Is Bob still a Bible-thumper?

October 13, 2005 4:17 PM

MeFi Dylanologists: Is the big man still a fundamentalist Christian?

Listening to a field recording from the fall '80 tour tonight I wondered: Has he ever renounced his fundamentalist Christian period/views? Certainly some of the rantings and ravings from that period -- see the Massey Hall shows, re: our friends in the middle east, oil, homosexuals and the apocalypse -- certainly don't seem to fit into his current image. I've read the Heylin bio and can't recall him pronouncing on the matter; while his post-"Christian trilogy" albums are less fundamentalist/apocalyptic and much has been made of his late-1981 visit to Jerusalem, has he ever come out and made an unequivocal statement about his faith?

(To the extent that any of his statements are ever unequivocal.)

posted by docgonzo to Media & Arts (21 answers total)

He hasn't renounced it as far as I can tell, but he just stopped talking about it.
posted by allen.spaulding at 5:00 PM on October 13, 2005

I'm just curious....why do you think he would have renounced his Christian faith? Nobody seems to care if Art Garfunkel has or hasn't renounced Judaism - or anybody else has renounced their faith. I'm truly not bashing your question - I'm genuinely just curious what prompted a question as to whether someone (Dylan in this case) is still a Christian. Did something happen that makes you think he might have had reason to do so? Truly curious about Dylan and the faith question - no insult intended.

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posted by Independent Scholarship at 5:19 PM on October 13, 2005

I became a Christian around the same time Dylan did-about 25 years ago. His was actually the first Christian music I ever bought.

Dunno where his belief systems stand now but I am pretty sure it is different at least in degree from where he was then. I myself would love an update though. Seems like he was getting back into more traditional Judaism at one point.
posted by konolia at 5:24 PM on October 13, 2005

Independent Scholarship, I think the analogy with Art Garfunkel, like all analogies involving Art Garfunkel, is odious. Dylan very publically converted to Christianity in the 80s and used to make a big deal about it. In this case, the conversion and the embrace were so sudden, for them to disappear seems noteworthy. If Cat Stevens stopped talking about Islam for a while, I'd wonder as well.

PS, here is how Dylan is introduced at his concerts:

Please welcome the poet laureate of rock 'n' roll, the voice of the promise of the '60s counterculture, the guy who forced folk into bed with rock, who donned makeup in the '70s and disappeared into a haze of substance abuse, who emerged to 'find Jesus,' who was written off as a has-been by the end of the '80s, and who suddenly shifted gears and released some of the strongest music of his career beginning in the mid-'90s. Ladies and Gentlemen, Columbia recording artist, Bob Dylan!
posted by allen.spaulding at 5:32 PM on October 13, 2005

allen.spaulding: my understanding is that the intro is a deliberate attempt to mock a write-up done in a (Seattle?) paper. It's basically all the stuff he hates to have written about him.

Can anyone else confirm/deny this? I can't recall where I read it, but it makes sense to me.
posted by handful of rain at 5:36 PM on October 13, 2005

Response by poster: Independent Scholarship -- No insult taken.

I think Dylan's faith is important because his adoption of fundamentalist Christianity represents a cleavage in his life and work at least as great as the going electric period in the early 1960s. Also, some of the views espoused on stage and on vinyl during the 1979-1981 period are so radically at odds with his views and position of the 60s.

I'm not as critical of his so-called Christian period as many other Dylan fans. I think it is his most undervalued period; certainly he has rarely played with such power and passion as during the three tours of the period.
posted by docgonzo at 5:38 PM on October 13, 2005

Response by poster: (I'd be interested to know more about the intro, too -- it seemed so out-of-place when I last saw him live.)
posted by docgonzo at 5:39 PM on October 13, 2005

To me, the intro's ambiguity between disdainful mockery and blase heavyhandedness is classic Dylan. Throw in Fanfare for the Common Man and I get itching to go back.
posted by allen.spaulding at 5:43 PM on October 13, 2005

OK, I really can't back that up with a link...I think I actually hear that in a conversation I had with fellow Madisonian and Dylan afficianado Stu Levitan at the show at the Rosemont a few years ago. So make of that what you will =)
posted by handful of rain at 5:45 PM on October 13, 2005

All right, here's the best I can do:

http://www.ndsmcobserver.com/media/paper660/news/2005/04/07/Scene/Bob-Dylan.Shines.In.Chicago-916079.shtml

It says it comes from a write-up in a Buffalo paper (so not written by Dylan), though the author of this piece seems to think Dylan uses it because he likes it so much. I still think the sarcastic explanation is plausible =)

/derail
posted by handful of rain at 5:48 PM on October 13, 2005

Thanks, docgonzo! It is an interesting question in that respect. I thought something had been going on I hadn't heard about. The intro is an interesting aside to this, and I'd like to hear more as well.

