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Friends,
One of the defining songs of my youth was “Blinded by the Light,” written by Bruce Springsteen in 1973 appearing on his debut album Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. (1973) and later transformed by Manfred Mann’s Earth Band on their 1976 album The Roaring Silence. Springsteen was sketching vignettes of life on the Jersey shore. The “blinded by the light” refrain itself carries the exhilaration and disorientation of being young and overwhelmed—by possibility, by sensation, by the sheer noise of being alive on the margins of society. Springsteen is presenting Light here not as something gentle or clarifying or healing; it is truly blinding, overwhelming, almost violent in its intensity. It is the feeling of standing at the edge of something enormous and not yet knowing what to do with it.
For the neighbors of the blind man, the pharisees, and the blind man’s parents this is the same feeling. The pharisees perceive the Light, Jesus, to be from something other than Yahweh and therefore bad. The neighbors are unsure the man with sight is the same person who was the blind man that they knew. The parents know it is their son, but they cannot testify to how his sight was restored.
Manfred Mann’s Earth Band’s version makes minor changes in the lyrics and major changes musically and to the overall meaning of the song. The grounded specificity of Springsteen’s Jersey shore framing gets abstracted. And being “blinded by the light” in Mann’s version feels less like the specific disorientation of youth on a New Jersey boardwalk and more like a general condition of being overwhelmed by existence itself—by beauty, by sensation, by forces larger than the self. The light in Mann’s arrangement feels genuinely celestial, almost divine in its indifference and power. While the man who was blind and now sees does not experience Jesus’ healing as indifference, he is overwhelmed by it and understands it as larger than himself, and he cannot explain it initially.
Ultimately, the man understands who healed him and then he utters these words, “Lord, I believe.” In uttering these words, he makes it clear that one is saved/healed by the Light of the world not blinded by it. We, too, will be saved/healed by the Light of the world!
Peace,
Rev. Tim
Manfred Mann’s Earth Band’s version (1976)
“Blinded by the Light”
Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
Madman, drummers, bummers
Indians in the summer with a teenage diplomat
In the dumps with the mumps
As the adolescent pumps his way into his hat
With a boulder on my shoulder, feelin' kinda older
I tripped the merry-go-round
With this very unpleasin', sneezin' and wheezin'
The calliope crashed to the ground
The calliope crashed to the ground!
But she was blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
Some silicone sister with a manager mister
Told me I got what it takes
She said, "I'll turn you on, son, into something strong
Play the song with the funky break"
And go-kart Mozart was checkin' out the weather chart
To see if it was safe outside
And little Early-Pearly came by in his curly-wurly
And asked me if I needed a ride
Asked me if I needed a ride!
But she was blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
Blinded by the light
Revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
blinded by the light
(Indians in the summer with a teenage diplomat) revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
(In the dumps with the mumps) blinded by the light
(As the adolescent pumps his way into his hat) revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
blinded by the light
(I tripped the merry-go-round) revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
(With this very unpleasin', sneezin' and wheezin') blinded by the light
(The calliope crashed to the ground) revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
blinded by the light
(And throws his lover in the sand) revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
(And some bloodshot, forget-me-not said daddy's within earshot) blinded by the light
(Save the buckshot, turn up the band) revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
blinded by the light
(Told me I got what it takes) revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night
(She said, "I'll turn you on, son, into something strong")
She got down, but she never got tired
She's gonna make it through the night
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