Gnostic & Esoteric Symbolism in "The Last Fight" by Velvet Revolver

LYRICS:
Time feels like I've been back in jail
Like when I was doing time but in the can
Spend all night on a bended knee
Just to beg for something to believe
Left home with a pack of clothes without a family tree [reference to fool card, 0?]

This fight could be the last fight
No giving and no winning
One time could be the all the time
Should we decide to end the misery

Time heals all of the burned out bridges
Filled with nothing more than misery
I wear the mask of the embattled son
Trying to beg for something to believe
Left home with a pack of clothes without a family tree

Break the chains of featherweights and giants
With disdain for everlasting liars
They're afraid when we spit out the fire
And start living my friend [that prayer?]

(Who will answer my prayer?)

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VIDEO:
The video begins with a storm brewing and a battle cadence.  Interestingly the etymology of the word cadence means "to fall" and they always played these before battles....
Scott sits at a table dressed in a white shirt, possibly a symbol of purity/truth.
He writes in a book and seals it up with multiple layers.

The semi-nude woman opens the book called "The Last Fight" (Armageddon) and begins to read and starts crying.  She removes the purple ring.  
 
Possible correlations to the ring include wisdom similar to "the pearl of great price", the ring is symbolic of marriage and Purple as the balance of masculine (red) and feminine (blue) aspects of unity, so she is now in an unbalanced state, a fall from wisdom.

She puts on the red battle jacket (red-fiery, masculine, mars energy) and leaves.

Scott is back at the piano in white again, seeing what the girl is doing.

Notice the guitars here - White on the left, Black on the right, Black & white similar to a Taoist yin yang symbol in the middle.

Center guitar player's vest has skull & crossbones (symbol for poison, omen of impending doom), and he is wearing a cross necklace, death & resurrection... also maybe both symbols of crossroads (decision to make).. also memento mori, remember death.
 
We view a room with many chairs, which then have red blindfolds appear on them. Various people come in and take their seats but it looks like they are almost going through her or maybe she's invisible to them.

All those different people may be symbolic of collective cult mentality/brainwashing across various religions/cultures. The other people's clothing looks black & white, dull...
 
The other people put on red blindfolds - spiritual blindness, operating under the masculine, mars, fiery energy,, imbalanced.

All the people except the girl are blind and "drinking the koolaid/flavoraid." She gets up and walks out carrying the book and a rosary with a cross (spiritual death/resurrection).

All the people are coming down the steps, they don't have their blindfolds anymore, Perhaps this symbolic of them dying -- going into the underworld and waiting for another reincarnation cycle.  Physical death opposed to her spiritual death & resurrection?

The girl comes back to the original room, puts the purple ring back on and takes off the battle jacket.
She stands next to the piano... the G key is pressed down... (GNOSIS/GENERATIVE POWER/GREAT ARCHITECT OF THE UNIVERSE - in freemasonry).  A rose shows on the piano and opens up... a symbol of wisdom/illumination, balance, love, ...

The G key is below the rose (sub rosa - under the rose = secrecy)
The drummer puts the battle drum down and walks away.

Should the Bible be taught in Public Schools? READ COMPLETELY

YES. 100%. As unbiased as possible, meaning NOT FROM A RELIGIOUS VIEWPOINT.

BUT...... the answer to this question isn’t even that simple.

To even remotely try to accurately teach the bible, you need context!

The political, social and cultural and religious history of Canaanites, Chaldeans, Phoenicians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Persians, Greeks & Romans, etc. need to be understood at some basic level at least. Pretty much a study of world civilizations and cultures.

Why do you need to know something about all these other cultures to study the bible? Well, Judaism, which the bible and Christianity is based off of, DID NOT COME OUT OF A VACUUM. Religious syncretism happened with all cultures. EVERY culture has taken things from other cultures and put their own spin on it. Cultures influence each other. The bible goes through quite a few people before anyone is called a Hebrew... even longer before anyone is called an Israelite and even longer before Judah comes along, which is where the words Judaism and Jew come from.

It is also imperative that there is a basic understanding of how beliefs were transmitted orally for a very long time before ever being written down and once those beliefs finally became written down, they were redacted (compiled & edited). There are NO ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPTS currently in existence. Scholars make guesses based on when they think manuscripts were written using linguistics information and they test them using radiocarbon dating. The Dead Sea Scrolls are the oldest of the Hebrew (Old Testament) scriptures found, only dating back to around the 200’s BCE. The Babylonian exile is believed to occur around the 500’s BCE, so we do not have any Hebrew scriptures dating back even that far. The oldest New Testament manuscript found is P52 which is a fragment of the book of John which is the size of a business card. It is dated as early as 125 CE, but possibly later. Manuscripts that have been found DO have variations. Some would be considered insignificant, others are not insignificant as they relate to key verses regarding commonly held beliefs/dogmas of Christianity.

