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Dylan views man spiritually. In "Dirge" (1973) he confesses, "I felt that place within/ That hollow place/ Where martyrs weep/ And angels play with sin." In "Simple Twist of Fate" (1974) he writes of one who "Felt that emptiness inside/ To which he just could not relate." Man's spiritual cavity too often remains vacant.

Dylan has criticized the established religious institutions. "Got no religion. Tried a bunch of different religions. The churches are divided. Can't make up their minds and neither can I," he said early in his career. He hit at the attempts of churches and preachers to be relevant in "Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again" (1966):

Now the preacher looked so baffled
When 1 asked him why he dressed
With twenty pounds of headlines
Stapled to his chest
But he cursed me when I proved it to him.
Then 1 whispered. "Not even you can hide.
You see, you're just like me.
I hope you're satisfied."

Religious institutions are impotent: "The priest wore black on the seventh day/ And sat stone-faced while the building burned" ("Idiot Wind," 1974).

Dylan views God pantheistically. "I can see God in a daisy," he told an interviewer. "I can see God at night in the wind and rain. I see creation just about everywhere. The highest form of song is prayer. King David's, Solomon's, the wailing of a coyote, the rumble of the earth." In his modern-day psalm "Father of Night" (1970), Dylan praises God as the creator of night and day, heat and cold, loneliness and pain. He is the Father of all "who dwells in our hearts and our memories," the "Father of whom we most solemnly praise." Dylan's prayer for his generation and all succeeding people is outlined in "Forever Young" (1973): "May God bless and keep you always," may you "know the truth," be righteous, upright, and true and "stay forever young." For as he wrote earlier, "He not busy being born/ Is busy dying."

"Sign on the Cross" (1967), perhaps Dylan's most enigmatic song, says that the sign on Jesus' cross can never be forgotten—"And it's still that sign on the cross/ That worries me." Men cannot escape that symbol and what it means.

"Knockin' on Heaven's Door (1972) deals with death. "I Threw It All Away" (1969) points to love as the ultimate force for good in the world. "Oh Sister" tells of dying, being reborn, and being "mysteriously saved." "Shelter From the Storm" finds Dylan wearing a crown of thorns and bargaining for salvation. "Long Ago, Far Away" (1962) warns that those who promote brotherhood might end up hanging on a cross. "Isis" (1975) speaks of quick prayers that easily satisfy. Priests recite "prayers of old" as the face of God appears in the streets in "Romance in Durango" (1975). "Joey" (1975) pictures a God of retribution who will punish evil acts.

Bob Dylan pioneered the message song; he remains at its forefront. He asks metaphysical questions and tries to give some answers, which are less than Christian. But he has affected many young people and continues to do so. We need to understand what kind of spiritual guidance he gives.

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May (Web-only) 2001, Vol. 45