“Now the World Knows”: Christian Conspiracist Texe Marrs on Jewish Genetics and the Khazarian Hypothesis

Abstract

In the last several decades, research on the population genetics of the Jewish people, what has been popularly called “Jewish genetics,” has captivated scientists and the public. In turn, scholars in the humanities and social sciences have noted the impacts of DNA testing on the Jewish identities of communities, families, and individuals. Few studies in contemporary antisemitism, however, have focused on how antisemites dialogue with Jewish genetics. In this article, I consider the Christian conspiracist writer and radio personality Texe Marrs (1944–2019), an antisemite who recently showed interest in Jewish genetic research purporting to support the Khazarian hypothesis, culminating in a 2013 book, DNA Science and the Jewish Bloodline. I show how Marrs mobilized recent research on Jewish genetics to denounce Christian Zionists, demonize Jews and Judaism, and delegitimize the State of Israel. Though Marrs died in November 2019, he was part of a much larger network of Christian conspiracists who drew from an archive of Jew-hatred. Where relevant, I address the work of other antisemitic Christian conspiracists in Marrs’s circle and consider the antisemitic sources upon which he drew.