randyh August 4th, 2005 12:43PM  
Quite simply, heaven (or hell) is something we create on this planet. It's a song about what divides us and what should be uniting us to make heaven on Earth. One of my favorite songs.

silverbeatle August 11th, 2005 10:21PM  
Imagine was originally inspired by a instructional poem in Yoko's book Grapefruit.

He was saying imagine what life would be like if it was like this. If we ALL imagine it, it could be real.

anonymous January 4th, 2006 10:49AM  
One of the greatest songs ever written apart from Stariway To Heaven. A little biography on Lennon when this song was written many people such as Christians got offended with ths first line "Imagine there was no heaven". They took that in offence assuming Lennon was a believer of god. But Lennon than corrected himself to the media sayin, "wait a second, Im just telling you for a minute just imagine if there wasnt I'm not saying that there is but just imagine (thats why the song is called imagine). Now not only imagine no heaven but no hell. These are all things that we believe in and religion as we knows creates wars. Just imagine if no one in the world belived that, there would probably be no wars, hate but more happinness. If we were all equal, its hard to imagine that because its impossible. But my song is just basically makes you reflect on these things, the impossible". Im a huge Lennon fan and know many things about his life. Also I can tell you Yoko Ono helped him write this song but she was never creditted on her help.

So this is what Lennon is saying, imagine if we were all equal and we didn't have different beliefs, with different beliefs we would have no religion, with no religion there would probably be no wars. "Its weasy if you try" this means a lot of people back then were disturbed and would not but he's saying just try, we all hate but why can't we love, why can't we imagine the good things in life? Why do we always have to experience hate and war?

This song is so great and powerful, I think bush should read it at least a million times.

anonymous February 23rd, 2006 06:19PM  
I think that John was strong about the world that we live in and thought what a better place it could be. I love the song because it tells what he thinks the world should be like.

anonymous August 9th, 2006 03:32AM  
How sad is it that texts that these get the terms "hippie" and "communist". Peace and a united world isn't communism - it is universal love. But we are too caught up in money and cell phones to see the big picture - and yes - this is more relavant than ever

anonymous September 13th, 2006 10:52AM  
This song is a great song. But that's in my opinion.

He wasn't dreaming of an ideal place, he wasn't saying if you don't have religion then there will be no wars. He was saying just forget about it for one minute, just imagine you have no one to impress, no one to worship... Imagine about a world of peace where we can look at someone a with different society, and social behavour and just forget about that and basically not genrealise anyone for what they are. He wanted people to stop fighting over these topics, that make us sterotypical and just live as one, not as a lot of religions. He might have said "imagine no possetions(sp?>.<)" while in the video he was in a big brilliant house but he earnt that house, he didn't ask for everyone to give him that money he earnt it making great music.

By someone saying they are offended because it's anti-religous, they are just proving that lennon was right in a way. They don't like the song because they think he meant harm to them, and their opinions.

anonymous September 21st, 2006 02:49PM  
I think lennon's main goal in writing this song is to get people to stop living life for what happens after we die and start living life for today. "imagine all the people/living for today." He's trying to get the point across that all of us focus way to much on religion when in reality religion is just another separation of people that creates arguments and even wars.

Live for today.

bubbabigdick October 18th, 2006 12:16AM  
Those of you who find this song offensive because it contradicts your christian/capitalist/whatever 'sensibilities' needn't worry. You needn't imagine hell; you're already there.

anonymous February 25th, 2007 12:07AM  
This song should not offend anyone, a song's meaning is just what you make of it. I for instance don't think it has to be about atheism, but about how most religions teach peace and love but yet is the cause of so many wars.
It is a comment on society.

anonymous March 13th, 2007 10:38PM  
This is my (rather long) opinion on John's Imagine @ Nooventures [http://wit.110mb.com]

## GOD, FREEDOM AND SURVIVAL. COMMENTARIES ON JOHN LENNON'S "IMAGINE" ##

** Ideals, understanding and life **

This surely is one of the greatest songs of our time.

Heralded by peace activist around the globe for its captivating simplicity, the lyrics actually depict how perplexing human nature really is. Beauty and hostility interchanges in our history through the expressions of religious zeal, patriotism and the struggle to survive. Properly expressed, beauty shine through. Overtly expressed, calamity erupts.

Yet, just exactly how does the same roots produces such paradoxical fruits ? What went wrong ?