The Documentary (JEPD) Hypothesis describes how some scholars believe the old testament texts were redacted and an Israeli Artificial Intelligence linguistics program was used on the texts as well which had similar results. https://www.haaretz.com/1.5024378
So, imagine an ancient scribe/priest who is compiling all the beliefs and laws together. This person may be working with multiple versions of something, trying to figure out which is correct. Let’s say there’s something that the scribe/priest thinks isn’t correct or relevant anymore. They would re-write the manuscript, changing, adding, deleting the information as they believed was correct, or how they were instructed to do, and then either put the old copy in storage somewhere or just destroy it. Manuscripts were shared by communities and mostly kept by the priests. Most of the laypeople couldn’t even read or write. Even if they could, it was up to the priesthood, which was tied in directly with the government, to write, interpret and enforce the laws and religion.

Political, cultural, social and religious history of the Hebrew/Jewish culture needs to be studied as well. Things evolved over time. There were splits among them. The influence by and upon other cultures has never stopped.

The time leading up to the first century CE and following is especially important. The Herodian Dynasty and their ties to the Roman Empire, the various sects of Judaism, the various sects of “Jewish Christians” of which there were MANY, all with differing views... (they didn’t call themselves Christians)... Gnostic beliefs and mystery religions should be studied. The conflict between Paul and the other apostles needs to be understood. Paul’s version of “Christianity” won out, which became the state religion of the Roman Empire. The New Testament manuscripts came down through the Roman Empire/Roman Catholic Church and was under their control for 1500 years. There were manuscripts they didn’t want people to read and groups that disagreed with them, whom they persecuted. There have been a few finds where people hid stuff in the ground or in caves to keep them from being destroyed, such as the Nag Hammadi Texts or the Dead Sea Scrolls.

So that brings us to the history of the Roman Catholic Church, when most of the doctrines of Christianity were hammered out and brutally enforced, the Council of Nicea, the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Protestant Reformation, how the British Empire then took up Christianity as THEIR state religion, which they also brutally enforced. So not one, but two world empires used Christianity as their state religion, for empire control and expansion.

You need to know the history of bible translation and the politics, conflicts and persecution that went along with that for people who wanted to get the bible out of the Roman Catholic Church’s dominion and into the hands of the lay people. You need to know how translators have BIASES based on their beliefs, which determine how they translate the texts. Things also get “lost in translation.” Various types of literature and literary devices need to be understood. The bible is a compilation of many different works written at various times and for various reasons.

Then you really should have some understanding of Greek and Hebrew language or at least be able to use a concordance or interlinear to be able to look up the original words. For example, just the word “God” in English can be a myriad of different words in the original languages and they are not as simple as just “God.”

You should be able to CRITICALLY read and scrutinize the texts. Look for contradictions, because contrary to the beliefs of some, there are MANY.

Here’s a couple examples:

1. Most everyone knows the story of the Exodus and how it is said that God told them to do the lamb sacrifice and then afterward it is said that God told them a lot of other sacrifices they needed to do... Jeremiah 7:21-28 says God didn’t tell them to do sacrifices when he brought them out of Egypt. In verse 22, if your bible has “I did not JUST give you commands about sacrifices” or something to that effect, the word JUST has been added by the bible translators. http://biblehub.com/interlinear/jeremiah/7-22.htm There are many other verses in the bible against the sacrificial system as well.

2. 1st Chronicles 21:1 versus 2 Samuel 24:1... so was it Yahweh or Satan??

So, in conclusion, the bible is a loaded book. It should be studied because the beliefs surrounding it have caused utter PSYCHOSIS in the world by people who only know what they have been told to believe by their pastors. Most pastors don’t even know these things, and most Christians do not look into things for themselves, because they are so conditioned by fear. Many have never even read the whole bible in it’s entirety for themselves! If you think I am tearing down your faith by making this post, you need to ask yourself if people really need a book to know God. The Bible is not even that old in terms of human existence and apparently people described in the bible, DID NOT HAVE A BIBLE and it was said they knew God. If you want to try to say it’s the “Word of God” and He preserved it, it’s perfect, etc... WHO made you believe that? The church. Because it’s obviously not perfect if you open your eyes. There are contradictory and horrific things in that book ascribed to God that are never uttered in a church. Also, in the bible, it says the Word of the Lord came to the prophets and that was before the bible existed! God gave us a brain, the capacity to think and reason, and a heart (conscience), which we need to use to discern what is right and what is wrong.... it’s pretty simple. Psychology of beliefs, and all religions and religious texts need to be studied and scrutinized.

