The “Bigger than Jesus” Scandal

After almost fifty years, the grainy, black-and-white footage still has its eerie, disquieting power. A group of teenagers  –  the young men neatly dressed in shirts and slacks, the young women in Peter Pan collars and glossy “flip” hairdos – applaud wildly and cheer each other on as they stamp dozens of vinyl records into  jagged shards and fling the pieces into trash cans.   

It is August of 1966, and John Lennon’s comment that the Beatles are now “bigger than Jesus” has infuriated many Americans, particularly throughout the South.  Christian youth groups gather in parking lots and fields to burn Beatles albums and souvenirs in bonfires; Ku Klux Klan members hoist signs and shout for vengeance, and owners of radio stations rail against “anti-Christian foreigners” and ban the playing of Beatles records. The Beatles camp begins to receive death threats; joining the fray, the Vatican issues an official condemnation.   

The furor was sparked in July, when Datebook, an American teen magazine, referenced an interview with John Lennon that had been published four months earlier in the U.K. by the Evening Standard.  Conducted by Maureen Cleave, an experienced music journalist and longtime friend of the Beatles, the story was intended to be an innocuous lifestyle piece, not an incendiary article that would trigger an international outcry.   

However, that is exactly what it did.   

The trouble began when the talk turned to religion. Noting that Christianity was in decline, Lennon predicted that it would ultimately “vanish.”  (Often overlooked in all the uproar was the fact that he  also predicted the extinction of rock ‘n roll music.)  Lennon referred to Jesus as “all right,” but claimed  that the disciples had misunderstood and distorted  the original message.   

However, it was his “We’re more popular than Jesus now” claim that provoked the most virulent rage.   

The interview aroused little comment in the U.K. when it was published in March of 1966.  In July, however –  as the Beatles were preparing for the  American leg of their world tour –  Datebook ran its article, triggering a furious reaction throughout the United States and Mexico.  At the peak of the frenzy, the Memphis city council declared the Beatles “not welcome,” and voted to cancel an upcoming concert at the Mid-South Coliseum. Such was the magnitude of the scandal that Beatles manager Brian Epstein considered cancelling the entire tour.   

Amid the outcry, the Beatles had some defenders.  Assorted radio stations made a point of playing even more Beatles music than usual, and a magazine published by Jesuit priests asserted that Lennon was merely stating a fact that many Christian educators would confirm.   

On August 11, 1966, the Beatles held a press conference to address the scandal.  A solemn-looking John Lennon apologized for using the “wrong words,” and attempted to explain what he had meant to say.   

Insisting that he was not “anti-Christ, anti-God or anti-religious,” Lennon said he had never intended to compare the Beatles to Jesus Christ, or imply that they were superior. He had been trying to articulate his belief that God — rather than being “an old man in the sky” — was in “all of us.” It is ironic that a similar concept had recently been espoused in a well-regarded book by the Bishop of Woolwich.   

The “Bigger Than Jesus” scandal undoubtedly contributed to the Beatles’ decision to stop touring. Although the Memphis show proceeded as scheduled, the group – nerves frayed from the death threats – momentarily panicked when they mistook a firecracker thrown onto the stage for gunfire. Their August 29 show at Candlestick Park in San Francisco would prove to be their last.   

The six small words spoken by John Lennon were to have consequences that extended even beyond the scandal. In a tragic footnote to the story, the man who murdered John Lennon on December 8, 1980, was a self-described born-again Christian who had long viewed Lennon’s statement as blasphemy.   

It took 42 years, but the Vatican officially forgave John Lennon. Characterizing his words as nothing more than a “boast” from a working-class youth, the 2008 statement went on to praise Lennon, and his fellow Beatles,  as a source of inspiration for an entire generation of musicians.