The most fundamental reason probably lie in the fact that humans seems to possess ideals as a built in feature. We need to live for something, to strive for something, and to die having done something of worth in life. The belief we have in our ideals will take us to the far end of strife and sacrifice, even when that would mean to die or to kill trying. And clearly, god, freedom, and survival, supply three of the most powerful ideals a man can aspire for in life.

Everythings fine with ideals, until one forgets that most of the times, our understanding of them are anywhere but perfect. And things deteriorate rapidly when men understand them differently and willingly strife to enforce their understanding to others.

** In God we trust . . . . . for God we kill ? **

In God alone men believe perfection and perfect bliss are attainable. Yet, as theologists and philosopher have reasoned, it is impossible to attain perfect understanding of God, and to attain perfection in God during our mortal lives here on earth. Perfection is to aspire for, they say. . . . . and attainment is beyond our effort, though certainly is not despite of our effort. And religions, have indeed shown the way, each to each people in each time and each place, and if we are wise enough, I believe, each to all people in all times and all places.

When one dwelves into the depths of Buddha, Lao Tze, Confucius, Moses, Jesus, Mohammed or Gandhi for recent example, it is simply unimaginable that they would meet and then mock and throw bombs at each other, let alone command their followers to nuke each other. Yet, precisely because the devoters forget that each religion teaches no enforcement on beliefs to others beyond their consent, wars and conflicts were precisely what happened here and there throughout history.

The unity in God simply can not produce divides. It’s our imperfect understanding and actions alone that produce the divides and blinds us from the unity that binds us. And it seems to me, diversity is God’s way of saying, “unite all believers of the world !” in the style of the Marxian version for workers. This is so apparent when one reads the sacred scriptures of the worlds religions. One would find so many overlapping essence throughout, expressed in different wordings, in different languages, and in different contexts, with the prime example being the “Golden Rule” : Love thy neighbour.

So I would say, religions are expressions, the diversity. While towards God and in God, essence and unity emerge. Meaning, we should be humble in our imperfection, in our imperfect understanding of God, in our imperfect strife towards God, and learn from our mistakes and from each other. This should apply for any open minded atheist too, since they too are destined as imperfects, with their own ideal and their imperfect understanding of it, or more precisely, of religion and the Ultimate Reality.

** “Freedom and prosperity for our people and our nation !” . . . . . How about the others ? **

Another ideal the world grew up with is that we should strive for what is ours, with our people and our nation among our most precious.

In schools and the media, teachers and politicians preach this line of thinking to innocent minds. In times of struggle for a counry’s indepence, it might have been sufficient, but for the world that we now live in, it simply is not enough.

Peoples and nations has become so interdependent, that the sole prosperity and freedom of ours can no longer serve justice to all of us. And with recent development in the crisis the planet is experiencing, the freedom and prosperity of humanity can no longer violate the freedom and prosperity of other species and the earth itself. And thus we come to the culprit of our ignorance : war and economics.

Wars served our egoes well in the past and present, while economic prosperity seems to serve our egoes better in the present. War is inherently destructive for life, yet some nation can’t shake of the addiction of building up military prowes, even with mutual destruction staring back at us from the future to be. On the other hand, economic progress, or to be more precise, economic growth, with so many inherent paradoxes entailing, becomes the unofficial religion of the world, carried ever forward with the fervor a staunch religious devotees would have by the professional work we carry out in society. The link in the deterioration of earth’s life-support systems and our economic activities grows ever clearer by the day.

While nukes can blow humanity out of existence in a single blow, economic growth sucks the life out of earth, and leaves us dying glimmering with money, and with pride of our material wealth. And yet still, we compete, wage war, and kill directly with bombs or indirectly through wrongly accumulating and using money.

We feed our fears and insecurities by saying that “the others” hates us and wants us to suffer, with the Russians a little while ago, and with Osama bin Laden recently, as the prophet of destruction. We take for granted the statement that our nation and our people must remain competitive to survive and to thrive, forgetting that in a competition, some win, and some lose, and that we can no longer afford to survive and thrive alone.

We strike and preempt, but forget to fix and to prevent. We compete and become professionals at that, but forget that in cooperation lies the harmony of life, in humanity and in the entire planet.

Life surely is worth more than killing and competing.

