Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
The Schmooze

New Biography Explores Bob Dylan’s Spiritual Journey

“Bob Dylan was born a Jew. Then he wasn’t, but now he’s back,” sang Adam Sandler in The Chanukah Song, voicing all of our dads’ anxieties over Dylan’s religious identity. A new biography “Bob Dylan: A Spiritual Life” by Scott Marshall, aims to explore Dylan’s spiritual odyssey.

Out on June 20th, Marshall’s book promises to analyze Dylan’s famously mercurial relationship to religion, which he said involves, “plenty of intriguing stories, competing voices, humor [and] conflict.”

So is the artist formerly known as Shabtai Zisl ben Avraham one of our own, or not?

“For Dylan [Christianity] seems it’s more about the figure of Jesus than the following of an organized religion,” Marshall told The Hollywood Reporter. “Dylan’s own Jewish roots cannot be denied, whether it’s the revolutionary figure of Jesus in the first century or Dylan’s childhood in Minnesota in the 1940s and 1950s, or his naturally slipping into synagogues as an adult. Dylan appears to be a child of God, not tethered to any religion for religion’s sake, but trying to pursue the Truth, clay feet and all.”

Ricocheting from Zionist summer camp to gospel albums to becoming a Jews-for-Jesus icon to playing at a seder attended by Marlon Brando, Dylan has made the moniker “a stiff-necked people” literal for many of his fans.

“Over the years he’s gone against the culture that was rebelling against the traditional Judeo-Christian framework,” says Marshall. “He hasn’t been bashful about saying he believes in the Old and New Testament.”

Marshall’s book includes interviews with President Jimmy Carter and Dylan’s ex-wife Carolyn Dennis, who has never spoken publicly about her ex-husband.

“May he be singing his songs into his 90s,” says Marshall.

And may the songs be clearly Jewish, add Jewish Dads everywhere.

Amen.

Jenny Singer is a writer for the Forward. You can reach her at [email protected] or on Twitter @jeanvaljenny.

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.

In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.

At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.

Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.

Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly. 

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30

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.