing the destruction you reap
Judgment has come
Find it and return to the One
Abandon the flesh
Self-interest "broadway to death"
Pride and the greed hiding subdividing the seed
The knowledge of good and evil is what caused us to lie
Caused us to die
Let your emotions be crucified
Renounce all your thoughts
Repent and let your mind be retaught
You'll find what you sought
Was based on the deception you bought
A perception of naught where the majority remains caught
Loving a lie, not realizing in Adam all die"
LAURYN HILL ON LOVE VI. One To listen click here: http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/09/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+one.mp3 One woman loved you for the things you do, and one was excited by the things you knew, oh one, tried to love every part of you, but none understood you quite the way I do, see I love the higher soul in you, see I love the higher soul in you, see I love the higher soul in you, see I
One woman loved you for the life you tried to live, and one said she loved you for the fight you give, oh one said you made him feel just like a kid, but none understood you quite the way I did, see I love the higher soul in you, see I love you for the higher soul in you, see I love you for the higher soul in you, see I...
Explanation: One of Lauryn's most powerful recordings on record, this song establishes a mode of pure meditation in less than two minutes, and since it is not even two minutes long, one can see how powerful her presence, performance, voice, inspiration, and spirit was. Clearly moved, she address that love should not be about the physical: the things you do, what you look like, how you protect others, nor petty matters: sex or money, but about the higher soul in a person. Not just their soul, but their godly soul, the highest fiber of their being, then it moves down to the lowly physical aspects of man. A simple song, this is one of her first and clearly most powerful interpretations of love.
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Just Like Water
http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/09/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+justlikewater.mp3
Moving down the streams of my lifetime, pools of fascination in my sleep/Cooling off the fire of my longing, warming up my cold within His heat/Melting down the walls of inhibition, evaporating all of my fears/Baptizing me into complete submission, dissolving my condition with His tears/It's just like the water/I ain't felt this way in years.
Coursing through my senses He's prevailing, floating through the space of my design/Drowning me, I find my insides sailing, drinking in the mainstream of His mind/Filling up the cup of my emotions, spilling over into all I do/If only I could get lost in His ocean, surviving on the thought of loving Just like the water/I ain't felt this way in years
Bathing in the fountain of His essence, He causes my expression to remain, humbled on the mountain by His presence, washing my intentions with His name/Sealing off the floodgates of His passion/Saving all His liquid for His own/Moisturizing me to satisfaction, in my imagination all alone/He's pouring out His soul to me for hours/Drawing out my nature with His hands/Yearning, I'm so thirsty for His power, burning to be worthy of His land/It's just like the watercleaning me,
He's purging me, and moving me He's bathing me, and he's cleaning me, and moving me around, around and around, and around, and washing me, cleaning me, moving me around, he's purging me, he's been cleaning me and moving me and around, around, around and moving me
Explanation: Commonly mistaken to be a song about sex, instead of love this is a powerful expression of God's movement in her life. She's not talking about a man, althought that might be garnered from lines like: burning to be worthy of his land. She explains most clearly that she's talking about God in the line:If only I could get lost in His ocean, surviving on the thought of loving you, Just like the water/I ain't felt this way in years
Significantly, in the lyrics she provided Sony Records, the He is always captilized as if common when referencing to God. It's clear she's saying she wants to get lost in God's ocean, his largeness, his love, his oneness, surviving on the thought of loving you, perhaps her husband, or an unnamed person, perhaps even referencing to God, since God is all things He can be both He and You at the same time.
The song expresses a desire to be completely lost in God. She compares his power to an energetic fludity, refreshing her, remaking her, renewing her, rejuvenating her, renevating her, and moving her around, cleaning her, washing her, and completely making her new. Her desire to be lost in God's healing power is spoken in the line: burning to be worthy of his land, if only I could get lost in his ocean, dissolving her condition with his tears. She obviously relishes the feeling in the line: I ain't felt this way in years. This is a good thing, and it's something that she clearly wants for the future. This song is definately one to meditate over for some time, in search of God in this same way, that you can be refreshed and healed and made new.
I Remember
http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/09/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+iremember.mp3
One of the more powerful songs, it speaks for itself. It appears at first to be directed to a lover, but as it professes it is obvious that it is directed towards God, as are many of her songs. Self explanatory, there is no need for a detailed explanation, so much as to say she complete surrenders herself to the will of God in this work, and example that we should take in life. Completely surrendering yourself. Heed the line:
I'm naked before you, but can I do, there's nothing I can do, I feel so beautiful, with you in my life, with you in my life.
