Dylan at the Foot of the Cross

Longtime disciple? Converted soldier? Secular prophet? The questions linger as the troubadour turns 70.

I taped a photocopied picture of Bob Dylan to my office door during the time I spent thinking about and writing this book. It is my favorite picture of the singer, taken likely in the fall of 1975. He is standing in a cemetery by a large crucifix, in the Catholic grotto in Lowell, Massachusetts. Jack Kerouac's grave is in this cemetery, so the motley crew touring with Dylan at the time stopped by the Beat writer's hometown to pay their respects. There are other photographs of this visit to the Lowell cemetery showing Dylan and poet Allen Ginsberg sitting cross-legged at Kerouac's grave.

The picture on my office door shows Dylan standing in front of the tall statue, his feathered hat just inches below Christ's nailed feet. He carries a large tree branch as a walking stick while the camera looks up into his face, capturing both the singer's stoic expression and the Messiah's agony all at once. The picture has symbolic potential that illustrates challenges facing those interested in Bob Dylan's relationship to religion.

For one thing, though Christ is in the picture, Dylan is the focal point. Christ on the cross looks off into the distant heavens, remote and inaccessible. Dylan, on the other hand, stares penetratingly into the eyes of anyone looking at the photograph. It is actually difficult to focus on the crucified figure, which is off center. We view Christ at a slight angle. He appears high in the frame of the picture, and we cannot make eye contact with him. Dylan's shadowed eyes, on the other hand, stare back at us from dead center of the picture. He has an authoritative, confident stance—one thumb coolly placed in a pocket, jacket thrown over his shoulder like a cape. The other hand grasps his walking stick firmly. He could be Moses leading his people, poised to strike against the rock (see Exod. 17:5-6).

To read more, click here.