Showing results by author "Robert M. Price" in All Categories

In Bart Ehrman Interpreted, theologian and writer Robert M. Price evaluates Ehrman’s body of work. Taking a collegial approach and rejecting polemics, Price defends Ehrman’s writing against conservative attacks, but also suggests a number of points at which Ehrman may be insufficiently or inconsistently critical.

Leading New Testament scholar Robert M. Price has taken umbrage at the cavalier manner in which Rev. Lee Strobel has misrepresented the field of Bible scholarship in his book The Case for Christ. Price exposes and refutes Strobel's arguments chapter-by-chapter. In doing so, he has occasion to wipe out the entire field of Christian apologetics as summarized by Strobel. This book is a must-read for anyone bewildered by the various books published by Rev. Strobel.

In The Christ-Myth Theory and Its Problems, Robert M. Price, one of America's leading authorities on the Bible, demonstrates that almost the entire "biography” of Jesus is a conscious reworking of earlier literature and shares the evidence that has led him and other scholars to conclude that Christ—a partial synonym for Jesus of Nazareth—is a mythical figure.

What if we have been missing a whole stage of how the canonical gospels came to be? What if there were a whole raft of prior Jesus narratives, the fragmentary vestiges of which now appear in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John? This would explain why these gospels seem over-crowded with incompatible understandings of Jesus ("Christologies")?

In this critique of modern evangelicals, theologian and writer Robert M. Price outlines several of the difficulties to be found in traditional evangelical apologetics, such as the evangelical defense of the historical reliability of the gospels, the resurrection of Jesus, and the claims of Jesus to be divine. He concludes by outlining some possible directions for the future of evangelistic thought.

The myth of Moses the Lawgiver has grown over the past two thousand years, evolving through gospel-like accounts from Hellenistic Jewish writers and even the cinematic epic The Ten Commandments. But the canonical story of Moses—as found in the first five books of the Bible—was itself the product of earlier stories, assembled by an unnamed, undated compiler. Where did the stories about Moses come from, and what were they? In Moses and Minimalism, Dr. Robert M. Price applies critical scrutiny and historical inquiry to this superstar of the Old Testament.

Was Jesus a mainstream or sectarian Jew, as the scholarly consensus tells us? This view—that we must automatically adopt Second Temple Judaism as the paradigm in which to interpret or reconstruct the historical Jesus—is often presented as self-evident, unquestionable, and beyond dispute. However, the promotion of the Jewish Jesus raises serious questions—specifically, whether this consensus is the product of theological and ecumenical agendas. In Judaizing Jesus, noted scholar Robert M.

C.S. Lewis' apologetic classic The Screwtape Letters is full of keen wit and wise counsel—if one is a Christian believer. Such a reader will find much to ponder in its pages. But instead of a wily senior devil who offers advice to a mentee nephew on how to secure the damnation of humans, what if the letter writer were a clever angel who instructs his underling how to keep humans firmly fixed in their Christian faith?

While Christian faith cannot be reduced to mere superstition, few would deny that Christianity is too easily plagued by superstition. Indeed, many Christian theologians have tried to purify Christianity of magical thinking in favor of genuine piety.

In this powerful volume, noted New Testament scholar Robert M. Price engages in serious scrutiny of the beliefs and thinking of genuine Christian theologians and explains why he no longer finds that cardinal Christian claims make enough sense to believe. As he concludes, the gospel proclamation is not a timeless revelation from heaven, but merely Christianity.

Christians consider their religion virtually synonymous with morality, believing there can be no moral standard without a God to guarantee it, no moral behavior without belief in God and knowledge of his commandments. Disbelievers are objects of their suspicion, tarred with labels like "relativist" and "nihilist." But buried under the benign and placid surface of Christian theology lies an incurable conflict—a ticking moral time bomb—and most believers have never realized the sinister implications of what they purport to believe.

In Preaching Deconstruction, Robert M. Price applies the philosophy of Jacques Derrida and the radical theology of Thomas J.J. Altizer to real questions of spirituality and biblical interpretation across a dozen unique sermons. Price preaches from both the Old and New Testaments, as well as the Koran and the Gospel of Thomas. Other influences on these sermons, delivered in a Baptist church toward the end of Price's pastorate, include Paul Tillich, Paul de Man, Rudolf Bultmann, Robert W. Chambers, Ingmar Bergman, Malcolm Boyd, and Thomas Ligotti.