So Much Things to Say
http://www.soundclick.us/fastkG/10/05/freemp3/terrencecraft+somuchthingstosay.mp3
originally written by Bob Marley, a stand up for your rights type songs, that expressed the idea of remembering those things that are good and those things that are evil, taking a stand, and realizing that although the world will fight against you in word and deed, that the power of your stand is most important
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QUOTES BY LAURYN
I. REVOLUTION
Revolution, like impatriotion, must first take place in the mind and heart, when you revolutionize, you have a revolutionary way of thinking, believe it or not, selflessness is revolutionary, because it’s the hardest and most challenging thing to be, to be a person who considers righteousness over oneself, that’s revolutionary, when we see these revolutionaries manifesting themselves throughout history, they were able to prioritize what needed to be done over what benefited them first and foremost.
And not that it didn’t benefit them, but it benefitted a higher portion of themselves as opposed to their limited flesh experience, and they saw the importance and the value in sowing to the spiritual part of man, to the eternal part of man, as opposed to the temporary part of man.
Explanation: This quote is quite simple to digest. What she is saying is that revolution in the tradition context is cliche. There are forms of revolution within man's heart that he hasn't yet discovered. One of them is selflessness. She is saying that not enough people in the world are selfless. Not enough people give of themself and count themself unimportant. This being said, for a person to actually be SELFLESS is revolutionary because it's something so much over looked. She then describes selflessness as choosing righteousness in God over oneself, expressing God over ones, choosing and doing the Will of God over oneself. This is revolutionary because the majority os people don't do it.
She compares revolution to impatriation at the beginning as well, another important aspect of the multifaceted quote. When one become impatriated, that is to say one becomes a Patriot for a cause. A patriot believes in, upholds, and tries to protect a certain thing. In order to be a patriot you must have that thing engrained in your mind and heart. Revolution, the opposite of impatriation, is absolutely the same, revolution like impatriotion must start in the mind and heart, but revolution is when you don't believe in, don't uphold, or don't try to protect a certain thing, a revolutionize against it. The word revolution, originally meant, to make a complete circle. By making a complete circle, you wipe something complete clean and start all over going over that which is already done over again, to make something new. That is in effect what happens in revolution, but said revolution must be felt within the mind and heart of man. It cannot be the Warrior's Fantasy.
The Warrior's Fantasy is the idea of liking how it feels to be a rebel, liking the words, the recklessness, but not really feeling it. A famous poet once said, "do not speak of revolution unless you are willing to eat rats to survive". This is how deeply revolution must be ingrained in the heart of a man. If it is not that deep for you, you potentially could be posing, suffering from the Warrior's Fantasy, the desire to fit it, to be it because it seems impressive, but the lifestyle must be completely yours, and must be in your mind and heart.
II. HONESTY
Honesty is like oxygen, and when you deprive the world of oxygen, you get nothing but death. Honesty is what we weep for as a people have misconstrued weeping and the expression of emotion as weakness, but it’s courage. It’s strength. But if we’ve been wired backwards, if we’ve been told left was right and right was left, then what do you have but a nice mess, a bunch of people persecuted for being. We can change that, by virtue of the fact that God Is.
Like a fallen fighter who comes back to fight another day, for all intensive purposes, I’m not supposed to be here. The things that were said about me, done to me, were aimed at breaking my spirit, robbing me of all love, but I’m here.
Explanation: Another rather multifaceted consideration, this one is easier to analyze than the others. She clearly states that without honesty nothing can survive, by comparing honesty to oxygen. If there is no oxygen, man will die. Likening honesty to oxygen is much the same thing. Without honesty, man will be surrounded with lies and man cannot survive on lies. It is impossible for man to live if everything is a lie. For instance, if I tell you it's daytime and walk across the street, but it's actually night and there's a hole in the middle of street, will you not fall to your doom. Most importantly what happens if that is all you've been told. You don't know daytime, and don't know about holes, you just know what you're told. In this regard, honesty is absolutely necessary because there are private things people do not share, and the only way we will know them is if they share them honestly. If they don't we will not survive in a world of lies.
Further, she goes on that weeping and the expression of emotions is considered weakness, but that it's courageous to display everything within you openly and without lie.
III. LOVE
I want to be comformed to love, to be love incarnate, and to not listen to people who would say there’s something wrong with being love. We talk about professionalism (appearance and behavior in life), but what does any of that have to do with a real exchange. We behave as professionally (socially) as we need to, you are profession as you need to be, but sincerity shouldn’t offence, it doesn’t confuse or complicate things, if anything it’s broken down and made the environment more comfortable for everyone else, so what does a lack of professionalism (social acceptability) do, what is the cost of your lack of professionalism in life (social acceptability). I believe a world can exist on honesty, I believe it, I just do, I’m a believer.
Most importantly to her message is the idea of being conformed to love, which means to allow yourself to be love incarnate. That's the objective. To allow love to lead and rule your life, until when finally you die you become one with universe in love. This believe is similar to the japanese believe of Kachihayabi, which states that once you fully master love and harmony you become one with the universe, and that in order for someone to beat you or hurt you, they have to defeat the entire universe, and noone can do that, because you are in harmony with the universe and the principles of it. By being love, we can share ourselves in complete honesty, and basically don't need to front or pose in life.
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