Amy-Jill Levine
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Amy-Jill Levine is University Professor of New Testament and Jewish Studies, E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Professor of New Testament Studies, and Professor of Jewish Studies at Vanderbilt University Divinity School and College of Arts and Sciences. Holding the B.A. from Smith College, the M.A. and Ph.D. from Duke University, and honorary doctorates from Christian Theological Seminary, Drury University, the University of Richmond, the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest, and the University of South Carolina-Upstate, Professor Levine has been awarded grants from the Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the American Council of Learned Societies. She has held office in the Society of Biblical Literature, the Catholic Biblical Association, and the Association for Jewish Studies. Her books include The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus (HarperOne), the edited collection,The Historical Jesus in Context (Princeton), and the fourteen-volume edited series, Feminist Companions to the New Testament and Early Christian Writings (Continuum). With Marc Brettler of Brandeis University, she has edited the Jewish Annotated New Testament (Oxford), and she has written, with her Vanderbilt Colleague Douglas Knight, The Meaning of the Bible: What The Jewish Scriptures and the Christian Old Testament Can Teach us (HarperOne). She has recorded "Introduction to the Old Testament," "Great Figures of the Old Testament," and "Great Figures of the New Testament" for the Teaching Company. In 2011, Professor Levine became Affiliated Professor at the Woolf Institute: Centre for the Study of Jewish-Christian Relations at Cambridge, UK. A self-described "Yankee Jewish feminist who teaches in a predominantly Christian divinity school in the buckle of the Bible Belt," Professor Levine combines historical-critical rigor, literary-critical sensitivity, and a frequent dash of humor with a commitment to eliminating anti-Jewish, sexist, and homophobic theologies.

Blog Entries by Amy-Jill Levine

What Does the Bible Say About Creation and Evolution?

0 Comments | Posted November 25, 2011 | 8:55 PM

For more than a century the creation vs. evolution debate has raged in numerous countries, nowhere more strongly than in the United States and the United Kingdom. Its sensationalist forms are fodder for the media: the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in 1925, the Arkansas trial of 1981, the "Intelligent Design" notion,...

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Biblical Views of God

0 Comments | Posted November 19, 2011 | 1:16 AM

The claims are familiar: humanity could not control nature, did not understand conception or birth, and feared death, and so we invented a God that brought order to chaos, purpose to life and comfort in death. Next, we developed religion to placate the God we invented to assuage our fears...

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The Bible and Sexuality

0 Comments | Posted November 13, 2011 | 7:01 AM

The culture wars over family values have yet to reach détente and will not until the messiah comes (or returns, depending on the reader's affiliation). Battles continue over women's equality vs. a wife's graceful submission, no-fault divorce vs. attempts to strengthen marital bonds, the ordaining of gays and lesbians and...

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Biblical Israel's History Viewed From Inside and Out

0 Comments | Posted November 12, 2011 | 5:13 AM

The Bible gives the impression of being grounded in history. The story of the Israelites unfolds chronologically from creation to the Hellenistic occupation during the fourth to first centuries BCE. A rich assortment of stories, poetry, laws and prophecies reinforces the sense of historicity.

So it can be disconcerting...

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