Mythologizing the bible: Ehrman’s partisan textual criticism

The general argument here is that Ehrman’s a priori stance towards Scripture leads him to employthe tools of contemporary biblical study prejudicially with the expressed purpose of converting selected content into an illusory creation of the human imagination or, in other words, to render it mythological, thereby justifying conclusions already held prior to rather than after analysis of biblical texts. In effect, the claim is that Ehrman’s implicit goal prior to biblical study is to make of the Gospel no Gospel at all, ideologically in tune with his own personal life deconversion from Christianity and conversion to self-professed atheistic status. To support this argument, the essay adopts a broad multifaceted critical social-scientific approach which looks closely at Ehrman’s personal life and attempts to make his sweeping pejorative theological claims about the Gospel intelligible in the light of these factors. The essay begins by providing a general overview of Ehrman’s life and career in order to place analysis within some kind of personal historical context. Then it critically reviews and comparatively evaluates some of the central elements and motifs of textual criticism in general and Ehrman’s preferred type of textual critical approach for studying New Testament manuscripts in particular. A small subset of Ehrman’s writings from some of his most popular books isthen critically assessed and examined for any possible links between personal biographical factors and general patterns in perspective and theological claims as well as links to broader American cultural trends. Lastly, several glaring ironies in Ehrman’s major work are briefly discussed.