About the Author
The Pearl River as seen from my hometown in Mississippi.
I was born and raised in Mississippi, and I come from what my old college professor and friend Clayton Sullivan has called a “grass roots” Protestant background. I’ve always known the Bible well, because Bible study is so engrained in Southern culture. My great grandmother taught me to read at three years of age and the King James Bible was my primer. However I was not especially “churched” for my parents were very critical of traditional religion during my childhood. Little did I realize, this worked to my benefit. I grew up during the height of the cold war when many of the churches in my area made patriotism a religion and taught hapless children that it was a good and holy thing to wage war against the “godless communists.” Some of the more backward churches I visited evenly openly condoned racism. Thus most of my ideas about what the Bible actually teaches came about not because of the doctrine and sermons I occasionally heard in the churches, but in spite of them. In other words, I was raised to be a freethinking Protestant.
I followed my father into the profession of law. I graduated the Mississippi College School of Law in 1989, passed the bar soon afterwards, and began my legal career. But Bible study was my first love, and you never forget your first love.
A few years into my law practice, I read James Charlesworth’s book Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls where I discovered Otto Betz’s Mk 3:6 Herodians/Essenes identification in Betz’s contributing chapter. I instantly realized that Betz had uncovered a new way of exploring Barbra Thiering’s Jesus as Wicked Priest theory, for Mk 3:1-6 was the inciting incident to crucifixion. Upon closer examination, I began finding numerous points of correlation between the Gospels and the Dead Sea Scrolls. I tried handing off my discoveries to established scholars, but when no one took me seriously I determined to do the work myself. So I returned to my undergraduate alma mater, the University of Southern Mississippi, and pursued graduate study in philosophy and religion. Originally I planned to proceed directly to doctoral study after I published my research, but I had no way of knowing then that Jesus the Wicked Priest would take fourteen long years to complete.
In the interim, I returned to my law practice and occasionally took elective coursework, getting more out of my masters program than ever was intended. In fact, I will finally graduate with my masters in philosophy and religion shortly after Jesus the Wicked Priest is released. I’m more committed to pursuing my doctoral work now than ever. There’s still time to make a difference; I’m only forty-four. The irony is that I’ve probably read the equivalent of a doctorate degree several times over. But I look forward to again experiencing the interaction you can only get among a vibrant community of like-minded scholars.
Several years ago, Travis Fulton, who was then the Methodist minister in my hometown, recognized and validated my call to ministry. Travis encouraged me to enter the candidacy program to become an ordained pastor in the United Methodist Church. I doubt I will ever pursue the traditional role of pastoring a church full time; I much prefer the role of an iconoclastic writer and speaker. But I think it is important that I follow through with ordination so I will have a legitimate Christian “voice.”
What are my other interests? I marched in the Phantom Regiment drum and bugle corps from 1981-83, so I’m a big fan of rudimental drumming. In my spare time, I teach my local high school drumline and arrange their music. At my peak, I was a 4.5 NTRP rated tennis player and an 1800 USATT rated table tennis player (I’m a pips-out penhold hitter, for those who follow the sport). I sometimes practice Qigong to relieve stress and I’m beginning to study Yoga.