Are Leonard Cohen's lyrics influenced by Buddhism?

[remote1]

Holydove, your posts are real treasures!

Reading the end of your post, I realised that one of the reasons I was loathe to see this thread come to an end is that I find it somewhat therapeutic. Could it be that crumbs of Buddhist bread are nourishing my mind right now?

Putting together your thoughts as well as Lili's, I think I will soon be able to put together a little narrative for myself on what "Waiting for the Miracle" might be about. However, when it comes to the last stanza, I am a bit stumped. I did understand it pretty much the way you do, but what I can't help thinking is this: if you're worried about being locked up, surely you're not going to tell the doctors, psychologists, or whoever they may be - "when you've fallen on the highway/and you're lying in the rain/and they ask you how you're feeling" - that "you're out there waiting for the miracle/ Waiting for the miracle to come"?
Anyway, I need to give this a bit more thought... Perhaps we're on the wrong track...

As for greetings, I don't know, maybe we don't really need any as we're never away from the forum for very long. So I'll just say: "See you!"

[Lilifyre]

In speaking of "Miracles", an old story came to mind. In the early days of the State of Israel, I think following either the 6 Day War or the Yom Kippur War, one of the founders (sorry can't recall if it was Ben Gurion, Golda Meier, or someone else) was asked if the Israeli's victory was seen as a "Miracle" considering they were so grossly outnumbered. The answer given was that as Jews there were 2 possibilities as to how victory was achieved...the ordinary/natural or the miraculous/supernatural. On the one hand the victory might have been an act of G_d in reestablishing a Jewish homeland. On the other hand it might have been that the Israelis had a superior fighting force, flawless equipment, and an inexhaustible supply of ammunition. After some thought, it was decided that the victory was achieved thru totally ordinary/natural means....G_d had intervened on the behalf of the Jewish People.

Just goes to show how a Miracle can be seen differently, depending on your point of view. That little story also points out that you can either wait for the miracle or you can go ahead and make the miracle happen. In my story above, the Israelis didn't just sit back and wait for the miracle, they went ahead and made the miracle happen. Perhaps this is what is being said thru-out this song. Don't just sit around and wait for the miracle. Act, do something, get married, do something "absolutely wrong". The song moves from complacency and boredom to action...even if it's the "wrong" action......force the miracle.

I can't speak for the Christian interpretation of miracles, but within Judaism, miracles are not considered "supernatural". They are as natural as the air we breathe, the rain that falls, the earth beneath our feet. I'm not sure how this relates to the Buddhist way of thinking. If you look at any of the pre-Christian Biblical "miracles", they only take place when accompanied by action. According to the accompanying Midrash, the waters of the Red (Reed?) Sea were parted only when the people committed themselves to crossing. Water came forth from the rocks only when Moses struck it. Miracles happen, but if all you do is wait for them....you'll wait your life away.

Lili

[TipperaryAnn]

Greetings, back after long Easter break! Have read about "Waiting for the Miracle" with interest, though it's not one of my favourites. I suppose the outcome of this thread would be " a few of Leonard's songs have been influenced by Buddhism. " But "When it all comes down to dust " he is really writing about himself and his concerns at the time, and magpie-like, draws on anything he was reading about or interested in at the time. Reminds me of Yeats, (Leonard would approve! ) who wrote about Oisin and Niamh and other characters of Gaelic legend, and then in later years looked back and wrote "But what cared I that set him (Oisin ) on to ride, I starved for the bosom of his faery bride," (NIamh, representing the real love of Yeats's life at the time, Maud Gonne. ) Persian poets, Buddhism, Christianity, Judaism, etc. all provided him with imagery and ideas.

[rpan]

Hallelujah - Leonard Cohen’s “Great Western Buddhist Hymn”

For Facebook users some interesting views at http://he-il.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=106490620418 on the Shambhala Sun facebook page from a guest writer James Ishmael Ford who is a Zen practitioner:

"I think of “Hallelujah” as one of the great Western Buddhist hymns, even if the words are all about David, king of sinners. For me the way shines through within our brokenness, or perhaps it would be better to say exactly as our brokenness. And Cohen touches this as few others ever have...."

[remote1]

Thanks for the link rpan. All very interesting. It's getting late, so I won't try to discuss it now, but while following various links that started from yours, I found an interview in which Leonard talks about "Waiting for the Miracle":

I think the miracle that is experienced in this song is the vision from the other side of waiting. It brings us back to that wisdom of no exit. There is a miracle that we are all waiting for that somehow goes along with the construction of the human heart, the human psyche. We seem to be waiting for a miracle. It seems we don’t have to dig too far to experience that waiting, that anxiety.