Gnostic & Esoteric Symbolism in Depeche Mode's "Suffer Well"

For years I only really knew and loved a couple of Depeche Mode songs.  "Enjoy The Silence" has been on my favorite list since the moment I heard it.  Once I began studying Gnosticism, all things esoteric and heretical, it gave me a new appreciation for Depeche Mode.  I find many of their lyrics and music videos contain multiple layers of meaning, many with a "gnostic vibe."  This is my take on their song and music video for "Suffer Well." I seem to find something new each time I listen to this song or watch the vid. Obviously I am writing this post, so these are my PERSONAL interpretations and opinions.

Just the name of the song are two words with opposite connotations.
Suffer - endure trials... be subjected to pain or sickness
Well - good... abundantly... healthy

Here are the lyrics:
Where were you when I fell from grace
Frozen heart, an empty space
Something's changed and it's in your eyes
Please don't speak, you'll only lie
I found treasure not where I thought
Peace of mind can't be bought
Still I believe
I just hang on
Suffer well
Sometimes it's hard
It's hard to tell
An angel led me when I was blind
I said take me back, I've changed my mind
Now I believe
From the blackest room, I was torn
You called my name, a love was born
So I believe
I just hang on
Suffer well
Sometimes it's hard
It's hard to tell
I just hang on
Suffer well
Sometimes it's hard
It's hard to tell

The exoteric meaning of the lyrics and video relate to the struggles Dave Gahan, the lead singer, experienced while living the rock star lifestyle which nearly killed him. The lyrics are also a questioning of religion, truth and reality.

Here are the thoughts I have on what may lie beneath the surface interpretation.

The video starts with a clean-cut Dave getting out of a limousine dressed in a gray jacket and black pants. Gray is a mixture of black and white. Black and white are symbolic of duality, two poles of extremity... masculine/feminine, light/dark, good/evil dichotomies.. Seeing only in black and white is viewed as being in a state of base or lower consciousness. Think of the checkerboard pattern, the twin columns of freemasonry and the pillars of severity and mercy in Kabbalah. Gray would be symbolic of the mixture/balancing of these dichotomies or “middle way.”

He then removes his wedding band. Marriage is the joining of the masculine and feminine (not getting into a debate or discussion on marriage and gender, this is about symbolism). The wedding band would also be symbolic of that middle way and balance between dichotomies. When he removes it, this is another indicator of a state of imbalance.

He breaks into a jewelry store which is shown with glittering curtains. Symbolic of materialism and greed. He puts on a cross necklace, some rings and his clothes change into a black shirt and pants with a white tank top underneath. The black is predominant. His hair and mustache have grown, symbolic of time. He also puts on sunglasses, symbolic of having his eyes covered... “being blind.”

He sees an angel in heaven and starts walking across the street towards it, nearly being ran over in the process. He's traveling toward the perceived light, goodness or truth  but he is “blind”.... enveloped by darkness (ignorance)... his vision has been obscured.... lacking mental perception. The angel then vanishes, symbolic of that which he was seeing being illusory. (The angel is actually his wife, who will make another appearance later.)

Then he comes to the next building labeled “FUTURE.”
The neon signs say “we sell HELL and suffer well” and “palms read, fortunes told”
He doesn't enter this building, he just stares at the neon sign for a while then moves on. I see these two neon signs representing the church (who sells hell) and new age beliefs.... or more generally, mainstream/accepted beliefs vs. alternative beliefs. Both are chock full of charlatans and bullshit to be avoided.

The wind starts blowing hard as he walks away from the window. Notice his pants are now gray, He goes into the tavern which is unattended so he just helps himself to some drinks. .. (Notice the black and white checkerboard floor.) Liquor is referred to as a “spirit.” He drinks the “spirit,” passes out, then wakes up, now wearing the white tank top. The cross on his necklace has changed, it's hard to see but it looks like it's now a crucifix... symbol of death/dying. He is drunk and disheveled and begins dancing on the checkerboard floor. Symbolic of gluttony, lack of self control.... base consciousness

He exits the tavern and it's raining. He tries to cover his head with a newspaper but sees that it is useless.

Now he comes to DM's Bridal Shop, where his other two bandmates are bride and groom mannequins. Again with the symbolism as mentioned above. He stands between the bride and groom.... struggling between the two dichotomies, or two pillars.  The bride mannequin begins singing... showing a questioning of reality.

The snow starts falling and then it shows Dave in an even more disheveled appearance, longer hair/mustache, his sunglasses have changed and the necklace is gone. He crawls through the snow and then is shown lifeless against a building. Next you see Dave as he was in the beginning. A symbolic death and resurrection. His wife walks up, gives him a kiss, and he's wearing the wedding band. All symbolic of a returning state of balance and equilibrium, They then pass by his old, dead self which is buried in snow.