News

In this section you can find all the latest news about the Centre for Biblical Studies' research and engagement activities.

Visit from Prof Johnson Thomaskutty, United Theological College, Bengaluru

May 22, 2024: We were pleased to welcome Professor Johnson Thomaskutty , from United Theological College, Bengaluru, India, to present a paper on ‘An Intercultural reading of the Fourth Gospel in the Asian Context’.

Joint Symposium on Bible and Trauma

On May 21, 2024, the Centre for Biblical Studies, jointly with EXCEPT, held a symposium on Bible and Trauma, chaired by Francesca Stavrakopoulou, with speakers Danilo Verde (KU Leuven), Diana Paulding (Exeter), and Karen O’Donnell (Westcott House, Cambridge), and responses from Christopher Southgate and Susannah Cornwall.

Online Seminars with Speakers from Around the World

Between November 2022 and June 2024 we have hosted a series of online seminars with speakers from Colombia, Myanmar, the Philippines, India, and Nigeria on the theme of ‘decolonising New Testament studies’, as part of David Horrell’s Leverhulme-funded research project on that topic.

New publications

Professor Francesca Stavrakopoulou’s new book, based on research funded by the Leverhulme Trust, God – an Anatomy, was published in September 2021. The book sets the biblical god Yahweh within a wider cultural and historical context, specifically through an examination of the various parts of this god’s physical body.

Professor Stavrakopoulou is also series editor for a new T&T Clark series, Hebrew Bible in Social Perspective, in which two new volumes have now appeared:

• Mark Leuchter (ed.), Scribes and Scribalism (Hebrew BIble in Social Perspective; London: T&T Clark, 2021)
• Francesca Stavrakopoulou (ed.), Life and Death: Social Perspectives on Biblical Bodies (Hebrew Bible in Social Perspective; London: T&T Clark, 2021). 

Professor Louise Lawrence examines the role of compassion in refiguring the university

Professor Louise Lawrence has written a book on universities in an age of neoliberalism, which includes a chapter on ‘Reading Early Christian Traditions of Compassion in the Throes of a Pandemic'. The book, to be published in September 2021, argues that compassion – appropriately understood – should have a central place in the curriculum and practice of the university. Refiguring Universities in an Age of Neoliberalism - Creating Compassionate Campuses | Louise J. Lawrence | Palgrave Macmillan.

New publications from AHRC funded project

The main publication from the AHRC-funded research project Ethnicity, Race and Religion in early Christian and Jewish Identities has recently appeared: David G. Horrell, Ethnicity and Inclusion: Religion, Race, and Whiteness in the Construction of Jewish and Christian Identities (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2020).

Another major publication from the project, the edited volume Ethnicity, Race, Religion is now available open access via Bloomsbury Collections.

Chloe Church wins 2020 SBL DeGruyter Award

One of our current PhD students, Chloe Church, funded by an AHRC-scholarship and supervised by Louise Lawrence (Exeter) and Alex Hoare (University of Bristol), has been awarded one of two DeGruyter Awards by the Society of Biblical Literature (2020 De Gruyter Award recipients are Carson Bay and Chloe Church). Chloe’s award is in the category of Material and Visual Culture and Reception of the Bible for her paper entitled “Receiving the Word in Image: Federico Zuccaro’s The Annunciation Broadcast By Prophets (1565) and the Reception History of the Bible in the Counter-Reformation.” The paper will be published in the Journal of the Bible and its Reception. In addition to being published, the awarded paper will be delivered at the SBL Annual Meeting followed by a panel discussion.

Professor Todd Still, Baylor University, USA

In January 2019 we were pleased to welcome Professor Todd Still, Dean of Truett Seminary, Baylor University, USA, to present a paper to a research seminar on texts on slavery in the New Testament and to discuss with postgraduate students academic job opportunities in the USA and how best to approach applications for such posts.

Co-chair of the International Society of Biblical Literature "Bible and its Influence: History and Impact" programme unit

David Tollerton is now co-chair of the International Society of Biblical Literature's "Bible and its Influence: History and Impact" programme unit. This wide-ranging unit is part of every year's international meeting and mixes open sessions on reception history with special themed panels. Recent panels have included focus on biblical reception during and after the 1967 Six-Day War. Plans for the Helsinki conference in July-August 2018 include a special panel on Bible and the history of blasphemy.  

Conference Presentations

David Horrell, Louise Lawrence and David Tollerton all presented papers at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Biblical Literature, held in Boston, USA in November 2017. Francesca Stavrakopoulou presented a main paper at the Society for Old Testament Studies meeting in July 2017. David Horrell presented a main paper at the British New Testament Society meeting in September 2017.

Church of England's Common Awards Conference

Louise Lawrence was a plenary speaker and led a workshop on the Bible and Disability at the Church of England's Common Awards Conference in July 2017.

Reading the World: Science and Sacred Texts

In April 2017, Cherryl Hunt presented a session on 'Biblical Approaches to the Environment' at the Faraday Institute, Cambridge as part of their short course on Reading the World: Science and Sacred Texts.