** To survive, to have, or to be ? **

Life entails survival. Life seeks to prolong itself, the best way it can, or any way it can.

It is very natural that each person, each family, each people, each nation wish to live on and prosper. We want enough food, enough clothes, a roof over our head, a comfortable spot to sleep on, a fulfilling and meaningful work, the warmth of relationship and time for leisure, art and spirituality . . . . In esence, to be.

Things used to be tolerable, until humanity multiplies unprecedently and compete mindlessly.

With six and a half billions of mouths to feed, bodies to clothe and cover, jobs to provide, and others eager to beat us to survival, “to be” simply is not an option anymore. First and foremost, to survive, next, to have, and if we made it through and manages to remember, to be.

Yet reality wakes you up from your dream and bites you in your real life.

Money is the blood of the economy, and the economy is the life of everyone. Thus, to survive, one must earn enough of it, in ways and jobs often far from the path to be. Conditions seems to prescribe nations to follow that path, the path of economic growth. Our jobs often divides families and communities, and destroy nature, but more than anything, they destroy our soul.

To have becomes our next goal after survival, and most of the times, they become our last. Thus, we become insensitive to the needs of others, humans or not, and ignorant to the needs of the planet.

Poverty and diseases persists despite the tremendous growth in the size of our economy. Garbage, waste and pollution, literally are the by-product our world economy excrete to the air, to the water, to the soil, and to other life on earth.

We refuse to except the reality that if they deteriorate, humanity goes down the drain into the abyss. Thus we end up with the chicken and egg kind of paradox. We survive they die. They die, we die. But we must survive, and they must survive. What to do . . . . . what to do ?

** Questions . . . questions . . . questions . . . and imagination **

Maybe what John really meant for us to do on hearing his song, was not to become atheists, anarchists, hippies, or communists for that matter, since a man of John’s stature should long ago have lost the interest in the glitter of isms.

Maybe he’s just trying to make us question, question so hard to the point that the fantasy of our world, the waking dream we are living, the half truths we behold as ideals, will crumble, so we can start rebuilding the foundations peace should rest upon. Meanwhile, hoping time will have mercy on us in getting the job done for our posterior to build upon.

Competition and cooperation have their proper places. We just need to figure out where for each.

Religions, nation states and the economy merely are tools . . . . . means. We should never become a tool of our tools. We should never mistake the means from the end. The means should never and can never become the end.

What will be your end ? Your ideal ? Make sure it’s worthy of your life.

What should we have as our means ? as our tools ? Let’s make sure we have the right ones.

Imagination rule the world, as Napoleon and Einstein would agree.

Let’s all spend a little more time to imagine what our end should be, and beware of the things that blinds us from the unity that binds us.

Permalink @ Nooventures -> http://wit.110mb.com/2007-03-12-god-freedom-and-survival-commentaries-on-john-lennons-imagine/

midnitegreen May 9th, 2007 05:39PM  
wow above good!

joe July 27th, 2007 01:16AM  
This is a beautiful song and it has a simple meaning. It describes what true communism would mean, that's why he says no religion, no possessions, and no countries. Most say this is impossible, but I think if the human race can survive long enough, thousands or even millions of years into the future, this song will become a reality.

anonymous August 1st, 2007 10:17PM  
Religious Beliefs have caused more wars than money.
Communism was a reality in early society, but It couldn't last.
The song's called "Imagine" because it will never be together.

Wasn't it a Millionaire who said "imagine no possessions?"

pricked_stood June 21st, 2008 08:00PM  
John Lennon's song is a piece that tries to test the world's view against religion, war, possessions, and peace. The song sends a pricking message to the whole world; it may have contradicted to their ideals and views on how life should be lived and how the world should be treated. But his message is something wonderful and calm. What if all of us tries to stop and live the moment and forget all about religion, wars, and our possessions, then we will attain peace--the kind of peace that transcends towards all humanities, saying, we are all but one brothers. After all, religion is not anything we should live for; religion can't save us, it's our faith. If all are equal, the world will not be divided and all of us shall live a peaceful life; that is, free from worries and hatred.

anonymous March 4th, 2009 05:56PM  
I can't think of a Beatles Christmas song, but OK. The problem is, when people show an outrage, and say "who is he to say this" he's a human being, and all of us have a right to say these things, to question what makes life the way it is. Accept or deny it, Religion, Nationalism, Materialism, all of these things ARE great dividers in society. Without these things, people wouldn't have as much to fight over, people could live to benefit all of society rather than just their own little corner of the world. Maybe it's a communist message, but in a sense, true communism, like that which John talks about here, could be hugely beneficial to society, but there is no way to that goal, human beings always have an aim, a goal, the need for a reward, recognition.

That's why it's wrapped up in the coating of the title imagine. He asks you to imagine a perfect world, a world where people are the same, people have nothing to divide them, a world that benefits all of its inhabitants, rather than having countries full of people dying of illnesses that we in our rich countries take for granted, scraping together what little money they can get, just to eat for a day. Religion, or difference of religious opinion, as most reasonable people know, is the cause of more conflict throughout history of the world than money or anything else. Whether it was the crusades, enforcing their religious belief on people who until then had been living in relative happiness without this pressure, to the present day problems between fundamentalist Islam and the heavily christian western world. You can hide behind your belief that religion doesn't cause conflict, but it's clear, that it indeed does.

It's an image of Utopia, the perfect, unattainable world, John knew this would cause widespread emotion, from solidarity, to outrage, but those who are outraged or disgusted by this song, are the ones who are causing all the problems of society.

JamesPaul April 22nd, 2009 06:42PM  
i wish people would give it up on the communism, atheism comments because this song is really not about either one. all it is saying is that if we took out the main things that start war there would not be war. the main things that people fight about is power, possesions, and religion. take those out and you can't fight about them. and about john being a communist, communism does look good on paper, but it just can't work out. what i mean is that it takes out classes, possesions, and much more, so really, there is nothing to fight about, nothing to be jealous of.

anonymous June 28th, 2009 09:12AM  
This song should offend religious people. Lennon was obviously anti-religion and a huge atheist. Listen to the song, "God." To all the people on here saying that religion teaches peace and tolerance...get real. Religion is the # 1 reason for war, terror, poverty, and hell on earth.

He said to imagine there's no heaven and imagine no religion because he meant it literally. He thinks religion and god suck and I agree with him. God is a concept. There is absolutely no evidence to suggest any kind of supernatural creator or god exists. The countries in the world that are the most peaceful, have the lowest rates of crime, murder, and poverty, and the highest rates of education, and the best social policies, and equal opportunities for women, are the countries that have the highest rates of atheism. And please shut up about Stalin. He was one nut, nothing more. The Stalin argument is like saying that Helter Skelter is an evil song because Charles Manson killed a load of people because of it. Stalin was one nut; religion is widespread, deeply-rooted, uncompromising evil. Fuck Jesus, Mohammed, Krishna, Buddha, and the Jewish Prophet (whenever the fuck he gets here and whoever the fuck he is).

anonymous July 18th, 2009 06:37PM  
Why does my heart keep telling me this is not an athiest song? How come every time I hear a good sermon about the huge problem in our world, HYPOCRICY (especially people who call themselves christians but really are just big hypocrites), I want to stand up and sing this song? Why do I hear the ideas in this songs when I hear some readings in the bible (SOME readings, religion has been messed up by tradition and imperfect humans, so when a pastor preaches he doesn't always explain things that Jesus taught - humans are just incredibly stubborn)

John Lennon wasn't an athiest. He even said so,
"I'd always suspected that there was a God, even when I thought I was an atheist. Just in case. I Believe it, so I am full of compassion, but you can still dislike things. I just hate things less strenuously than I did. I haven't got as big a chip about it because maybe I've escaped it a bit. I think all our society is run by insane people for insane objectives..."

Imagine there's no heaven etc.
this line I hear all the time, and I say this idea to people all the time. There's a verse I heard a few weeks ago. I think its in Luke, but it says something about not doing things so that YOU can get rewarded, so that YOU can get something out of it (Imagine there's no heaven), and also says not to Not do something because you're afraid of whait society will think or that you'll be punished for it and not to build your mind off of what other people who think they are better than you tell you to believe or think (No hell below us; above us only sky). I was sitting there as I heard this and I'm thinking "that's in 'Imagine', that's what it means!"

