Dio - Holy Diver Lyrics Meaning

This is about a martyr or a pious figure, mainly someone who is "pure," their attempted escape from evil and feigned richeousness. Though the theme remains it does vary on the story, a structure used by Dio for story telling through song. It is NOT about heroin or illicet drugs. I am not saying that it is all about the bible. When I look at the first line,"Holy Diver, you've been down to long in the midnight sea, oh what's becoming of me" is see that it is about a richeous charecter that has fallen to the level of the seedy underworld, not necessarily hell but a place of wrong doing, crime-ridden etc. "What's becoming of me?" is a sad wonderment about his fall. "Ride the tiger, you can see his stripes but you know he's clean" is discussing someone who is reformed, his stripes the markings of his wrong doings, knowing he's clean about his reform and bettering as a whole. "Shiny diamonds, like the eys of a cat in the black and blue, something is coming for you" Someone who would ensare him using greed or lust to his advantage, look out simply a literal warning. "Race for the morning, you can hide in the sun till you see the light, we will pray it's alright." They are feeing, trying to escape the night and reach morning, hiding in the sun meaning protected by a false holyness, a group or something representing the use of a front of good to reach an ultimatly evil goal. "Between the velvet lies, there's a truth as hard as steel, yeah, the vision never dies, life's a never-ending wheel, say..." Inside of the comforting false premises there is a core that is absolute and unyielding. "Jump on the tiger, you can feel his heart but you know he's mean." This is about a person who is faithful and a zelot, but someone who will gladly destroy any opposing his beliefs. This song, to me, discusses the false pretenses that appeal and how those are used by some for their own purpose, Holy Wars of sime kind, the line between belief and absolution, extremism.