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2025 Annual Meeting
Meeting Begins: 11/22/2025
Meeting Ends: 11/25/2025
Call for Papers Opens: 1/22/2025
Call for Papers Closes: 3/25/2025
Requirements for Participation
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Program Units
Academic Teaching and Biblical Studies
Description: Pedagogy and the classroom each provides a hermeneutical and heuristic frame of reference for the reading and interpretation of the Bible. Each classroom is also part of a larger institutional context has its own mission statement and culture. These provide concrete interpretive communities in which reading and interpretation take place. The exploration of the dynamics of teaching within the context of pedagogical concerns, institutional goals and cultures, and specific classroom communities is the goal of the group's agenda.
Call for papers: We are accepting proposals in four different topics:
Session 1: “Adapting the Gospels: The Cultural and Pedagogical Impact of The Chosen.” (Joint session with the Bible and Film and the Bible and Popular Culture)
Session 2: “Using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to Improve Learning and Teaching.”
Session 3: “Using Biblical Teaching Strategies.”
Session 4: “Teaching Ezra-Nehemiah” (Joint session with Ezra-Nehemiah)
Please find the complete descriptions for each of these sessions here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TQhmToOZHe7dYsnaWRKQ6m2jkTawiqDd1ArwUPwmSuI/edit?tab=t.0
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African Biblical Hermeneutics
Description: This section is devoted to the study of the Bible from African perspectives, and focuses on African issues. A diversity of methods reflecting the social-cultural diversity of Africa is used in reading the Bible. The emphasis is on encouraging readings of the Bible that are shaped by African perspectives and issues, and giving voice to African biblical scholars as they contribute to global biblical scholarship. The unit expects to publish essays from its sessions.
Call for papers: 1. Methodologies and Epistemologies in African Biblical Interpretation: This session invites contributions exploring how African methodologies shape biblical interpretation and enrich our understanding of African identities. By engaging with African contexts' cultural and linguistic diversity, these approaches reveal new dimensions of meaning and relevance within the Bible. Contributors should examine how frameworks rooted in African realities interact with lived experiences and historical narratives. We welcome papers highlighting the role of African indigenous knowledge in shaping interpretation and challenging Western-dominated readings. 2. Reimagining Biblical Interpretation through the Lens of Climate Justice and African Socio-Political Realities: This session seeks papers examining how biblical texts address climate justice and socio-political challenges in African contexts. Themes include sustainability, justice, and community resilience, exploring the Bible's role in responding to corruption, inequality, and climate change. We invite contributions highlighting African women scholars who use feminist and womanist hermeneutics to challenge gender inequality and advocate for equitable social and ecological justice approaches. 3. The Role of Oral Traditions in African Biblical Hermeneutics: This session examines how African oral traditions, including proverbs and storytelling, shape the interpretation of biblical narratives. Rooted in African cultural heritage, these traditions provide insights into morality, justice, and human relationships, connecting biblical texts with shared community values. Submissions should explore the links between oral traditions and the Bible, drawing on works like Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart and Ngugi wa Thiong’o's The River Between to illuminate how these traditions bridge biblical texts and African lived experiences. 4. Biblical Dream Narratives, African Cosmologies, and Ancestral Traditions: This session explores the inters
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African-American Biblical Hermeneutics
Description: The purpose of the African American Biblical Hermeneutics Section (AABHS) is to engage in the interdisciplinary and holistic study of the Bible and its place in a multi-faceted and complex African-American cultural Weltanschauung. The section provides a forum for scholarly discussion of any aspect of engagement with the bible from the perspective of African American culture, history, literature, or politics. It encourages interdisciplinary discussions about hermeneutics and culture and strives to encourage emerging scholars in publishing scholarly work in the field and advancing the study of African American hermeneutics.
Call for papers: The African American Biblical Hermeneutics section welcomes proposals for papers on various aspects of engagement with the Bible from the perspective of African American culture, history, literature, or politics. Three sessions are planned for the 2025 meeting:
Session One is a call for papers on "Liberation, Equality, Justice, and African American Scriptural interpretations in the age of Trump." The session invites papers that explore the context(s), method(s), and/or relevance of African American Biblical hermeneutics in the current political and cultural contexts. Papers that directly attend to African American hermeneutic approaches to scripture, theopolitics, nationalism, and justice are especially welcome.
Session Two is an invited session on African American Biblica Hermenuetics and the politics of justice.
Session Three is an open call for paper proposals that take up interdisciplinary discussions that advance the study of African American Biblical Interpretations.
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Ancient Education: Social, Intellectual, and Material Contexts
Description: Ancient Education: Social, Intellectual, and Material Contexts invites
conversation about the production and transmission of knowledge in the
late ancient Mediterranean and Middle East. Rather than treating social
networks, material artifacts, and curricular frameworks separately, we
explore their manifold intersections and investigate their contexts and
implications. The unit locates the production of religious knowledge within
capacious social, intellectual, and material histories, crossing geographical,
linguistic, and religious boundaries that often divide scholarly conversation.
Call for papers: The Ancient Education program unit will sponsor three sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting.
(1) We extend an open call on the topic of Meals and Learning, offered as a joint venture with the Ancient Jewish and Christian Meals and Their Afterlives program unit. We invite proposals addressing themes of reading, writing, conversing, and learning in emergent Jewish and Christian meal settings, broadly understood. We particularly encourage papers that deploy innovative critical approaches and those that analyze overlooked sources (textual or otherwise).
(2) Our second session, co-sponsored with the Book History and Biblical Literatures program unit, will take us a few blocks down the road from the Convention Center to the Boston Public Library (https://www.bpl.org/) for an interactive session on the materiality of ancient education and textual cultures, in conversation with BPL curators and material texts from the BPL collection.
(3) Finally, the unit will host an invited review panel on Kelsie G. Rodenbiker’s Scriptural Figures and the Fringes of the New Testament Canon (Oxford University Press, 2025). The book investigates the role of letters attributed to the apostles James, Peter, John, and Jude (“the Catholic Epistles”) and their use of exempla from the Jewish scriptural past in the formation of an inescapably porous New Testament canon.
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Ancient Fiction and Early Christian and Jewish Narrative
Description: The Section on Ancient Fiction and Early Jewish and Christian Narrative fosters methodologically diverse analyses of these ancient narratives, including: their interplay and interconnections; socio-cultural contexts; representations of reality, including religion; and narrative form, including plot, character, style, voice, etc.
Call for papers: The Ancient Fiction section intends to host four sessions. The FIRST is a review of Tom de Bruin’s monograph, Fan Fiction and Early Christian Writings—panellists will be by invitation only.
The SECOND is in collaboration with the program unit Biblical Literature and the Hermeneutics of Trauma. These papers will focus on the use of trauma hermeneutics applied in early Jewish and Christian narratives. In particular, we are looking for the interplay of trauma and fiction, as illustrated by theorists such as Whitehead, Vice, Lurkhurst, Sebald, Phillips, Visser, Balaev, and Michaels. Revisiting the ancient stories with a cross-disciplinary lens seeks to discuss not only the “question of what is remembered of the past” but “how and why it is remembered (Whitehead 2004, 3).” Papers featuring the use of intertextuality to address gaps and silences are desired, as are papers that demonstrate theoretical sophistication in both trauma theory and the work of ancient Greek, Jewish, and Christian fictions.
The THIRD session is on “Reception of the Ancestral Figures recorded in Genesis”. The matriarchs and patriarchs recorded in Genesis had afterlives longer than Old Methuselah’s lifetime, but they certainly did not get stuck in a rut. For this session, we invite papers exploring stories about any of the ancestral figures from Genesis—like Eve and Adam; Hagar, Sarah, and Abraham; Rebecca and Isaac; Bilhah, Zilpah, Rachel, Leah, and Jacob; or the twelve sons of Israel and their wives. The retelling of these ancestral figures provide invaluable insight into developments and tensions in later time periods, as authors and communities reshaped these characters to better reflect their later contemporary realities. We welcome any paper that explores the expansions, alterations, and additions to these characters’ lives and interpretations of their actions.
The FOURTH is an open call, for which we invite any paper on the subject of ancient fiction.
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Ancient Jewish and Christian Meals and Their Afterlives
Description: Building on the achievements of the Meals in the Greco-Roman world unit, this section will pursue a comparative approach with later developments of meal practice and discourse in Judaism and Christianity. Expanding previous research on early Jewish and Christian meals, we will consider the reception of formative Greco-Roman meal practice in Late Antiquity and beyond. Through studying the reception history of early Christian and Jewish meal-texts and their dynamic evolution, we will examine the complex development of meal ritual using an intra-religious and inter-religious lens.
Call for papers: The “Ancient Jewish and Christian Meals and Their Afterlives” unit intends to host three sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting.
The first is a joint session with Korean Biblical Colloquium, titled "K-Food and the Bible." Building on work that commenced in the successful 2022 special session of unit, this session seeks to creatively explore the intersections of Korean food culture and the themes of meals and food in Biblical literature. We welcome papers that engage with a broad range of related topics, including but not limited to: a) Reexamining ancient Jewish and Christian meal traditions through Korean/Korean American (or other minoritized) hermeneutics; b) Interpreting Korean food culture within biblical meal discourses and rituals; c) Exploring the lived reception of biblical meal traditions in Korean cultural contexts, past and present. Innovative approaches fostering dialogue between biblical scholarship and Korean cultural studies are encouraged.
For our second session, we invite paper proposals addressing the topic of “Meals and Learning.” Structured as a joint venture with the “Ancient Education: Social, Intellectual, and Material Contexts” unit, this session will give priority to proposals addressing themes of reading, writing, conversing, and learning in emergent Jewish and Christian meal settings, broadly understood.
Our third session is an open call for new work engaging the reception of formative Greco-Roman meal practice in late antiquity and beyond. For this session, we are particularly eager to foreground the work of graduate students, junior scholars, and early career researchers.
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Ancient Near Eastern Iconography and the Bible
Description: This section examines the ways that ancient pictorial material informs interpretations of biblical texts. We welcome papers that explore the relationships between iconographic and textual materials as well as papers that deal exclusively with iconographic issues.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting we will take advantage of the concurrent ASOR meeting with a session entitled “Violence and Identity: Conceptions of Self and Others in Iconography and Text.”
From the walls of Medinet Habu to Persian Period cylinder seals, violent imagery in the ancient Near East is a remarkably durable trope for highlighting issues of identity. In biblical texts, violence is also a common mechanism for reflecting identity and probing the boundaries of gender, ethnicity, and social status.
For this session, we welcome papers that explore the interrelated concepts of violence and identity in biblical texts and ancient Near Eastern visual sources. Specifically, we will seek papers of four types: (1) those that explore the interaction of violence and identity primarily in visual sources; (2) those that explore the interaction of violence and identity primarily in textual sources; (3) those that explore the ways that visual sources interact with biblical texts in their portrayals of violence and negotiation of identity; (4) those that explore, from a theoretical and methodological perspective, the related concepts of violence and identity broadly across the ancient Near East.
In addition to the session on violence and identity, we also welcome papers for an open session. This session provides a broad forum for scholarship that explores the relationships between iconographic and textual materials, as well as papers that deal exclusively with iconographic issues.
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Anglican Association of Biblical Scholars
Description: The Anglican Association of Biblical Scholars is an international association of biblical scholars who are affiliated with the churches of the Anglican Communion, including the Episcopal Church in the U.S., the Anglican Church of Canada, and the Church of England. Its purpose is to support biblical scholarship at all levels in the Anglican Communion. AABS is dedicated to fostering greater involvement of biblical scholars in the life of Anglican churches, and to promoting the development of resources for biblical studies in Anglican theological education.
Call for papers: Plans for the 2025 meeting of the Anglican Association of Biblical Scholars (AABS) in Boston are still under discussion, although we are not calling for paper proposals. Our usual plan is to meet at an Episcopal Church near the conference venue for gathering, Eucharist, catered dinner, and a program on the Friday evening before the SBL annual meeting. In addition, in recent years we have also been scheduling a Eucharist for 11:15 am on the Sunday of the annual meeting in a conference space. Also, in recent years, we have included a virtual meeting, usually in June, with a program, discussion, and brief worship. Information about all of these plans will be made available through announcements on the SBL annual meeting website and in the SBL newsletter and through direct emailings to all on our emailing list. If you wish to be added to that list, email Elizabeth Struthers Malbon at malbon@vt.edu with your request.
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Apocalypse Now: Apocalyptic Reception and Impact throughout History
Description: Apocalypse Now is conceived as an interdisciplinary research group aiming to analyze the effective history of biblical and related apocalyptic literature (Daniel, Revelation, Enoch etc.) in the creation, establishment, and development of eschatological groups from antiquity to the present within the Abrahamic traditions, and in particular those of apocalyptic nature. It is of much interest to our work to observe how those groups developed networks of eschatological nature throughout history that can be found today at the basis of some social and political movements. By analysing in tandem the nature of the different groups over the centuries and how eschatological hope circulated among them at different moments, this research unit aims to foster and develop new interpretation theories that can lead to a better understanding of the use of apocalyptic expectations in the 21st century, and in particular, of the processes that led apocalypticism to take peaceful and/or violent forms.
Call for papers: The Apocalypse Now group intends to organize three sessions for the Annual Meeting SBL in Boston. The focus of two of these sessions will be on time and space in apocalyptic thought: we want to study the ways in which time and space play a role in writings from early Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as well as in modern endtime narratives.
Apocalyptic writings of early Judaism and of later dates often assign a special role to time and space. Time is frequently depicted as structured in periods the boundaries of which have been divinely ordained, and spatial elements play a similar role. Human beings, angelic beings, rulers, demons — they all have their time and space. The idea of a divine ordering of these two dimensions warrants the attention of this group. How do time and space play a role in the various apocalyptic writings produced by early Judaism and its later successors, Christianity and Islam? How are these two dimensions pictured in (early) modern endtime narratives? How are time and space connected in our sources?
The third session will be an open one, for which we welcome proposals that fit our topic.
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Aramaic Studies
Description: The Aramaic studies section is intended to provide a forum for scholars interested in various aspects of Aramaic language. Previous paper topics have included aspects of the Targumim, Qumran Aramaic, Peshitta, Samaritan papyri, and Elephantine Aramaic.
Call for papers: The Aramaic Studies section is planning to hold two open-call sessions for the 2025 Annual Meeting. We welcome presentations from any chronological period, from Old Aramaic down through the dialects of Late Antiquity and beyond. Previous paper topics have focused on topics related to Old Aramaic inscriptions, the Elephantine papyri, Biblical Aramaic, the Aramaic of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Samaritan papyri, Qumran, and elsewhere), Syriac language and literature, the Targumim, magical texts, etc.
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Archaeology of Religion in the Roman World
Description: The goal of this unit is to promote the study of material culture associated with religious activity in the Hellenistic and Roman periods and to showcase new theoretical approaches to this evidence. Presentations related to Second Temple Judaism, early Christianity, and Greco-Roman religion, broadly defined, are all welcome.
Call for papers: The Archaeology of Religion in the Roman World unit invites paper proposals related to the following themes. 1) Workers and Workspaces: Possible topics include material evidence for worship in ancient workspaces, and for religious practices in the meeting spaces of guilds and other worker groups; and the material conditions for the making of sacred objects. 2) Domestic religions: preferred topics are worship spaces in the domestic realm comparing more than one site; and the material relationship between public vs. private religious practices, or domestic vs. civic. We especially welcome papers that examine the religious practices of children, enslaved persons, women, and those outside of elite circles. A session on “Problematizing ‘Christianization’ in Rough Cilicia and Isauria” is already planned. As always, we welcome all proposals for papers that discuss new methodologies and areas of research related to the archaeology of religion in the Roman world.
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Archaeology of Roman Palestine
Description: This program unit explores the socio-political, economic, cultural, and
religious history of Roman Palestine (ca. first century BCE to fifth century
CE) through its material remains. The goal is to emphasize the importance
of archaeology as an independent source of evidence for the study of early
Judaism and Christianity.
Call for papers: This unit is not accepting proposals.
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Art and Religions of Antiquity
Description: This section examines the visual and material evidence of the religions of the Mediterranean basin in antiquity (Judaism, Christianity, and Greco-Roman "paganism") as well as the methods by which scholars study these materials alongside textual or documentary evidence.
Call for papers: The Arts and Religions of Antiquity Section invites papers for two planned sessions for 2025. The FIRST SESSION is "Adornment in Action": The nuances and performative possibilities of dress and adornment offer the historian multiple ways of studying “art” in social and religious context. How does dress endow someone with charisma or, alternately, reduce their importance? Does adornment (including tattoos) augment or complete a body? How do jewelry and accoutrements influence one’s disposition, spiritual experience, and carriage through society? What sorts of gaze did garments invite from observers? And what of “invisible” adornment, like amulets? We invite papers that address (as far as possible) actual artifacts – textiles, jewelry and amulets, as well as images of adorned bodies. The session will interact with the theoretical work on dress and adornment by Elisabeth Dospel Williams (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), to be distributed at a later date. The SECOND SESSION is "Animals, Monsters, and the Human": As the study of religion integrates post-humanist questions, our examinations of the representation of animals in ancient art must likewise evolve. Are animals represented as antithetical or as complementary to humans – or even (as in apocalyptic texts) as allegories for divine or human agencies? Which animals fit paradisical scenes, battle scenes, and hell-scapes; are animals somehow more “natural” to certain landscapes than humans? What hybrid features shift an animal into the realm of beast or monster, or a god into the realm of an animal? Do juxtapositions of animals to heroes or gods depict their conquest or the hero/god’s attributes? We invite papers that address such questions with visual materials. The session and session papers will interact with theoretical work on animals and humans by Rafe Neis, author of When a Human Gives Birth to a Raven: Rabbis and the Reproduction of Species (Berkeley 2023).
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Asian and Asian-American Hermeneutics
Description: The unit promotes Asian and Asian American biblical scholarship, highlighting the broad range of diversity that makes up the different Asian and Asian American communities. It also aims to contribute to diversifying biblical scholarship and expanding biblical studies in terms of topics, approaches and discourses.
Call for papers: For our two sessions, the Asian and Asian-American Hermeneutics Seminar invites proposals for papers related to the following themes:
Theme 1: "Reception of the Bible in Asia and Asian America." We welcome papers that explore how the Bible is perceived, interpreted, and received in Asia and Asian America. Approaches can focus on particular texts or topics (e.g., colonialism, poverty, immigration, politics, and culture) or national/geographical areas. Both frequent and first-time presenters are encouraged to submit proposals.
Theme 2: Open session. We also invite papers that examine methodological issues involved in interpretation and hermeneutics, or topics related to reading the Bible with other sacred texts in, from, as well as to Asian and Asian American contexts and communities.
We will also co-sponsor two sessions with invited panelists: 1) A book review panel of Yii-Jan Lin's Immigration and Apocalypse: How the Book of Revelation Shaped American Immigration (Yale University Press, 2024) with the Latina/o/e and Latin American Interpretation (SBL), Bible in America, John's Apocalypse and Cultural Contexts Ancient and Modern (SBL), and Religion and Migration (AAR) units, 2) “Jesus in Asia” panel with the Historical Jesus unit.
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Assyriology and the Bible
Description: Assyriology and the Bible section provides the focused context for papers dealing with various Mesopotamian-related topics. It seeks to generate strong integrative research between the disciplines of Assyriology and Biblical Studies by encouraging adept historiographic, philological, literary and/or iconographic work.
Call for papers: In Boston, the Assyriology and the Bible Section will host an open, joint session on exploring the influence of Assyria in the west, together with the Hebrew Scriptures and Cognate Literature unit. The joint session requests papers exploring the influence of Assyria in the West, particularly during the Neo-Assyrian period (ca. 911–605 BCE). During this period, Assyria spread its influence using international soft power as well as military force. How did this regional dominance affect events and cultural production in the Levant? Papers may address the topic from any angle. Additionally, Assyriology and the Bible will host open sessions, for which we will consider proposals on any subject related to the study of both Assyriology and the Bible. This year, we particularly welcome papers that explore the theme of “Colonial History and Colonial Futures”, as connected to the intersection of Assyriology and the Bible.
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Bible and Emotion
Description: This section focuses on understanding the spectrum of emotions displayed throughout the Bible in their literary and cultural contexts, informed by the burgeoning cross-disciplinary study of emotion in contemporary philosophy, psychology, literary theory, linguistics, neuroscience, politics, economics and other fields.
Call for papers: The Bible and Emotion Section will host four sessions in 2025. The first session is OPEN. We invite proposals related to the critical study of emotion across the full range of biblical literature and closely related literature. We are interested in papers that examine divine and/or human emotions in a biblical text, set of texts, book, or genre. The second session will be devoted to the comparative study of emotion: how do the emotions within the Hebrew Bible and New Testament corpora resemble, differ from, appropriate, resist, sublimate, and/or transform the emotions of the wider cultural world? We will host a joint session with the Cognitive Science Approaches to the Biblical World Section. We invite papers that use appraisal theories of emotion and/or consider the interplay of reason and emotion. We will also host a joint session with the Ritual in the Biblical World section. We invite proposals that examine the close relationship between emotion and ritual and the ways in which ritual engages with emotion to form, maintain, and excise social structures. This session is the second of a series of joint sessions in which the relationship between ritual and emotion as presented in the biblical texts and surrounding Levantine cultures will be explored with a hope for a volume following the conclusion of the series.
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Bible and Ethics
Description: This unit explores ethical issues related to the biblical canon. It seeks to bring together exegetes of the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament in order to discuss similarities, differences, and intertextual connections between the various ethical traditions in biblical literature and their respective contexts.
Call for papers: Ethics of Power and Leadership in Biblical Texts
The Bible and Ethics Section invites proposals for papers exploring the ethical dimensions of power, authority, and leadership as presented in the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. This theme examines how biblical figures wielded power, the moral implications of their leadership decisions, and the ways these ancient examples can inform contemporary discussions on ethical leadership across religious, political, and social contexts.
We welcome papers that engage with the following key focus areas:
• Kingship, Governance, and Leadership in the Hebrew Bible: Ethical challenges faced by rulers, the dynamics of justice and power, and the prophetic critique of leadership.
• Leadership Ethics in the New Testament: Explorations of Jesus’ and Paul’s teachings on leadership, authority, and service.
• The Use and Abuse of Power in Biblical Narratives: Reflections on how power is portrayed, its misuse, and its relevance for modern ethical thought.
Submissions may adopt interdisciplinary approaches, including theology, ethics, philosophy, and political theory, or draw connections to contemporary leadership studies. We encourage proposals that offer innovative insights into the text and its application to present-day ethical questions.
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Bible and Film
Description: This unit focuses on the critical analysis and interpretation of the multiple intersections between Bible and Cinema. Our focus is broad, giving attention to “Bible films” (“Bible on Film”), the use and treatment of biblical texts in films (“Bible in Film”), how films and biblical texts can function in analogous ways (“Bible as Film” / “Film as Bible”), and how Bible and Film can be placed into mutually critical dialogue. We explore how biblical texts can enhance our understanding of cinema, and how films can offer lenses for helping us (re)interpret biblical texts. In short, we welcome papers that seek to illuminate our understanding of Bible, Film, or both. (This unit was titled Scripture and Film through 2013).