There’s another position where you move across the waiting to the other side of waiting. Where you recognize or acknowledge or affirm that you’re waiting for the miracle, but this is a position of freedom, rather than a position that is imprisoned or fixed.

Waiting is fixed. The other side is free. You’re free to come or go from your waiting, and that’s where the song says, “Let’s do something crazy, something absolutely wrong.” At the other side of waiting, you can act freely—free from right and free from wrong, free from waiting and free from not waiting. That’s the miracle of the song. It led me to that other position where I could look at waiting from the other side.

Source: http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?o ... mitstart=2
Leonard Cohen: "The Other Side of Waiting", January 1994. [Can't find it in The Leonard Cohen Files, but it's probably there somewhere]

I have not read the whole interview but there may be more in there on the relationship between his lyrics and Buddhism. Just thought I would report the finding immediately, in case those of you who are on a different time zone fancy reading it while I'm asleep!

Good night!

[TineDoes]

Looking from a humanistic or secular point of view I always took ‘waiting for the miracle’ to mean ‘waiting for the impossible’ (dream). I think that on the road towards a good and meaningful life one of the things one has to do is take responsibility for ones life and actions; be brave, make decisions, act and take the consequences. When or if one doesn’t do this and just sits around and waits for something to happen, for the breaks to come, one cannot hope for anything but to pick up the crumbs that others leave behind and then one must never complain.
But because taking responsibility is so very difficult and takes so much courage we often choose the agony of waiting. This is what, in my simple understanding, I hear in this song.

Thank you all for your very interesting and beautiful explainations, Learning so much from you.
Tineke

http://www.leonardcohenfiles.com/dube.html
A paper on 'Waiting for the miracle' which you've probably come accross already.

[Lilifyre]

Looking from a humanistic or secular point of view I always took ‘waiting for the miracle’ to mean ‘waiting for the impossible’ (dream). I think that on the road towards a good and meaningful life one of the things one has to do is take responsibility for ones life and actions; be brave, make decisions, act and take the consequences. When or if one doesn’t do this and just sits around and waits for something to happen, for the breaks to come, one cannot hope for anything but to pick up the crumbs that others leave behind and then one must never complain.
But because taking responsibility is so very difficult and takes so much courage we often choose the agony of waiting. This is what, in my simple understanding, I hear in this song.....

This is basically the same thing I said. Thank you, TineDoes for saying it in such a succinct manner. Taking responsibility requires action, not just "waiting".

Lili

[TineDoes]

Lilifyre,
Thank you for confirming this. It was this quote that prompted my writing; sorry for not putting it in:

Don't just sit around and wait for the miracle. Act, do something, get married, do something "absolutely wrong". The song moves from complacency and boredom to action...even if it's the "wrong" action......force the miracle.

Now this:

Taking responsibility requires action, not just "waiting".

In the interview in the film "I'm your man" by Lian Lunson, Leonard Cohen talked about the song The Traitor. I quote these lines:

"The judges said you missed it by a fraction
Rise up and brace your troops for the attack
Ah the dreamers ride against the men of action
Oh see the men of action falling back
....
So daily I renew my idle duty
I touch her here and there -- I know my place".

I think what LC said in that interview was that sometimes waiting and not taking the responsibility of action and suffering the consequences is preferable in some situations.
Though in this song the Traitor might have been taking his responsibility by not obeying the orders from above.

[TipperaryAnn]

I think there is a lot of sense in what you say about taking responsibility, TineDoes and Lillyfyre, not just "waiting for the miracle". Have you heard the story about the religious man forced up onto his roof because of a flood ? A rescue boat stops below and the rescuers plead with him to climb down to them, but he refuses : "God will provide", he says, so they give up, and go to rescue someone else. Then the flood waters keep rising, and he is drowned. He appears before God and remonstrates with him: " Why didn't you provide?" he demands. God's reply is : "And who do you think sent the boat ?"

[holydove]

[quote="remote1"]

but what I can't help thinking is this: if you're worried about being locked up, surely you're not going to tell the doctors, psychologists, or whoever they may be - "when you've fallen on the highway/and you're lying in the rain/and they ask you how you're feeling" - that "you're out there waiting for the miracle/ Waiting for the miracle to come"?

Remote1, good point!! This verse is really, on a certain level, hilariously funny! I also can't help thinking, that if you see someone who has fallen on the highway, & lying in the rain - would you really need to ask that person how he's feeling?? Isn't is rather obvious, how he would be feeling!! Perhaps these inquirers are not very perceptive.

