Is Rock Prophecy about worshipping Jimi Hendrix?
On page 1 of Rock Prophecy, the first sentence in the book reads: “We do not worship Jimi. The Hendrix story teaches us how destructive ‘worship’ can be.” This sentence is quoted from my article published in Straight Ahead magazine years earlier (Aug. 1994 p. 16). The point is that for decades I’ve been countering the charge that somehow we’re “worshipping” Jimi Hendrix. On the contrary, Hendrix represents an effective means by which we see the practice of “worship” as destructive, a syndrome to be avoided. The way in which one group of people worships will distinguish them from people with other beliefs. A woman who eats meat on Friday doesn’t comply with Vatican rules. A man who won’t lay prostrate and face Mecca disobeys Muslim customs. Dominators fixate on such differences and care little for any increased sense of the “mystery and wonder of the world.” Communal contemplation, and praise of the mystery, is replaced with a rejection of outsiders. Worship becomes Warship. Warship is
