This, along with "Hymn #101" and "Hymn #76", is part of a series of lyrics written to some imagined, much larger hymnal. Hymn #101 largely discusses the life of Jesus from his perspective, but this seems to be more from the "Father's" perspective. The interpretation of "YWVH" is generally "I Am that I Am". Joe Pug's lyric for this song attempt to capture all of that.
Since it's pretty difficult to interpret these lyrics individually, I'll try to do so overall. Most verses are composed of some statement about God, followed by a contradiction. This is a common notion in religious mythology, where a deity is both a creative and destructive force. Whereas in Hinduism where the creative and destructive are treated as aspects, the creative and destructive force of the Christian god is unitary. This is often seen as a great mystery; there's a whole field of philosophy related to it called Theodicy. If God is omnipotent and benevolent, then why does evil exist?
This could also be interpreted as contradictory statements that people CLAIM about God. Maybe Joe Pug is saying, "How can these all be true? But yet they are."
These contradictory themes include time (e.g., dawn, day, and darkness; the past, the present, and the unknown future; birth, rebirth, and eternity), danger and safety (a fence pasture, "dakota thunder raging"), morality and amorality ("I have done wrong, I will do wrong, there's nothing wrong with doing wrong"), power and weakness ("the teeth of champions", "rust of water rot"), creation and destruction ("I am the brush, I am the strokes/ I'm sickness come to the best of folks").
My feeling towards all this is that Joe Pug isn't trying to solve these mysteries, only evoke them.
This, along with "Hymn #101" and "Hymn #76", is part of a series of lyrics written to some imagined, much larger hymnal. Hymn #101 largely discusses the life of Jesus from his perspective, but this seems to be more from the "Father's" perspective. The interpretation of "YWVH" is generally "I Am that I Am". Joe Pug's lyric for this song attempt to capture all of that.
Since it's pretty difficult to interpret these lyrics individually, I'll try to do so overall. Most verses are composed of some statement about God, followed by a contradiction. This is a common notion in religious mythology, where a deity is both a creative and destructive force. Whereas in Hinduism where the creative and destructive are treated as aspects, the creative and destructive force of the Christian god is unitary. This is often seen as a great mystery; there's a whole field of philosophy related to it called Theodicy. If God is omnipotent and benevolent, then why does evil exist?
This could also be interpreted as contradictory statements that people CLAIM about God. Maybe Joe Pug is saying, "How can these all be true? But yet they are."
These contradictory themes include time (e.g., dawn, day, and darkness; the past, the present, and the unknown future; birth, rebirth, and eternity), danger and safety (a fence pasture, "dakota thunder raging"), morality and amorality ("I have done wrong, I will do wrong, there's nothing wrong with doing wrong"), power and weakness ("the teeth of champions", "rust of water rot"), creation and destruction ("I am the brush, I am the strokes/ I'm sickness come to the best of folks").
My feeling towards all this is that Joe Pug isn't trying to solve these mysteries, only evoke them.