The Word of the LordLyrics by Stephen Schwartz, Music by Leonard Bernstein
You can hear (and see) it sung here—the song is in English despite the narrative being in German.
You can lock up the bold men.
Go and lock up your bold men and hold them in tow.
You can stifle all adventure for a century or so.Smother hope before it is risen,
watch it wizen like a gourd,
but you cannot imprison the Word of the Lord.
No, you cannot imprison the Word of the Lord.For the Word,
for the Word was at the birth of the beginning,
it made the heavens and the earth and set them spinning.
And for several million years,
it withstood all our quorums and fine ideas.
It’s been rough,
it’s been rough but it appears to be winning.There are people who doubt it.
There are people who doubt it and shout it out loud.
There are local, vocal, yokels who we know collect a crowd.They can fashion a rebuttal that’s a subtle as a sword,
but they’re never going to scuttle the Word of the Lord.
No, they’re never going to scuttle the Word of the Lord.…
All you big men of merit,
all you big men of merit who ferret out flaws,
you rely on our compliance with your science and your laws.Find a freedom to demolish while you polish some award,
but you cannot abolish the Word of the Lord.
No you cannot abolish the Word of the Lord.For the Word,
for the Word created mud and got it going.
It filled our empty brains with blood and set it flowing.
And for thousands of regimes,
it endured all our follies and fancy schemes.
It’s been tough,
it’s been tough and yet it seems to be growing.Oh you people of power,
oh you people of power, your power is now.
You may plan to go forever but you never do somehow.So you wait in silent treason until reason is restored,
and we wait for the season of the Word of the Lord.
We await the season of the Word of the Lord.We wait,
we wait for the Word of the Lord.
I hope that is right, I wasn’t sure about a couple of words. I was working from the 1971 recording, I hear that the newer one on the video is slightly different.
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