Call for papers: For the 2025 meeting, the Bible and Film unit will be holding three sessions, plus a joint session with The Bible and Popular Culture, and Academic Teaching of the Bible Units on The Chosen. For this joint session, we welcome proposals that explore this streaming series in terms of its theological adaptation of the biblical text; its use in the classroom; or its branding, marketing, and influence on popular culture. Time slots in this joint session will be 25 minutes in length.
In our open sessions, we invite proposals that explore the vital filmmaking happening outside of the United States. We invite papers on any international film - recent or not - that can be read in engagement with biblical texts. A second open session seeks papers focusing on how gender expression is portrayed in films based on the Gospel narratives. Preference will be given to papers that demonstrate a willingness to engage characterization in terms of cinematic techniques beyond narrative and dialogue. A third session will be open to all topics related to Bible and Film.
Papers in the open sessions are scheduled for 40 minute slots, with the expectation that presenters will include roughly 10 minutes of film clips.
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Bible and Popular Culture
Description: This unit explores and analyzes the relationship between the Bible and popular culture. It focuses on materials designed for everyday life—comic strips, advertisements, theme parks, popular music, video games, etc. Drawing from a variety of disciplines and analyzing both the printed and visual media, presenters will explore the interaction between biblical text and popular culture.
Call for papers: Have weird and wacky ideas, genre-bending popular culture obsessions that call for your academic analysis, and see the Bible in unexpected places? The Bible and Popular Culture is interested!
Themed session: Bible and Popular Culture, along with Academic Teaching and Biblical Studies and Bible and Film, seek papers exploring The Chosen, analyzing its role as a cinematic adaptation of the Gospels, a popular culture phenomenon, and its relationship to Bible teaching. Possible topics for pop culture analysis could include aspects of production, crowdfunding, and the implications of a television series with a theatrical release.
Open Session(s): We invite papers that analyze Bible in popular culture, and are especially interested in biblical themes in Stranger Things, explorations of fan fiction and non-canonical texts, and other timely ideas. We are interested in works that engage clear methodology and theory for the reciprocal way popular culture in any setting or medium engages the Bible and how the Bible informs popular culture. All may join us at our business meeting that follows.
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Bible and Practical Theology
Description: This section aims to promote the development of integrative knowledge centered upon the intersections between biblical interpretation and practical theology. We want to challenge both doctrinal reductionism and the distancing inherent in the historical-critical method, as well as encourage relational and interactive readings of both human situations and biblical texts in order to reveal their multivalence.
Call for papers: The Bible and Practical Theology will host three sessions. The first session is an open call that invites submissions on interdisciplinary research on the conquest narratives in the Hebrew Bible, specifically the book of Joshua, and Practical Theology. This session will be an integrative conversation on recent archaeological discoveries related to the Hebrew highland settlements, rising Christian nationalism and the conquest narrative. Papers can deal broadly with the impact of archaeology on our understanding of conquest narratives in the Hebrew Bible. Alternatively, papers might dialogue with Norman Gottwald’s The Tribes of Yahweh, speaking to its practical implications, or engage Kate Common’s recently published Undoing Conquest: Ancient Israel, the Bible, and the Future of Christianity. The second session is an open call that invites papers on pedagogy that blends biblical studies and practical theology. In particular, we are interested in models of teaching that draw on theoretical and practical disciplines for student formation. We are especially interested in papers that address classroom strategies that facilitate integration of interdisciplinary material that help bridge the divide between disciplines. Successful proposals will explore the history of praxis around pedagogies, interdisciplinary studies, and praxis in ministry. For the third open session we are particularly interested in intersectional approaches that engage the biblical text through the lens of neurodivergent experiences and identities. Successful proposals should include but are not limited to the following topics: representation of neurodivergence in biblical narratives and characters; pastoral care or ministry practices informed by neurodivergent experiences; the intersection of mental health, spirituality, and biblical interpretation; or ethical considerations when interpreting biblical texts with respect to healing, difference, and community.
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Bible and Visual Art
Description: The purpose of the section is to provide a forum at the national SBL to explore historical, hermeneutical, theological, iconographic, and/or theoretical aspects related to the interpretation of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures in visual art through the centuries.
Call for papers: The Bible and Visual Art section welcomes submissions for the following sessions at the Annual Meeting in 2025: We invite proposals that fall within our broad purpose: to explore historical, hermeneutical, theological, iconographic and/or theoretical aspects related to the interpretation of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures in visual art through the centuries. We especially encourage proposals on topics that relate to paintings, sculpture, and other forms of biblical art in public spaces in the Boston area; There will also be a joint session with the Book of Samuel program unit. We invite papers focusing on art exploring the text of Samuel as the theme.
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Bible in America
Description: This group will examine the uses of both an abstract idea of "the Bible" and
of particular biblical narratives by different groups, considering the Bible's
utility for social control, resistance, identity and group formation. Our forum
will bring together disparate discussions touching on the Bible
Call for papers: We invite papers for our open session on any aspect of the Bible and its reception in American culture. Reviewers will be invited for our second session, a review of Yii-Jan Lin's Immigration and Apocalypse.
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Biblical Archaeology Society
Description: The Biblical Archaeology Society (BAS) was founded in 1974 as a nonprofit, nondenominational, educational organization dedicated to the dissemination of information about archaeology in the Bible lands. BAS’s flagship publication, Biblical Archaeology Review, is the only magazine that connects the academic study of archaeology to a broad general audience eager to understand the world of the Bible.
Call for papers: This program unit is not accepting papers for the 2025 Annual Meeting.
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Biblical Exegesis from Eastern Orthodox Perspectives
Description: This unit fosters interpretation of biblical texts through engagement with Eastern Orthodox interpretive tradition. Such engagement might include critical reflection on Eastern patristics, Orthodox liturgical tradition, and modern Orthodox theologians to stimulate theological interpretation. The consultation will bring Orthodox perspectives to bear on contemporary exegetical issues.
Call for papers: The Biblical Exegesis from Eastern Orthodox Perspectives Unit will offer four sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting: 1) New Exegetical Insights into the Farewell Discourses in the Gospel of John (chapters 13–17) and Their Patristic Reception. 2) Joint Session with AAR’s Middle Eastern Christianity and Eastern Orthodox Studies Units – This session will address the theme “Minorities and Freedom in the Middle East: Biblical, Theological, and Socio-Political Perspectives.” Papers may explore how scriptural, doctrinal, and historical perspectives inform contemporary discussions on religious minorities and freedom in the region. 3) The Psalms in Orthodox Tradition and Liturgy – We welcome papers on the role, interpretation, and theological significance of the Psalms in Eastern Orthodox worship, exegesis, and spiritual practice. 4) Invited Panel on Leslie Baynes’ Between Interpretation and
Imagination: C. S. Lewis and the Bible (Eerdmans, June 2025)** – This session will feature invited responses to Baynes’ forthcoming work, examining Lewis’ approach to Scripture from various scholarly perspectives. Proposals for the first three sessions are welcome.
Tags: Religious Traditions and Scriptures (History of Interpretation / Reception History / Reception Criticism)
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Biblical Greek Language and Linguistics
Description: This section aims to promote and discuss ongoing research into biblical Greek language and
linguistics, covering the Septuagint and particularly the New Testament. While traditional
language studies are welcome, methods derived from modern linguistic theories and their
applications are encouraged.
Call for papers: The Biblical Greek Language and Linguistics session is organizing two sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting. The first session features an open call for papers on any topic that advances scholarship in biblical Greek language and linguistics, encompassing both the New Testament and the Septuagint. We invite proposals that demonstrate a clear linguistic methodology in the analysis of Greek texts. In our digitalized world, the teaching and learning of Greek are undergoing significant transformations. Proposals discussing various pedagogical approaches to available grammar tools or electronic resources are particularly encouraged.
Second, we will host an invited themed panel on Linguistics and New Testament Ethics. This panel will focus on the interrelation between language and ethics in the New Testament, examining how the authors utilize linguistic devices to convey ethical values. It is important to note that ethics encompasses a broad spectrum, including applied ethics (e.g., ecology, medical ethics, human life issues), normative ethics (e.g., moral standards, the language of virtue ethics) and metaethics (e.g., the language of truth vs. relativism, the meanings of moral terms, etc.)
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Biblical Hebrew Poetry
Description: This section focuses on all aspects of Hebrew poetry in the biblical canon: archaic poetry, the role of oral tradition, poetic meter, parallelism, structural and nonstructural poetic devices, imagery, metaphor, and figurative language. Papers dealing with any portion of poetry in the Hebrew Bible are welcome.
Call for papers: Biblical Hebrew Poetry will be hosting four sessions: The FIRST session will be a joint open session with Cognitive Linguistics on “‘Voicing’ in Biblical Poetry.” Who speaks in biblical poetry and to whom? In what tone do they speak? And how does the poetic use of language convey this? From the perspective of Hebrew poetry, we are interested in papers that consider the rhetorical techniques, strategies, and effects of poets’ use of voice; and from a cognitive-linguistics perspective, we are interested in papers that address the expression of viewpoint in poetic language. Strong papers will go beyond thematic and methodological reflection to include exegetical and linguistic results and engage critically with the theory they apply. There will be respondents to the papers. Therefore, presenters will email their completed paper to section chairs by October 10, 2025. Please submit a proposal only if you are also willing to send your completed paper by this date. The SECOND session will be “Poetry and the Absence of God.” Biblical poets wrestle mightily with the absence of God, expressing longing for God’s presence in times of crisis and God’s voice in times of divine silence. This session welcomes papers that explore this important theme in biblical Hebrew poetry. The THIRD and FOURTH sessions will be general open sessions. We invite papers regarding any aspect of Biblical Hebrew Poetry.
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Biblical Law
Description: The purpose of the Biblical Law Section is to promote interdisciplinary research on ancient Near Eastern, biblical, and post-biblical law. Methodological perspectives include historical-critical, literary, legal-historical, feminist, and social-scientific approaches.
Call for papers: The Biblical Law Section is planning three sessions for the 2025 Annual Meeting. We invite proposals for two open sessions on any aspect of the study of biblical law, including work related to cuneiform documents, the Dead Sea Scrolls and other Second Temple Literature, questions of Pentateuchal criticism, legal history, gender analysis, social-scientific analysis, and newer methodologies.
Our third session, “My Body, Why Not My Choice?” will be co-sponsored with the Womanist Interpretation section and will consist of invited and proposed papers. The Dobbs decision has resulted in the rapid passage of laws in many states severely limiting women’s reproductive freedom. Often, lawmakers have used biblically based arguments to justify these restrictions on women’s rights to bodily autonomy. Black women in particular, as well as other women of color, have been negatively impacted by these legal developments. For this joint session, we invite proposals covering either (or both) of the following topics: (1) womanist interpretation of texts in the biblical legal collections wherein women are either given no agency in relation to their sexuality and/or reproductive functions (such as with enslaved and captive women; e.g., Exod 21:7-11; Lev 19:20-22; Deut 21:10-14) or that seek to strictly limit that agency (such as with free women; e.g., Exod 22:15-16; Lev 21:9; Deut 22:13-21, 28-29); (2) analysis through a womanist lens as to how the Bible (and, ideally, biblical law in particular) has been weaponized by some lawmakers and how recent laws that have arisen in the wake of the Dobbs decision have severely impacted the ability of women, especially black women and other women of color, to exercise agency in relation to sexual and reproductive matters and have limited access to essential reproductive healthcare. Papers that draw a connection between the two topics are especially encouraged.
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Biblical Lexicography
Description: The Section brings together those working on lexicography and lexicology of ancient biblical languages. The discussions seek to bring the theoretical to bear on the practical task of dictionary making and encourage research in the area of historical lexical analysis.
Call for papers: Biblical Lexicography will organize four sessions this year, which are as follows: 1) Open call for papers relating to the lexicography of Greek from any period in relation to the biblical and/or parabiblical corpora. 2) Open call for papers relating to the lexicography of biblical Hebrew. 3) A joint session held in collaboration with Nature Imagery and Conceptions of Nature in the Bible, the topic of which is lexicography of the natural world of the Bible. Papers in this session will explore the lexicon of animals, plants, and other elements of the natural world in the Hebrew Bible and pay attention to the methodological issues related to the study of this specialized vocabulary in antiquity. The sessions will focus on either (a) semantic examinations of the Hebrew vocabulary in its Near Eastern context, including a comparison with Semitic and specifically West-semitic lexica; or (a) lexicographical histories of interpretation of biblical vocabulary in the ancient versions of the Bible (LXX, Old Latin/Vulgate, Targums, Syriac), possibly involving a comparison with Greco-Roman zoology. 4) A joint session held in collaboration with Numismatic Evidence and Biblical Interpretation. The aim of this joint session is to explore how numismatic evidence — coins and their inscriptions within their historical contexts, and even iconography — interacts with biblical lexicography, particularly in providing concrete cultural and linguistic insights into the semantics of biblical and early Christian contexts. This session would allow participants to explore how numismatic artifacts might contribute to our collective understanding of language usage, semantic shifts, and lexical choices in biblical texts.
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Biblical Literature and the Hermeneutics of Trauma
Description: This unit studies methods for employing various definitions of trauma to interpret particular sets of biblical and extra-canonical texts, giving attention to the relationship between personal and communal dimensions of trauma, and to applying biblical interpretation in other theological disciplines.
Call for papers: The Biblical Literature and Hermeneutics of Trauma section plans to host three sessions in Boston, two of which are open for abstracts:
The "Biblical Literature and the Hermeneutics of Trauma" unit at the annual SBL has been a prominent one since its inception in 2013. As it often goes in teenage years, there is an opportunity to look back at what was and has been done in order to make sense of what it is becoming–as well as what may need to be addressed and left behind in maturing. The FIRST SESSION will thus feature invited papers for a roundtable in collaboration with the Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion on the histories and potential futures of feminist and trauma studies in the biblical field. Papers will discuss both the problems and potentials in the use of trauma theory and the Bible in hopes that growing pains might be felt and dealt with.
The SECOND SESSION is in collaboration with the program unit Ancient Fiction and Early Christian and Jewish Narrative. These papers will focus on the use of trauma hermeneutics applied in early Jewish and Christian narratives. In particular, we are looking for the interplay of trauma and fiction, as illustrated by theorists such as Whitehead, Vice, Lurkhurst, Sebald, Phillips, Visser, Balaev, and Michaels. Revisiting the ancient stories with a cross-disciplinary lens seeks to discuss not only the “question of what is remembered of the past” but “how and why it is remembered (Whitehead 2004, 3).” Papers featuring the use of intertextuality to address gaps and silences are desired, as are papers that demonstrate theoretical sophistication in both trauma theory and the work of ancient Greek, Jewish, and Christian fictions.
The THIRD SESSION will be an open session to which we invite proposals of all types that seek to interpret biblical text through the lens of trauma theory(s).
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Biblical Studies and Spiritual Care: Intersections of Pastoral Praxis and Biblical Hermeneutics
Description: This unit explores the mutual contribution of biblical and related literature
and Spiritual Care (hereafter, SC). What new hermeneutical insights can
scholars, students, and practitioners of SC, in the different contexts they
work in, provide to biblical literature? And what corpus of texts, methods,
approaches, and conceptual tools can biblical scholars offer to SC? This
unit aims at integrating in biblical scholarship the hermeneutical
perspectives offered by the multifarious contexts of SC and highlights the
relevance of biblical literature for the training/professionalization of
chaplains.
Call for papers: During the Annual Meeting of 2025 we will address the context of incarceration. In line with our twofold scope, we solicit papers dealing with the conceptualisation of feelings or concepts, representing groups and issues, and especially approaching biblical texts relevant to the context of punitive or imposed incarceration. Moreover, we solicit papers that highlight the new exegetical insights brought up by scholars, students, and chaplains working in carceral spaces such as prison, asylum, immigration detention, and imposed confinement.
A third session will be co-sponsored with the AAR "Innovations in Chaplaincy and Spiritual Care Unit" on Sarah Jobe’s new book No God Forsaken Place: Prison Chaplaincy, Karl Barth and Practicing Life in Prison (T&T Clark, forthcoming in the spring of 2025). For the third session, please contact Silvia Castelli (s.castelli2@vu.nl) and Peter-Ben Smit (p.b.a.smit@vu.nl).
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Book History and Biblical Literatures
Description: This unit investigates how insights from Book History illuminate scriptural
literatures. We marshal scholars of various fields in a theoretical and
historical conversation about the culturally contingent concepts of text,
authorship, readership, publication, and materiality.
Call for papers: The Book History and Biblical Literatures investigates how insights from Book History illuminate scriptural literatures. We gather scholars of Hebrew Bible/ANE, Judaism, Christianity, Nag Hammadi, Syriac studies, and modernity in a theoretical and historical conversation about the culturally contingent concepts of text, authorship, readership, publication, and materiality. We will sponsor four panels at the 2025 Annual Meeting in Boston, two of which will welcome paper proposals.
First, our session Manuscripts and the Making of Late Antique Syriac Literature, co-sponsored with the Syriac Studies program unit, invites proposals that explore how the production of Syriac manuscripts reflects late ancient literary and intellectual culture. Papers might address such topics as genre, attribution or authorship, and the structuring and organization of knowledge. How are the contours and bounds of Syriac literature being defined and redefined in the manuscripts?
The second panel is an open call: We are interested in new work engaging with questions of Book History, broadly conceived, and are particularly hoping to highlight the work of early career researchers, junior scholars, and graduate students.
Finally, we will co-sponsor two prearranged sessions: with New Testament Textual Criticism, a book review panel on Garrick Allen's Words are Not Enough (Eerdmans, 2024) and Liv Ingeborg Lied and Brent Nongbri’s Working with Manuscripts (Yale UP, 2025); with Ancient Education, a session focused upon manuscripts and books in the collections of the Boston Public Library.
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Book of Acts
Description: This Section (1) explores new strategies for reading Acts; (2) proposes solutions to existing exegetical, literary, text critical and historical problems associated with Acts; (3) highlights new areas of inquiry regarding Acts; and (4) assesses the significance of the history of Acts scholarship.
Call for papers: For 2025, the Book of Acts section invites submissions for an open session covering any
aspect of research related to the Acts of the Apostles, including (for example) textual,
theological, narratival, historical, reception-historical, exegetical, social-scientific, and
postcolonial approaches. Proposals for papers that engage in reading Acts with new,
minoritized, or multiperspectival approaches are especially welcome.
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Book of Daniel
Description: The Book of Daniel consultation seeks to promote new and inter-disciplinary scholarship on Daniel and Daniel-related literature (both canonical and pseudepigraphical literature). It welcomes a range of analytical approaches to Daniel, but especially encourages ideological, theological, and literary treatments.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting, the Book of Daniel section welcomes proposals dealing with any topic or issue in the critical interpretation of the Book of Daniel, including the MT, the LXX, the Additions to Daniel, and pseudepigraphic materials related to Daniel. The best proposals will indicate a distinctive contribution to a current problem in the study of Daniel, will bring a promising theoretical framework to a particular issue, or will raise new questions about an overlooked problem in the understanding of Daniel. All proposals must go through the SBL proposal submission link on the website.
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Book of Deuteronomy
Description: This unit provides a forum for the discussion of Deuteronomy as a book, its origins and growth, as well as its reception by different groups of readers in antiquity.
Call for papers: The Deuteronomy Program Unit will host three sessions in Boston 2025:
(1) An open session; proposals on any topic, text or method/approach advancing the study of the Book of Deuteronomy are welcome.
(2) An invited panel on the Dangers of Deuteronomy, where we will explore the book’s (recent) reception history. The session will examine both the dangers of interpreting Deuteronomy, as well as the dangers to Deuteronomy that various interpretations have posed.
(3) An invited review session with the Space, Place, and Lived Experience Program Unit on Mark Lester, Deuteronomy and the Material Transmission of Tradition (Brill, 2024).
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Book of Ezekiel
Description: This Section has two aims. First, it seeks to bring together scholars working on the book of Ezekiel to share research and conclusions about the book. Second, it encourages an expressly theological approach to the book.
Call for papers: The Book of Ezekiel section will hold three sessions in 2025. (1) The first will be an open session. We invite submissions on any topic with a linguistic, textual, literary, or historical focus. (2) The second session will consist of both invited papers and open submissions on the art of commentary writing on the book of Ezekiel. (3) The third will be a joint session with the “Literature and History of the Persian Period” section, the subject of which will be the reception of the book of Ezekiel in the Persian period.
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Book of Isaiah
Description: The Book of Isaiah unit provides an international forum for discussion of issues related to the formation, growth and unity of the Isaiah scroll as well as questions of poetic imagery, intertextuality, history of interpretation and reader response criticism.
Call for papers: For 2025, the book of Isaiah will host four sessions. One will be a joint session of the Book of Isaiah and Psalms sections, on "Historical Origins and Formation of Isaiah and Psalms," and we invite submissions. The second will be a State of the Field in Isaiah Research," which consists of invited papers. The third is an open session of papers exploring the relationship between the prophetic figure of Isaiah and the royal house and elites of Judah, as well as the relationship between Isaiah's prophecies and the idea of monarchy and kingship in Judah. The fourth is an open session which especially invites papers engaging connections between the book of Isaiah and the ancient Near East.
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Book of Jeremiah
Description: Since its inception in 2007, the Jeremiah unit has been committed to creating space for innovative and experimental readings of this complex, though fascinating book. Going forward, we seek to create conversations along three interpretive axes: 1) analysis of dimensions of the ancient historical contexts that produced the biblical texts of Jeremiah; 2) critical inquiry into the nature of literary signifying, with attention to the roles of readers and interpreting communities; and 3) rigorous engagement of hermeneutical assumptions underlying postmodern interpretive practices within biblical studies.
Call for papers: In 2025 the unit invites papers addressing the interplay between historical approaches to Jeremiah and the new(er) reading strategies that have been so well-championed by the Jeremiah unit over the last two decades, including but not limited to postcolonial theory; feminist, womanist, and gendered approaches; trauma and other psychological and social-scientific studies; and ideological and postmodern interpretation. This session seeks to build on the methodological advances that Jeremiah scholars have brought into the mainstream, and to reckon explicitly with how they can or should impinge on more traditional historical questions. It is meant to address the persistent conversational gap between classical interpretive approaches and newer ones and, in the process, to broaden out the unit's remit and ensure that it can effectively act as a meeting place for all kinds of Jeremiah scholarship.
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Book of Psalms
Description: It is the aim of the Book of Psalms unit to promote all aspects of and approaches to the study of the Psalms, with a major focus on the issue of how the Psalter as a collection has an integrity, history, and purpose of its own.
Call for papers: For 2025, the Book of Psalms unit will host several sessions, two of which are collaborative. The first will be held in conjunction with the Intertextuality and the Hebrew Bible unit. We invite papers exploring intertextual relations between the Psalms and other biblical or non-biblical books. The second is with the Book of Isaiah unit. The concern here is with (comparative) matters of historical contexts/origins and formation in Isaiah and the Psalms (see the Book of Isaiah call for further details). We also welcome proposals for one or more open sessions on any topic relating to the Psalms, though we are especially interested (this year and in upcoming years as well) in the Psalms and music/art.
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Book of Samuel: Narrative, Theology, and Interpretation
Description: Utilising critical and literary methods, this unit focuses on the literary and theological interpretation of the Book of Samuel. The consultation promotes the integration of multiple methodologies in interpretation, including dialogue between specialists in synchronic and diachronic approaches.
