I previously posted the lead single from Madonna‘s new album Confessions on a Dancefloor. At the time, I made passing reference to the controversy surrounding the song “Isaac,” which is supposedly about Rabbi Isaac Luria.
Madonna has claimed that the song title is actually the English translation of the first name of Yitzhak Sinwani, the Yemeni singer who appears on the track. Is she just trying to be clever?
Note this quote:
“The album isn’t even out, so how could Jewish scholars in Israel know what my song is about? I don’t know enough about Isaac Luria to write a song, though I’ve learned a bit in my studies.
“But I’ve never heard that it’s blasphemous for anyone to mention the names of catalysts. That’s just a religious organization claiming ownership of something. ‘This is our information; you’re not Jewish and you can’t know about it,’ or, ‘You’re female and you can’t know about it.’ That’s religious thinking.”
And this one:
“You do appreciate the absurdity of a group of rabbis in Israel claiming that I’m being blasphemous about someone when they haven’t even heard the record, right?” she wonders aloud. “It’s interesting how their minds work, those naughty rabbis,” she adds, with a twinkle in her eyes.
So, Madonna, who is a huge follower of Kabbalah, writes a religious song called “Isaac,” which some people mistakenly believe is about Rabbi Isaac Ben Solomon “The Lion” Luria, the 16th century scholar and mystic whose teachings revolutionized the entire Kabbalistic tradition, but the truth is that she actually named the song after her back-up singer? Right. How could people make that mistake?
I mean, it’s not like she ever courted attention through religious controversy before, right?
Some people think the song a good idea, some aren’t so happy. Commit sacrilege and risk divine punishment yourself; get “Isaac” here [link removed].