Personal Jesus: An In-Depth Look at the Remarkably Popular Hit
The big hit Personal Jesus first released on August 29, 1989 by quintessential 1980s synthpop band Depeche Mode has been covered by over 11 different bands and sampled in multiple other places, including National Public Radio.
Quick Facts:
- Ranked #368 on Rollings Stone magazine's "The RS 500 Greatest songs of all time"
- Popular covers of Personal Jesus include Johnny Cash, Marilyn Manson
- The back-cover of "Personal Jesus" features one of the band members and the back-side of a naked woman. The band member she is with depends on whether you have the 7" Vinyl (Martin Gore), the 12" Vinyl (David Gahan), the Cassette (Andrew Fletcher), or the original CD (Alan Wilder).
- The song was sampled in Hilary Duff's "Reach Out", which she performed on her 2007 tour, the Dignity tour.
Behind the Song:
Songwriter Martin Gore says the song was inspired by the book Elvis and Me by Pricilla Presly:
"It's a song about being a Jesus for somebody else, someone to give you hope and care. It's about how Elvis was her man and her mentor and how often that happens in love relationships; how everybody's heart is like a god in some way, and that's not a very balanced view of someone, is it?"
The song then is not about Jesus per se, but instead about the desire for a Jesus-like figure or being a Jesus-like figure for someone else. What does this mean? According to Personal Jesus...
Someone who cares...
Someone to hear your prayers
Someone who's thereFeeling unknown
And you're all alone
Flesh and bone
By the telephone
Lift up the receiver
I'll make you a believer...Things on your chest
You need to confess
I will deliver
You know I'm a forgiver
Therefore, Personal Jesus is a song about being or having an attatchment to someone that is savior-like in role: whom you can always go, talk, and even divulge faults to. This person supposedly has the character to listen sympathetically, be present or accessable when needed, and offers a balm to the conscience by being a "forgiver."
Analysis
Positive: Everyone needs the kind of friends who are "go-to" guys (or girls.) You know if you call them at 3 a.m. with a radical need, they'll listen, jump in the car like the Duke Boys and be there. They'll receive you, foibles and all, unconditionally. Indeed, for followers of Jesus Christ, we are to be a conduit of the grace of Jesus by the real presence of Jesus in us.
Our hands hold with his hands, hug, and minister His presence. We are to be hands to hurting, feeding the poor, bringing emotional, physical, and spiritual healing to wounded hearts. Something we've not always done very well at. In this way, we are to be a 'personal jesus'
Negative: Personal Jesus, according to the songwriter, is more about an unhealthy attatchment, where the personal jesus takes the place of the real deity, rather than being a channel or representative of it.
These types of relationships always fall short simply because no one other that the real Jesus has to the power to be unfailingly everywhere, always ready-to-help, and the authority to grant real forgiveness of sins on God's behalf( see Luke 5:21-26.)
See Also: