War

War, performed by reggae artist Bob Marley and adapted from an excerpt of Ethiopian Emperor H.I.M. Haile Selassie’s address to the United Nations in October 1963. With such potent and meaningful lyrics, the song became one of Bob Marley’s greatest classics, carrying the Rastafarian message to the world until his last show on September 23, 1980.

Lyrics

Until the philosophy which hold one race superior
And another
Inferior
Is finally
And permanently
Discredited
And abandoned—
Everywhere is war—
Me say war.

That until there no longer
First class and second class citizens of any nation
Until the color of a man’s skin
Is of no more significance than the color of his eyes—
Me say war.

That until the basic human rights
Are equally guaranteed to all,
Without regard to race—
Dis a war.

That until that day
The dream of lasting peace,
World citizenship
Rule of international morality
Will remain in but a fleeting illusion to be pursued,
But never attained-
Now everywhere is war—war.

And until the ignoble and unhappy regimes
That hold our brothers in Angola,
In Mozambique,
South Africa
Sub-human bondage
Have been toppled,
Utterly destroyed-
Well, everywhere is war—
Me say war.

War in the east,
War in the west,
War up north,
War down south-
War—war—
Rumors of war.
And until that day,
The African continent
Will not know peace,
We Africans will fight—we find it necessary—
And we know we shall win
As we are confident
In the victory

Of good over evil – Good over evil, yeah!
Good over evil—
Good over evil, yeah!
Good over evil—
Good over evil, yeah!

—Bob Marley