lpetrich

URL: <a href="http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/robert_price/price-rankin/price1.html" target="_blank">http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/robert_price/price-rankin/price1.html</a>

First, I've been unable to find an e-mail address for Richard Price; I don't have as much interest in contacting John Rankin, however.

It seems to me that RP was focused directly on the issue at hand, while JR preferred invoking grandiose issues with questionable relevance -- at best. RP brought up the important issue of why Jesus Christ's life fits the Mythic Hero profile so well, and JR never responded to that. Instead, he claimed that it is from the Bible that we get concepts of historcity, democracy, civil liberties, scientific method, and so forth. And he also made a big issue out of what might outside our physical Universe; he also claimed that deities of other religions are wicked and capricious. JR even had the chutzpah to claim that it would be wrong to question the historicity of JC when it was the book that describes him that gave us our concepts of historicity.

In addition to being side issues, a lot of what JR said is just plain wrong. The ideas of democracy and republics are totally absent from the Bible; simply consider where these words come from.

Also, the classical Greco-Roman world had produced some good, careful historians and scientists, which is more than can be said about the Bible. Is there anyone comparable to Herodotus or Aristotle in the Bible?

Finally, I must mention that RP asked why no present-day religious hero seems capable of Jesus Christ's miracles or of calling fire down from heaven. And JR claimed that JC had forbidden doing that, which is doubtful at best.

[ January 07, 2002: Message edited by: lpetrich ]</p>