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posted by Independent Scholarship at 5:53 PM on October 13, 2005

As far as I can tell from recent interviews, he's either into mysticism of some variety or back to not believing in anything, a la Dylan 1965. I doubt he considers himself Christian anymore, or else such themes would surface in his music. Both Time and Love and Theft seem secular, with mentions of God either ironic or functioning as symbol.
posted by luckypozzo at 6:17 PM on October 13, 2005

Oh, and Dylan claims his traditional Judaism phase was faked, including the famous photo of him, which he staged.
posted by luckypozzo at 6:34 PM on October 13, 2005

Wheres Y2Karl when you need him?
posted by wheelieman at 8:21 PM on October 13, 2005

I don't remember him having renounced it, but I always felt it pretty clear that he'd stepped away from his views of that period. I think as his lyrics have gotten more personal and introspective and "small" they have also gotten more ambivalent about god and salvation (and the possibilities for salvation).

As well, Chronicles is not the work of someone interested in evangelism to any extent, IMO.
posted by mikel at 8:40 PM on October 13, 2005

Sorry for the double! But luckypozzo do you have a reference for the claim that his stint with the Lubavitchers and the photo at the Western Wall etc. were staged? I'm curious about this myself (thanks docgonzo for opening up the question).
posted by mikel at 8:43 PM on October 13, 2005

Time Out of Mind was a very serious album, very cunning, a mature, less obviously dramatic but more poetically complicated album than Blood on the Tracks...

Check out Tryin' to Get to Heaven... I think if you expect thoughtful people not to have a thoughtful take on religion, even a religion they've adopted, that's unfair...

Most fundamentalist Christianity is marked by a fundamental lack of thought, while you aren't going to get that from Dylan, you might get some interesting stuff on the nature of sin... plus he's pretty old these days, he's got alot on his mind.
posted by ewkpates at 6:55 AM on October 14, 2005

This is still a matter of debate among some but the man once said when asked if he was still a Christian in 1986, less than five years after his celebrated conversion:

What are you talking about? What makes you think that? Whoever said I was Christian? Did you see the movie 'Gandhi?' Well, like Gandhi, I'm Christian, I'm Jewish, I'm Moslem, I'm a Hindu. I am a humanist!

Hmm, a humanist who later sang for the Pope.

Here are some related links:

Bill Parr's Christianity and Bob Dylan Page

Bob Dylan's Christian Music, 1979-81

Bob Dylan: Tangled Up In Jews

From that: Jewish Dylan Anecdotes

From that page:

1995...

....I walked up with him and he opened the ark. Yes there was a hush in shul as people recognized who was opening the aaron.

After he opened the Ark he alternated between looking into his machzor, at the Torah and at me to see when he should close it.

The congregation began to sing Avinu Malkeinu, chaneinu v'aneinu, ki ein baanu maasim.

The first time they sang it he began to sway with the music. As they began singing it again, I heard him hum the song along with the crowd.

After Avinu Malkeinu was over, he closed the ark, I shook his hand and walked with him back to his seat. He stayed in his corner until after Ne'ilah. he then spoke with the Rabbi, the son of Rabbi Shlomo Cunin, of Chabad of California. He then looked for me, walked over and thanked me, shoking my hand and leaving.

At that time, I was a huge Deadhead and, let's face it, Dylan wasn't much of a performer back then. He was often drunk, moody or crabby at concerts. I would listen to the old stuff, but Dylan the man. They were saying he was washed up and I believed them.

But, as I heard him hum Avinu Malkeinu, the Lubavitcher in me kicked in. Here I was, watching a man's "pintele yid" inspire him to come to shul, to daven, to sway, he was definitely "shukeling," to hum Avinu Malkeinu and to see him with the "awe" that a Jew is supposed to have on Yom Kippur. In that moment, I became I huge Dylan Ba'al Teshuva. And I have been a Chasid of Rabbeinu Bob since.

We can safely say that much of the time he is ecumenicall.