Call for papers: At the 2025 meeting the following sessions are planned: 1) A joint session co-sponsored with the Bible and the Visual Arts section on the topic Samuel in the Visual Arts. The Book of Samuel, especially the story of David, has a rich legacy of interpretation via visual art throughout the centuries. This session offers an opportunity to explore historical, hermeneutical, theological, iconographic, and/or theoretical aspects related to the interpretation of the Book of Samuel in visual art throughout the centuries. 2) A themed session on 2 Samuel 21–24. These chapters of Samuel are sometimes viewed as an appendix and sometimes as a carefully constructed conclusion. This session invites papers that will explore these chapters and how they relate to the rest of the Book of Samuel. 3) At least one open session on any aspect of the Book of Samuel. For these open sessions we welcome proposals on any aspect of the book of Samuel, especially papers which explore different methodologies in interpretation, the dialogue between synchronic and diachronic approaches, and theological concerns.
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Book of the Twelve Prophets
Description: The Book of the Twelve Prophets Section provides a forum for research
into textual, literary, historical, religious, and ideological aspects of the
Book of the Twelve Prophets. The section is interested in understanding
individual passages as well as all phases of the development of this book.
Call for papers: The Book of the Twelve Prophets Program Unit is organizing four sessions for the Annual Meeting in Boston:
We warmly invite anyone working on topics related to the context of these prophetic books to apply to present at the two open sessions. The Book of the Twelve Prophets Section provides a forum for research into textual, literary, historical, religious(-historical), and ideological aspects of the Book of the Twelve Prophets and focuses on the question of the origin and historical context of the individual books and the Book of the Twelve Prophets as a whole.
For one open session, papers that present a historical or redactional-historical perspective are particularly welcome. The second open session will particularly feature a reception history perspective.
In addition, we are organizing an invited session entitled “Changes in Zion Theology in the Redaction History of the Book of the Twelve”. Together with the “Ritual in the Biblical World Program” unit, we will host an invited joint session on the topic of “Ritual Failure and Change”.
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Catholic Biblical Association of America
Description: The purpose of the CBA is to promote, within a context of faith, scholarly
study in Scripture and related fields by meetings of the association,
publications, and support for those engaged in such studies.
Call for papers: The purpose of the CBA is to promote, within a context of faith, scholarly
study in Scripture and related fields by meetings of the association,
publications, and support for those engaged in such studies.
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Children in the Biblical World
Description: This section explores the child characters in the Bible, investigates the lives of children in the ancient world, and evaluates how biblical texts affect children in the post-biblical world. We invite traditional research in biblical studies, as well as interdisciplinary approaches to the topic.
Call for papers: This section explores the child characters in the Bible, investigates the lives of children in the ancient world, and evaluates how biblical texts affect children in the post-biblical world. We invite traditional research in biblical studies, as well as interdisciplinary approaches to the topic. This year we will host four sessions. The first session is an open call. The second session invites papers that align with the theme, "Boundary Crossing." Here papers should interact with issues of forced migration/immigration and "crossing boundaries" in general. Our third session is a joint-session with the Disputed Paulines unit in which a panel will discuss how a childist methodological approach can help in reading the Pastoral epistles. In our final session, we will host the podcasters of the Bible For Normal People, who will discuss their new children's bible.
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Christian Apocrypha
Description: The Section fosters ongoing study of extra-canonical texts, as subjects of literary and philological investigation; as evidence for the history of religion, theology, and cult practice; and as documents of the socio-symbolic construction of Christianity along lines of class and gender.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting, the Christian Apocrypha program unit will begin a three-year invited session on the adaptation (and creation) of apocryphal traditions by the tenth-century writer Symeon Metaphrastes. The plan is to assemble a group of translators for the texts (which have not yet appeared in English translation), present their contents at SBL 2025, 2026 and 2027, and then publish the translations in a collected edition. We will also hold a joint session with the Religious World of Late Antiquity program unit. We invite papers that consider the influence of apocryphal literature on the development of local cult in late antiquity. Topics might include the role of apocryphal narratives in popularizing and legitimizing local cults, the use of apocryphal literature in the construction of devotional landscapes and pilgrimage traditions, and the ritual contexts in which people engaged with stories from apocryphal literature. In addition, we welcome proposals on any topic related to apocryphal texts, but particularly encourage papers discussing paratexts (titles, prefaces, marginalia, illustrations, corrections) in manuscripts (or editions and translations) of apocryphal texts or paratexts in canonical texts that relate to apocryphal traditions (including prologues and catenae).
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Christian Theology and the Bible
Description: This unit invites a conversation between the disciplines of Christian Theology and Biblical Studies. We are interested in questions, categories, or hypotheses drawn from the broad tradition of Christian theology which inform readings of the biblical texts, and we aim to foster constructive theological work with biblical texts.
Call for papers: This unit invites a conversation between the disciplines of Christian Theology and Biblical Studies. We are interested in questions, categories, or hypotheses drawn from the broad tradition of Christian theology which inform readings of the biblical texts, and we aim to foster constructive theological work with biblical texts. The unit often has one session devoted to a review of a recent book. In 2025, an invited panel will review Kevin Vanhoozer’s Mere Christian Hermeneutics: Transfiguring What It Means to Read the Bible Theologically (Zondervan Academic, 2024) in conjunction with the Theological Interpretation of Scripture unit. Beyond that, we are especially interested in papers for a session devoted to Trinitarian approaches to the Bible, especially the Old Testament. We also welcome papers for one or two open sessions on the general topic and intersection(s) of the Bible and Christian Theology.
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Chronicles-Ezra-Nehemiah
Description: Our section provides a collegial forum for graduate students and scholars in which papers can be read, projects initiated, questions explored, new approaches attempted and broader discussions held relating to the research and scholarship of these biblical books.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting, the Chronicles-Ezra-Nehemiah (CEN) section will hold four sessions. 1) An invited panel on the question of using the designations “Jewish” vs. “Judean” vs. “Yehudite” in scholarship on the books of Chronicles/Ezra-Nehemiah; 2) An invited panel on new methodologies emerging out of the digital humanities and their potential use for central questions in the study of Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemiah; 3) a co-sponsored panel with Academic Teaching and Biblical Studies on teaching Ezra-Nehemiah. This session examines the pedagogical and cultural challenges of teaching Ezra-Nehemiah to undergraduate and early graduate students. While these texts are vital for understanding Jerusalem’s restoration during the Persian period and the formation of the Bible, students often find them overly technical, morally troubling, or inaccessible. This session explores strategies for engaging students, addressing misuses of the texts in contemporary contexts, and highlighting how these narratives speak to enduring issues of identity, community, and leadership. Topics may include pedagogical approaches to difficult passages, teaching strategies that use these books to illuminate broader questions of community, interdisciplinary teaching methods, countering stereotypes of “legalistic” Judaism in the classroom, and so forth 4) An open session. We welcome paper proposals on any topic relevant to the program unit, and we especially encourage early-career scholars to submit proposals to the open session.
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Cognitive Linguistics in Biblical Interpretation
Description: The field of cognitive science has reshaped longstanding philosophical assumptions about how people use and process language. This section applies cognitive linguistics to biblical studies, with a focus on the ways cognitive approaches help scholars understand and interact with ancient texts.
Call for papers: Cognitive Linguistics in Biblical Interpretation will hold two open sessions and a joint session with Biblical Hebrew Poetry.
For the open sessions, we invite papers that use one or more cognitive-linguistic methods to study a biblical text or corpus. We are especially interested in cognitive approaches that are underutilized in biblical studies — for example: constructionist grammar approaches, viewpoint analysis, applications of embodied cognition, prototype theory, force dynamics, conceptual blending, frame semantics, and conceptual metonymy. Papers may use conceptual metaphor theory to explore a biblical text or corpus, but presenters should assume that the audience is familiar with the theory. We are also likely to give priority to approaches that have been underapplied by biblical scholars.
The joint open session with Biblical Hebrew Poetry will focus on “voicing” in biblical poetry — who is speaking and to whom, in what tone, and how poetic use of language conveys this. From the perspective of Hebrew poetry, we are interested in papers that consider the rhetorical techniques, strategies, and effects of poets’ use of voice; and from a cognitive-linguistic perspective, we are interested in papers that address the expression of viewpoint in poetic language.
Strong papers in all sessions go beyond thematic and methodological reflection, include exegetical and linguistic results, and engage critically with the theory they apply.
There will be respondents to the papers. Therefore, presenters will email their completed paper to section chairs by October 10, 2025. Please submit a proposal only if you are also willing to send your completed paper by this date.
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Cognitive Science Approaches to the Biblical World
Description: This program unit draws on scientific explanations of human thought and behavior to understand cognitive processes behind religious thought, experience, and practice, in order to explain religion in the biblical world and develop approaches integrating cultural and cognitive studies.
Call for papers: This year we are organizing three sessions. (1) For a session co-sponsored by the Bible and Emotion section we invite papers that demonstrate how emotion animates texts. In particular, we welcome proposals that apply appraisal theories of emotion and/or consider the interplay of reason and emotion in the interpretation of ancient texts. (2) Our second open session invites the application of contagion/contamination frameworks to biblical and cognate texts or material remains. Papers may consider realms like food, sex, ethnicity, apparel, etc. but should, in any case, show how contamination heuristics may be operative in the text or the world of the text. (3) Our third session consists of an invited panel to explain the “4E” theory of cognition (i.e., that cognition is embodied, embedded, enacted, and extended) and to illustrate the utility of each “E” for the interpretation of ancient texts.
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Connecting John: Intertextualities, Contexts, Reception
Description: This consultation explores the Gospel of John's connections with other literary works, media, and
artifacts, with all papers and panels setting John in dialogue with another object of study, ancient or
modern—including, narratives, letters, apocalypses, apocryphal acts, ritual forms, and artistic
representations. Its aim is to re-frame John as a watershed work in early Christian history—one that
creatively synthesized earlier traditions, carved out new literary spaces, and ignited new directions in
theology, literary practice, ritual, and art.
Call for papers: The “Connecting John” unit invites proposals for three open-call panels exploring how the Gospel of John connects to other objects of study. The unit is especially, but not exclusively, interested in papers devoted to (a) “John in the Greco-Roman World” (broadly defined, with papers exploring the Gospel of John in relation to Greco-Roman texts, cultural practices, philosophical traditions, and societal contexts); (b) “John and Jewish Contexts” (inclusive of submissions examining John’s connections with the Hebrew Bible, Second Temple literature, and Early Jewish literature, as well as the Gospel's role in Jewish-Christian dialogue); and (c) “The Many Faces and Connections of John,” a quick-fire panel inviting 5–10-minute contributions showcasing a broad range of intriguing receptions of John in manuscripts, art, musical, performance, and literary contexts (e.g., reinterpretations of Gospel scenes in later gospels and epistles, icons of John and Prochorus, depictions of Lazarus’ raising, John in film, etc). Finally, the unit is excited to co-sponsor an invited book review panel with the "Johannine Literature" and "Corpus Hellenisticum" units profiling new books by Mark Goodacre and James Barker on John's relationship with the Synoptics. As always, we encourage creative and interdisciplinary approaches to these themes, and we look forward to dynamic conversations.
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Contextual Biblical Interpretation
Description: The goal of this consultation is to explore the interest in developing a SBL seminar or section on *Contextual Biblical Interpretation,* its different strategies (including “inculturation,” inter(con)textualization, and reading with “ordinary” readers) and its methodological justifications, and the extent to which all interpretations are contextual.
Call for papers: We welcome papers that examine biblical texts or methodology while explicitly engaging a reader’s contemporary context. There is one open session and two invited sessions. (1) We invite papers for an open session about the impacts on teaching biblical studies that are occurring under increasingly restrictive government and ideological oversight. We are particularly interested in contextualized pedagogical strategies to address Christian nationalism, censorship, etc. This session will involve panelists providing short papers followed by discussion. (2) We will host an invited panel that honors the life and contribution of Daniel Patte to contextual biblical interpretation and explores its future. (3) We will co-sponsor with Feminist Hermeneutics of the Bible an invited womanist-feminist multigenerational panel exploring dialogical practices of contextual biblical interpretation.
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Contextualizing North African Christianity
Description: This consultation encourages interdisciplinary study of North African Christianity within its broader social, cultural, and historical contexts (ca. 180-650 CE). The goal is to explore how North African Christians cultivated religious identities and practices as inhabitants of an evolving society in late antiquity.
Call for papers: This year, we have an open call for two sessions. The first is entitled "Receptions of Jesus in North Africa," focusing on the reception of the gospels and Jesus traditions from the 2nd to the 5th centuries in North Africa. The second is a joint session with the Development of Early Christian Theology section dealing with theological controversies surrounding the Council of Nicea (325 AD). We seek proposals on themes such as (but not limited to) Christological, Trinitarian, pneumatological, or ascetic theology, particularly with relevance to scriptural exegesis, leading up to and/or emerging from the Council. Additionally, we will host two review sessions. The first will review Jane Merdinger's "Carthage" (Brill, 2025). The second will be a joint session with the Augustine and Augustinian section (AAR) over Catherine Conybeare's Augustine the Africa" (Liveright, 2025).
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Corpus Hellenisticum Novi Testamenti
Description: This consultation will 1) read and discuss ancient Greek materials that provide insight into the literary and religious worlds of early Christianity and 2) read and discuss papers that analyze early Christian texts in dialogue with Hellenistic materials.
Call for papers: For the 2025 annual meeting, the Corpus Hellenisticum Novi Testamenti program unit will convene four sessions. (1) An invited panel-review of Mark Goodacre's «Fourth Synoptic Gospel: John's Knowledge of the Gospels» and James Barker's «Writing and Rewriting the Gospels: John and the Synoptics», hosted with the Johannine Literature and Connecting John program units. (2) An open-call session on Solomon as a master of esoteric wisdom and ritual expert in both pseudepigraphical texts (e.g., Wisdom of Solomon, Psalms of Solomon, Odes of Solomon, Testament of Solomon) and in material contexts (amulets, incantations, curse tablets, synagogue or church adornments), hosted with the Pseudepigrapha program unit. (3) An open-call session on the topic: Please Recycle! Ancient Intertextuality in the New Testament, Christian Apocrypha, and Beyond – "Cancel Culture" Edition, that is, with a special focus on texts seeking to correct, replace, or erase their intertexts. And, (4) an invited session on Divine Power in Human Hands: "Magical" and Related Texts and Artifacts.
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Critical Carceral Studies and the Bible
Description: Mass incarceration is one of the great injustices of U.S. American life, with
1.9 million people incarcerated. This section explores biblical con/texts
through the lens of critical carceral studies. This section examines the
relationship of scripturalizing to prisons, ancient and modern. It considers
ancient texts and their reception through questions of rhetoric, punitive
agents and machineries, migration and borders, structures of feeling,
questions of subjectivity, and imperial and state power. It will also consider
pedagogies, political and religious contexts for reading, and insights.
Call for papers: Mass incarceration is one of the great injustices of U.S. American life, with
1.9 million people incarcerated. This section explores biblical con/texts
through the lens of critical carceral studies. This section examines the
relationship of scripturalizing to prisons, ancient and modern. It considers
ancient texts and their reception through questions of rhetoric, punitive
agents and machineries, migration and borders, structures of feeling,
questions of subjectivity, and imperial and state power. It will also consider
pedagogies, political and religious contexts for reading, and insights.
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Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature
Description: The unit provides a forum for the deuterocanonical writings. The goal is to foster academic research, stimulate discussions among scholars, and promote interest in these texts.
Call for papers: In the 2025, the Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature program unit will organize three sessions: one open session, one invited session on synopses projects of the book of Ben Sira, and one on the Latin tradition of deuterocanonical and pseudepigraphical books, organized jointly with the Vulgate and Latin Bible program unit.
Proposals for the open session may be on every topic of the deuterocanonical writings. Proposals for the joint session may be on any aspect of the Latin tradition of deuterocanonical and pseudepigraphical books and can be submitted to either of both program units involved (when going through the online submission procedure, please designate either the Vulgate and Latin Bible or the Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature program unit as the primary unit).
Tags: 1 Esdras (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), 1 Maccabees (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), 2 Esdras (4 Ezra) (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), 2 Maccabees (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), 3 Maccabees (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), 4 Maccabees (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Additions to the Book of Esther (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Baruch (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Deuterocanonical Works (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Judith (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Letter of Jeremiah (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Prayer of Manasseh (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Psalm 151 (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), The Additions to the Book of Daniel (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), The Additions to the Book of Daniel - Bel and the Dragon (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), The Additions to the Book of Daniel - Prayer of Azariah and Song of the Three Young Men (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), The Additions to the Book of Daniel - Susanna (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Tobit (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works), Wisdom and Philosophical Literature (Early Jewish Literature - Jewish Pseudepigrapha), Wisdom of Solomon (Biblical Literature - Deuterocanonical Works)
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Deuteronomistic History
Description: This unit is a forum for scholarship pertaining to the books of Deuteronomy and the Former Prophets (Joshua–Kings). Papers may treat material in one or more of these books or in the collection as a whole. Relevant foci include literary history and compositional techniques; theological trends exemplified in the texts; the social and historical milieu or milieus in which they were produced; as well as connections among one or more of these books, whether topical, chronological, or linguistic.
Call for papers: The Deuteronomistic History section invites abstracts for papers pertaining to the books of Deuteronomy and the Former Prophets (Joshua–Kings). Papers may treat material in one or more of these books or in the collection as a whole. Relevant foci include literary history and compositional techniques; theological trends exemplified in the texts; the social and historical milieu or milieus in which they were produced; as well as connections among one or more of these books, whether topical, chronological, or linguistic. In 2025, we will be cosponsoring two sessions with the Joshua–Judges section and the Postcolonial Studies and Biblical Studies section. We welcome historically-minded
contributions on the books of Joshua and Judges which are informed by analytical
categories developed in postcolonial theory. In bringing together colleagues from
various scholarly backgrounds, we hope for a mutually enriching exchange which
ideally will not only shed new light on Joshua and Judges but also help develop truly
integrative approaches to read literary traditions hailing from ancient Israel and Judah
in their ancient Western Asian imperial contexts. In exploring such new avenues,
authors are explicitly encouraged to experiment, provided that they contructively
engage both historical and postcolonial perspectives.
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Development of Early Christian Theology
Description: This unit explores the close connections among the construction of the Christian scriptures, early Christian practices of biblical interpretation, and the theological and ecclesiastical debates that occurred from the apostolic period through the seventh century.
Call for papers: In 2025, in addition to a book review panel, our program unit will be sponsoring three open-call sessions, including a co-sponsored panel. Reflecting our unit’s commitment to exploring the interplay between the formation and interpretation of the Christian scriptures, how early Christian authors participated in the broader Greco-Roman intellectual world in the presentation of their ideas both rhetorically and polemically, and the theological and ecclesiastical debates that occurred from the apostolic period through the end of late antiquity, we are seeking proposals for papers in two sessions dealing with the particular Christian debates — theological, ecclesiastical, political — centered on the Council of Nicaea (325 C.E.). We welcome proposals dealing with themes such as (but not limited to) Christological, Trinitarian, pneumatological, or ascetic theology, particularly with relevance to scriptural exegesis, leading up to and/or emerging from the Council. In light of the submissions, we will organize two panels around common themes, figures, and/or debates. In addition to this open call, we especially encourage proposals dealing with these fourth-century debates and themes in early Christian authors from North Africa for one co-sponsored panel with the Contextualizing North African Christianity Section.
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Digital Humanities in Biblical, Early Jewish, and Christian Studies
Description: This consultation explores the ongoing transformation of biblical studies, and early Jewish and Christian studies, within digital culture. Initiated in the 1940s, the "Digital Humanities" is now shaping all Humanities disciplines. Sessions will focus on its impact on manuscripts and editions; reading and exegesis; publishing and access; and innovative research methodologies more generally.
Call for papers: This consultation explores the ongoing transformation of biblical studies, and early Jewish and Christian studies, within digital culture. Initiated in the 1940s, the "Digital Humanities" is now shaping all Humanities disciplines. Sessions will focus on its impact on manuscripts and editions; reading and exegesis; publishing and access; and innovative research methodologies more generally.
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Disputed Paulines
Description: The Disputed Paulines Consultation seeks to explore historical, literary (including rhetorical), and theological matters which bear upon the interpretation of the letters of the Pauline Corpus that many argue are not genuinely or immediately authored by Paul. It is hoped that careful study of these letters will help us better understand both these documents and early Christianity more broadly.
Call for papers: The Disputed Paulines Section invite papers exploring historical, literary (including rhetorical), and theological matters that bear upon the interpretation of Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Thessalonians, or the Pastoral Epistles (either a discreet section thereof or sections of various letters). We will offer 1 or 2 sessions depending on the number and quality of proposals received. Please note that we are also holding a joint panel with the Children in the Biblical World section.
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Early Christianity and the Ancient Economy
Description: The Early Christianity and the Ancient Economy Consultation is the foundational component of an international, interdisciplinary project that seeks to delineate the relationship between early Christianity and the ancient economy in the period from Jesus to Justinian, demonstrating both similarities and differences in attitudes, approaches to problems, and attempted solutions.
Call for papers: The Early Christianity and Ancient Economy program examines economic aspects of early Christian groups from the first to the fifth century CE within the context of the economies of the Roman Empire and its provinces. We invite papers exploring the ancient economy, understood broadly to consist of the production, transmission, and consumption of goods and services, as well as the social, political, and ideological conditions associated with economic systems.
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Early Jewish Christian Relations
Description: The Early Jewish Christian Relations Group deals with the relationships of Christians and Jews as Christians emerged as groups distinct from Jews, and how these groups continued to affect one another in the following centuries. It considers approximately the first four centuries.
Call for papers: The Early Jewish Christian Relations Group invites submissions that address the complex relationships between Jews and Christians during the first four centuries. We are particularly seeking papers that examine how New Testament figures—such as Jesus, Mary, Peter, and Paul—were received, reinterpreted, and contested within later rabbinic Judaisms.
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Ecological Hermeneutics
Description: This Section will focus on hermeneutical principles and models for ecological readings of the biblical text and tradition. Attention would be paid to the anthropocentric bias of texts and readers as well as to discerning alternative traditions sympathetic to ecology, Earth and the Earth community. The aim is to explore the art of reading the text with empathy for the natural world.
Call for papers: In 2025, four sessions are planned.
1. Aesthetics, Ecology, and the Bible: In Honor of Rabbi Ellen S. Bernstein (1954-2024). Until recently, the appreciation of beauty was not considered an important value or motivating force in environmental ethics. In her interpretive work, Rabbi Bernstein championed the emerging field of “eco-aesthetics.” This session continues her legacy by inviting papers that explore the value of aesthetics in ecological hermeneutics.
2. Food and Ecology. Proposals are invited on the topic on the relationship between food and ecology in the Bible and its interpretation. The topic is quite diverse, incorporating aspects ranging from the ecological aspects of food production (land use, deforestation, irrigation, erosion), processing and distribution (associated damage to humans, animals and the environment, wastage, inequities).
3. Habitats of Justice: In Honor of Elaine M. Wainwright (1948-2024). Elaine Wainwright’s biblical scholarship was wide ranging and included work in feminist studies, ecological hermeneutics, contextual hermeneutics, and Matthean studies. This will be a joint session with the Islands and Islanders unit. We invite papers that dialogue with any aspect of Elaine’s work.
