Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
The Schmooze

Matisyahu vs. Drake: Battle of the Rhyming Jews

Hasidic reggae musician Matisyahu has challenged rapper Drake’s status as “the best Jew to ever do it,” in a recent video posted on gossip site TMZ.

Responding to the question of who of the two rappers is more kosher, Matisyahu responds: “Drake is a pretty good man. He’s got his thing, but it’s different than what I do.”

Continuing, he says of Drake: “He’s Jewish, but he’s not representing Judaism. He happens to be Jewish just like Bob Dylan happened to be Jewish, but what I’m doing is really tapping into my roots and culture, and trying to blend that with the mainstream…[Drake’s] being Jewish is just a by-product.”

Matisyahu, born Matthew Miller, was brought up as a Reconstructionist Jew and attended Hebrew school. His music often addresses traditional Jewish themes, and occasionally contains Yiddish and Hebrew lyrics.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.