On the Religious Roots of Comedians

It is not funny that anything else should fall down; only that a man should fall down. Why do we laugh? Because it is a gravely religious matter: it is the Fall of Man. Only man can be absurd: for only man can be dignified.

- GK Chesterton

There's no getting around it: most of the funniest people walking the earth today come from a religious upbringing or religious roots.

Many of them will shrug it off as anecdotal, something irrelevant to their calling as comics; some comics even see religion as harmful to humanity in general. 

But if we're honest with ourselves, there is a definite and blatant pattern of the religious roots of comics; and whether or not they still embrace the "faith of their fathers," many of the greatest American comedians of the past two-hundred years sprang from Jewish or Catholic households. 

For starters: Adam Sandler, Woody Allen, Billy Crystal, Seth Rogen, Andy Samberg, Jonah Hill, Rob Reiner, Sacha Baron Cohen, Larry David, Jack Black, The Marx Brothers, Jerry Lewis, and Jerry Seinfeld all had a Jewish upbringing and/or Jewish roots. And that's just the beginning:

Of course, you'll often find many of these people denying actually practicing Judaism; but their culture, their youth, and their families are all there, testifying to their religious roots.

Now, take a gander at a few other obscure comics who had a Catholic upbringing:

• Jim Carrey was raised Catholic.
• Jimmy Kimmel served as an altar boy.
• Steve Carrell has admitted: "I'm Catholic, born and bred."
• Patricia Heaton and Peter Boyle of "Everybody Loves Raymond" were both raised Catholic; Boyle nearly entered the religious life.
• Big boys John Candy and John Pinette were both Catholic-educated.
• Dan Aykroyd was once on his way to becoming a Catholic priest. His fascination with "things invisible" carried over into the development of his "crystal head" vodka.
• Jimmy Fallon was raised Catholic; in an interview, he confessed to a childhood fascination with Catholic mass, and a desire to become a priest as a young adult.
• SNL legends Martin Short, Phil Hartman, Chris Farley, and Bill Murray were all raised Catholic; Murray's sister is a nun. 
• Bob Newhart was raised Catholic - he also has a sister who became a nun.
• Kevin Smith, director of Dogma, still goes to Catholic mass.
• Dane Cook and Jim Gaffigan were raised Catholic, and still joke about it in stand-up bits.
• Bill Maher, Seth MacFarlane, Julia Sweeney, Greg Giraldo, Janeane Garofalo, and George Carlin - staunch critics of religion all - were all raised Catholic. 
• Vince Vaughn, Danny DeVito, and master of deadpan Steven Wright were all raised Catholic.
• Ben Stiller's father is Jewish; his mother is Irish-Catholic. 
• Conan O'Brien, Louis CK, Brian Regan, Dennis Leary, Molly Shannon, Nathan Lane, and Bill Burr all come from Irish-Catholic backgrounds.

TS Eliot once said that Dante and Shakespeare divide the literary world between them. Similarly, it looks like Judaism and Catholicism have divided the biggest slice of the comedy world between them.

Of course, this is not a universal law. Most Jews and Catholics are not comedians, and there are plenty of comedians with non-Jewish, non-Catholic, or even non-religious backgrounds (Christopher Guest, for instance). But the overall pattern is undeniable and inescapable.

In fact, take Comedy Central's two hottest shows - "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" - and what do you have? A guy raised in a Jewish family and a practicing Catholic and Sunday school teacher.

What can this mean? Why do Judaism and Catholicism often pump out the most hilarious people in America, even if they don't practice their faith, or openly deny or criticize it?

A common explanation was best formulated by Rob Reiner: "Persecuted people have two things they can do to win their point. They can punch back, or they can defuse it with laughter."

At first glance, this theory seems to explain everything. Antisemitism has (and continues to have) a long, ugly history in America; and historian Arthur Schlesinger Sr. once called anti-Catholicism "the deepest-held bias in the history of the American people." (It's hard to believe now, but JFK had to cool the same paranoid concerns about his Catholicism that Mitt Romney does now for his Mormonism.) Walker Percy once quipped that KKK members in the South were generally amiable people, "except when it comes to blacks, Jews, and Catholics." Of course, this persecution theory would also explain the other major slice of the comic pie: African Americans. (Tyler Perry, let's not forget, is now the highest paid man in show biz.) 

But can persecution really explain everything? Aren't there plenty of religious, sexual, and ethnic groups that were (and are) persecuted and marginalized in America, that aren't major comic forces en masse the way Jews, Catholics, or African Americans have been?

Persecution seems to explain a lot about this strange pattern, but it's not the complete picture. Here, philosopher Peter Kreeft explores the pattern from another angle:

Kreeft notes that true humor spins off from the perception of ironies, incongruities, puns, and questions, "the compression of language to reflect the compression chamber of life" - all features of so-called "Jewish humor." For if you descend from an obscure little tribe that claims to be the chosen people of the one true God, a people constantly held captive and persecuted - seeing the irony in situations is in your bones, because it's in the very fabric of your religion and your tragic history.

In Jewish synagogues, tabernacles
hold the word of God (torah scrolls).
In Catholic churches, tabernacles
hold the word of God "made flesh" -
the Eucharist. 

Likewise, American Catholics and African Americans have both maintained a strong bond with Jewish stories and traditions. Antisemitism has periodically plagued both groups; but, at their root, they seem to be the most Jewish groups next to Jews themselves. Countless African American spirituals from the civil rights era ("Go Down Moses," "Walk in Jerusalem," "Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho") reveal an identification with Jewish stories of divine guidance in the midst of captivity and great suffering. Similarly, innumerable Catholic practices, prayers, and traditions have their roots in Jewish thought (Pope John Paul II once called Jews the "older brothers and sisters" of Catholics).

Many comedians listed above would likely take umbrage with all of this - but from the outside looking in, it's hard not to notice the strange pattern: God's chosen species emerged "out of Africa," his chosen people out of Israel, and his chosen church out of Rome; all three groups suffered (and often still do suffer) the slings and arrows of suspicion and persecution in America; and all three came out on the other side holding up one or both Testaments and telling jokes and stories.

A long history of persecution against a group may make it quicker to laugh; but when that persecution is paired with the ancient ironies of Jewish thought, the hearts and minds of its children routinely forge comic gold.