4. Open Session. Proposals on any biblical text or theme related to the unit description are welcomed.
All proposals are encouraged to have a robust methodological basis.
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Economics in the Biblical World
Description: This program unit explores economics in the biblical world from a variety of approaches, including textual analysis, archaeological study, economic history, and much-needed theoretical engagement. We examine both larger economic structures and more local patterns (i.e., household and village).
Call for papers: The Economics in the Biblical World program unit will have an invited panel on the early Hellenistic/Ptolemaic period, and we invite members to submit proposals for a second, open session of papers in any area related to the program unit description.
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Egyptology and Ancient Israel
Description: The principal goal of the Egyptology and Ancient Israel Section is to promote collaboration between biblical scholars and Egyptologists in their comparative examination and analysis of historical and literary connections between ancient Israel, the Hebrew Bible, and the history and literature of ancient Egypt. Where appropriate, the section joins with other related program units to foster interdisciplinary conversation across the wider ancient Near East.
Call for papers: The principal goal of the Egyptology and Ancient Israel Section is to promote collaboration between biblical scholars and Egyptologists in their comparative examination and analysis of historical and literary connections between ancient Israel, the Hebrew Bible, and the history and literature of ancient Egypt. Where appropriate, the section joins with other related program units to foster interdisciplinary conversation across the wider ancient Near East.
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Ethiopic Bible and Literature
Description: This unit studies the sacred texts and literature of the ancient and rich Ethiopic tradition. It seeks, through critical study, to understand the ideology, sociology and the process of literary formation, of the Ethiopic tradition, in particular the Bible, and also discusses its manuscript tradition.
Call for papers: This year we invite proposals for two sessions. The first is an open session welcoming papers on any aspect of Ethiopian and Eritrean Studies. This includes papers on biblical studies, theology, ideology, sociology, literary formation in Ge'ez literature, and the interactions between Ge'ez literature and other literary traditions.
Our second session invites proposals on Manuscript Discoveries in Ethiopian and Eritrean Studies. This session includes papers on digitization and cataloging of manuscripts as well as papers on manuscripts in digital humanities projects. Proposals on paratextual elements, illuminated manuscripts, and manuscript libraries will also be welcomed.
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Ethnic Chinese Biblical Colloquium
Description: The Ethnic Chinese Biblical Colloquium (ECBC) emerged with the rise of the awareness of contextualization and cross-cultural awareness in biblical interpretation. A group of scholars who are of ethnic Chinese origin created ECBC as a forum to address issues relevant to this concern within SBL in the 1990s. Prominent founding members of this group are Dr. Seow Choon-Leong, Dr. Wan Sze-Kar, Dr. Gale Yee, Dr. Mary Foskett, Dr. Jeffrey Kuan, and Dr. John Yieh. The group invites scholars to participate in the forum held annually within the SBL Annual Meeting.
Call for papers: The Ethnic Chinese Biblical Colloquium (ECBC) emerged with the rise of the awareness of contextualization and cross-cultural awareness in biblical interpretation. A group of scholars who are of ethnic Chinese origin created ECBC as a forum to address issues relevant to this concern within SBL in the 1990s. Prominent founding members of this group are Dr. Seow Choon-Leong, Dr. Wan Sze-Kar, Dr. Gale Yee, Dr. Mary Foskett, Dr. Jeffrey Kuan, and Dr. John Yieh. The group invites scholars to participate in the forum held annually within the SBL Annual Meeting.
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Exile (Forced Migrations) in Biblical Literature
Description: This section examines exile, displacement, and migration (forced or involuntary) in biblical literature—its history, associated literature, and conceptualization from a wide range of methodological perspectives.
Call for papers: 1. Title: Migration and Gender
Description: We seek papers on any aspect of the gender/migration/displacement nexus in periods relevant to the study of the Bible. We especially invite papers that employ new methods or raise under-appreciated questions about gender-related dynamics in contexts of migration and displacement. Papers might address how these or other factors affect other identity-markers and interplay in processes of identity formation/negotiation.
2. Title: Open Session
Description: This session invites papers on the experiences and themes of movement, migration, exile, diaspora, and return across biblical corpus.
3. Title: Invited Roundtable on Diaspora
Description: This session will feature an invited panel to discuss diaspora and the Bible. In 2002, R.S. Sugirtharajah considered how diaspora had been understood by biblical scholars in three parts: 1) Fernando Segovia's 'hermeneutics of diaspora', 2) rereading through similar and parallel diasporic experience and 3) through literature. However, Sugirtharajah critiques how some of these have missed opportunities to embody diaspora as a concept in their approach, and acknowledges his own hopes for future diasporic hermeneutics. Given the disconnect between many biblical scholars and current scholars of migration, mobility, and therein, diaspora, have we attended to this invitation in the 23 years since this publication? These papers will explain their own approaches to diaspora and the bible in attendance to the gap between time and space.
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Feminist Hermeneutics of the Bible
Description: The aim of this unit is to provide a forum for research in issues and questions relating to feminist methods of interpretation. While specifically focused on methodological concerns, we are also concerned to ground that reflection in the reality of engagement with specific texts.
Call for papers: Feminist Hermeneutics of the Bible (FHB) will offer/co-sponsor four sessions in 2025:
Open Call for Papers: "Abortion and Reproduction in Biblical Traditions" Biblical texts, traditions, and interpretations frequently appear in conversations and debates about abortion and the use of assisted reproductive technologies (ART). We invite papers that critically examine these traditions and the ways they get used to control conversations, reproductive options, and specific bodies. Papers in this session will be considered for an edited volume targeted to a wide range of readers, including students, scholars, religious leaders and their congregants, and those working toward reproductive justice.
Open Call for Papers: "Images of Parenthood in Sacred Texts" We seek papers that explore the diverse and complex relationships of parenthood as portrayed in sacred texts. These relationships may include, but are not limited to, traditional roles such as mother and father, as well as non-traditional dynamics such as teacher-student mentorship, divine-human relationships, surrogate parenting, adoption, and community caregiving and other such caregiving roles. We encourage submissions that take an interdisciplinary and/or cross-cultural approach, offering fresh insights into the concept of parenthood as represented in sacred texts. We aim to define sacred texts broadly to not only include texts from other religious traditions, but also artifacts and other pop culture mediums that can broaden our perspectives on parenthood.
Invited Panel: "Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies in and around the Paul and Politics volume" FHB is co-sponsoring a panel with the Paul and Politics unit.
Invited Panel: "Womanist-Feminist Multigenerational Dialogue" FHB is co-sponsoring a panel exploring dialogical practices of contextual biblical interpretation with the Contextual Biblical Interpretation unit.
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Gender, Sexuality, and the Bible
Description: This group engages in critical discussion with research on sexuality and gender in disciplines such as critical theory, philosophy, literature, cultural studies and the social sciences. It explores the implications of this research for biblical and postbiblical studies.
Call for papers: Gender, Sexuality, and the Bible is excited to host two sessions this year.
The FIRST SESSION is a review panel of Trans Biblical: New Approaches to Interpretation and Embodiment in Scripture published by Westminster John Knox. The session is co-sponsored with the LGBTI/Queer Hermeneutics program unit. Reviewers are invited speakers.
The SECOND SESSION is an open session. We invite papers on all aspects of gender and/or sexuality as they relate to the Bible and other closely related ancient texts. Paper submissions may address selections of texts that are obviously gendered and those that are not with attention to unexplored aspects of gender and sexuality. In particular, we encourage innovative explorations of gender identity and sexuality, including transgender, agender, non-binary identities, as well as asexuality.
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Genesis
Description: The Genesis unit promotes sustained and continued dialogue and scholarship on the book of Genesis from a variety of methodological perspectives, especially (yet not limited to) those approaching and treating the text as a canonical whole. It creates space for those working on Genesis to share their work in a focused place.
Call for papers: The Genesis Section will host three sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting and will be accepting paper proposals for the first two. The first session will be an open session on any topic related to the book of Genesis. The second session will be a mix of invited and proposed papers on the topic ‘Law in Genesis’. The third will be an invited panel on the topic ‘Genesis and Judges as alternative origins stories’.
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Gospel of Luke
Description: The Gospel of Luke garners continued interest because of its distinctive narrative construction and its rhetorical, theological, and ethical emphases. The unit is interested in exploring Luke’s literary features and theology, and in encouraging new research on the gospel.
Call for papers: The Gospel of Luke Program Unit invites submissions for an open session covering any aspect of research related to the Gospel of Luke, including (e.g.) exegetical, historical, narratological, postcolonial, reception-historical, social-scientific, textual, and theological approaches. Proposals that engage in reading Luke with new, minoritized, or multiperspectival approaches are especially welcome, as are proposals from both early career and experienced scholars. The Program Unit will also host a joint session with the Hebrews Program Unit exploring the intersections between Luke and Hebrews, on e.g. theological and/or ethical themes, uses of Scripture and intertextuality, intersections with other Jewish, Greek, and Roman texts and traditions, rhetoric, and reception. Contributors to the open session are also welcome to address these themes in their proposals.
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Gospel of Mark
Description: The Gospel of Mark Section is a venue for research on the text and themes of the Gospel of Mark and its various contexts.
Call for papers: The Gospel of Mark program unit has three sessions for 2025. Session 1: An open call for papers on any topic or text advancing scholarship on the Gospel of Mark. Session 2: An open call for papers focused on interpretations of Mark 2:1-3:6 as a textual unit, which continues a multi-year series with a view to fostering conversation about the textual, historical, hermeneutical, and theological aspects of the Gospel in larger-scale perspective. Session 3: An open call for papers that interpret Mark from specific located perspectives including but not limited to various cultural, economic, and political perspectives. The purpose of this session is to make space for marginalized readings. We welcome proposals for these three sessions that demonstrate a clearly defined thesis, methodology, and argument.
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Greco-Roman Religions
Description: This unit is highly interdisciplinary and comparative, a forum regularly bringing together historians of religion, specialists in Christian origins, classicists, archaeologists, and social scientists from across the world to pursue questions that foster new cooperative research initiatives.
Call for papers: We invite proposals for 4 sessions: 1. An open call for papers re: "New Developments in GRR." 2. New Directions in Comparing the Bible & Greco-Roman Religions (with Hebrew Philology). Comparison of the Bible (HB/NT) and the G-R world has recently experienced a resurgence. This new conversation has shifted away from linear influence, instead asking broader questions about how these literatures and cultures illuminate each other. We welcome papers that advance such comparative study, whether through new comparanda or methodological reflection on biblical/G-R comparison, especially those that engage G-R philosophy and other kinds of cultural discourse in their relationship to religion. 3. Honoring Frederick Brenk: Religion & religious thought in the early and high Roman empire (with SAMR). We invite papers on the relationship between religion, philosophy, and literature in Plutarch and others in the first two centuries of the Roman empire in honor of Frederick Brenk. Topics might include Plutarch's views on religion and society; studies of Plutarch's and his contemporaries’ religious thought; figures of the Second Sophistic as religious practitioners and theorists; 1st and 2nd c. treatments of religious practices; connections between Middle Platonic philosophy and religion; the legacy of Brenk’s work. The panel aims to celebrate Brenk's contributions while fostering new discussions and insights. 4. The Divine Feminine. For decades, the “divine feminine” has admitted to broad conceptual definition and to diverse methodological approaches. This panel builds on last year’s on Goddess Worship by considering how this broad concept pertains to G-R religions and to connections/comparisons between these and Judaism, Christianity, and related traditions. Viable topics include degree and forms of correlation between the divine feminine and divine being(s); relationship of devotees’ gender to deities; impact of the divine feminine on worship practices and institutional forms.
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Healthcare and Disability in the Ancient World
Description: This unit, titled Disability Studies and Healthcare in the Bible and the Ancient World, seeks to foster scholarship related to disability, illness, medicine, and healthcare in the biblical world and text. Major areas of interest include: the religious, legal, and cultural status of persons with disabilities or illness in the biblical and formative Jewish and Christian periods; the representation of disability and illness in biblical and cognate texts; the theology of such texts; the history and archeology of medicine and healthcare in the ancient Near East and Greco-Roman worlds; and the subjects of disability, illness, medicine and healthcare in the history of biblical interpretation.
Call for papers: The Healthcare and Disability in the Ancient World Program Unit this year invites submissions to four sessions: a) an open-call for face-to-face papers related to healthcare and/or disability in HB/OT/Jewish Studies, (b) another open-call for face-to-face papers related to healthcare and/or disability in NT/Apocrypha/Early Christian Studies, (c) an open-call for a hybrid session in any area related to healthcare and/or disability across biblical literature and ancient religion more broadly (priority will be given to folks whose work is presented online), (d) a thematic session inviting papers drawing on crip, trans, and/or queer engagement with disability in ancient religion. Potential points of focus may be on how these approaches contribute to political activism, theories of intersectionality, ancient conceptions of the body, and the roles of personal experience and positionality to interpreting aspects of the past. We especially invite papers that extend beyond biblical/scriptural literature to include material culture and other evidence of ancient religion.
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Hebrew Bible, History, and Archaeology
Description: This program unit exists to foster discussion of the relationship between archaeology in all its aspects (including survey, excavation, and epigraphic data) and the history of the ancient Israelite kingdoms and/or the Hebrew Bible.
Call for papers: The Hebrew Bible, History, and Archaeology unit is hosting three sessions for the 2025 annual meeting. First, we are hosting an invited session, focused on current views regarding the composition of the Jacob cycle and its historical context, bringing together recent scholarship on textual analysis and historical inquiry.
Second, we are hosting an invited session on diverse conceptions of death in ancient Israel. This session is co-sponsored by the Israelite Religion in its Ancient Context (IRAC) program unit. The papers in this session address this diversity through a series of case studies that highlight the complexity of the study of death in this region. Scholars have written on each of these different areas, but to date, these discussions remain siloed. This panel brings together scholars of the Hebrew Bible, archaeology, and epigraphy to discuss their own research so that these ideas can cross-pollinate and lead to a more holistic understanding of death and burial in the ancient southern Levant. For the full description of this session, please see the CFP for IRAC.
Third, we invite papers for an open session. We welcome any paper proposal that fosters discussion about the relationship between archaeology in all its aspects (including survey, excavation, and epigraphic data) and the history of the ancient Israelite kingdoms and/or the Hebrew Bible. We strongly encourage graduate students and junior faculty to submit abstracts for this session.
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Hebrew Scriptures and Cognate Literature
Description: The Hebrew Scriptures and Cognate Literature Section provides a major forum for research on specific points of contact between the Bible and the literatures of Israel's neighbors, to better elucidate the Bible as a collection of ancient Israelite writings.
Call for papers:
The Hebrew Scriptures and Cognate Literature unit covers all aspects of the international scribal and literary culture of the ancient Near East as it relates to the Hebrew Bible and other texts from the southern levant. If you are using Mesopotamian, Anatolian, Levantine, Egyptian, or Mediterranean texts in comparison or conjunction with biblical texts, this unit is for you.
In 2025, the Hebrew Scriptures and Cognate literature unit invites papers for three sessions: 1) A themed session on scribes and literature; 2) a joint session with Assyriology and the Bible exploring the influence of Assyria in the west; and 3) one open session.
The themed session on scribes and literature requests submissions on the relationship between scribes and texts in comparative perspective. Investigations may approach scribalism as a social system or material mode of textual production or scribes as individuals and communities.
The joint session with Assyriology and the Bible requests papers exploring the influence of Assyria in the West, particularly during the Neo-Assyrian period (ca. 911–605 BCE). During this period, Assyria spread its influence using international soft power as well as military force. How did this regional dominance affect events and cultural production in the Levant? Papers may address the topic from any angle.
Finally, the open session welcomes proposals that fit with the program unit but do not pertain to the preceding themes.
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Hebrews
Description: The famous and almost proverbial saying that Hebrews appears to its viewer as a “melchisedekitisches Wesen ohne Stammbaum” was uttered by Franz Overbeck in the year 1880, during the high noon of historicism. The missing genealogy that Overbeck lamented meant peculiarly to him a lack of historical context. This perceived “lack” was the consequence of flawed presuppositions originating in ideological frameworks, and consequently led New Testament scholarship to view Hebrews as the “enigmatic,” the “other” one, and furthermore led to the neglect of its historical context by Hebrews scholarship. Consequently, the context was judged as “irrelevant” for Hebrews interpretation. Recent scholarship on the contrary has developed a particular interest in Hebrews’ context. Therefore, while maintaining the distinctiveness of Hebrews it is the aim of this Group to explore extensively and facilitate scholarly research on Hebrews’ relations to other early traditions and texts (Jewish, Hellenistic and Roman), so that Hebrews’ historical, cultural, and religious identity may be mapped in greater detail.
Call for papers: The Hebrews program unit invites paper proposals on any topic related to the epistle for its open sessions. Please limit the abstract to 200 words and describe the project as clearly as space allows. In addition, the unit will cohost a session of invited papers on Hebrews in conversation with the Gospel of Luke.
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Hellenistic Judaism
Description: This section is devoted to the history of (a) Judaism of the Hellenistic period (that is, "Hellenistic" understood chronologically from Alexander the Great to Augustus), (b) Greek-speaking Judaism in antiquity (that is, "Hellenistic" understood linguistically), and (c) the interaction between Judaism and its host cultures in antiquity ("Hellenistic understood culturally and socially).
Call for papers: The Hellenistic Judaism Unit is organizing three sessions at the Boston meeting.
1) The first is an open session dedicated to the Letter of Aristeas. Since the beginning of modern study of the Letter of Aristeas, scholars have debated the question of the historical value of the Letter, arriving at very different conclusions. In recent decades, that debate remains as vigorous as ever, with important scholarly voices making the case for 1) the abandonment of efforts to read the Letter as witness to historical events; 2) the historical value of the letter for understanding the origins of the Greek Torah. This session invites papers that will reflect on debates – of recent times or much earlier – about the historical value of the Letter; we also invite papers that will address specific contested questions, e.g. the roles of Demetrius of Phaleron, Ptolemy II Philadelphus, arguments from analysis of the language and social contexts of the translators of the Greek Torah.
2) The second is invited and a joint session with the Qumran unit on Anxiety and Ritual. The session will explore ritual as an element in anxiety management. Cognitive scientists have sought to identify mechanisms by which ritualized behaviors (e.g., redundant, rigid, repetitive action) bring a sense of control. Speakers will explore theory as well as textual and archaeological data for ritual behaviors and activities that may be seen as responses to stress and anxiety, especially threats seen as looming or ambiguous.
3) Invited book review panel on Hindy Najman's Scriptural Vitality: Rethinking Philology and Hermeneutics.
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Historical Geography of the Biblical World
Description: This unit provides a platform for scholars to present original research
related to the historical geography of the biblical world. While we anticipate
many studies related to both the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament and the New
Testament, we welcome studies of related regions and texts as well.
Call for papers: This unit provides a platform for scholars to present original research
related to the historical geography of the biblical world. While we anticipate
many studies related to both the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament and the New
Testament, we welcome studies of related regions and texts as well.
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Historical Jesus
Description: Historical Jesus research is one of the oldest and most debated areas in Biblical Studies. We encourage critical analyses of historical methods, recent trends and contemporary reception, and we give scholars and students opportunities to present their latest Jesus research.
Call for papers: The Historical Jesus program unit organizes four sessions for the 2025 meeting. Three of the four will have invited panelists, and one is open to proposals. The sessions are: 1) Open session. We welcome proposals on topics related to the historical Jesus and contemporary historical research. 2) An invited book review panel on Crossley and Keith, eds., _The Next Quest for the Historical Jesus (Eerdmans, 2024). 3) An invited panel, co-hosted with the Asian and Asian American Hermeneutics unit, entitled "Jesus in Asia." 4) One additional book review panel with invited papers, further details TBA.
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Historiography and the Hebrew Bible
Description: This unit (formerly Current Historiography and Ancient Israel and Judah) explores how historians use the Hebrew Bible for purposes of historical research and writing.
Call for papers: The Historiography and the Hebrew Bible program unit invites paper proposals that examine specific historical questions or topics that pertain to the texts of the Hebrew Bible. Papers that engage contemporary debates surrounding the theories and methods of history writing are particularly welcome. In addition to one open session, we will be hosting a special session on Kinship and Political Communities. This session will consist of a combination open-call submissions and invited papers. It will focus on the question of how scholars navigate the relationship between kinship structures, kingship and other forms of socio-political organization, as evidenced in both Ancient Near Eastern texts and archaeology. We invite papers that engage both archaeological and textual evidence, and particularly encourage papers that address the methodological challenges historians face when we engage these different datasets. In addition, we will host a session of invited papers on Mahri Leonard-Fleckman’s 2025 book, Scribal Representations and Social Landscapes of the Iron Age Shephelah (Oxford University Press). The goal of this panel will be to use Leonard-Fleckman’s book as a point of departure for a provocative and stimulating discussion of research at the intersection of History and Biblical Studies. Some of the issues we will consider are: what kinds of tensions are inherent in historical critical work? How do we create bridges between fabricated/imagined space and concrete, literal place? What are ethical or responsible ways to engage with issues of ancient identity?
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Homiletics and Biblical Studies
Description: The Homiletics and Biblical Studies Section encourages dialogue among scholars in both fields who share an interest in critical exegesis, its various methods, and the unique hermeneutical and theological problems inherent to the relationship between biblical interpretation and proclamation.
Call for papers: The Homiletics and Biblical Studies Section invites papers in our open call sessions for the 2025 Annual Meeting. There will be two open call sessions. For the first session, the papers can address any topic related to the intersection between homiletics and biblical studies. The Homiletics and Biblical Studies Section encourages dialogue among scholars in both fields who share an interest in critical exegesis, its various methods, and the unique hermeneutical and theological problems inherent to the relationship between biblical interpretation and proclamation. For the second open call session, we invite papers that explore the topic: Homiletics and Christian Nationalism.
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Institute for Biblical Research
Description: The historical goals of the Institute for Biblical Research include fostering the study of Scripture within an evangelical context, establishing facilities for the furtherance of biblical studies, and encouraging university and college students toward a vocation of biblical scholarship. Website: www.ibr-bbr.org
Call for papers: Some of our research groups are issuing a call for papers. Others have invited presenters. Note that all paper proposals for IBR and the Kirby Laing Centre Scripture Collective sessions must be submitted directly to the sponsor(s) of the relevant session, not through the SBL system. See https://www.ibr-bbr.org/research-groups for details on each group.
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International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies
Description: The IOSCS is an Affiliate of the SBL. For further information on the IOSCS, please contact the program unit chair.
Call for papers: The International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies (IOSCS) is soliciting papers for its annual meeting in Boston, to be held in conjunction with SBL. We invite proposals for twenty-minute papers on any aspect of the LXX and cognate literature. One of the sessions will be devoted to translations of the LXX into East-Asian languages and to East-Asian research on the LXX more broadly (chair Jonathan Lo). Proposals of max. 350 words for that session or on any other relevant topic are welcome and should be submitted through the SBL Annual Meetings website. All presenters and panelists must be members in good standing with the IOSCS (see http://ioscs.org/ for details). Please direct any queries to Reinhart Ceulemans at reinhart (dot) ceulemans (at) kuleuven (dot) be.