And that's happened with other parts of the song. On Easter he was talking about living for today and that same idea. I had that same excitement "that's in the song!" This old man came as a guest pastor or something to our church once and started talking on the same idea as John Lennon does in this quote,
"I don't need to go to church. I respect churches because of the sacredness that's been put on them over the years by people who do believe. But I think a lot of bad things have happened in the name of the church and in the name of Christ," - by some of the hypocrites who go to them and end up getting us stereotyped like Islam is by the few radicals who love to blow stuff up - "Therefore, I shy away from church, and as Donovan once said, 'I go to my own church in my own temple once a day.' And I think people who need a church should go. And the others who know the church is in your own head should visit that temple because that's where the source is. We're all God. Christ said, 'The Kingdom of Heaven is within you.' And the Indians say that and the Zen people say that. We're all God. I'm not a god or the God, but we're all God and we're all potentially divine - and potentially evil. We all have everything within us and the Kingdom of Heaven is nigh and within us, and if you look hard enough you'll see it."
Religion complicates things with tradition. It'll make you think Christ or God meant something when he said this, when he really meant that. You've got to free your mind and Imagine, what does it all truly mean? (No religion too)
A lot of people say they don't want to go to church because they're all hypocrites there. And that's what I hear in the first part of the song. They're people who celebrate Christmas and Easter and may even go to church every sunday but don't really listen to the sermon. These people have the nerve to pick on a song like this, but don't even look in the mirror at themselves and realize they're the ones who are wrong here.
Yoko Ono once said something like "If half the room doesn't walk out angry, I haven't done it right." That's what I think about when I hear this song. A lot of people, the first time they hear it (including me), just want to punch him in the face. Imagine there's no heaven? Why would you want to do that? But (in my opinion) it's more deep than that. It's not saying let's Imagine they're no God, Imagine he's no reward, then who would you be? Would you still do something good even though YOU wouldn't get anything out of it? That's what God truly wants us to be like, and obviously what John Lennon wants us to be like, completely unselfish and generous.
And yeah, the first time I heard this I was kind of upset. But I remember I heard the line "living life in peace" and I thought how Jesus preached about peace. Something about it made me want to listen to over and over (It's the most listened to song on my iPod, about 4 times more than the 2nd most listened to song on my iPod). Then I started hearing these ideas in church and I started to realize what it truly meant. I read some guy saying something about this song has a simple meaning and you can't really go in depth with it. I though, "what song are you hearing?" I could sit and talk about this song for hours. To me it's really deep and it a song meant to be analyzed more than one time. That's why its my favorite song, because it carrying out the wisdom I hear from God in a way that you've never heard before. It makes you second guess things and then you start to get upset because as you think about what it means, you want everyone in the world to see it that way too. You hear songs in church all the time saying "Jesus loves you, he died for you..." yeah, I've been hearing that over and over again my whole life and I'm very very thankful, but they're more than just believing in what he did for us, it's listening to what he was saying. And I hear that in this song.
Maybe I just look too much into things, but that's what art is, you're supposed to come up with you own meaning, and you shouldn't criticize the artist on what you get out of it.

monkee5th September 1st, 2009 11:17PM  
Wonderful song needs no interpretations really. Sad thing was just after Sept. 11 2001 this son was banned because it's content go figuer

anonymous September 5th, 2009 03:08AM  
"Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today"

Heaven and hell, like all other opposites in this world, occur only in the human mind. God is oneness, and when your mind is free of attachment to this world, and you experience oneness with everything, you are in true Heaven, and there is no hell. To reach this oneness, you must also live in the moment. Time is an illusion. When we see things in this world change from one appearance to another, and use our memory to notice this change, we believe that time has passed. But when we are one with the Universe, time does not exist. Eternity is not endless time, it is no time. Oneness with everything means the constant state of bliss, nirvana.

"Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

This is much easier to interpret and come to grips with. again it deals with separation. Humans suffer because they feel alone or separated. Having enemies makes them feel better about themselves, but this comes from fear. Feeling oneness with all God's creatures, with the Universe itself, is the only true happiness, and peace.

"You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one"

If everyone joined John in the dream of this song, the world would truly be as one. We may be evolving to this state. Humans became aware of themselves, their individuality, which also brought about their fear and suffering, but once they realize their oneness with the Universe, while they are still aware of their own being, a special spiritual race will evolve.


"Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world"

This is such a beautiful phrase and gives you a view of what life could be like if all people truly loved each other as one.

"You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one"

John was a dreamer, and was able to put one of the greatest, most mysterious spritiual truths into a wonderful song that will be enjoyed forever