Ethnicity/Race/Religion: Identities, Ideologies, and Intersections in Biblical Texts and Interpretation

From 9th-11th August, the Centre for Biblical Studies hosted an international conference on Ethnicity/Race/Religion: Identities, Ideologies, and Intersections in Biblical Texts and Interpretation, with AHRC-funding from a leadership fellowship awarded to David Horrell. Main speakers were Musa Dube (University of Botswana), Ma. Marilou S. Ibita (Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium), and Gregory Cuéllar (Austin Presbyterian Seminar, Texas, USA). Twelve offered papers were also presented. During an extended visit funded by the project, Musa Dube also gave a public talk at Exeter Cathedral on ‘The Bible in the Bush: Translating and Interpreting the Bible in Africa’

Ethnicity, Race and Religion in Ancient Constructions of Identity

On 19-20 April a group of scholars met at the University of Exeter for a workshop funded by the AHRC on Ethnicity, Race and Religion in Ancient Constructions of Identity. This workshop forms part of a research project on Ethnicity, Race and Religion in Early Christian and Jewish Identities led by Professor David Horrell, holder of an AHRC Leadership Fellowship, and hosted by Exeter’s Centre for Biblical Studies, one of the Centres within the Department of Theology and Religion. Much of the organisational work was undertaken by Katherine Hockey. Among the presenters was a visiting professor from the USA, Denise Kimber Buell, who spent a week at Exeter as an international visitor, giving reaction and advice concerning the project. Professor Buell also presented a paper on ‘whiteness’ and the ethics of interpreting ancient texts. Other presenters – Professors Tim Whitmarsh (Cambridge), Judith Lieu (Cambridge), and John Barclay (Durham) – spoke about ancient Greek identity, the use of ethnic labels in early Christian texts, and the controversy concerning the translation of the term Ioudaios (rendered Jew, or Judean). Other participants were Professor Steve Mason (Groningen), Professor Philip Esler (Gloucester), Professor Morwenna Ludlow, Dr Richard Flower, Dr Cherryl Hunt, and Wei Hsien Wan (Exeter). The main aims of the workshop were to explore the ways in which ethnic/racial/religious identities are presented and constructed in ancient texts and interpreted in modern scholarship, and to probe critically the ideologies that shape contemporary interpretation.

Exploring ideologies of race and the contemporary contexts of New Testament interpretation

International visitors from the USA and Norway, together with other scholars from the UK and staff and graduate students from the University of Exeter, met on 15-16 March to explore the ways in which ideologies of race, nation, and ethnicity shape the practice of New Testament interpretation – and vice versa. Brought together by Professor David Horrell, under the auspices of an AHRC Leadership Fellowship, assisted by Katherine Hockey, presenters considered how topics such as African-American biblical interpretation and race relations in the USA (Love Sechrest); the overlaps between anti-Semitism and Islamophobia in the Norwegian context, with particular reference to the terrorist atrocities committed by Anders Breivik (Halvor Moxnes); the changing uses of terms like Volk (‘people’) and Rasse (‘race’) in German New Testament scholarship (Kathy Ehrensperger); and the ways in which depictions of Judaism in contrast to Christianity in mainstream British New Testament scholarship reflect the prevalent neoliberal political ideology (James Crossley). 

Workshop: ‘Ordinary’ Christians and the Bible

This Workshop on Thursday 11 February 2016, will provide an excellent opportunity to hear about and discuss recent research in this area. Topics covered will include what ordinary churchgoers actually believe (‘ordinary theology’, presented by Prof. Jeff Astley, Durham University), how they think about and use their scriptures (Prof. Andrew Village, York St John University), how the course Exploring Christianity was received in parishes of this diocese (Rev Dr Tim Gibson of SWMTC) and how various resources designed for training ordinary Christians might be used to maximum effect (Dr Cherryl Hunt, University of Exeter).

God, Religion and the Bible

In September 2015, Francesca Stavrakopoulou spoke alongside Keith Ward and Stephen Law at a debate held at Conway Hall, London, entitled ‘God, Religion and the Bible’, organised by the British Humanist Association.

Main Papers at SNTS and the Congress of Iberian Biblical Associations

David Horrell has presented main invited papers at the 70th meeting of the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas in Amsterdam (July 2015) and the inaugural Congress of Iberian Biblical Associations in Tarragona (Sept 2015).

Panel on Cinema and Biblical Epics

In June 2015 David Tollerton organised a panel and spoke on cinema and biblical epics at the ‘Use of the Bible in Contemporary Culture’ conference in Chichester, in June 2015.

‘Sensing Disgust’ at ERC-funded conference in Utrecht

In April 2015 Louise Lawrence gave a paper on ‘Sensing Disgust in Biblical Traditions’ in Utrecht at an ERC-funded conference on the ‘Aesthetics of crossing: experiencing the beyond in Abrahamic traditions’. She also delivered a paper at the University of Gloucestershire's newly founded 'International Centre for Biblical Interpretation' (ICBI).

Keynote lecture at Amherst College, Massachusetts, USA

In April 2015 Francesca Stavrakopoulou gave a keynote lecture on ‘Sexism, Secularism, and Speaking about the Bible’, and an undergraduate class on ‘Coping with Corpses’, at Amherst College, Massachusetts. On her return to the UK, she appeared alongside novelists, historians, and scientists on BBC Radio 4’s programme The Hollow Earth: A Travel Guide, presented by Robin Ince.