Robert M. Price

Robert M. Price
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For other people named Robert Price, see Robert Price (disambiguation)

Robert McNair Price (born July 7, 1954 in Mississippi) is a Professor of Theology and Scriptural Studies at the Johnnie Colemon Theological Seminary in Miami Gardens, Florida. He is a religious skeptic, especially of orthodox Christian beliefs, a fellow of the controversial Jesus Seminar, and the author of many books and articles on religion. He has also written extensively about H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos and runs a user community for those interested in the history of Christianity. He is also the editor of The Journal of Higher Criticism.

content

1 Background
2 Theology
3 Cthulhu Mythos
4 TheBibleGeek.org
5 Books
- 5.1 On religion
- 5.2 On the Cthulhu Mythos (as editor)
6 References
7 External links

Background

Price is a former Baptist Minister in New Jersey, with Doctorates in both Theology (Drew University, 1981), as well as in New Testament (Drew, 1993).^[1]

A self-described humanist, he is a member of the Episcopal Church and is friendly with fundamentalist Christians outside of academia. He is also friends with the evangelical (but not fundamentalist) pastor and author Greg Boyd, with whom he has had numerous public debates concerning the historicity of Jesus.

Theology

In books like The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man, Deconstructing Jesus and Beyond Born Again: On Putting Away Childish Things, Price has challenged Biblical literalism and argued for a more skeptical and humanistic approach to Christianity. He has helped to popularize the Gnostic tradition and has questioned the idea of a historical Jesus.

In the documentary “The God Who Wasn’t There,” Price suggests that the early Christians adopted the model for the figure of Jesus from the popular Mediterranean dying- rising saviour myths of the time, such as that of Dionysus. He points out that the comparisons were even known at the time because The early church father Justin Martyr admitted the similarities.

In his encyclopedia article “New Testament Narrative as Old Testament Midrash,” he argues that there was an almost complete fleshing out of the details of the gospels by a Midrash rewriting of the Septuagint, Homer, Euripides' Bacchae, and Josephus. In part four in the sub-section of the essay referring to a Midrash in the Acts of the Apostles, commenting on Euripides, Price writes "Dionysus has appeared in Thebes as an apparently mortal missionary for his own sect." In the play, Dionysus is viewed as not being a God by Cadmus, who then adds the idea that the people should lie and say he is a God, because it would make it seem that the mortal woman Semele gave birth to a God, and that it would bring honor on their race. Price argues that Luke is borrowing a general theme from Euripides here, but does not clarify if this includes the deception issuse by those that wanted Jesus to be perceived as a God. Price has suggested during a Q&A session that it would make sense if the early Christians lied that Jesus was a God, because this would explain how someone purely mythical could have gained such a powerful following in and beyond the first century. Price accepts that this would also agree with the biblical theme of "responsible lying," meaning that lying is acceptable if it done to protect God's people, such as in the case of Rahab (Joshua 2: 3-4), which is recalled in the New Testament (Heb 11:31 and James 2:25) as an exemplary case. As Price points out, Nietzsche also indicated the force of the 'holy lie' in his book the 'Anti-Christ.' Nietzsche writes "Such a priestly syllogism is by no means merely Jewish and Christian; the right to lie and the shrewdness of "revelation" belong to the priestly type, to the decadent priests as well as to the priests of paganism (pagans are all those who say Yes to life, for whom "god" is the word for the greatest of all things). The "law," the "will of God," the "holy book," "inspiration"—all mere words for the conditions under which the priest attains power, with which the priest preserves his power; these concepts are found at the basis of all priestly organizations, of all forms of priestly or philosophic-priestly rule. The "holy lie"—common to Confucius, the law of Manu, Mohammed, the Christian church—is not absent in Plato. "Truth is there": this means, wherever it is announced, the priest lies." Price publishes a monthly essay on Nietzsche.

Price acknowledges that there are a few ancient non-gospel sources that claim Jesus Christ was a real living person (such as Tacitus). However, Price points out that even if these references are taken as genuine (which many scholars contest), they at most refer to the claims of the contemporary Christians of the time about Jesus, and were never claims of Jesus as a contemporary of the ancient writers.

Price hosts a weekly call-in webcast, The Bible Geek in which he answers a wide range of questions pertaining to religion. He appeared in Brian Flemming's documentary film The God Who Wasn't There (2005). From 1994 until 2003, Price was the editor of The Journal of Higher Criticism. [1]

Cthulhu Mythos

As editor of the journal Crypt of Cthulhu (published by Necronomicon Press) and of a series of Cthulhu Mythos anthologies, Price has been a major figure in H. P. Lovecraft scholarship and fandom for many years. In essays that introduce the collections and the individual stories, Price traces the origins of Lovecraft's entities, motifs, and literary style. The Cthulhu Cycle, for example, saw the origins of the octopoid god in Alfred Lord Tennyson's "The Kraken" and particular passages from Lord Dunsany, while The Dunwich Cycle points to the influence of Arthur Machen on Lovecraft's "The Dunwich Horror".

Price's religious background often informs his Mythos criticism, seeing gnostic themes in Lovecraft's fictional god Azathoth and interpreting "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" as a kind of initiation ritual.

TheBibleGeek.org

Price runs a website, TheBibleGeek.org, that in addition to offering a number of his writings, also allows people to listen to audio recordings of a broadcast show that he runs that allows people to "ask the Bible Geek" questions that he will answer. The site also has a number of user oriented features that let people participate with him and with one another online.

Books

On religion

Jesus Christ Superstar
Beyond Born Again: Towards Evangelical Maturity.
The Widow Traditions in Luke-Acts: A Feminist-Critical Scrutiny. (ISBN 0788502247)
Deconstructing Jesus. (ISBN 1573927589)
Mystic Rhythms: The Philosophical Vision of Rush (co-authored by his wife, Carol Selby Price). (ISBN 1587151022)
The Pre-Nicene New Testament. (ISBN 1560851945)
The Da Vinci Fraud: Why the Truth Is Stranger than Fiction. (ISBN 1591023483)
The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man. (ISBN 1591021219)
The Reason Driven Life: What Am I Here on Earth For?. (ISBN 1591024765)
The Buddha and the Bible. ^{citation needed}
Jesus Christ Superstar: A Redactional Study of a Modern Gospel.
Inerrant the Wind: The Evangelical Crisis of Biblical Authority (forthcoming).
Paul as Text: The Apostle and the Apocrypha (forthcoming).
The Paperback Apocalypse: How the Christian Church was Left Behind. (ISBN 1591025834)
Paul: The Amazing Colossal Apostle (forthcoming).
Jesus is Dead. (ISBN 1578840007)
The Empty Tomb: Jesus Beyond The Grave (as editor). (ISBN 159102286X)