RightWingBob sounds the alarm today about an unsourced and unfounded aside in an otherwise routine profile of Bob Dylan in The Christian Science Monitor:
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 [Martin] Scorsese.
RightWingBob is on the scent that should be readily apparent to even armchair Dylan fans who care about his worldview:
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).
My friend and fellow Dylan fan Scott Marshall nails down the context 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.
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.