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International Qur’anic Studies Association (IQSA)
Description: The International Qur’anic Studies Association fosters scholarship on the Qur’an, its context, its relationship to other scriptural traditions, and its influence upon literature and culture. IQSA facilitates the broad and open discussion of the Qur’an from a variety of academic perspectives.
Call for papers: The International Qur’anic Studies Association fosters scholarship on the Qur’an, its context, its relationship to other scriptural traditions, and its influence upon literature and culture. IQSA facilitates the broad and open discussion of the Qur’an from a variety of academic perspectives.
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International Syriac Language Project
Description: All papers are presented as contributions to the International Syriac Language Project (ISLP), the aim of which is to redefine ancient-language lexicography for the 21st century, and to lay the foundations for a new comprehensive Syriac-English lexicon. The group and its invited contributors is interdisciplinary and collaborative, and therefore includes specialists in related fields.
Call for papers: All papers are presented as contributions to the International Syriac Language Project (ISLP), the aim of which is to redefine ancient-language lexicography for the 21st century, and to lay the foundations for a new comprehensive Syriac-English lexicon. The group and its invited contributors is interdisciplinary and collaborative, and therefore includes specialists in related fields.
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Interrelations of the Gospels
Description: This section focuses on the production and reception of early Christian
Gospels, particularly the ways subsequent authors redacted and rewrote
previous Gospels in whole or in part. Perennial inquiries include the
Synoptic problem and John's relation to the Synoptics, but additional
texts-both extant and hypothetical-are also evaluated. The unit fosters an
open forum that does not privilege or exclude any methodologically
rigorous source-critical hypothesis.
Call for papers: For the 2025 meeting in Boston, the Interrelations of the Gospels section will convene two or three panels. One is an open-call session exploring the Synoptic Gospels' relationship to early collections of Paul's letters. The other panel(s) will discuss any aspect of the interrelations of the Gospels.
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Intertextuality and the Hebrew Bible
Description: The purpose of this unit is to provide a forum for presentation and discussion on the study of intertextuality in the Hebrew Bible. This unit explores various issues related to methodology as well as interpretation, considering not only the Hebrew Bible but also its connection to ancient Near Eastern literature, Second Temple texts, the New Testament, interreligious sources, art, and film.
Call for papers:
Intertextuality and the Hebrew Bible will host four sessions in 2025. • The first session will be a joint session with the “Book of Psalms” Unit. We invite papers exploring intertextual relations between the Psalms and other biblical or non-biblical books. • For our second season we are looking for proposals that explore intertextual references in the Psalms to significant figures, events, or motifs in other biblical books. These papers may focus on discussing the relevance of the evoked texts to the psalm ("author-oriented" approach), or they may consider the relevance of the references to both the psalm and the evoked texts ("reader-oriented" approach). Questions to explore the relationships might be: How are people and events remembered in the psalms; what elements and aspects are chosen, enforced, added, modified, transformed, etc.? Can such variations be linked to particular times or events? What is the impact of the literary genre, how does a poem or the context of prayer influence the understanding of the evoked texts? How do intertextual references add to the construction of the lyrical subject in the psalms? • Our third session will focus on intertextual relations between the Psalms and the book of Genesis. We are looking for articles that either focus on intertextual relationships between individual Psalms and the Book of Genesis or that examine the motifs, motif complexes, phrases or terms from the Book of Genesis in the Psalter. • Our fourth session is open to any intertextual reading of the Hebrew Bible, but we would welcome proposals that focus on intertextuality as a cultural phenomenon, exploring the in-between reading of human life accounts and Psalms. We aim to examine diverse cultural in-between readings and the intertextual entanglement of Psalms and human lives.
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Intertextuality in the New Testament
Description: The purpose of this unit is to provide a forum for presentation and discussion on intertexual interpretations of New Testament passages. This unit focuses on ways in which the language of texts are recited, echoed, reconfigured, or recontextualized by other texts from the LXX, Greco-Roman philosophers, orators, decrees, Second Temple sources, Hebrew Scriptures, or another ancient source.
Call for papers: The Intertextuality in the New Testament (INT) Section invites proposals for papers during the 2025 annual meeting. Papers may focus on any aspect of intertextuality and New Testament interpretation, but should articulate the kind of intertextual work or method being employed. First-time presenters are encouraged to propose papers.
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Inventing Christianity: Apostolic Fathers, Apologists, and Martyrs
Description: This unit focuses on the writings of the Apostolic Fathers, the apologists, and the authors of martyrdom accounts (AFAM) in the second and third centuries. The goal is to explore their role in the invention of “Christianity” and early Christian identities.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting, Inventing Christianity invites submissions for three panels:
(1) Retrospective on Elizabeth A. Castelli’s _Martyrdom and Memory_: Our first session is a retrospective on Elizabeth A. Castelli’s _Martyrdom and Memory: Early Christian Culture Making_ (Columbia UP, 2004). This session will feature both invited papers and open call submissions. We encourage submissions reflecting on the content and scholarly legacy of Martyrdom and Memory, especially its influence on theory and method in the study of early Christian martyr accounts, as well as more broad-ranging explorations on Castelli’s body of work. (2) Inventing Christianity in Rome:
For our second session, we invite wide-ranging submissions pertaining to “inventing Christianity” in second and third century Rome. For example, papers may engage with Rome as real or idealized space; an element of early Christian ritual and liturgical practice; an historical context for the development of Christian beliefs, practices, and identity; or, more broadly, as a theological or theoretical concept in early Christian writings. (3) Our final session is an open-call session, and welcomes proposals on any topic related to the theme of “Inventing Christianity” in the second or third centuries. We especially welcome proposals from early career researchers, contingent faculty, and scholars from underserved communities.
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Islands, Islanders, and Scriptures
Description: This section is a platform for island and islander views, languages, peoples, swaggers, rhythms and more. It engages interests and realities of islanders from and between the Caribbean and Oceania, and how those condition the reception, translation and interpretation of scriptures.
Call for papers: CLIMATE AND THE BIBLICAL TEXT/S
With the climate catastrophe continuing to devastate the livelihood of creation’s inhabitants and at the same time diminishing its resources, the call for stronger perspectives and insights on becoming better caretakers of the Earth and Moana (ocean) and advocates for climate change could not be more profound. A large number of the world’s population continues to read the bible/biblical text/s, while governments even mould their moral compass on these texts. For islander nations who are on the frontline of the climate crisis, there should be no choice but to re-read the biblical text with perspectives that reinforce our global commitment to ensuring the safety of the Earth and the Ocean. Sadly, this is not the case for so many in our islander contexts. This call for papers therefore, is an invitation, like Macedonia reaching out to the Apostle Paul, to islanders and friends of islanders to come forth with (re)readings of the biblical text/s that can help our islander cause, and hence assist in the global fight against the colonial systems that continue to wreak havoc on the environment.
This call for papers is not just a presentation of your thoughts, but in islander style, you will be encouraged to engage in talanoa/conversation with each other and also participants, to ensure that there is rich discussion and stronger advocacy to emerge.
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Israelite Prophetic Literature
Description: This section aims to provide an open forum for scholars to present papers on a variety of topics germane to the study of ancient Israelite prophecy and prophetic literature.
Call for papers: The Israelite Prophetic Literature is accepting proposals for the following sessions: (1) WE ARE ACCEPTING PROPOSALS with papers that define the intersections between "humor and trauma" as a hermeneutical lens to prophetic texts in the Hebrew Bible. Preference will be given towards interdisciplinary approaches or comparative approaches (whether in ancient near eastern, sacred, or popular/cultural expressions). In this second year of this themed session, we welcome proposals that may be included in a later published volume. (2) WE ARE ACCEPTING PROPOSALS on a broad range of topics dealing with prophetic literature.
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Israelite Religion in Its Ancient Context
Description: A forum for the study of religion in Israel and Judea within their larger Southwest Asian and East Mediterranean contexts. Aims to bring together a wide variety of questions, perspectives, periods, disciplines, theories, methods, and kinds of data, e.g., verbal text (literary and pragmatic), visual art, artifacts and architecture; philology (broadly), art-history, sociology and anthropology, and history; theology, ritual, gender, and ethnicity. Above all, the forum seeks to facilitate the systematic framing of questions and analysis of religion in theoretical terms, with theoretical scholarship.
Call for papers: In 2025, we are accepting papers for two sessions. One is completely open: the papers should engage in some way with the study of religion in the ancient southern Levant. The second session will be a joint session with the Social Sciences and the Interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures program unit. We welcome papers that focus on the scenescapes of ancient southern Levantine religion. We also welcome papers that engage with methodologies that might meaningfully be applied to the study of the spaces and ritual objects in the Biblical text and/or to other ancient descriptions of sensorial experience.
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Jewish Christianity / Christian Judaism
Description: The broad aim of this research unit is to clarify the religion, history, and sociology of the ancient groups traditionally called, collectively, “Jewish Christianity,” but increasingly “Christian” or “Jesus-believing Judaism.” The group also seeks to clarify the issues involved in conceptualizing such groups as a distinct category of religion in antiquity.
Call for papers: The Jewish Christianity / Christian Judaism program unit plans to hold three sessions in 2025: 1) A panel on "Philosophy and Jewish Christianity," featuring invited scholars working at the intersection of the late antique philosophy and Jewish Christianity, principally but not limited to the Pseudo-Clementine corpus. 2) A panel on violence and representations of violence in histories and historiographies relating to the so-called "parting of the ways" between Jews and Christians. What roles might traumatic moments play in histories of "religious" partition and/or separation? How and to what ends do the ancient sources and/or modern scholars stage violent episodes in history as evidence of separation? 3) An open Call for Papers relating to broader questions regarding Jewish Christianity in antiquity.
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Johannine Literature
Description: Our mission is to address issues and concerns having to do with the analysis and interpretation of the Johannine literature--a major component of the Christian Scriptures, encompassing for our purposes the Gospel of John and the three Johannine letters. The section has historically been committed to highlighting new voices and issues in the field.
Call for papers: The Johannine Literature Section welcomes papers for the 2025 SBL Annual Meeting. We will have four sessions. Two invited sessions: (1) a session on the state of "the Johannine Community"; and (2) a review of James Barker's and Mark Goodacres's books on John’s Relationship with the Synoptic Gospels, co-sponsored with Corpus Hellenisticum. The other sessions will be open sessions. We invite paper proposals for the two entirely open sessions, which may focus on the Gospel, the Letters of John, or a combination of the two. A wide variety of methodologies, interdisciplinary readings and interpretations are encouraged.
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John the Baptist
Description: While there is always a steady trickle of interest in John the Baptist, recent
publications in English, Spanish, and Italian suggest that there is a current
surge not only in interest in John as a historical figure, not only also as a
literary figure in the canonical Gospels, but in his appearance in Christian
apocrypha and in Mandaean literature. These areas are often separated
among different program units, and this consultation will provide
a place for them to come together and interact.
Call for papers: For 2025 the John the Baptist program unit has an open call for papers. Papers on John as a historical figure, his literary depiction in the New Testament texts, and his reception in subsequent literature and various artistic media, including in other religious traditions such as Mandaeism and Islam, are all welcome.
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John's Apocalypse and Cultural Contexts Ancient and Modern
Description: This section provides an interdisciplinary forum for nontraditional and traditional methods to interact in the exploration of the meaning and significance of the Apocalypse of John and related literature in both their ancient and modern cultural contexts.
Call for papers: We invite submissions for two open sessions on John's Apocalypse and Cultural Contexts, Ancient and Modern. While we welcome proposals on all aspects of the book of Revelation, we especially invite papers that offer new perspectives on the text, including papers that approach the text from specific hermeneutical contexts, employ innovative approaches to the Apocalypse, and/or offer new perspectives on enduring questions. We are also co-sponsoring a session with the Performance Biblical Criticism section. There will be three performances of Revelation 13-14 (one in each language, English, ASL, and Spanish) and three respondents exploring how the embodiment and cultural memory shaped their experiences. Proposals to be a respondent should outline their experience and cultural position. Finally, we are co-sponsoring an invited review panel of Yii-Jan Lin’s Immigration and Apocalypse: How the Book of Revelation Shaped American Immigration with the Bible in America, Latina/o/e and Latin American Biblical Interpretation, Asian and Asian-American Hermeneutics, and Religion and Migration sections.
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Josephus
Description: The Josephus Group will support the Brill Josephus Project, which is publishing all of his works with translation and commentary. We shall reach out collaboratively to the SBL community with a wide variety of topics related to the study of Josephus.
Call for papers: The Josephus Group welcomes proposals focussed primarily on the study of Josephus.
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Joshua-Judges
Description: The Joshua-Judges Section will seek to reach a synthesis of all genuinely pertinent information and insight needed to interpret Joshua and Judges responsibly and competently. Specialists will contribute to understanding contents, background, text, structure, and interpretation of these books.
Call for papers: At the 2025 Annual meeting, we will have three session.
1) An invited review panel discussing recent publications on Judg 4-5.
2) A partly invited session on "Historical and Postcolonial Approaches to Joshua–Judges" (organized together with the Deuteronomistic History and Postcolonial Studies and Biblical Studies units). In this session, we welcome historically-minded contributions on the books of Joshua and Judges which are informed by analytical categories developed in postcolonial theory. In bringing together colleagues from various scholarly backgrounds, we hope for a mutually enriching exchange which ideally will not only shed new light on Joshua and Judges but also help develop truly integrative approaches to read literary traditions hailing from ancient Israel and Judah in their ancient Western Asian imperial contexts. In exploring such new avenues, authors are explicitly encouraged to experiment, provided that they contructively engage both historical and postcolonial perspectives.
3) In addition, there will be an open session. Papers dealing with any aspect related to Joshes or Judges are welcome.
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Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion
Description: The JFSR is the oldest interdisciplinary, interreligious feminist academic journal in religious studies. Founded in 1985, it is published twice annually, in the spring and fall. Located at the intersection of feminist theory and studies in religion, it welcomes contributions that explore a diversity of feminist theories, practices, cultures, and religions. Its editors are committed to rigorous thinking and analysis in the service of the transformation of religious studies as a discipline and the feminist transformation of religious and cultural institutions. Website: http://www.fsrinc.org/jfsr/
Call for papers: The JFSR is the oldest interdisciplinary, interreligious feminist academic journal in religious studies. Founded in 1985, it is published twice annually, in the spring and fall. Located at the intersection of feminist theory and studies in religion, it welcomes contributions that explore a diversity of feminist theories, practices, cultures, and religions. Its editors are committed to rigorous thinking and analysis in the service of the transformation of religious studies as a discipline and the feminist transformation of religious and cultural institutions. Website: http://www.fsrinc.org/jfsr/
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Korean Biblical Colloquium
Description: The purpose of this organization is to promote Korean scholarship in biblical studies and related fields and to facilitate fellowship and networking among Korean scholars in those fields. Members of KBC include Koreans and others who are engaged in biblical studies and related fields and who are interested in developing Korean perspectives in those fields and sharing their scholarly experiences with fellow Korean scholars.
Call for papers: (1) The Korean Biblical Colloquium invites papers for a joint-session with the "Ancient Jewish and Christian Meals and Their Afterlives" Unit titled "K-Food and the Bible." This session aims to explore intersections between Korean food culture and biblical themes of meals and food. Topics may include: a) Reexamining ancient Jewish and Christian meal traditions through Korean/Korean American (or other minoritized) hermeneutics; b) Interpreting Korean food culture within biblical meal discourses and rituals; c) Exploring the lived reception of biblical meal traditions in Korean cultural contexts, past and present. Innovative approaches fostering dialogue between biblical scholarship and Korean cultural studies are encouraged. (2) KBC will continue to explore last year’s joint-session theme (with the Womanist Interpretation Unit): “K-Pop and Hip-Hop: (How) Can Korean/Asian-American Biblical Scholars Learn from Womanist Interpreters, and Vice Versa?” Using K-Pop and Hip-Hop as symbols representing Korean and Womanist approaches to biblical interpretation, we will examine intersectional possibilities and dialogues among various other minoritized biblical interpretations and interpreters, with a focus on Korean and Womanist perspectives. What similarities and differences can we discern from these interpretive voices? How can we appreciate hermeneutical influences from one another while also acknowledging and learning from dissonant hermeneutical tones? What are the limits and potentials of dialogue—hermeneutical, existential, and social—within academic discourse and in broader societal contexts? While K-Pop and Hip-Hop serve as metaphorical starting points, paper proposals are not restricted to discussions of music genres. This session welcomes a variety of approaches that address the broader theme of intersectional and dialogical hermeneutics. ACCEPTING PAPER PROPOSALS.
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Latino/a/e and Latin American Biblical Interpretation
Description: The issue of contextualization at the level of reception or interpretation, involving not only location but also perspective, has become paramount in Biblical Studies in recent years. For some time now, a good and growing number of Latino/a American and Latin American biblical scholars have been addressing the problematic of reading the Bible explicitly from their particular placements and optics in society and culture. This proposed Consultation seeks to pursue such work in sustained and systematic fashion by bringing together scholars—Latino/a and Latin American as well as others with an interest in such discussions—from across the spectrum of biblical criticism. Its scope is conceived as broad: first, the biblical texts as such, both testaments; second, readings and readers of these texts in modern and postmodern biblical criticism; lastly, traditions of reading the Bible outside academic criticism. Its approach is also envisioned as wide-ranging: open to a variety of methodological approaches and theoretical perspectives, from the more traditional to the more recent.
Call for papers: The SBL’s Latino/a/e and Latin American Biblical Interpretation and Poverty in the Biblical World program units will host a session that honors Gustavo Gutiérrez, a leading figure of liberation theology who passed away in 2024. Building off of last year’s session reflecting on the legacies of Enrique Dussel and Jorge Pixley for biblical interpretation and liberationist thought, we invite papers this year that consider and respond to Gutiérrez’s use of biblical texts, impact on biblical interpretation, and effect on scriptural practices and relations more broadly. Proposals may also address intersections between liberation theology and biblical studies in Gutiérrez’s work, or develop interpretations of scriptural texts that employ Gutiérrez’s thought to examine the texts’ social, economic, and political dimensions and implications. We also welcome proposals for an open session on general topics in Latina/o/e and Latin American biblical interpretation, especially proposals for papers that examine the uses of the Bible in Latina/o/e and Latin American communities, with particular attention to Indigenous Latina/o/e realities, Puerto Rican and other Caribbean readings, women’s reading practices, reading practices in migrant communities, and bilingual reading practices. In addition, with other units, we are co-sponsoring an invited review panel that gathers scholars of U.S. immigration, politics, and apocalyptic ancient and modern to think with and respond to Yii-Jan Lin’s Immigration and Apocalypse: How the Book of Revelation Shaped American Imagination. The book weaves together U.S. religious history, immigration and ethnic studies, and the use of biblical texts and imagery.
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Latter-day Saint Association of Biblical Scholars
Description: Latter-day Saint Association of Biblical Scholars
Call for papers: The Latter-day Saint Association of Biblical Scholars (LDSABS) invites presentation proposals for as many as two sessions. Successful paper proposals will demonstrate grounding in the academic methodologies connected to biblical studies and will engage any aspect of the Bible or its reception within the wider Latter-day Saint tradition, including as the Bible is received and reflected in other scriptural texts of the tradition.
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Letters of James, Peter, and Jude
Description: The Letters of James, Peter, and Jude Section considers research on these letters that contribute to understanding them and their social contexts. It encourages the use of rhetorical, social-scientific, sociorhetorical, ideological, and hermeneutical methods, as well as other cross-disciplinary approaches in addition to the historical-critical method.
Call for papers: The Letters of James, Peter, and Jude section is conducting a (multi-year) critical assessment of the evidence and methods that inform modern dialogues on matters of “introduction,” including authorship, date, literary relationships, etc. This represents an opportunity to investigate untested assumptions, to revisit long-held viewpoints, and to explore new avenues for answering some foundational interpretive questions. In 2025 we will have three sessions:(1) a session with papers addressing the influence of Paul on the Catholic Epistles, especially ones that attempt to critically assess the evidence and methods that inform this question; (2) an open session with papers exploring any topic related to the study of the letters of James, Peter, and Jude; (3) a session with invited participants engaging in a critical assessment of the evidence and methods that inform modern dialogues on literary relationships that exist between James, 1-2 Peter, and Jude as well as their relationship with other writings.
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LGBTI/Queer Hermeneutics
Description: Sexual orientation and kinship continues to be contested in public, ecclesial and academic communities across the globe and Biblical interpretation underpins much that is oppressive in these efforts. This section provides a forum for interrogating issues related to these interpretations and for formulating interpretive methods that emerge from the diversity of LGBTI/Q experience and thought.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting, we have two open calls for proposals:
(1) For an fully open session, we welcome any papers that engage LGBTI/Queer hermeneutics. We always are always excited to receive proposals from graduate students in the specific topics that interest them.
(2) With the Synoptic Gospels unit, we are accepting proposals for a co-sponsored panel, "Que(e)r(y)ing the Synoptics." We invite papers that use queer and/or trans hermeneutics to engage the Synoptic Gospels.
(3) We are interested in papers that engage either the work of Sara Ahmed or Gayle S. Rubin for a potential panel that considers their ongoing relevance in biblical scholarship and the radical politics of sex and gender and the work of feminist, queer, and trans killjoys.
Finally, we will co-sponsor a review panel of Trans Biblical: New Approaches to Interpretation and Embodiment in Scripture published by Westminster John Knox. The session is co-sponsored with the Gender, Sexuality, and the Bible program unit. Reviewers are invited speakers.
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Linguistics and Biblical Hebrew
Description: The goals of the unit: to provide a forum where scholars can share the
results of their research on different aspects of Biblical Hebrew; advocate
the advantages of linguistic methods for biblical studies; build a platform for
interdisciplinary partnership with other disciplines and units.
Call for papers: The Linguistics and Biblical Hebrew program unit solicits papers for five sessions. The FIRST SESSION is non-thematic / open. The SECOND SESSION, co-sponsored with Performance Criticism of the Bible and Other Ancient Texts, is entitled “Translation and Linguistic Issues in Apocalyptic Literature in Ancient Hebrew and Aramaic.” The THIRD SESSION is a joint open session with NAPH, entitled “Linguistics and Biblical Hebrew.” The FOURTH SESSION is a joint open session with NAPH, entitled “Biblical Hebrew Linguistics and Interdisciplinarity: Bridging the Gap Between Language, Literature, History, and Theology.” The FIFTH SESSION is a thematic session entitled “Biblical Hebrew Linguistics and Natural Language Processing Tools: AI, LLMs, and Machine Learning
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Literature and History of the Persian Period
Description: The Literature and History of the Persian Period Group emphasizes an interdisciplinary approach to biblical texts and related literature of the 6th-4th centuries BCE by bringing together archaeologists, Assyriologists, classicists, Egyptologists, and sociologists, to name but a few, with biblical scholars specializing in various facets and texts pertinent to this era.
Call for papers: 1) Mobility:Migration in the Persian Period
We announce a three year programmatic theme of “Mobility:Migration in the Persian Period.” Recently the differentiation of migration and mobility has been reconceptualized as a nexus rather than two competing terms (Bitschnau & D’Amato 2023). This nexus includes multiple practices, including long- and short-term, monodirectional, and circular movements—all of which we find in biblical and ancient Near Eastern sources. As such, there are multiple avenues of investigation available.
