Bob & Elvis Are Not Jewish
As Jews we have this interesting past time of mulling about the Jewish status of prominent individuals (in fact, there is an entire website dedicated to this subject). I personally find it pretty interesting who pops up for speculation and it is wild to see the ‘traits’ that someone determines are Jewish or not.
But my interest turns to irritation when hearsay gets touted as fact. Jewish scholarship is one where we look at a topic from all angles and fully explore all possibilities before arriving at a conclusion. But for some reason, that process gets thrown out the window when it comes to recognizing someone’s Jewishness. And there are two famous musicians who this happens to pretty frequently — and that is Bob Marley and Elvis Presley. It also so happens that both men are deceased, so can offer no personal opinions on the matter.
From what I have seen, neither of these men are Jewish. I’ll flesh out how I came to this conclusion (so yeah, the receipts are here!).
Bob Marley
As a Black Jewish woman of Jamaican decent, this one hits close to home. Bob Marley was born in Jamaica in 1945 in rural area of Nine Mile in the parish of St. Ann Jamaica. His parents were an Afro-Jamaican teenaged girl, named Cedella Malcolm and his father was Norval Sinclair Marley. No one disputes that any Jewish ancestry would have come from his father’s lineage and not his mother’s, which instantly disqualifies him from being a born Jew as per the rules of Jewish halacha anyway. But just for kicks, let’s explore the ‘Jewish ancestry’ on his father’s side.
The claim was made that Norval’s mother, Ellen Broomfield (sometimes noted as ‘Bloomfield‘), was of Syrian-Jewish ancestry. This claim was made by others, but not Bob himself. His son Rohan said the following:
“Bob Marley had a Jewish father. He was a British Jewish guy. They take a lot of pride in their Jewish connection, the Marleys,”
Rohan Marley
But let’s not forget, Rohan did not have any personal relationship with any members of the Marley family in that Bob was estranged from them. Also there is no documentation of this claim of Jewishness. And it isn’t like Jamaica did not have an established Jewish community on the island. And yet, Ms. Broomfield had no verifiable connection to it. What we do have though is a copy of her marriage record.
So it looks like Ellen was actually noted as being ‘Colored’ on the marriage record — which provides a stronger claim that she was part African and not part-Jewish. I will also point out that Jamaicans often use the term ‘Syrian’ to refer to anyone of Middle-Eastern ancestry. And it is possible, being that this was the 1870s, that any Black/African ancestry would be ‘erased’ by saying that you were Middle-Eastern. It is also pretty sus that in regards to Ellen’s birth record, her father, Richard Bloomfield is known, but her mother is not.
So if we look at anything that isn’t a personal claim, we really don’t have any convincing evidence that even Norval Marley was Jewish, much less Bob himself.
Maybe what we should do instead is acknowledge some of Bob’s Jewish decedents — all of which are undeniably members of the tribe.
Ziggy Marley married Israeli businesswoman Orly Agai, and their four children are being raised as Jews. It is also interesting to note that one of Bob’s other sons, Damian, does have a documented tie to the Jewish community. His mother’s paternal grandmother’s original surname was Sanguinetti, which is an Italian-Jewish surname. Although Damian’s recent lineage also disqualifies him as being a Jew as per Jewish halacha, this tie is still quite a bit stronger (albeit far from being definitive) than the claim that Bob Marley himself was Jewish.
And finally we should be quick to put to rest the claim that Bob Marley was Jewish because it is a tie that would be coming from his father’s side — which Bob himself held little respect for. But upon deep dives into Bob’s early life, it is easy to see why Bob held this opinion.
