Editing Mark David Chapman (section)

== Motive ==
{{Quote|I would listen to this music and I would get angry at him, for saying that he didn't believe in God… and that he didn't believe in the Beatles. This was another thing that angered me, even though this record had been done at least ten years previously. I just wanted to scream out loud, "Who does he think he is, saying these things about God and heaven and the Beatles?" Saying that he doesn't believe in Jesus and things like that. At that point, my mind was going through a total blackness of anger and rage. So I brought the Lennon book home, into this The Catcher in the Rye milieu where my mindset is Holden Caulfield and anti-phoniness.|Mark David Chapman}}
Chapman allegedly started planning to kill English musician John Lennon three months prior to the murder. A longtime fan of Lennon's band the Beatles, Chapman turned against Lennon following a religious conversion, and was angry about Lennon's highly publicized 1966 comment that the Beatles were "more popular than Jesus." Jan Reeves, the sister of one of Chapman's friends, reported that Chapman "seemed really angry" toward Lennon and spoke frequently about Lennon's claim, saying it was blasphemy. Some members of Chapman's prayer group made a joke in reference to Lennon's song "Imagine": "It went, 'Imagine, imagine if John Lennon was dead.'" Chapman's childhood friend Miles McManushe recalled that he said that the song was "communist".

Chapman had also been influenced by Anthony Fawcett's ''John Lennon: One Day at a Time'' about Lennon's lifestyle in New York. According to his wife Gloria, "He was angry that Lennon would preach love and peace but yet have millions". Chapman later said: "He told us to imagine no possessions and there he was, with millions of dollars and yachts and farms and country estates, laughing at people like me who had believed the lies and bought the records and built a big part of their lives around his music." He also recalled having listened to Lennon's ''John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band'' album in the weeks before the murder.

Chapman's planning has been described as "muddled." Over the years, Chapman has both supported and denied whether he felt justified by his spiritual beliefs at the time or had the intention of acquiring notoriety. The only time he made a public statement before his sentencing — and for several years afterward — was during a brief psychotic episode in which he was convinced that the meaning of his actions was to promote ''The Catcher in the Rye'', which amounted to a single letter mailed to the ''New York Times'' asking the public to read the novel. According to Chapman, he had an alternate hit list of potential targets in mind, including Beatles bandmate Paul McCartney, talk show host Johnny Carson, actress Elizabeth Taylor, actor George C. Scott, former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, just-elected US president Ronald Reagan, and Hawaii governor George Ariyoshi. In 2010, he said that the only criterion for the list was being "famous", and that he chose Lennon out of convenience. Journalist James R. Gaines, who interviewed Chapman extensively, concluded that Chapman did not kill Lennon to become a celebrity.

It is rumored that Chapman traveled to Woodstock, New York during one of his New York visits in search of Todd Rundgren, another target of obsession. Chapman was wearing a promotional T-shirt for Rundgren's album ''Hermit of Mink Hollow'' when he was arrested and had a copy of ''Runt. The Ballad of Todd Rundgren'' in his hotel room. Rundgren was not aware of the connections until much later.  On the day of the murder, singer David Bowie was appearing on Broadway in the play ''The Elephant Man''. "I was second on his list," Bowie later said. "Chapman had a front-row ticket to ''The Elephant Man'' the next night. John and Yoko were supposed to sit front-row for that show too. So the night after John was killed there were three empty seats in the front row. I can't tell you how difficult that was to go on. I almost didn't make it through the performance."