Time and religion in the song Tempo Rei by Gilberto Gil

Abstract

The objective of this work is to analyze the song Tempo Rei by Gilberto Gil. Our main sources are the lyrics of his song and a text found on the composer’s official website, which, in a synthetic way, presentes the philosophycal and religious elements of his song. To add to these sources, we use works by research of the phenomena of religion, such as Mircea Eliade, Carl Gustav Jung, among others. For these authors and the composer there are two contradictory positions regarding the perception of time: the first occurs in the profane, within the limits of human experience and reason and another in the sacred, where one admits what is beyond rational understanding. Gilberto Gil’s song takes the perspective of sacred time as opposed to the posture of the song Oração ao Tempo, by Caetano Veloso. We conclude that music is a request by the poet so that he can understand the passage of time, as well as, to console you, of the inevitable losses that this entails, revealing the Christian aspect of your faith.