Name Randel Helms | Role Professor | |
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Books Gospel Fictions, Who Wrote the Gospels?, BIBLE AGAINST ITSELF, Tolkien's World, Tolkien and the Silmarils | ||
Gospel Fictions : Crucifixion & Resurrection
Randel McCraw Helms (born November 6, 1942 in Montgomery, Alabama) is an American professor of English literature, a writer on J. R. R. Tolkien and critical writer on the Bible.
Helms studied at University of California, Riverside, B.A. 1964, University of Washington, Ph.D. 1968, then taught from 1968 at the University of California as assistant professor of English, before becoming professor at the Department of English, Arizona State University. In 2007 he established the Randel and Susan McCraw Helms Homecoming Writing Contest for undergraduate students.
As Loyce Randel Helms he wrote his dissertation on William Blake: Artful thunder: a literary study of prophecy He has also written on Blake's "Everlasting Gospel" (1980).
Helm's writings on Tolkien include Tolkien's world (1974) and Tolkien and the Silmarils (1981).
Helms has written a series of books using Higher Criticism to analyze the Bible. In "Gospel Fictions" , Helms shows how the Gospel writers used the Old Testament as a source of material to build up fictional details about events surrounding Jesus. He also wrote "Who wrote the Gospels?" (1997) and The Bible against itself (2006) on similar themes.