Celebrating more than 100,000 visitors
over the last four years ! :-)
You are visitor number: Car Accident Lawyer since
5th April 2006, when I
replaced the web counter ;-)
WordsofWisdom
was originally founded
24th November 2001.
Greetings and welcome toWordsofWisdom!
This website is
dedicated to matching Reggae song lyrics to
Biblical quotations. Thank you for
visiting. May JAH guide thy coming in and protect thy
going out -
Deuteronomy 28:6, Psalm 121:8
Many
reggae songs - especially those inspired by Rastafari - contain biblical quotations,
references, and allusions. Sometimes these are quite
obvious, taken as direct quotes from scripture, but in
other cases they may be adapted to fit a rhythm or rhyme,
and will therefore be less easy to pin-point.
Biblical quotes in reggae lyrics are usually taken from
the King James Version (abbreviated to KJV)
of the Bible, also known as the Authorized Version (AV). This was
published in 1611, which accounts for the old style of
English. The KJV is still perhaps the most widely known
and best loved version of the Bible in English today.
Click the picture for more general information about the Bible
Quotations in reggae lyrics are frequently adapted from
the original Biblical text to include Rastafarian
terminology. See the Key Ideas section of this website for
plenty of examples.
Reggae lyrics did not always contain Biblical quotations.
Probably these were first introduced when Rastafarian
musicians appeared on the reggae scene. Since this time,
reggae music has become almost inseparably associated
with Rasta culture, not least because some of its best
known exponents were Rastafarians. The closely related Nyabinghi chants are similarly often
inspired by the Psalms.
As a slight aside from the main biblical theme, I've also
devoted part of this site to the occurence of
Amharic lyrics in Reggae songs. Amharic is the
national language of Ethiopia, and is therefore very important
to Rastafarians. Please see the Amharic
section for
further information, translations and reggae lyrics
featuring Amharic words and phrases.
As mentioned above, I've also included a selection of
articles about key concepts (both biblical and
extra-biblical) featured in Rasta reggae lyrics, as well
as brief commentary where appropriate on some of the most
frequently occurring biblical quotations.
Personally, I love reading the Bible. Sometimes quite by
chance I will come across a scripture that I recognise
from a Reggae song, and think, 'Aha! So that's where it
comes from'. Most of the time, however, I use the Bible Gateway website to help find quotations and
references. This site is a powerful Bible-study tool,
where you can both look up particular references and also
search for words or phrases. It has translations of the
Bible in numerous different languages and versions.
WordsofWisdom was originally the so-called 'Bible
Section' of the Reggae
Lyrics Archive but has expanded to the extent that it is
now a homepage in its own right.
The title 'Words Of Wisdom' is derived from the
song of the same name by Dennis Brown. However, the phrase 'words of wisdom' is
not actually a direct bibilcal quotation in the KJV,
though most people would agree that the Bible contains
many words of wisdom.
Click here for a list of all the artists/groups
whose lyrics are featured on this site.
I hope you will find this site useful and informative,
whether your interest is from the angle of reggae, Rasta,
the Bible, languages, or any other.
Please feel free to send any comments,
suggestions, or corrections to me, Lois.Many
thanks :-)