If It Be Your Will

If it be your will

That I speak no more

And my voice be still

As it was before

I will speak no more

I shall abide until

I am spoken for

If it be your will

If it be your will

That a voice be true

From this broken hill

I will sing to you

From this broken hill

All your praises they shall ring

If it be your will

To let me sing

From this broken hill

All your praises they shall ring

If it be your will

To let me sing

If it be your will

If there is a choice

Let the rivers fill

Let the hills rejoice

Let your mercy spill

On all these burning hearts in hell

If it be your will

To make us well

And draw us near

And bind us tight

All your children here

In their rags of light

In our rags of light

All dressed to kill

And end this night

If it be your will

If it be your will.

One of Cohen’s most overtly religious songs, it is based both musically and lyrically on the synagogue prayer “ May it therefore be Your will, Lord our God” recited on the eve of Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement. Perhaps for this reason, it is more monotheistic than, for example, “Heart With No Companion” which was the preceding track on Various Positions (1984). Cohen has said that the song “took a long time to write because the lyric and the melody are so simple that if there were a false step it would really collapse the structure … but I think it’s probably one of the best songs I’ve ever written”.