So, while the narrator's physical situation quite obviously displays/represents his state of emotional despair & derangement (as I see it), his verbal responses (in LC's inimitable style) contain these paradoxes: first he says he "can't complain", then when he's "squeezed for information", the lyric says he's "got to play it dumb" & his verbal response is that he's "out there waiting for the miracle. . .", so while he says that he must withold the information by "playing it dumb", his response reveals his true state of mind - which is so obvious that one can't fathom why anyone would even ask such a bizarre question, or need to "squeeze" him for the information, given the circumstances. So the inquiry (re: how he's feeling), and his response that he's out there (lying on the highway in the rain) waiting for the miracle, and the imagery of the whole verse, I would venture to say, magnifies the absurdity of the whole human circumstance - how we all relate to each other, to our own pain, to the world, etc. - how we pretend not to know, how we see but don't see, how we try to hide things that really can't be hidden, how we conceal & reveal at the same time, etc. I think this whole song contains alot of paradox and dark humor - the kind that only LC can conjure from the deep caverns of his exquisite mind!!

About the interview where he talks about the "other side of waiting" (I had forgotten about that - thanks for the reminder); I think there may be another paradox here: we are all waiting for the usual/conventional idea of something "extraordinary" to happen; and perhaps the thing that can get us to the "other side of waiting", & free us from the "prison" of waiting, is the realization that every moment of our ordinary daily existence is really quite miraculous & extraordinary (& that is a "biggy" in Zen/Buddhism - what we spend so much of our time looking for, & waiting for, is really right here, right now). Attaining that realization requires both effort & waiting - hence he is still waiting, but there is a sense of freedom (other side) within the waiting, because he is choosing to both wait, & make the required effort. Actually, the type of waiting required in meditation practice is a very active waiting - Taoism teaches the idea of movement within stillness & stillness within movement - it's a similar idea.

TINEDOES: thank you for the link to that article - very interesting!

[TineDoes]

I think there may be another paradox here: we are all waiting for the usual/conventional idea of something "extraordinary" to happen; and perhaps the thing that can get us to the "other side of waiting", & free us from the "prison" of waiting, is the realization that every moment of our ordinary daily existence is really quite miraculous & extraordinary

Holydove, Excuse me for butting into the exchange.
I am not sure I understood the meaning of ''the other side of waiting". Do I understand that this is the time that the state of waiting has turned into a state of acceptance and that the mind had changed focus; from wishing the impossible to appreciating and opening up to what 'is' and seeing 'possibilities'?
Lilifyre, Tying this into the exchange about 'responsibility'. It would mean that action is not the only path in which one can realise ones own miracles.

There is another LC song where there is 'the others side of.... " not of 'waiting' but of 'loss'. And that is "Alexandra Leaving" .
First there is the loosing and then there is a proposed transition into accepting the loss.
Say goodbye to Alexandra leaving.
Then say goodbye to Alexandra lost.

TipperaryAnne,
That is a funny story, thanks.

[remote1]

Hey TineDoes

I am sure Holydove will answer your question, but I thought I would dig out this old post of hers which may be relevant, to give her a hand: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=20614&start=15#p212307.

What I understand when Leonard talks about "the other side of waiting", "the other side of loss", "the other side of intimacy", is that he is turning inside out old concepts and habitual ways of being, so as to look beyond them, to look at them as just what they are, concepts, habits of the mind. If we are able to see them as such, we can free ourselves of their empire on us to a certain extent. It's a bit like looking behind the mirror and realizing that the mirror is a construct...

So I think that in the interview Leonard is not saying that he is necessarily free of "waiting for the miracle", as he seems to see this as part of the human condition, but what he is saying is that he is free to come and go as he wishes within and without the concept/habit. This insight (or outsight, perhaps) is his freedom. And so he explains: "At the other side of waiting, you can act freely—free from right and free from wrong, free from waiting and free from not waiting. That’s the miracle of the song. It led me to that other position where I could look at waiting from the other side."

The last stanza certainly makes more sense if it is understood as ironical, although I don't get that in his tone when he is actually singing the song. Still, I believe it is a likely reading. When you're in a state of distress which nobody seems to really understand, which nobody perhaps is in a position to understand, and they try to help but you know that they will never get it, just forget about it, accept that you cannot be helped, accept your distress. Only you can understand that within your distress, you also have a freedom that they could not comprehend*. Of course I understand that there is a strong Buddhist message in this. I can't help being reminded of Baudelaire's poem, L'Albatros: "Le Poète est semblable au prince des nuées/Qui hante la tempête et se rit de l'archer. . ." (Here is a link to the poem with multiple translations of unequal quality: http://fleursdumal.org/poem/200). The poet was misunderstood by his contemporaries but was prince of the skies, he flew higher and saw better; he was a seer, a visionary. This can be transposed to "Waiting for the Miracle", in that the narrator is able to see the other side of things; he also, is misunderstood, but he is prince of the skies...