In the first year (2025), we will focus on mobility:migration as present in texts—as literary motifs, tropes, etc., we question the purpose, symbolism, and significance of mobility:migration in there. In the second year (2026), we partner with the ANE Iconography Section to focus on iconographic representations of mobility:migration—from Neo-Assyrian palace wall reliefs to Kuntillet ‘Ajrud graffiti, we look forward to critical studies of visual depictions of the many practices subsumed in this nexus. In our final year (2027), we partner with the Forced Migration Section to center our discussions on social practices inherent in mobility:migration. Anthropological, sociological, and archaeological papers are especially encouraged in this year—new interpretations of biblical passages, cuneiform or Aramaic documents, presentations of comparative practices from other cultures, etc.. . .
2) Ezekiel and the Persian Period
This year we invite papers for a joint session with the Book of Ezekiel Section on the “Reception of Ezekiel in the Persian Period.” We are interested in papers exploring the evidence for literary or social engagement with Ezekiel in the Achaemenid period, whether through the growth of the text itself, other textual traces, etc.
Both calls include invited presenters and open calls for abstracts. We especially encourage younger scholars.
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Masoretic Studies
Description: The purpose for this section is to discuss, research and promote the field of Masoretic Studies among Hebrew Bible Scholars. Masoretic Studies seeks to clarify the translation and interpretation of the Hebrew Bible text through the use of the Masorah, to further our understanding of the history of the Masorah, and to explore related fields (e.g. grammar, Rabbinic Studies).
Call for papers: The Masoretic Studies section is planning to have three sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting in Boston. The first two sessions will be open. Papers can address any topic pertaining to Masoretic studies, such as Masoretic notes, Hebrew Bible manuscripts, Masoretic systems of vocalization and accents, digital Masorah approaches, etc. The presentation of the work of doctoral candidates and early career researchers are especially welcome. The third session will be a book review to mark the release of T&T Clark Handbook to the Masoretic Text with invited contributions.
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Matthew
Description: The Matthew Section welcomes submission on topics related to Matthean scholarship and sponsors invited as well as submitted papers, panels, and reviews.
Call for papers: The SBL Matthew section invites submissions for papers that seek to challenge and overturn long-held assumptions and conventional wisdom taken for granted in Matthean studies. The primary aims are to foster critical and innovative approaches to established claims and offer fresh perspectives on the Gospel of Matthew. We welcome papers that address, but are not limited to, the following topics: new insights into the date, location, authorship, and community of Matthew; challenging traditional views on the theological, socio-political, and religious milieu of Matthew; offering new points of departure on source criticism; and innovative methodological approaches from postcolonial criticism to reception history to reinterpret significant literary and theological themes in Matthew.
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Meals in the HB/OT and Its World
Description: The unit explores the cultural-anthropological centrality of meals, utilizing the considerable data about food and feasting from the OT/HB and ANE (textual, iconographic, archaeological), to address questions of gender, social formation/identity, intercultural dynamics, ecology, ideology & theology.
Call for papers: This year the ‘Meals in the HB/OT and Its World’ unit will host two sessions.
The first is an invited panel of presenters honoring the work of Dr. Carol Meyers, one of the founding members of the ‘Meals in the HB/OT and Its World’ unit. Dr. Meyers is well-known for her work on women within ancient Israelite households and for her rich and illuminating discussions related to their role in bread production. As a unit exploring meals, food, and foodways in the Hebrew Bible, we are deeply indebted to the ways that Dr. Meyers has advanced our area of study, and we look forward to this chance to celebrate her and her work. We will hear from friends and colleagues, as we think about her foundational scholarship as well as what lies ahead because of it.
In light of the occasion of SBL meeting in the same city as ASOR (American Society of Overseas Research), our second session will be an ‘open’ session that invites proposals on food topics related to archaeology, material culture, and/or texts from the ancient Near East. We welcome submissions from scholars at all levels and we encourage submissions from early career scholars and graduate students.
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Metacriticism of Biblical Scholarship
Description: This unit interrogates the contours and boundaries of the discipline of
biblical studies, including analysis of the guild's historic and current
preoccupations, methods, and participant composition, while providing a
forum for constructive recommendations for future directions in the field.
Call for papers: The Metacritcism section will be holding an open session welcoming proposals relating to any metacritical examination of the field and its place in academic culture. The second session is entitled "Sustaining Biblical Studies within a Changing Liberal Arts Ecosystem". Institutions that have long prioritized a Liberal Arts curriculum have seen dramatic shifts in funding and support for the Humanities, with stricter limits on resource allocation and increasingly diminishing numbers of undergraduate majors. The area of Religious Studies— including Biblical Studies—is especially hard-hit by these trends, at a time when school administrators prioritize areas of study that appear to more directly funnel students toward a specific career path.
The session seeks papers addressing this evolving ecosystem, broadly conceived across a diversity of higher-ed contexts. How can academics reframe the place of Biblical (and Religious) Studies within this new ecosystem? What new courses, programs, and interdisciplinary projects can be proposed by scholars working in this area that might broaden the appeal of Biblical and Religious studies among administrative decision-makers? What types of scholarly work, including public-facing scholarship, can best represent the significance of our field to audiences with little or no understanding of what the field entails or why studying religion or religious texts is important within the Liberal Arts and secular society in general? We invite papers that reflect on the theoretical as well what has already been (un)successfully tried.
Finally, we are co-sponsoring (with the Paul Within Judaism unit) a book review panel on Sarah Emanuel's WRESTLING WITH PAUL: THE APOSTLE, HIS READERS, AND THE FATE OF THE JEWS (Fortress Press, 2025).
For all sessions taking submissions, we encourage proposals from early career scholars, as well as scholars from under-represented groups within SBL.
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Metaphor in the Bible and Cognate Literature
Description: This section aims to analyse metaphors across the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, New Testament, Ancient Near Eastern texts, Deuterocanonical Books/Apocrypha, and the Dead Sea Scrolls. It integrates diverse disciplines, approaches, and theories to illuminate the linguistic, conceptual, and cultural dimensions of metaphors in the Bible and related texts
Call for papers: For the 2025 SBL Annual Meeting, the “Metaphor in the Bible and Cognate Literature” research unit plans to organize three sessions.
The FIRST SESSION, titled “Metaphors in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” will be a joint session with the Qumran research unit. While some of the speakers will be invited, this session is also open to proposals that explore the use and development of metaphors from the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Submissions that address influences and parallels between metaphors in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament, shedding light on shared and divergent metaphorical traditions within early Jewish and Christian literatures, are also welcome. Furthermore, we are open to contributions that explore novel metaphors in the Dead Sea Scrolls, particularly those without direct parallels in biblical literature.
The SECOND SESSION will be a Graduate Student Research Session, offering PhD students—and MA students preparing to enroll in a doctoral program—a platform to present their ongoing research on metaphors in the Bible and related literatures. A maximum of four proposals will be selected, and each will be assigned a respondent to facilitate in-depth discussion. Students who want to participate in the second session are expected to submit an abstract by the deadline, and the full paper (maximum 3000 words) by the end of September 2025 at the latest.
The THIRD SESSION will feature a Book Review Panel, where invited speakers will engage with Esther Brownsmith’s recently published work, Gendered Violence in Biblical Narrative: The Devouring Metaphor (Routledge, 2024).
In order to be considered, abstracts for the first two sessions must clearly outline the scope of the research, the main thesis or argument, specific case studies or textual examples, the methodology applied, and the relevance of the research to the study of metaphors in biblical and cognate literatures.
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Midrash
Description: The Midrash Section is a scholarly forum for the comprehensive, interdisciplinary study and analysis of the particular mode of interpreting the Bible developed and utilized by the rabbis of late antiquity.
Call for papers: The Midrash Section invites paper proposals for two sessions it will sponsor at the 2025 Annual Meeting of the SBL: 1) A joint session with the Prayer in Antiquity section. Possible topics for this open session include midrash in the liturgy, biblical themes in liturgy such as the Creation or the Exodus, the relation between liturgy and specific midrashic anthologies, or other aspects of biblical exegesis and prayer. 2) An open session devoted to any aspect of the study of Midrash and related literature including medieval midrash and Bible commentaries.
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Minoritized Criticism and Biblical Interpretation
Description: The issue of contextualization at the level of reception and interpretation, involving not only social-cultural location but also ideological perspective, has become paramount in Biblical Studies in recent years. For some time now, a substantial and ever-growing number of African American, Asian American, and Latino/a American biblical scholars have been addressing the problematic of reading the biblical texts explicitly from their respective placements and optics in society and culture. This proposed Consultation seeks to expand such work by bringing together scholars from these and other population groups, both national and international, that have traditionally been classified as “minority” groups but who today classify themselves as “minoritized” groups.
A word about the term “minoritized” is in order. Such groups have undergone what in Racial-Ethnic Studies is known as a process of racialization or ethnicization, grounded in real or perceived biological or cultural features, respectively. The process itself is dialectical as well as differential. It is dialectical insofar as it entails a construction of a racial or ethnic Other by a Self, which in the process constructs itself as separate. It is differential insofar as such a construction involves an unequal relation of power between Self and Other, one of domination and subordination, respectively. When such a process takes place at the level of a political unit or state, then one can speak of such groups as “minoritized” by a “dominantized” group formation.
The proposed Consultation thus seeks to bring together critics from such groups not only within the United States but also globally, in order to work together as critics on the problematic of minoritization-dominantization at all levels of the discipline as conceived and practiced today. Its scope is thus quite broad: (1) the ancient texts as such, canonical as well as extracanonical; (2) readings and readers of these texts in modern and postmodern
Call for papers: We invite papers on reproductive rights, violence against bodies by the state whether on trans, queer, Black or Brown bodies, disabled or debilitated/maimed, vis a vis use of the biblical text or with recourse to the biblical text.
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Mysticism, Esotericism, and Gnosticism in Antiquity
Description: This unit is dedicated to the critical investigation of religious currents of secrecy (esotericism), knowledge (gnosticism), and/or their revelation through religious praxis (mysticism) as they developed during the formative periods of Judaism and Christianity (500 BCE-500 CE). This unit is committed to the examination of texts and artifacts created and used in early Jewish, Christian, Greco-Roman, Egyptian, Persian, and Babylonian contexts. We are open to the application of a wide range of historical, comparative, and critical methodologies, including reception history for those who wish to study the effects of these texts and artifacts in later historical periods.
Call for papers: Mysticism, Esotericism, and Gnosticism in Antiquity (MEGA) is a welcoming section for upcoming, new, and innovative as well as established scholars who want to investigate issues that often fall through the cracks of other units. This year, (1) MEGA welcomes papers on any topic related to the study of knowledge (gnosticism), secrecy (esotericism), and their revelation through religious praxis (mysticism) in the ancient Mediterranean and Near East as well as their reception from a wide variety of critical methodologies and theoretical perspectives. In addition to our open call, (2) we will be having a book review of Andrei Orlov's new book, Divine Mysteries in the Enochic Tradition (de Gruyter, 2023). We also welcome any papers that engage Orlov's past and present work or Enochic traditions.(3) We also welcome papers in conjunction with the Nag Hammadi and Gnosticism program unit ton "Nag Hammadi and the Occult," with special interest in ancient notions of occult and Nag Hammadi texts, and "lost," "hidden," and/or "secret" texts in modern Nag Hammadi-inspired religious movements.
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Nag Hammadi and Gnosticism
Description: The Nag Hammadi and Gnosticism Section provides a forum for current international research on the Coptic codices discovered at Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in 1945. Research areas include issues of text, interpretation, social and religio-historical contexts, codicology, and translation.
Call for papers: The Nag Hammadi and Gnosticism Section plans to hold four sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting in Boston. We welcome papers on any topic related to the study of Nag Hammadi and/or Gnostic traditions, with a particular interest in those that address the following themes. In addition to (1) an open session, we plan to hold sessions examining (2) Nag Hammadi and the Heresiologists, as well as (3) Manichaeism. We also plan for (4) a joint session with the Mysticism, Esotericism, and Gnosticism program unit that will focus on Nag Hammadi and the Occult, with special interest in ancient notions of the occult, and lost, hidden, and/or secret texts in modern Nag Hammadi-inspired religious movements. For all sessions that seek proposals, advanced graduate students and scholars of traditionally under-represented groups are especially encouraged to submit abstracts for consideration.
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National Association of Professors of Hebrew
Description: The NAPH is an Affiliate of the SBL. For additional information on the NAPH, please contact the program unit chair.
Call for papers: NAPH is sponsoring five sessions and two co-sponsored session. I. Annual Meeting of Officers and Members. II. Book event, Z.Garber and K. Hanson, Jewish Studies and the Fourth Gospel (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2025). Session aims to provide insight into the overarching question: how, can and should Jewish condemnation and negativity in the Fourth Gospel be understood and what approaches can be utilized in cleansing Jewish negativity from select Church preaching, rituals and teaching. III. Title, "Christian/ 'Messianic Jewish' Zionism vs. Modern Religious Zionism: Concord or Discord?" This session deals with the well-attested phenomenon of Christian and Messianic Jewish Zionism.While a considerable amount of punditry has been devoted to this phenomenon, there is still room to probe the correspondence or lack thereof between the Zionist theology of evangelical Christians and Messianic Jews, and Jewish/ Israeli Zionists. Theological congruence or discord? IV. BH Pedagogy: "How to Cultivate Fluent Readers of Biblical Hebrew." Kindly propose either (a) a theory-and-rationale paper explaining the nature of fluency in L2 reading, and its importance for learners of BH, or (b) a paper demonstrating how you lead learners toward BH reading fluency (whether beginner, intermediate, or advanced learners). For more info, contact Paul Overland (poverlan@ashland.edu). V. BH Pedagogy: "Lost in Translation." Proposals will describe brief classroom demonstrations leading students to notice features in the Hebrew Bible that often are lost in translation (or added to translations). Applicants will participate in three preparatory monthly peer-input Zoom workshops to refine presentations (April, May, June), followed by final selection of presenters. For more info, contact Paul Overland (poverlan@ashland.edu).Joint sessions with the SBL Linguistics and Biblical Hebrew program unit are also planned.
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Nature Imagery and Conceptions of Nature in the Bible
Description: The section focuses on the plethora of nature references in the Bible,
discussed multi-disciplinarily by scholars of Bible, archaeology,
iconography, life & natural sciences, and more. Our goals are to enable
better exegesis of biblical nature imagery and to address biblical
conceptions of nature.
Call for papers: We are planning to have three sessions in Boston 2025. Session 1, the Open session. We invite papers on any topic relevant to this group’s focus on nature imagery in the Bible. Sessions 2 and 3 this year will be dedicated to a methodological collaboration established with the Biblical Lexicography unit over the topic: Lexicography of the Natural World of the Bible. These two joint sessions, with both invited and proposed papers, will explore the lexicon of animals, plants, and other elements of the natural world in the Hebrew Bible and pay attention to the methodological issues related to the study of this specialized vocabulary in antiquity. The sessions will focus on either (1) semantic examinations of the Hebrew vocabulary in its Near Eastern context, including a comparison with Semitic and specifically West-semitic lexica; or (2) lexicographical histories of interpretation of biblical vocabulary in the ancient versions of the Bible (LXX, Old Latin/Vulgate, Targums, Syriac), possibly involving a comparison with Greco-Roman zoology.
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Network for Vocation in Undergraduate Education (NetVUE)
Description: NetVUE
Call for papers: This unit is not accepting proposals.
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New Testament Textual Criticism
Description: The New Testament Textual Criticism Section seeks to foster the study and criticism of the text of the New Testament—including examination of manuscripts and other sources, evaluation of their textual variation, restorations of texts, and the investigation of the history of its transmission—in its cultural and historical contexts. SBL has had a group dedicated to this topic as far back as 1946.
Call for papers: The program unit invites paper proposals addressing all aspects of New Testament Textual Criticism, including the study of manuscripts and other sources in various languages; codicology and material studies; the exploration of the textual history and transmission of the New Testament through the ages; and critical reflections on methodology, approaches, and the history of the discipline. Please submit your proposal through the SBL online system.
Additionally, the program unit organises two joint sessions. Together with the Book History and Biblical Literatures program unit, a panel is planned on Garrick Allen’s Words Are Not Enough. Paratexts, Manuscripts, and the Real New Testament (2024) and Liv Ingeborg Lied and Brent Nongbri’s Working with Manuscripts: A Guide for Textual Scholars (2025).
In cooperation with the German Bible Society, a book panel is planned on the new Textual Commentary of the Greek New Testament by Hugh Houghton (2025), which will replace Bruce Metzger’s commentary. The new Textual Commentary will be examined from a variety of scholarly perspectives to explore its potential applications and implications for diverse groups of users.
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Novum Testamentum Graecum: Editio Critica Maior
Description: The unit presents the on-going work on the Editio Critica Maior (ECM), a comprehensive text-critical edition of the Greek New Testament that exhibits the history of the Greek text through its first millennium as documented in manuscripts from the second century until the invention of letterpress printing. It provides scholars engaged in the tasks of exegesis and textual criticism with all the relevant materials found in Greek manuscripts, patristic citations, and early translations. The selection of Greek manuscripts rests on an evaluation of all known primary witnesses, and each of the manuscripts selected is cited completely with all its variants. This opens the way for a new understanding of the history of the text, the more so because all relevant evidence is stored on databases. The primary line of the ECM presents a text based on a careful application of internal and external criteria, streamlined by the Coherence-Based Genealogical Method.
Call for papers: For its open-call session, the program unit welcomes paper proposals of reports and updates on the on-going work and research on the Editio Critica Maior (ECM), as well as papers offering critical reflections on the ECM and the Novum Testamentum Graecum (NTG). Please submit your proposal through the SBL online system.
Two joint sessions will focus on the forthcoming ECM of the Gospel of Matthew, scheduled for publication in 2025. In cooperation with the German Bible Society, the volumes produced at the INTF in Münster will be presented. Additionally, a joint invited session with the Matthew program unit will examine the new ECM of the Gospel of Matthew from various exegetical and methodological perspectives.
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Numismatic Evidence and Biblical Interpretation
Description: This Program Unit explores how ancient coinage illumines the
interpretation of early Christianity and biblical literature. It will appeal to
scholars interested in epigraphic, iconographic, and historical questions, as
well as those who specialize in the social history of early Christianity.
Call for papers: The Numismatic Evidence and Biblical Interpretation Section welcomes papers for the 2025 SBL Annual Meeting. We will have three sessions. The first session (open call) invites paper proposals on the numismatic illumination of the social and cultural world of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. This may include, but is not limited to, historical, linguistic, cultural and archaeological dimensions. The second session (open call) invites paper proposals which focus on any specific aspect of how ancient coinage illuminates the interpretation other biblical literature, including, among other considerations, epigraphic, iconographic, and historical matters. The third session will be a joint session held in collaboration with Biblical Lexicography. The aim of this joint session is to explore how numismatic evidence — coins and their inscriptions within their historical contexts, and even iconography — interacts with biblical lexicography, particularly in providing concrete cultural and linguistic insights into the semantics of biblical and early Christian contexts. This session would allow participants to explore how numismatic artefacts might contribute to our collective understanding of language usage, semantic shifts, and lexical choices in biblical texts.
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Papyrology and Early Christian Backgrounds
Description: The Papyrology and Early Christian Backgrounds Group explores how the ancient papyri illumine the world of early Christianity and will appeal to scholars interested in paleographic, linguistic, and textual questions, as well as those who specialize in the social and cultural history of early Christianity.
Call for papers: The Papyrology and Early Christian Backgrounds Group invites paper proposals for three sessions. One session will focus on documentary letters and early Christianity. A second session welcomes proposals related to issues of provenance, broadly construed (pieces with known archaeological contexts or manuscript histories involving the antiquities trade). A third session will be an open call for proposals related to any of the group's themes (the intersections of papyrology with paleography, linguistics, book production, and textual criticism, as well as larger questions relating to the social and cultural history of early Christianity). Please direct any questions to Brent Nongbri (brent.nongbri@mf.no).
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Paul and Politics
Description: The purposes of the Paul and Politics Group are to bring together several currently separate but often overlapping lines of investigation and interpretation of the apostle Paul, his mission, his letters, and his longer-range impact. Those lines of investigation include "Paul and the politics of the churches," "Paul and the politics of Israel," "Paul and the politics of the Roman Empire" and "Paul and politics of Interpretation."
Call for papers: The Paul and Politics Section proposes four sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting in Boston, Massachusetts. The FIRST SESSION and SECOND SESSION engage the legacy of the volume Paul and Politics: Eklesia, Israel, Imperium, Interpretation. It was twenty-five years ago that the Paul and Politics volume was published. This volume, edited by Richard Horsley, featured groundbreaking work by top scholars in Paul and politics at the turn of the millennium. These two sessions offer the opportunity to critically reflect on how this field has evolved in the past twenty-five years. Invited panelists ranging from senior scholars to more junior scholars will offer reflections on this volume’s history, ongoing presence, and potential future directions for Paul and politics research. One session co-sponsored with Feminist Hermeneutics of the Bible will broadly focus on the critical work of gender and sexuality, while the other will focus on empire, postcolonialism, and Paul within Judaism. The THIRD SESSION co-sponsored with the Bible in America is titled “Paul and Politics within the Westminster Study Bible.” This invited panel will consist of scholarly contributors writing on Pauline material for the recently published Westminster Study Bible. The panel will dialogue over each scholar’s engagement with politics broadly conceived and with pedagogical concerns in crafting their contributions to this important volume. Within this dialogue, contributors will address multiple lenses impacting their contribution to the volume such as feminist and gender analysis, imperial and postcolonial interpretation, and identity analysis. The FOURTH SESSION is an open call inviting papers on any element of research related to the relationship(s) between “Paul” and “politics” in the broadest sense of these terms.
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Paul within Judaism
Description: While the opposition between Paul and Judaism has been the undisputed point of departure in much previous Pauline scholarship, the aim of this program unit is to develop Pauline studies from the hypothesis that Paul remained within and practiced Judaism.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting, Paul within Judaism is putting on two invited sessions. First, we are hosting a panel assessing the impact of Mark Nanos's scholarship on New Testament studies over the past 30 years. Second, we are co-sponsoring, with the Metacriticism of the Bible unit, a book panel on Sarah Emanuel's Wrestling with Paul: The Apostle, His Readers, and the Fate of the Jews (Fortress Press, 2025).
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Pauline Epistles
Description: The Pauline Epistles section aims to stimulate critical analysis of the letters of Paul by offering a platform for new research. The section maintains a historical orientation and typically focuses on situating the undisputed Pauline letters in their immediate social, political, religious, and intellectual contexts.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting in Boston, the Pauline Epistles section is planning two open-call sessions. For these sessions we invite any paper proposals that fit our section description (which is provided above). In addition to these open-call sessions, we will host a panel on "Interrogating the Authenticity of the Pauline Epistles," inviting three scholars to discuss their newly published books on the subject: Gregory Fewster's The Authentic Paul: Critical Scholarship and the Making of a Christian Book; Nina Livesey's The Letters of Paul in Their Roman Literary Context: Reassessing Apostolic Authorship; and Benjamin White's Counting Paul: Scientificity, Fuzzy Math, and Ideology in Pauline Studies. Finally, we plan to co-sponsor, with the Early Jewish Christian Relations unit and the Pauline Theology unit, a book panel on Matthew Novenson's Paul and Judaism at the End of History (CUP, 2024).