Take this comment on Quora on the subject…:
Bob Marley was not Jewish. His father’s mother’s family the Bloomfields say they are not Jewish and even have relatives from Massachusetts that go back to earlier days before all States in the US were fully established. Lets be clear, this is a case of colonialism. Norval Marley 60+ years old befriended Omirah Malcolm who was a womanizer himself and molested his teen daughter, who claims she was 16. She then claimed he proposed after finding her pregnant probably out of fear and embarrassment. Her proof of marriage was debunked and apparently he left her asap. Her only other interaction after was Norval kidnapping Bob at age 8 with the promise of sending him to Boarding school. After going missing for months with no contact, Bob was spotted by one of his mothers friends in Kingston and by the grace of God he was returned to his mother. Apparently he had been left with an old lady dying of diabetes. Im sickened by people trying to romanticize white and Jewish into a Black mans story. Not to mention another example of a Evil human that happens to be white, so white historians or sympathizers try to turn him into a hero. Fact is Bobs male authority figures were his Grandfather Omirah, Stepfather Toddy Livingston, and his first boss Coxone Dodd. Norval Marley was a predator that assaulted Cedella Marley.
And finally I realize that many Jews get excited when they see ‘Jewish’ imagery, such as the magen David and the Chai symbol being utilized by Bob Marley. However this is due to the Rastafarian appropriation of these symbols – and not as a representation of Judaism directly.
Elvis Presley
I have to be honest with you, initially I wasn’t as confident with debunking the claim of Elvis’ Jewishness; but after some research, I’ve landed into the ‘not’ camp. And there is a lot of stuff online that states that Elvis is Jewish. But if you really read these claims, again, there is nothing concrete. Lots of mentions of Elvis being ‘a friend of the Jews’ and ‘appreciating Jewish symbolism’. The Jewish woman that Elvis is said to be descended from is Nancy Burdine — which would have been Elvis’ great-great grandmother. However, this would still make Elvis a Jew as per Jewish law; if Nancy herself was Jewish.
But was she? Well let’s take a look, shall we?
This website really goes down the rabbit hole, but comes to the conclusion that Nancy Burdine was probably not Jewish.
The point of contention lies within the genealogy record. The legend says that Nancy Burdine was of Lithuanian Jewish decent. However she was born in Mississippi in 1805; back when the United States was only 29 years old and 12 years before Mississippi was even admitted as a state to the union. Ok, so yes — we know that Jews were some of the earliest settlers to the Americas. So let’s dig a little bit deeper. Nancy’s father was Dr. John Fletcher Burdine, born in Culpepper County, Virginia in 1772. Still no demonstration of any ties to the Lithuanian (or any other) Jewish community. It’s true I don’t see any notion of Nancy’s mother, but let’s just say that these mythical Lithuanian Jewish ancestors immigrated to the US prior to the Revolutionary War (they would have had to if Dr. Burdine was born in Virginia). But immigration from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth or the Russian Empire immigrated to the American South during the American Revolution was essentially nil — with most of the Jews in the US around this time period being of either German, British or Sephardic descent (interesting personal tidbit — my husband is a Southern Jew descended from Lithuanian Jews — but his ancestors landed in NYC in the 1910s and then migrated to the South; they were not here at all prior to the 19th century).
Oh and to really put a wrench in things, Elvis might not even be a descendent of Nancy Burdine at all! We know that Doll (Mansell) Smith was Elvis’ maternal grandmother; and that her mother was Martha Sue (Tackett) Mansell. This Tackett family tree has Martha’s mother as Cecilia Ann Butler — born in South Carolina in 1809.
Yikes. The stretch to call the King of Rock ‘N’ Roll a Jew just went from being a stretch to a leap across a gorge. So yeah, I personally wouldn’t be willing to wedge any bets on this one. Even the claim that Elvis had a Star of David placed on his mother’s tombstone kinda hits different when you realize that the tombstone also has a cross on it too:
As I’ve said before the symbolism is a nice form of flattery; but it isn’t proof of someone being a Jew — especially in the absence of any other documentation to this fact.
Conclusion
It is mind-blowing to me the enthusiasm that (some in) the Jewish community has for declaring that someone accomplished/famous has Jewish roots. Yet, many of us who do have documents to prove our Jewish status are questioned time and time again. In fact this post was inspired by a response that I made to someone who (erroneously) stated that Bob Marley was Jewish. My commented listed the reasons to support that Bob was not Jewish. Their response to the information that I shared was “Are you Jewish?”. LOL – wow.
So before we try so hard to make various non-Jews into Jews; we should first work on welcoming those who are squarely, undoubtedly members of the tribe. One love!
