BOB MARLEY
If you're a reggae fan, you've probably heard several urban
legends about how Bob Marley died. He was in the prime of his career when he
was diagnosed with cancer, which killed him at age 36. A devout Rastafarian,
Marley's faith would play a profound role in how he sought treatment.
A Diagnosis of Melanoma
In 1977, Bob Marley
was diagnosed with malignant melanoma, a kind of skin cancer, after doctors
found a lesion on a toe he'd injured in a soccer game.
At the time,
physicians recommended having the toe amputated. However, Marley opposed the
surgery.
Marley's Rastafarian Faith
As a devout Rastafarian, Bob Marley adhered strongly to the tenets of his
religion, which includes a belief that amputation is sinful. A Bible verse that
Rastafarians hold as very important is Leviticus 21:5, which says, "They shall not make
baldness upon their head, neither shall they shave off the corner of their
beard, nor make any cuttings in the flesh."
The first part of
this verse is the foundation of the belief in wearing dreadlocks, and the
second is the basis for a belief that amputation (as well as other types of
body modification) is sinful. Other verses, including those which refer to the
body as a holy temple, may also influence this belief.
Rastafarianism
teaches that death is not a certainty and that truly holy people will gain
immortality in their physical bodies.
To acknowledge that
death is a possibility is to make certain that it will come soon. It is
believed that this is the reason that Bob Marley never wrote a will, either,
which resulted in difficulty in dividing his assets after his death.
Final Performances
By the late summer
of 1980, the cancer had
metastasized throughout Bob Marley's body.
While he was in New
York City performing, Marley collapsed during a jog through Central Park. He
performed for the last time in September of 1980 in Pittsburgh, a performance
that was remastered and released in February of 2011 as "Bob Marley and
the Wailers Live Forever."
Bob Marley's Death
After the
Pittsburgh incident, Marley canceled the remainder of his tour and traveled to
Germany. There, he sought the care of Josef Issels, a physician and former Nazi
soldier who had gained a reputation for his controversial cancer treatments.
His treatment methods appealed to Marley's Rastafarian aversion to surgery and
other forms of medicine.
Despite following Issels'
regimen of diet and other holistic treatments, it soon became clear that
Marley's cancer was terminal. The singer boarded a plane to return to Jamaica,
but he rapidly declined en route. At a stopover in Miami on May 11, 1981,
Marley died. According to some reports, his final words were spoken to his
son Ziggy Marley: which is "Money can't buy life."
Conspiracy Theories
To this day, some
fans still harbor conspiracy theories about Bob Marley's death. In 1976, when
Jamaica was roiled by political turmoil, Marley had been planning a peace
concert in Kingston.
On Dec. 3, while he
and the Wailers were rehearsing, armed gunmen broke into his home and
confronted the musicians in the studio. After firing several shots, the men
fled.
Although no one was
killed, Marley was shot in the arm; the bullet would remain lodged there until
his death. The gunmen were never caught, but rumors circulated that the C.I.A.,
which had a long history of covert activities in the Caribbean and Latin
America, was behind the attempt.
Some would blame
the C.I.A. again for the cancer that eventually killed Bob Marley in 1981.
According to this often-repeated tale, the spy agency wanted Marley dead
because he had become so influential in Jamaican politics since the turmoil of
1976. An agent allegedly gave the singer a pair of boots that were contaminated
with radioactive material.
When Marley tried
on the boots, according to the urban legend, his toe became contaminated,
eventually causing the fatal melanoma.
In a variation on
this urban legend, the C.I.A. also recruited Marley's physician Josef Issels to
ensure their assassination attempt would succeed. In this rendition, Issels was
not just a former Nazi soldier but an SS officer who used his medical training
to slowly poison Marley when the singer sought treatment from him. None of
these conspiracy theories have ever been verified.