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Originally Posted by DNND Who is Acharya? What is her full name? I love to study astrotheology, but I never heard the name. |
D.M. Murdock is her given name. However, if you want to do a general search on her, then I'd use her pen name(Acharya S.). Robert M. Price had written a critical review of her work at one time and in it he had given her real name. She still uses her pen name mostly, but she has used her regular name on her most recent book.
She says that she has used a pen name because she has many angry critics. She compares the mythologies of Christianity with Hinduism, and apparently neither group likes being compared to the other. She also makes comparisons to Buddhist mythology, but I haven't heard about any Buddhists threatening her.
Just Google her name. She has her own website and forum(truthbeknown.com). She has tons of information on her site. There is a page about her credentials and there is a thread in her forum that answers the basic criticisms of her work. She has 2 books available on Amazon.
Also, her work has been discussed on many different forums(such as Dawkin's or Internet Infidels). I bet her name gets mentioned some on religious forums. Several Biblical scholars and many Christians have written about her work on the web.
Earl Doherty has written a positive review. Robert M. Price took down his negative review from his site, and now has written the introduction to her recent book. Both Doherty and Price are mythicists with their own websites, and Price was a member of the Jesus Seminar. I believe Richard Carrier wrote a negative review of her work, but I think he is generally critical of mythicism. Of course, Apolegetic writers such as J.P. Holding are critical.
You might have heard of the movie Zeitgeist which is available on Google. The first part of that movie is about Astrotheology. She was an advisor for some of the astrotheological info in the movie, but I know she disagreed about the dating for the end of the age of Pisces. In forums, her name often comes up in reference to this movie.
I've read her first book several years ago, I'm almost finished her second book, and I've skimmed her third book slightly. I know her work fairly well. She is the first author that I read that expounded in detail on the mythology in the Christian tradition in terms of ancient texts.
Her first book(The Christ Conspiracy) is her most popular one. Her second book(Suns of God) was written partly to answer the criticisms of the first book. Her third book(Who Was Jesus?) isn't about astrotheology, but instead more directly focuses on the ahistoricity of Jesus using motly Christian sources for her arguments.
I'm not an expert on her work, but if you have any questions I might be able to find an answer for you. Here is an introductory article about astrotheology that she recently put up on her site:
http://www.truthbeknown.com/astrotheology.html