His concept of religion was not very pleasant in his overt Christian phase--his onstage raps from then are pretty horrific reading for me. In 1991 he said his favorite books in the Bible are Leviticus and Deuteronomy.

Remember we are talking about a very complex individual who is the past master of re-invention here. Whatever he is now is not what he was then. He has spent so much time being elusive to others that one wonders if he is not as elusive to himself.

His religion seems to be stern and unforgiving for the most part, he professes a belief in the Apocalypse on several occasions and he goes to Lubavitcher seders. Then again, he's on record: I'm Christian, I'm Jewish, I'm Moslem, I'm a Hindu. I am a humanist!

As with just about everything else in his life, he is amibguous and his true feelings and opinion on the topic are private.

You know the old saying--Six of One, Twelve Dozen of Another

That's Bob Dylan. Just who, what and when depends. Why is never known.

Your guess is as bad as mine.
posted by y2karl at 8:09 AM on October 14, 2005

I see that Bill Parr, from whom I got the 1983--not 1986--Christian-Muslim-Jew-Hindu quote questions it as being from Dylan and suggests it originated from someone in his record company.

I also he has no quotes of Dylan on the topic that come after 1991.

And here are two excerpts from the liner notes from 1993's collection of traditional blues and ballads--World Gone Wrong:

...DELIA is one sad tale-two or more versions mixed into one. the song has no middle range, comes whipping around the corner, seems to be about counterfeit loyalty. Delia herself, no Queen Gertrude, Elizabeth 1 or even Evita Peron, doesn't ride a Harley Davidson across the desert highway, doesn't need a blood change & would never go on a shopping spree. the guy in the courthouse sounds like a pimp in primary colors. he's not interested in mosques on the temple mount, armageddon or world war III, doesn't put his face in his knees & weep & wears no dunce hat, makes no apology & is doomed to obscurity. does this song have rectitude? you bet. toleration of the unacceptable leads to the last round-up. the singer's not talking from a head full of booze.

LONE PILGRIM is from an old Doc Watson record. what attracts me to the song is how the lunacy of trying to fool the self is set aside at some given point. salvation & the needs of mankind are prominent & hegemony takes a breathing spell. "my soul flew to mansions on high" what's essentially true is virtual reality. technology to wipe out truth is now available. not everybody can afford it but it's available. when the cost comes down look out! there wont be songs like these anymore. factually there aren't any now.


Your guess is as good as mine.

I will say this--his is my favortie version of Delia. As with several of the other songs, he did some re-writing and tweaking and created a canonical version out of several songs of the same title.

All the friends I ever had are gone...

Good as I Been to You and World Gone Wrong mark the point where he began to put some effort into his playing and siging again.

Something which, however, I can't say he did in the last two live performances of his which I saw.

Interestingly, however, his last encore in both shows was Al Along The Watchtower in which he sang the song through and then reprised the first verse. The last line the two crowds heard was

None of them along the line know what any of it is worth.</em
posted by y2karl at 8:37 AM on October 14, 2005

handful: Reason magazine confirms it, too: Dylan evidently found this Hollywood minute either accurate or amusing—my money's on the latter—because he now opens his concerts with a prerecorded introduction lifted directly from Miers' column.

(For Dylan, introductions are fraught with meaning.)

According to (the mainstream Protestant) Christianity Today, "Bob Dylan encountered Jesus in 1978, and that light has not entirely faded as he turns 60":

What is clear from this account is that Dylan hasn't been walking the talk. At times his life seems like a shambles. Dylan's church attendance was sporadic even in his most evangelical days but is now nonexistent. The womanizing and drunkenness that Dylan once saw as evidence of the old life have apparently continued almost uninterrupted.

Although Sounes does not mention it, the lack of close Christian fellowship and Bible ministry must have affected the quality and consistency of Dylan's faith. This may be in part because of Dylan's restless spirit and continuous touring, but it's also because churches have such trouble helping celebrities blend in as ordinary members. When Dylan attended church, Vineyard assistant pastor Bill Dwyer tells Sounes, "people would glom onto him: Oh, it's Bob Dylan!"

In 1999, his onetime pastor publicly asked people to pray and intercede on behalf of Dylan's faith.
posted by dhartung at 12:46 AM on October 15, 2005

Not to be too snarky, but if he is still a christian, he has some explaining to do about that plagiarism stuff in Love & Theft
posted by terrapin at 6:35 AM on October 19, 2005