* I assume that it is understood that all human beings have the potential to reach this freedom, but that in the time and space of the song, the protagonists have not yet got to that place.

[TineDoes]

Remote1,
Thank you for posting the link with The other thread. Must do more digging. ANd also the translations of the poem The Albatross. An ugly glimpse into human nature that, and what we are capable of doing to others when we are not able or willing to accept the existence and beauty of exceptional creatures that are beyond our reach.

Thanks also for your very clear explanations. I may still not understand to the full what you are saying about duality, but that is because I have little framework of reference on Buddism.
In the 70’s I did read the book Siddhartha I think by Hermann Hesse. It was about the life of Buddha. There is one concept I vaguely remembered, if I remember correctly this is it:
When Siddhartha was sitting in contemplation by a river, he came to the conclusion that there is no difference between sitting by the river in contemplation or being in the river and going with the flow. The river being the river of life.
I think this could have a connection with what you wrote about the 'other side'; that one is free to take part in life, to act and go with the living because one knows it also okay to choose not to take part and observe and contemplate life from the side line. Correct me if I am wrong!
Question: Could everybody make this concept of duality and of the freedom his or her own? If so does whoever does not become impalpable or illusive for others around him or her and make that person always beyond the reach of others? Like the person waiting for the miracle in the last stanza who can or will not be helped.
A vivid image comes to mind out of the musical Jesus Christ Superstar where Jesus is accused and led before Pontius Pilot and says nothing in his own defence. Pilot then says something like this: “well die if you want to you innocent martyr” And we know how the story goes….. I guess I’m back with the Albatross . Excuse the rambling on.

The poet was misunderstood by his contemporaries but was prince of the skies, he flew higher and saw better; he was a seer, a visionary. This can be transposed to "Waiting for the Miracle", in that the narrator is able to see the other side of things; he also, is misunderstood, but he is prince of the skies...

Tine

[holydove]

TINEDOES: you are not butting in - the discussion is open to everyone, I'm glad you joined us, & thank you for your great questions & comments.

REMOTE1: Thank you for your wonderful explanation of the "other side" - I think it's perfect! And thank you for the reminder of Leonard's quote about how the song led him to another position where he could look at waiting from the other side. It reminds me of the album title "Various Positions": LC has spoken of the Zen teaching that one should not get stuck in seeing any given situation in only one way; that one's mind should be flexible, willing & able to view any given situation/idea/etc., from - you guessed it - "various positions" - I think he actually related that teaching to the title he gave to the album (or maybe I made that connection, but I think he actually said it himself - don't remember for sure, though, & don't want to misattribute words - anyway, the connection does seem likely). And I think this idea of shifting one's mind from one position, to another, to another, etc., is very telling in terms of this song, as well as much of LC's songs & poems - I've always been very struck by how he so frequently shifts into "various positions" of looking at whatever the subject may be - from personal to universal; from social/ political to spiritual to personal; from bitter to tender; from hilarity to deep gravity - all within one song/poem.

So yes - another way to say it (though remote1 already said it perfectly - turning old concepts/habits inside out) might be that an alternative to being caught up within a particular way of viewing something, or within a particular emotion/idea/emotional response, would be to extricate oneself from whatever mental/emotion place you find yourself stuck in, & try to view it from different angles. The situation might still remain as it was - but we can potentially find freedom within it by viewing/responding to it differently - & that, in turn, can transform the situation into something else - because, ultimately, our realities are created by our minds - when we change our minds, we change our realities. So maybe he is still waiting, but his experience & view of waiting is different.

[TineDoes]

LC has spoken of the Zen teaching that one should not get stuck in seeing any given situation in only one way; that one's mind should be flexible, willing & able to view any given situation/idea/etc., from - you guessed it - "various positions" - I think he actually related that teaching to the title he gave to the album

From Various Positions by I. Nadel. P2 - about the title of the book and the album:
Quote - The title of the book ...is also a philosophical statement, reflecting a dictum offerd by Cohen's Zenmaster, Joshu Sasaki Roshi: "A Zen man has no attachments'. To fix a position, to hold a singular point of view for a lifetime, is antithetical to Zen because there are no absolutes in the Zen world. The only absolute is change; all is transition. The only thing that lasts and the only reality in Zen is the pure and unattached self, which one must constantly seek to uncover. - unquote.