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Pauline Theology
Description: The unit has been set up in order to explore central issues in Pauline theology. No single understanding of "Pauline theology," or of how it is to be delimited from other aspects of Pauline discourse, is assumed at the outset. A complementary goal is the introduction of Pauline textual and theological insights into conversations with other fields, for example, with brain research, ecology, and race.
Call for papers: Theme: "The Apostle Paul and Freedom"
The Pauline Theology Unit invites paper proposals for sessions exploring questions related to both the theme of freedom in relation to the witness and theology of the Apostle Paul.
• Papers might examine one or more discrete passages from the Pauline letter corpus in which freedom and its implicates are explicitly at stake, e.g., Galatians 5:1f., 1 Cor 9:19, etc. What does ??e??e??? actually mean for Paul? What are its sources? What is its form and function? What ‘company does it keep’ with other motifs in Paul’s writing? To what ends is freedom ordered? What, for Paul, is freedom for?
• Papers might also approach the theme in Paul by way of consideration of its contradiction and look to shed light on the theology of freedom by way of an exploration of contrary motifs of captivity to sin, imprisonment, slavery, etc.
• Alternately, papers might specifically explore aspects of the question of divine freedom—the freedom of Christ, the Spirit’s freedom, etc.—in Paul’s witness, either as a theme in its own right, or in relation to questions of human freedom and agency.
• Papers could also examine the import and consequence of Paul’s rhetoric and theology of freedom in subsequent Christian doctrine, ethics, and political witness. What developments and debates in later Christian doctrine have Paul’s discourse of freedom at their root in one way or another, and how so? How are aspects of Christian theology today exposed to criticism and revision by way of new and better hearings of the witness of Paul, ‘the apostle of freedom’?
As ever, the committee welcomes proposals which engage the long history of the reception of Paul’s letters and their theology as well as those which concentrate upon the more immediate horizon of contemporary exegetical scholarship, both historical and theological.
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Pentateuch
Description: The Pentateuch Section provides a forum within the SBL for presentation and discussion of research on the Pentateuch, with a particular focus on transmission-historical issues and linkage of that area of inquiry with other more synchronic methodologies.
Call for papers: The Pentateuch Section provides a forum within the SBL for presentation and discussion of research on the Pentateuch, with a particular focus on transmission-historical issues and linkage of that area of inquiry with other methodologies. For the 2025 Boston meeting, we will have a particular focus on the Samaritan Pentateuch. One invited panel (co-sponsored with the Textual Criticism group) will be devoted to recent developments in SP research. A second invited panel will be a text workshop on Deuteronomy 27, with particular emphasis on the compositional history of the text, on issues such as the textual variants in the Masoretic and Samaritan versions of the chapter, as well as the potential for theories of monumentality and sacred space to illuminate the passage. We will host two open sessions in 2025. Paper proposals in all areas of Pentateuchal research are welcome.
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Performance Criticism of the Bible and Other Ancient Texts
Description: This interdisciplinary unit is intended to foster discussion about how the creation and interpretation of biblical and other ancient texts has been shaped by their oral transmission and aural reception by ancient communities, using the methods associated with performance criticism.
Call for papers: Biblical Performance Criticism investigates how meaning is made in communication events of biblical (and other) traditions involving a performer (e.g., lector, preacher, teacher), audience, tradition, situation, and media. We invite papers in 2025 on performance of apocalyptic literature (canonical and extra-canonical) and how embodiment and cultural memory shape the experience of meaning making. We will have three sessions and one networking meeting and invite proposals in each area.
- A Joint Session with John’s Apocalypse and Cultural Contexts Ancient and Modern. There will be three performances of Revelation 13-14 (one in each language, English, ASL, and Spanish) and three respondents exploring how the embodiment and cultural memory shaped their experiences. Proposals to be a respondent should outline their experience and cultural position.
- A Joint Session with Linguistics and Biblical Hebrew calls for papers on “Translation and Linguistic Issues in Apocalyptic Literature in Ancient Hebrew and Aramaic.” In recent years, questions have emerged on how to translate lexical, grammatical, and pragmatic issues in the Hebrew Bible, especially in the context of non-written domains. Preference will be given to proposals focusing on multimodal translation (including oral, sign language, and digital) of Hebrew or Aramaic apocalyptic texts and informed by linguistic theory. We welcome specific case studies in one or more of these domains.
- Biblical Performance Criticism: What is it? How to do it? Where is it going? Paper proposals should introduce BPC to interested parties and new practitioners and engage long-time participants in discussion of the direction of BPC.
Networking Luncheon. In San Diego, the BYOL lunch on Monday was a great success and will be repeated to bring new and long-time students and scholars together.
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Philo of Alexandria
Description: The Philo of Alexandria program unit has since 1984 been a premier international forum in which the works of Hellenistic Judaism’s most prolific author have been studied both in their own right and within the frameworks of early Judaism (Second Temple and rabbinic), New Testament Studies, and early Christianity.
Call for papers: At the SBL Annual Meeting in Boston 2025, the Philo seminar will hold three sessions. The (1) first will be an open call under the broad heading, “Studies in Philo of Alexandria.” We welcome submissions from scholars with any degree of familiarity with the Alexandrian’s works, whether veteran Philonists, senior experts in neighboring fields, or those dipping into Philo’s works for the first time. We will also organize two invited sessions: (2) a panel on Philo’s De aeternitate mundi; and (3) a book review panel of The Reception of Philo of Alexandria, ed. Courtney Friesen, David Lincicum, and David Runia (Oxford University Press, 2025).
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Philology in Hebrew Studies
Description: This program unit aims to take up the dual challenge of reflecting self-critically on the nature of philology as a discipline and developing rigorous methodologies of philological study, particularly as may pertain to the Hebrew Bible and related literature.
Call for papers: Philology in Hebrew Studies will host three sessions in 2025: --- 1. OPEN. "New Directions in Comparing the Bible and Greco-Roman Religions." We welcome papers that seek to advance the resurgent comparison of the Bible and the Greco-Roman world, whether through new comparanda or methodological reflection on biblical/Greco-Roman comparison itself (or both). We are especially interested in papers that engage Greco-Roman philosophy in terms of its relationship to religion in both contexts. This session is jointly sponsored with Greco-Roman Religions. --- 2. INVITED. "What Is a Prophetic Utterance?" This session will feature invited contributions that bring speech back into the picture as an important category alongside text in the study of ancient Near Eastern and Mediterranean prophecy. Even if a prophetic utterance is entirely a textual contrivance and never actually occurred aloud, it is still presented as speech within the world of the text. Investigating this presentation of speech may offer new insights into how ancient writers theorized what prophecy is and how it works. This is the first year of a two-year collaboration with Prophetic Texts and Their Ancient Contexts. --- 3. INVITED. A review panel on Jacqueline Vayntrub, "Body Language: Voice, Embodiment, and Textuality in the Hebrew Bible" (AYBRL; Yale University Press, forthcoming).
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Postcolonial Studies and Biblical Studies
Description: This section offers a forum for papers exploring any aspect of the relation between postcolonial studies and biblical studies, including both the use of the Bible in the modern colonial enterprise and the application of postcolonial models to the ancient world.
Call for papers: The Postcolonial Studies and Biblical Studies unit will host four sessions at the 2024 Annual Meeting, three of which are jointly sponsored.
1. The first session is open and seeking papers that use postcolonial analysis and/or ideas associated with decolonization as a lens to explore biblical texts, their contexts, and/or the use of the Bible in modern colonial and neocolonial contexts.
2. We will have an invited panel session to review Sonia Kwok Wong’s monograph, The Solomonic Fantasy: The Political Unconscious of the Imperialized Yehudites (Mohr Siebeck 2025), jointly sponsored with Psychology and the Bible.
3. We will have an invited panel session on Bible Translation and Decolonization in Global Contexts, jointly sponsored with African Biblical Hermeneutics and Latina/o/e and Latin American Biblical Interpretation.
4. We are jointly sponsoring a session on Historical and Postcolonial Approaches to Joshua-Judges with the Joshua-Judges and Deuteronomistic History units.
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Poverty in the Biblical World
Description: This unit will examine poverty, servitude, and related issues in the Hebrew Bible, Early Judaism, and Early Christianity. While non-canonical texts and related materials will be included, primary focus will be on biblical texts. Innovative interdisciplinary methods as well as traditional exegesis are welcome.
Call for papers: The Poverty in the Biblical World will have FOUR sessions this year.
The FIRST session will feature an invited panel discussion on Poverty, Economy, and Empire, celebrating Richard Horsley’s significant contributions to the field.
The SECOND session, co-sponsored with the Minoritized Criticism and Biblical Interpretation, calls for papers exploring the intersection of poverty, minoritization, and biblical interpretation in this present moment of apocalypse—apocalypse as the revealing of capitalist and colonialist forces at work and/or apocalypse as disaster in current contexts of climate catastrophe, war, political precarity, state-sanctioned violence, and mass migration. We invite scholars to examine critically how biblical texts have been meaningful for these minoritized peoples (via the nexus of gender, race, indigeneity, debility/disability, etc.) amidst their struggle with poverty and/or how biblical texts can themselves become sites of struggle.
The THIRD session, co-sponsored with the Latino/a/e and Latin American Biblical Interpretation, will host a session honoring Gustavo Gutiérrez, a leading figure of liberation theology who passed away in 2024. Building off of last year’s session on Enrique Dussel and Jorge Pixley, we invite papers that consider and respond to Gutiérrez’s use of biblical texts, impact on biblical interpretation, and effect on scriptural practices and broader relations. Proposals may also address intersections between liberation theology and biblical studies in Gutiérrez’s work or develop interpretations of scriptural texts that employ Gutiérrez’s thought to examine the texts’ social, economic, and political dimensions and implications.
The FOURTH session is an OPEN session. We welcome proposals on any topics related to the unit but are particularly interested in proposals that look at the engagement of biblical texts with a variety of modern poverty issues.
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Prayer in Antiquity
Description: The Prayer in Antiquity Section examines prayer in Israelite, Jewish, Christian and pagan contexts. Moving beyond historical- and form-critical methodologies, and approaches that reduce prayer simply to text, presentations will examine prayer within its cultural context and give priority to understanding prayer as embodied practice.
Call for papers: The Prayer in Antiquity program unit will host three sessions for the 2025 SBL Annual Meeting. The first will be a joint session with the Midrash program unit. Possible topics for this session include midrash in rabbinic liturgy, biblical themes in the liturgy such as the Creation or the Exodus, the relation between liturgy and specific midrashic anthologies, or other aspects of midrashic biblical exegesis and prayer. Second, we will be jointly hosting a session entitled 'Prayer and/in Ekstasis' with the Religious Experience in Antiquity program unit. This session will address prayer and its embodied practice during various heightened states, including but not limited to, prophetic inspiration or apocalyptic journey. In proposals for this second session, please specify the particular traditions, texts, practices, and/or artifacts engaged in your paper with respect to prayer and its embodied practice. Our third session will be an open session. All proposals submitted to this program unit should clearly identify the texts that will be examined and the specific methodology(ies) that will be used.
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Prophetic Texts and Their Ancient Contexts
Description: The objectives of this group are: (1) to foster as much discussion as possible among participants in the sessions without limiting the number of participants; (2) to involve a wide variety of viewpoints from the international academy interested in "prophetic texts and their ancient contexts"; and (3) to encourage creativity and diversity among those interested in this field by inviting proposals for papers within the described parameters.
Call for papers: This unit is not accepting proposals.
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Pseudepigrapha
Description: The goals of this section include: to provide a forum for scholarly discussion of Jewish and Christian pseudepigrapha; to encourage the broader study of pseudepigrapha for its relevance in understanding early Judaism and Christianity; to facilitate both cross-disciplinary interaction and further integration of the study of pseudepigrapha within biblical studies.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting, we will host one open session on the Pseudepigrapha, with proposals dealing with issues of gender and marginalization especially encouraged. We are also hosting a joint session with the Corpus Hellenisticum Novi Testamenti section on the figure of Pseudo-Solomon/Solomon Magus. We are especially interested in representations of Solomon as a master of esoteric wisdom and a ritual expert, in both pseudepigraphical texts (e.g., Wisdom of Solomon, Psalms of Solomon, Odes of Solomon, Testament of Solomon) and in material contexts (e.g., textual amulets, exorcistic incantations, curse tablets, synagogue or church adornments).
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Psychology and Biblical Studies
Description: The objectives of the Psychology and Biblical Studies Seminar are (i) to provide a forum for developing the future agenda of "psychological criticism" within Biblical Studies; (ii) to assess the significance of these approaches for ongoing Biblical research, exegesis, and interpretation, and (iii) from time to time to to present an historical-critical overview of "psychological" approaches to scripture. As always, we request that reference to the biblical languages be included where relevant.
Call for papers: For the next three years we call for papers on the "symbols of transformation" in the Bible understood from a psychological perspective with the following subthemes:
Year 1 (2025): The Past. Metaphorical death, conversion, and rebirth.
Year 2 (2026): The Present. New identity and the inevitability of regression.
Year 3 (2027): The Future. Prophecy, premonition, revelation.
Important is to include reference to a specific psychological theory and to the original language of a specific biblical text in the proposal.
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Q
Description: The Q Section offers a forum for research on the “Sayings Gospel” Q. Since Q provides access to earliest Jesus tradition and to the theology and social history of Jewish Christianity, the Q Section integrates a broad variety of issues and methods. The Q Section website is https://neues-testament.uni-graz.at/de/forschung/fwf-projekte-zum-spruchevangelium-q/sbl-q-section/.
Call for papers: Call for papers: [[Note: The Q Section (and the field) offer heartfelt gratitude to Giovanni Bazzana for two full terms of warm, bridge-building, innovative service as co-chair. We joyfully welcome Olegs Andrejevs, who steps in to join Sara Parks in the co-chair role.]] The Q Section is accepting papers for three sessions in 2025. 1) OPEN CALL. We invite papers engaging with Q or its contents from any approach, for our annual open session. 2) FORMATIVE STRATUM. This session will showcase and respond to Llewellyn Howes' recent book arguing for a wider formative layer of Q, with consequences for historical questions about the earliest Galilean Jesus movement. Invited respondents who also work on Q's stratigraphy bring generative and collaborative discussion to this review panel. 3) OUTSIDER READINGS. This session invites non-Q (and even non-New-Testament) scholars who work with texts from various theoretical approaches (e.g. postcolonial, Womanist, Queer, feminist/gendered, historical-critical, rhetorical, socio-linguistic, reader-response, etc.), to provide a reading of Q as text. For all three sessions, as always, the Q Unit especially encourages first-time presenters, grad students, postdoctoral researchers, early careers, and scholars from demographics underrepresented in Q Studies (see Rollens 2020) to participate. We aim to provide early career mentorship and inclusive/accessible conference experiences for those who join our sessions.
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Qumran
Description: The Qumran Section of the SBL provides an equal-opportunity forum for presentation and discussion of views relating to the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Qumran settlement, and the people of that place and of those documents. The Qumran Section has three goals: (1) It provides a forum for scholarly discussion of any aspect of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the material culture of Qumran, and the history, literature, and worldviews of the people associated with them. (2) It encourages new discussions and new approaches in the field of Dead Sea Scrolls studies. (3) It strives for integrating the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls with other fields of biblical and related studies.
Call for papers: In 2025, the unit organizes four sessions. (1) "Anxiety and Ritual" is a joint session with Hellenistic Judaism unit and will explore ritual as an element in anxiety management. Cognitive scientists have sought to identify mechanisms by which ritualized behaviors (e.g., redundant, rigid, repetitive action) bring a sense of control. This session is invited: speakers will explore theory as well as textual and archaeological data for ritual behaviors and activities that may be seen as responses to stress and anxiety, especially threats seen as looming or ambiguous. (2) "Metaphors in the Dead Sea Scrolls," will be a joint session with the Metaphor in the Bible and Cognate Literature Unit. Partly invited and partly open, this session welcomes proposals that explore the use and development of metaphors from the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Submissions that address influences and parallels between metaphors in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament, shedding light on shared and divergent metaphorical traditions within early Jewish and Christian literatures, are also welcome. Furthermore, we are open to contributions that explore novel metaphors in the Dead Sea Scrolls, particularly those without direct parallels in biblical literature. (3)(4) In addition, we invite paper proposals to two open-call sessions that will address any aspect of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Qumran. We commit ourselves to balance senior and junior voices. In order to maximize opportunities for presenters, scholars should not present more than two years in succession. This restriction does not apply to invited papers.
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Rabbinic Literature and Culture
Description: This section is devoted to both historical and literary study of the Rabbis of Late Antiquity (ca. 70 CE - 640 CE). We encourage studies that are interdisciplinary and comparative, and that take into account the wider social and cultural environments in which the Rabbis worked.
Call for papers: The History and Literature of Early Rabbinic Judaism program unit invites papers for the 2025 Annual Meeting. The program unit seeks submissions related to ancient Jews and their neighbors that explores textual, material, and theoretical intersections with rabbinic literature. In addition to an open call for papers, the program will organize two thematic panels devoted to 1) legal theory applied to rabbinic literature 2) Rabbis and the Roman Empire. The unit will also cosponsor a panel on "Expertise in Late Antiquity" with the Early Jewish Christian Relations program unit, as well as cosponsor a review panel of Moulie Vidas's The Rise of Talmud (Oxford University Press, 2025) with the Religious World of Late Antiquity program unit.
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Racism, Pedagogy, and Biblical Studies
Description: This consultation will focus on strategies for addressing racism in the process of teaching and learning biblical studies. Presentations and discussions will deal with racist assumptions and practices at curricular, institutional, disciplinary, and meta-theoretical levels, as well as with respect to reading or use of specific biblical texts.
Call for papers: The 2025 open session will focus on issues of racism in the process of teaching and learning biblical studies, as well as strategies for addressing these issues. We invite papers that expose racist assumptions and practices at policy, curricular, institutional, disciplinary, and meta-theoretical levels. We are keen to receive proposals that address the ways that recent legal bans of critical race theory and DEI are impacting classroom discussions about race and racism. We are especially interested in reviewing proposals from emergent scholars and first-time presenters.
Tags: Pedagogical Theory (Learning & Teaching)
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Reading, Theory, and the Bible
Description: The Reading, Theory, and the Bible Section provides a forum to encourage innovative and experimental approaches to biblical studies, to facilitate critical reflection on the role of theory in reading, and to support biblical scholarship informed by cross-disciplinary conversation.
Call for papers: Reading, Theory and the Bible offers a home for innovative, experimental work on the Bible and related texts. We welcome work that explores new approaches and pushes the boundaries of scholarship and conventional hermeneutics. We also encourage innovative presentation. For 2025, we are planning three sessions:
Our FIRST SESSION is an open session; we invite papers on any topic.
Our SECOND SESSION is a themed session on Literary, Ecological, and Feminist Interpretation. For this session we seek papers that intentionally engage the intersections of literary, ecological, and feminist biblical interpretation. We are especially interested in papers that are either interested in recovering ecofeminist theories or that trace a new direction for this work vis-à-vis the biblical text. We invite submissions related to this theme.
Our THIRD SESSION is a co-sponsored session with The Bible and Animal Studies (SBL) and Sacred Texts, Theory, and Theological Contexts (AAR) entitled “Theoretically Animals,” which will explore animal studies and/in sacred texts but with a particular focus on theory. This panel is seeking work that engages with Animals and/in Sacred Texts, but does so via strong engagement with sharply informed critical theory—including but also going well beyond Agamben, Calarco, Derrida, Haraway, and others—in an effort to address "what is 'the Animal'?" While some papers will be invited, we also invite submissions related to this theme.
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Recovering Female Interpreters of the Bible
Description: This unit focuses on the recovery of work by female biblical interpreters before the twentieth century who wrote from various faith and ideological standpoints. These female interpreters will be considered in their cultural and historical contexts, with the intention of analyzing their neglected contributions to the study of biblical literature.
Call for papers: SESSION 1. “WOMEN BIBLICAL INTERPRETERS THROUGH THE AGES (ca. 100 CE – ca. 1920).” We invite proposals for 20-minute papers on any topic related to women who interpreted scripture prior to the early twentieth century. Topics might include women who interpreted the Bible through their writing, teaching, preaching, speaking, art, music, or other mediums. Papers may deal with individual women; or may compare several women writing on the same theme or biblical passage; or may deal with some other aspect of women's scriptural/theological interpretation through the ages. SESSION 2. “WOMEN WHO PUSHED BOUNDARIES IN BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION (ca. 100 CE – ca. 1920).” We invite proposals for 20-minute papers on women who interpreted Scripture to challenge traditional restrictions on women’s preaching, teaching, and education for the advancement of justice and equality. In this broad vein, for example, papers may deal with women who interpreted scripture in order to:
• Challenge established social hierarchies based on gender, ethnicity, class, and other forms of social stratification.
• Advocate for marginalized and vulnerable groups within society.
• Develop innovative hermeneutical approaches.
• Engage specific biblical texts, genres, or themes in ways that challenged dominant readings.
For more information, contact Bernon Lee at bernon.lee@saskatoontheologicalunion.ca
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Redescribing Christian Origins
Description: The Seminar contributes to the study of Christian origins by problematizing current consensus
views, unexamined assumptions, and categories. It recontextualizes and redescribes key data
through comparative analysis. It accounts for (i.e., explains) the production and continued
function of cultural artefacts (mainly texts but not entirely) in terms of social theory.
Call for papers: Redescribing Christian Origins seminar has three panels for SBL 2025.
Our first session is dedicated to Nina E. Livesey’s _The Letters of Paul in their Roman Literary Context: Reassessing Apostolic Authorship_ (Cambridge UP, 2025). This session will feature invited speakers reflecting on Livesey’s findings and how The Letters of Paul redescribes not only the authorship, but also the wider literary and historical contexts of the “undisputed” Pauline letters.
Our second panel, “Experimenting with and without Paul,” considers how Paul’s presence and correspondence (including letters attributed to Paul), facilitated social experimentation among early Christian associations of the eastern Mediterranean. We welcome a broad range of submissions perhaps considering, but not limited to, the following questions: How did people begin to “try something new” in light of their contact with Paul? What sorts of social experimentation were prompted by the compilation and circulation of Paul’s letters? Conversely: How might Paul, or others’ interpretation(s) of Paul, place limits on formative Christian efforts at social experimentation? How did Paul’s real or perceived absence facilitate social experimentation among specific groups of early Christians?
Our third session is an open call. We encourage all submissions related to the scholarly redescription of Christian origins and especially welcome submissions from early career and contingent researchers, as well as scholars from underrepresented communities.
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Religion and Philosophy in Antiquity
Description: This unit seeks to investigate how Christian, Jewish, and “pagan” intellectuals engaged with the concepts, questions, and writings of ancient philosophy in order to understand better the interconnections of “religion” and “philosophy” in late antiquity and to reassess the usefulness of those categories.
