(click here for post regarding the resolution of this matter)

Forget the Reuters “fauxtography” scandal (well, don’t actually forget it) — the Dylan world is rocked this morning by a completely unsourced quote published in the Christian Science Monitor, in an article that attempts some kind of overview of Dylan’s career coinciding with the release of Modern Times . (Thanks to RCB for the tip.)

Here it is, in context (bolding mine):

Dylan, who declined to comment for this article, remains, as ever, an enigma. (Three years ago, he called himself “a 62-year-old Jewish atheist.”) But he’s more open than he’s ever been about his past, even opening himself to interviews for Scorsese.

Notice how the quote is captured offhandedly in parentheses, as if to demonstrate that it’s no big deal, and certainly not open to debate.

So, in 2003, according to Jim Sullivan and the editors of the Christian Science Monitor, Bob Dylan called himself “a 62-year-old Jewish atheist.”

And somehow we didn’t hear about it until now.

The quote is self-evidently bogus.

It immediately reminded me of a quote attributed to Jerry Wexler — co-producer of Slow Train Coming and Saved — which is referred to in many places (try this Google search).

Scott Marshall refers to it in his book, “Restless Pilgrim“:

Full of zeal, Dylan tried to interest his other producer, Jerry Wexler, in the New Testament. Wexler responded, “I’m a sixty-two-year-old card-carrying Jewish atheist.” According to Wexler, that was the end of the discussion.

Wexler also makes essentially the same statement when re-telling the anecdote in the film “Rolling Thunder and the Gospel Years,” released earlier this year and described (including that quote) in this article.

OK: so we’ve established that Wexler said those words, in 1979 — i.e., 27 years ago, and has quoted them repeatedly since. Where does the Christian Science Monitor get off attributing them to Bob Dylan in 2003?? For that matter, where do they get off publishing a quote like that, allegedly from Bob Dylan, without any information regarding to whom he was speaking, or exactly when, or where?

You can ask them.

Contact form here:
http://www.csmonitor.com/cgi-bin/contactus.pl

Update: A better route is probably through their “corrections” page, which is at this link.

(Again, the original article by Jim Sullivan is here.)

Now excuse me while my head explodes.

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Addendum 4:09 pm: The Christian Science Monitor is a newspaper with global reach. Even if it weren’t, this kind of unsourced and outrageous quote would be unacceptable. A quote likes this gets out into the ether and soon becomes accepted as fact. The sad truth is that it’s already too late to prevent that, but a prompt correction would at least minimize the damage and confusion it causes. Take, as another example, this so-called quote, which Dylan allegedly gave to a nameless person and which was printed in a gossip column in 1983: “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!” Anyone who knows Dylan’s stuff, and is familiar with how he speaks on such subjects, should immediately hear a loud buzzer after that, saying “WRONG!” It doesn’t sound remotely like him, and it clashes fundamentally with his body of work. Yet, notwithstanding its complete unsupportability, this so-called quote has been regurgitated in various forms (I recall seeing it in a column by Liz Smith some years back) and is used to confirm what many people inexplicably want to believe about Dylan. This latest Christian Science Monitor nonsense is actually much worse. It’s not a gossip column. It’s a respected international newspaper. The “quote” will inevitably be recycled over and over again in the years to come.

Let me be clear: there’s nothing wrong with Jerry Wexler being “a 62-year-old Jewish atheist” or any other kind of atheist if that’s what pleases him, or has pleased him. He has that right and he can still be a good guy. But for the CSM to put that quote into Bob Dylan’s mouth is an extraordinarily pernicious error. To put it briefly: Bob Dylan’s work is infused with the Bible (both the Jewish and Christian parts). To remove God from Dylan’s work, as this implicitly would if it were true, would be to render it incredibly cynical and arguably almost valueless. Fortunately, it’s not true, as Dylan has made crystal clear on too many occasions to list, and as his music continues to make clear.

This has to be corrected, to the fullest extent that it can be. Perhaps you can let the Christian Science Monitor know that you care.

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Addendum 8:20 pm: Douglas LeBlanc at GetReligon.org has picked up on the story.

Tip to Monitor editors: Wexler will, God willing, turn 90 in January. And at last report he’s still a card-carrying Jewish atheist. A most informative feature would center on which agency distributes the cards, and how often.

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Addendum 09/02/2006 9:36 am: Twenty-four hours after being informed that they wrongly attributed a gravely misleading quote to Bob Dylan, the Christian Science Monitor has neither responded nor issued a correction. This is a highly respected, world-class publication — so I guess we shouldn’t be surprised. What a crazy, crazy world.

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Addendum 09/02/2006 10:44 am: Apparently the same Jim Sullivan who wrote the piece in the CSM has his own website at this link. I used the contact form to ask him to provide the source for his Bob Dylan quote.

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Addendum: 09/02/2006 11:55 am: Thanks very much to the writer Jim Sullivan who responded quickly and straightforwardly:

I did the checking and you’re right. The quote was from World Magazine
(Aug. 19, 2006) and it was from a conversation Dylan was having with
producer Jerry Wexler. Wexler was the one who told Dylan that. I notified
the Monitor of the error and assume they will correct it promptly.
Thanks for catching it.

You can’t ask more of anyone than to admit their mistake promptly, and we all make them. As I responded to him, “Considering how much people like to argue about what Bob Dylan believes, this quote is probably going to be showing up in bar room debates years from now. It’s a kind of immortality, maybe.”

Now we await the Christian Science Monitor’s official correction.

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Addendum: Click here for the latest post on this.

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