BOOKS BY DR. JOSEPH MURPHY The Amazing Laws of Cosmic Mind Power The Cosmic Energizer: Miracle Power of the Universe The Cosmic Power Within You Great Bible Truths for Human Problems The Healing Power of Love How to Attract Money How to Pray with a Deck of Cards How to Use the Power of Prayer How to Use Your Healing Power Infinite Power for Richer Living Living Without Strain Love is Freedom Magic of Faith Mental Poisons and Their Antidotes The Miracle of Mind Dynamics Miracle Power for Infinite Riches Peace Within Yourself The Power Of Your Subconscious Mind Pray Your Way Through It Prayer is the Answer Psychic Perception: The Meaning of Extrasensory Power Quiet Moments with God Secrets of the I Ching Songs of God Special Meditations for Health, Wealth, Love, and Expression Stay Young Forever Supreme Mastery of Fear Telepsychics: The Magic Power of Perfect Living Why Did This Happen to Me? Within You is the Power Write Your Name in the Book of Life Your Infinite Power to be Rich
(Arabic: جوزيف ميرفي) Joseph Murphy was a Divine Science minister and author.
Murphy was born in Ireland, the son of a private boy's school headmaster and raised a Roman Catholic. He studied for the priesthood and joined the Jesuits. In his twenties, an experience with healing prayer led him to leave the Jesuits and move to the United States, where he became a pharmacist in New York (having a degree in chemistry by that time). Here he attended the Church of the Healing Christ (part of the Church of Divine Science), where Emmet Fox had become minister in 1931.
In the mid 1940s, he moved to Los Angeles, where he met Religious Science founder Ernest Holmes, and was ordained into Religious Science by Holmes in 1946, thereafter teaching at the Institute of Religious Science. A meeting with Divine Science Association president Erwin Gregg led to him being reordained into Divine Science, and he became the minister of the Los Angeles Divine Science Church in 1949, which he built into one of the largest New Thought congregations in the country. In the next decade, Murphy married, earned a PhD in psychology from the University of Southern California and started writing. After his first wife died in 1976, he remarried to a fellow Divine Science minister who was his longstanding secretary. He died in 1981.
I read a soft copy of Riches Are Your Right largely because the title was impossible to ignore. Who doesn’t want to understand the idea that wealth and abundance might be a rightful part of life rather than something to struggle endlessly for?
Early on, I found myself conflicted. Dr. Murphy’s interpretation of scripture often diverges sharply from traditional Christian teaching. His approach leans heavily on metaphor and metaphysical symbolism, suggesting that many biblical writers were speaking in coded language rather than literal terms. For readers deeply rooted in orthodox theology, this can feel unsettling and, at times, controversial. I admit I questioned how confidently one could claim insight into the original intent of biblical authors.
Still, curiosity won. I chose not to disengage simply because the framework challenged familiar beliefs.
Read properly, this is not a theological manual but a philosophy of mindset and subconscious alignment. Dr. Murphy’s central argument is that our subconscious beliefs — especially about money, worth, and success — quietly shape our outcomes. He supports this with anecdotal accounts from clients and patients he worked with, illustrating how internal narratives can either block or invite abundance.
One story that stayed with me, particularly as an author, involved a talented writer who struggled financially despite her skill. Her issue, Murphy suggested, was not ability but belief: she subconsciously viewed money as something unclean and believed her work should not be done for financial reward. Through affirmations and mental re-conditioning, she reframed money as fair exchange — compensation for value that uplifts and serves others — and her circumstances reportedly changed.
Whether one accepts every claim or not, the book raises an important question: how many of our financial limitations are reinforced not by lack of opportunity, but by inherited attitudes toward money itself?
This book works best when read with discernment — not as literal doctrine, but as a reflective guide on the power of belief, self-talk, and internal alignment. It will resonate strongly with readers open to metaphysical thinking and personal responsibility, and may provoke healthy tension for those grounded in more traditional frameworks.
Either way, it invites introspection — and that alone makes it worth reading.
In other words, “What we permit ourselves to believe quietly shapes the life we experience publicly.”
Dr. Murphy did it again! Every work in his backlog is superb! Riches are your Right literally feels like the Bill of Rights but for Divine Law and Order. This book, to me, is just as important as knowing your rights and should be in everyone's pocket. Riches are your Right is required reading for life.
The power of positive affirmations and tapping into your personal power, comes to light in this book. The book itself is an affirmation that speaks abundance of richness in love, self-expression, confidence, wealth, divine-consciousness and health.
A book that I would keep as my personal spiritual guide for the rest of my life.There are many anecdotes that inspire faith and courage in the weakest hearts. I would recommend it to anyone who seeks a kind and true greater power and to anyone who wishes to make the best of their lives .
To practice the principles in this book requires a lot of courage and determination. Practicing the principles in this book turns into spiritual beings with success and results.