Call for papers: Our seminar is pleased to announce four sessions at the upcoming Annual Meeting. We invite proposals for the following topics: 1. Revelation and Reason: Two Sources of Knowledge? Reconsidering this classical dilemma as it appears in ancient philosophical texts. 2. Fresh Perspectives on Epicureanism and Early Christianity: Exploring intersections in communities, ethics, and epistles. 3. Critical Approaches to the Oxford Handbook of Deification (2024). A joint session with the AAR Platonism and Neoplatonism Unit. Additionally, we cosponsor a panel with the SBL Intertextuality in the New Testament Unit on Brokins’ Recent Monograph Rediscovering the Wisdom of the Corinthians: Paul, Stoicism, and Spiritual Hierarchy (Eerdmans, 2024).
Tags: Church History and Ecclesiology (Other), Greece and Hellenism (History & Culture), Religio-Historical Approaches (Interpretive Approaches)
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Religious Competition in Late Antiquity
Description: This unit analyzes the competition between diverse socioreligious and philosophical groups of the ancient Mediterranean basin through the development of broadly comparative approaches and methodologies. It delineates the ways in which competitive interaction reshaped cultural and religious landscapes.
Call for papers: This year RCLA will host three sessions: 1. Competing over Antiquity (Invited Panel): Panelists will focus on modern competitions over facets of religious antiquity (e.g., competing readings and methods of textual interpretation, the evocation of ancient objects, texts, or ideas in modern conflicts or modern competition over ancient artifacts), especially those addressing the methods, goals, and impact of these competitions on the reception and overall understanding of the ancient Mediterranean and southwest Asia. 2. 1700 Years After Nicaea (Open Call) - Our second session welcomes proposals on aspects of competition and the Council of Nicaea, with a special focus on Nicaea’s significance and competition beyond Christian groups. 3. New Approaches and Methods to the Study of Antiquity (Open Call): Our third session welcomes proposals that focus on new approaches or methodologies and their relevance and potential to the study of religious competition in Late Antiquity. Potential areas of inquiry include Digital Humanities, for example social network analysis or digital text analysis and recent approaches in the study of global antiquity.
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Religious Experience in Antiquity
Description: This section investigates the experiential elements of religions from the ancient near east to late antiquity, with a particular interest in examining (1) the relationship between texts and experience, (2) religious practices in the context of ritual, prayer, ecstasy, dreams and visions, 3) the role of embodied experiences (cognitive, neurological, and sensory) in the generation of religious ideas and commitment.
Call for papers: The Religious Experience in Antiquity program unit will hold two sessions this year, both with open calls for papers. (1) For our first session, we welcome paper proposals for an open session on any topic that investigates the experiential elements of religions from the ancient near east to late antiquity. We have particular interests in examining (a) the relationship between texts and experience, (b) religious practices in the context of ritual, prayer, ecstasy, dreams and visions, and/or (c) the role of embodied experiences (cognitive, neurological, and sensory) in the generation of religious ideas and commitment. In your proposal, we ask that you specify the texts or other material artifacts under discussion and include a clear methodological perspective. (2) For our second session, we will be jointly hosting a special session on 'Prayer and/in Ekstasis' with the Prayer in Antiquity program unit. This session will address prayer and its embodied practice during various heightened states, including but not limited to, prophetic inspiration or apocalyptic journey. In your proposal, please specify the particular traditions, texts, practices, and/or artifacts engaged in your paper with respect to prayer and its embodied practice.
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Religious World of Late Antiquity
Description: A forum for scholars working comparatively and thematically in the period and regions in which Christianity, Judaism, Manichaeism, and Islam formed within a rich environment of other religious traditions, where norms of authority, belief, practice, and identity were contested and settled.
Call for papers: The Religious World of Late Antiquity program unit plans four sessions for the 2025 meeting: 1) Co-sponsored session with Christian Apocrypha: We invite papers that consider the influence of apocryphal literature on the development of local cult in late antiquity. Topics might include the role of apocryphal narratives in popularizing and legitimizing local cults, the use of apocryphal literature in the construction of devotional landscapes and pilgrimage traditions, and the ritual contexts in which people engaged with stories from apocryphal literature. 2) Sense of an Ending: This open call invites papers reflecting on how ends shape structure and meaning when we study late ancient religion. How does the application or reception of a line of research contribute to its entire trajectory? How do our own investments in outcomes (real or imagined) spur the desire to begin a project? What have we learned about our work and our field from projects that we never pursued or abandoned? Papers might consider not only the role of endings in the structure of individual stories or histories, but also persistent bookends and interruptions which constitute our understanding of the period. 3) Experiments with Form and Genre: We seek proposals for a session that includes considerations of and experiments with form and genre in the historiography of late antiquity. That is, we are interested in how form and genre have shaped (and limited) knowledge production about religion in late antiquity, as well as in work stretching the boundaries of traditional academic forms to produce new understandings of late antiquity. 4) Book review panel. Finally, we will be co-sponsoring an invited book-review panel with the History and Literature of Early Rabbinic Judaism program unit on Moulie Vidas’s The Rise of Talmud (Oxford University Press, 2025).
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Rhetoric and Early Christianity
Description: This section has historically explored the continuously-evolving field of
rhetorical criticism of the New Testament in all its diversity. Marking a slight
shift in focus, 'Rhetoric and Early Christianity' will extend RNT's refined
critical lens to address a broader spectrum of source material.
Call for papers: The Rhetoric and Early Christianity Section fosters research centered on the arts of persuasion, broadly conceived, as they intersect with the study of Early Christian sources and worlds. We invite proposals for our sessions. First, we invite proposals on End Times and the reception of Jewish Apocalypticism by the earliest Christ-believing authors. Since the beginning of these communities and up to the present time, events of various sorts have been said to reflect signs of End Times. For a session “Rhetoric and the End Times,” we seek papers that critically assess how eschatology and apocalypticism developed and functioned rhetorically in early Christian thought and writings. These papers can engage the ecclesial, political, or social implications of Christ groups using the rhetoric of end times in the first centuries of the common era. Second, the ideal male has been understood in some corners of Western culture (and again more recently) as commanding and domineering. We seek proposals that explore assumptions about masculinity more broadly within early Christian sources, texts often considered as foundational for this debate. Specifically, our interest is in proposals that aim to analyze instances of the rhetorical development of masculinity within and/or across those sources. Finally, as usual, we invite proposals dealing with other aspects of the intersection of the arts of persuasion and the study of early Christianity for an open session.
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Rhetoric of Religious Antiquity
Description: The Rhetoric of Religious Antiquity Seminar provides a forum for collegial work on the Rhetoric of Religious Antiquity Commentary Series, and for the public exploration of facets of sociorhetorical interpretation that promise to contribute to the work of biblical scholars not directly associated with the project.
Call for papers: This unit is not accepting proposals.
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Ritual in the Biblical World
Description: The Ritual in the Biblical World Section focuses on the nature, meaning and function of ritual found in textual sources (HB, NT, non-canonical) in the larger context of the material culture of the ancient world, employing insights and methods of the field of ritual theory and enthnography.
Call for papers: The Ritual in the Biblical World section will offer four sessions in the upcoming 2025 annual meeting: (1) The first session will focus specifically on the interpretation of ritual activities as indexes. Building on the theoretical framework of Charles Sanders Peirce and expanding upon it, this session will primarily explore how ritual actions function to index existential relationships between different ritual elements. While this session is primarily by invitation, we welcome additional submissions for potential inclusion in the program. (2) The second session will be a joint session with the Bible and Emotion section. We invite proposals that examine the close relationship between emotion and ritual and the ways in which ritual engages with emotion to form, maintain, and excise social structures. This session is the second of a series of joint sessions in which the relationship between ritual and emotion as presented in the biblical texts and surrounding Levantine cultures will be explored with a hope for a volume following the conclusion of the series. (3) The third session will also be a joint session with the Book of the Twelve section. This session explores the theme of ritual failure and change within the Book of the Twelve, emphasizing connections and intersections across its individual texts. Moving beyond isolated interpretations, the papers in this session consider how representations of ritual practices and their transformations contribute to the broader literary and theological coherence of the Twelve. This session is by invitation only. (4) The fourth session will be an open session on all parameters of meaning and function of ritual found in textual and iconographic sources in the larger context of the cultures of the ancient world, employing insights and methods from the field of ritual theory.
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Senses, Cultures, and Biblical Worlds
Description: This interdisciplinary unit investigates all aspects of sensory perception in the Bible and early Judaism and Christianity, including how various cultures thought about, used, and ascribed meaning to the senses. The unit embraces diverse approaches to the study of the senses, including philological, anthropological, psychological, linguistic, cognitive, literary, and phenomenological methods.
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting we invite papers for one session on teaching with the senses in biblical and religious studies. Presentations may include, but are not limited to, teaching the cultural history and anthropology of the senses, doing sensorial exegesis in the classroom, teaching the senses and material culture, or undertaking sensory-themed excursions, experiments, exercises, or assignments. We welcome presenters at all stages of their career and with a variety of lived and learned experiences.
All proposals should contain a brief description of the data that will be examined or presented, as well as the theories and methods that will be applied in the papers. We also invite presenters to consider non-traditional modes of presentation for their papers at the annual meeting.
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Slavery, Resistance, and Freedom
Description: This unit will investigate the intersections between Ancient Near Eastern and Mediterranean slavery and biblical and early rabbinic texts, the diverse forms of resistance to it, and the meaning of freedom in slave-holding societies. Presenters will also examine how Jews and Christians—free, freed, and enslaved—have interpreted biblical texts on slavery and freedom and will propose how to “read for freedom.”
Call for papers: Slavery, Freedom, and Resistance plans three sessions this year. The first session will focus on the intersectionalities of status among enslaved people and freed persons. Papers should engage the differing power relations that blurred statuses create. Examples of these power relationships could include freedpersons’ and their former enslavers, enslaved people who are married to their enslavers, enslaved people who enslaved people, enslaved people with multiple enslavers, and many other possibilities. Papers will analyze the implications for engagement with biblical texts, ancient religious practices, or other contextually relevant contexts.
The second session will be an invited panel discussion about the discourse of ancient slavery in teaching contexts. Centered around the new textbook Ancient Slavery and Its New Testament Contexts edited by Christy Cobb and Katherine A. Shaner (Eerdmans: 2025), panelists will discuss strategies, critical frameworks, and practices needed for teaching about slavery in undergraduate and graduate classrooms.
The third session is an open session that encourages proposals on any aspect of slavery, freedom, and/or resistance and its connections with biblical studies
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Social History of Formative Christianity and Judaism
Description: This section is dedicated to a study of formative Christianity and formative Judaism utilizing a broad methodological perspective that places an emphasis on interpreting the data within specific social, cultural, and linguistic contexts. We function as a clearinghouse for developments in social historical methodology and perspectives for our period. (previously Social History of Early Christianity)
Call for papers: The Social History of Formative Judaism and Christianity program unit will sponsor two sessions in 2025. For the first, we extend an open call for a session on “Street Style: Material Culture, Daily Life, and Religious Exchange in ‘the Street.’” Renewed focus on lived religion has encouraged scholars to reconsider the pivotal role played by everyday spaces where cultural diffusion, emergence, immersion, and exchange took place around the ancient Mediterranean. This session focuses on one of these liminal spaces—the infrastructural and cultural space of "the Street." We encourage papers that address any aspect of the architectural, urban, geographic and cultural space of "the street" in rural and urban settings; those that consider material culture (art, graffiti, textiles, inscriptions, objects, architecture) as much as literary texts are particularly welcome. Our second session will be a book review panel for Writing, Enslavement, and Power in the Roman Mediterranean, 100 BCE–300 CE, edited by Jeremiah Coogan, Candida Moss, and Joseph Howley (Oxford 2025).
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Social Sciences and the Interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures
Description: This quintessentially interdisciplinary unit combines the skills that are unique to classic biblical scholarship with exciting and vibrant conversations and developments from disciplines in the social sciences, including anthropology, sociology, psychology, and political science.
Call for papers: We have 3 open calls for papers this year. 1) Positionality and the Uses of Social Scientific Models in Hebrew Bible Research: This session invites papers that take critical account of the uses of social scientific approaches in studies of the Hebrew Bible and related literature, even as we continue to make use of them. Positionality, itself developed largely in the field of anthropology, refers to scholarly reflections on how one’s own social “position” (gender, race, ethnicity, class, etc.) influences one’s research, especially in relation to the “position” of the subject being researched. In recent years, some biblical scholars have begun to acknowledge more openly how issues of positionality impact and have historically impacted the field of biblical studies. This session is devoted to an examination of how issues of positionality have influenced the uses of social scientific models in Hebrew Bible research (and the development of these models themselves within the social sciences) and/or new research in the field of Hebrew Bible (broadly understood) that utilizes positionality as one of its theoretical approaches. 2) Joint Session with Hebrew Scriptures and Cognate Literature: This themed session welcomes papers that focus on the scenescapes of ancient southern Levantine religion. In the same way that the visual rhetoric of Assyrian royal reliefs conjured the sensorial aspects of court life and royal ritual, biblical narratives in a similar way evoked the sensorial experiences of religion. We also welcome papers that engage with methodologies that might meaningfully be applied to the study of the spaces and ritual objects in these narratives. The details in the biblical text do not merely preserve the memory of past experiences of the smells, sights, sounds, tastes, and tactile dimensions of a broad range of ritual encounters, but they generate new scenescapes through the text. 3) Open session.
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Social Scientific Criticism of the New Testament
Description: The Social Scientific Criticism of the New Testament Section program encourages the self-conscious employment of recognized models, methods, or theories of the social sciences in order to contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of the texts and social world of the New Testament.
Call for papers: We are pleased to offer four sessions this year:
1. Open session. We enthusiastically seek proposals on any aspect of the social-scientific study of the New Testament and related literature.
2. “Intersectionality and Urban Space in Common Era Antiquity.” A joint session of the Space, Place, and Lived Experience in Antiquity unit and the Social-Scientific Criticism of the New Testament unit. The session will be a combination of invited contributions as well as papers accepted for presentation. We invite papers to consider ways that shared urban spaces such as marketplaces, harbors, crossroads, streets, cemeteries, brothels, carceral spaces, shops, cauponae, insulae, domus, associations, etc. furnished places for such things as the generation of social contacts, differing forms of visibility, displays of identity, the exchange of ideas, the dynamic construction of social and religious identities, etc., and ways in which such generation, possibilities, displays, and exchanges shaped the practices, experiences, and imagination of urban spaces.
3. “Decentering and Decolonizing Approaches to Social-Scientific Interpretation of the NT”: we invite proposals that pursue social-scientific approaches to the NT that decenter the individual, decolonize the field, and re-define methods that have, consciously or unconsciously, contributed to the erasure and/or marginalization of voices in the field. We particularly welcome papers that pair metacriticism of traditional social-scientific approaches with the development of more inclusive and ethical social-scientific frameworks in the interpretation of NT texts.
4. A joint review session (invited panel) of Sarah Bond’s new book, Strike: Labor, Unions, and Resistance in the Roman Empire (Yale, 2025), with the Early Christianity and the Ancient Economy unit.
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Society for Ancient Mediterranean Religions
Description: This new group is devoted to the study of the religions of the ancient Mediterranean basin broadly conceived. The Society for Ancient Mediterranean Religions aims to focus particular attention on the polytheistic religious traditions of Greece, Rome and the Near East, their interaction with each other, and with the monotheistic religious traditions of the region. Please visit out website (www.samreligions.org) for further information.
Call for papers: Honoring Frederick Brenk: Religion & religious thought in the early and high Roman empire (with SAMR). We invite papers on the relationship between religion, philosophy, and literature in Plutarch and others in the first two centuries of the Roman empire in honor of Frederick Brenk. Topics might include Plutarch's views on religion and society; studies of Plutarch's and his contemporaries’ religious thought; figures of the Second Sophistic as religious practitioners and theorists; 1st and 2nd c. treatments of religious practices; connections between Middle Platonic philosophy and religion; the legacy of Brenk’s work. The panel aims to celebrate Brenk's contributions while fostering new discussions and insights.
Co-Sponsored Open Call: "Religious Violence and the Affective Turn" (with the Violence and Representations of Violence in Antiquity) This session will explore the emotional dimensions of religious violence in the ancient world.
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Society for Comparative Research on Iconic and Performative Texts
Description: The Society for Comparative Research on Iconic and Performative Texts (SCRIPT) was founded in 2010 to encourage new scholarship on iconic and performative texts. Our goal is to foster academic discourse about the social functions of books and texts that exceed their semantic meaning and interpretation, such as their display as cultural artifacts, their ritual use in religious and political ceremonies, their performance by recitation and theater, and their depiction in art. SCRIPT sponsors programming at existing regional and international scholarly meetings and at colleges and universities. We welcome new members and ideas for programs and venues to host them. For further information, see http://script-site.net/.
Call for papers: Honoring the work and legacy of James W. Watts: Beginning in the early 2000s, James Watts and Dorina Parmenter began conversations that would become the Iconic Books Project, and later evolved into the Society for Comparative Research on Iconic and Performative Texts. Now, as he begins his transition to retirement, we celebrate the ongoing work and legacy of James W. Watts. Papers are invited that engage with Watts's methodological and theoretical work on clarifying and identifying the concept of Iconic Books, as well as papers that look at Watts's role in the development and impact of the Iconic Books Project and SCRIPT over the past two decades. Papers both accepted and submitted to this section will be considered for inclusion in an upcoming special issue of Postscripts Journal, honoring Watts and his work.
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Society for the Arts in Religious and Theological Studies (SARTS)
Description: The Society was organized to provide a forum for scholars and artists interested in the intersections between theology, religion, and the arts, to share thoughts, challenge ideas, strategize approaches in the classroom, and to advance the discipline in theological and religious studies curricula. The goal of the Society is to attract consistent participation of a core group of artists and scholars of theology and religion in order to have dialogue about the theological and religious meaning of the arts, and the artistic/aesthetic dimension of theological and religious inquiry.
Call for papers: The Society was organized to provide a forum for scholars and artists interested in the intersections between theology, religion, and the arts, to share thoughts, challenge ideas, strategize approaches in the classroom, and to advance the discipline in theological and religious studies curricula. The goal of the Society is to attract consistent participation of a core group of artists and scholars of theology and religion in order to have dialogue about the theological and religious meaning of the arts, and the artistic/aesthetic dimension of theological and religious inquiry.
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Space, Place, and Lived Experience in Antiquity
Description: This unit seeks to engage diverse methodological and theoretical perspectives on social practices in antiquity as mediated through place or larger spatial frameworks. Presentations exploring the creation, use, or understanding of space or place through material remains and/or texts are welcome.
Call for papers: 1. Reflecting on ruins. Ancient and modern reflections on ruins, ruination, and ruined spaces often diverge considerably. We anticipate proposals that explore this gap between ancient and modern theorizations of ruins. Do theories of ruins/ruination developed for the industrial and post-industrial world offer insights for ancient datasets? Can ancient reflections on ruins speak to contemporary ruin theory? We also welcome proposals on specific archaeological sites or ancient literary discourses of ruins. Theoretical frameworks informed by gender, trauma, occupation, and war are especially sought.
2. The Social Scientific Criticism of the New Testament and Space. Place, and Lived Experience in Antiquity Units are pleased to announce a joint session dedicated to the theme of intersectionality and urban space in Common Era Antiquity. The session will be a combination of invited contributions as well as papers accepted for presentation. We invite proposals for papers that consider ways in which shared urban spaces such as marketplaces, crossroads, streets, cemeteries, shops, cauponae, insulae, domus, harbors, prisons, etc. furnished places for dynamic construction and signaling of socio-religious identities.
3. A book panel on Mark Lester’s Deuteronomy and the Material Transmission of Tradition (Leiden: Brill, 2024) held jointly with the Book of Deuteronomy unit. Panelists will be invited.
4. Finally, we have an open call on space, place, and lived experience in antiquity. Successful proposals will include a clearly stated theoretical framework and an explanation of the link to “lived experience.”
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Synoptic Gospels
Description: The Synoptic Gospels as a unit plays an important role in modern scholarship, including, but not limited to, generating debate about the relationships among the gospels. This section provides a forum for the discussion of papers from a variety of theoretical perspectives and critical methods on the content and formation of the Synoptic Gospels and what they reveal about the contexts of their composition.
Call for papers: The Synoptic Gospels section invites proposals for two open sessions on the content or formation of any of the Synoptic Gospels. We especially welcome papers that address the relationship between two or more Gospels or that deal with themes touching on multiple Gospels.
In addition, the Synoptic Gospels section invites proposals for two special sessions. In one special session that will be held jointly with the Queer Hermeneutics section, we invite papers that engage the Synoptic Gospels through explicitly queer and/or trans hermeneutics. In the other special session, we invite proposals that examine various facets of enslavement found within the gospels including analysis of enslavement as metaphor, enslaved characters, enslavers, and manumission.
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Syriac Studies
Description: Syriac Studies invites papers on the Syriac versions of the Bible, on the
interpretation and reception of biblical material in Syriac traditions, and on
the literature and history of Syriac-speaking Christian communities and
their interaction with neighbouring cultures (e.g., Greek, Armenian, Arabic)
and religions (e.g., Jews, Manichaeans, Zoroastrians).
Call for papers: For the 2025 Annual Meeting we invite proposals for four sessions, three of which will be thematic.
Our first thematic session, Encountering enslaved persons in Syriac literature, will consist of short papers (7-10 minutes) that explore inadvertent or casual references to slavery in Syriac literature. What do such incidental remarks that are not part of a sustained discussion of slavery reveal about how slavery was experienced or perceived? How do they accord with broader Syriac discourses on slavery?
The second thematic panel, Gender and exegesis, will examine how Syriac homilists and commentators engaged with biblical texts that present (or were perceived to present) problems pertaining to gender. We invite papers that analyze the exegetical response by Syriac authors in light of recent theoretical advances in the field of gender studies.
Our third session on Manuscripts and the making of late antique Syriac literature, co-sponsored with the Book History and Biblical Literatures program unit, invites proposals that explore how the production of Syriac manuscripts reflects late ancient literary and intellectual culture. Papers might address such topics as genre, attribution or authorship, the structures and organization of knowledge, and how the contours and bounds of Syriac literature are being defined and redefined in the manuscripts.
Our fourth panel will be an open session for which papers on any aspect of Syriac Studies are welcome.
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Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible
Description: The Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible section concerns itself with the origin and nature of all forms of the biblical text. The discipline involves the comparison of data from the various witnesses to the biblical text (Masoretic text, Septuagint, Dead Sea Scrolls, etc.), and the evaluation of that data.
Call for papers: The TCHB Unit is organizing four sessions for the 2025 SBL Annual Meeting: (1) Review Panel on Volumes 3a & 3b of the Textual History of the Bible Series (Brill). The first session will be a review panel dedicated to the publication of Volumes 3a (History of Research) and 3b (Modern Critical Editions) as part of the Textual History of the Bible series by Brill. Scholars are invited to engage with and discuss the contributions of these volumes to the field of textual criticism. (2) Invited Joint Session with the Samaritan Pentateuch Unit. The second session is an invited joint session with the Samaritan Pentateuch Unit, exploring the latest scholarly developments and ongoing projects in this important textual tradition. (3-4) Open Sessions on Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible. The last two sessions are open to proposals on any topic related to textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible and its relationship with other textual traditions, such as Qumran, the Septuagint, Targums, and more. We invite submissions from junior and senior researchers, as well as PhD students. Preference will be given to papers that demonstrate originality, propose new methodologies, and offer fresh textual solutions to critical issues in the Hebrew Bible and its interpretation.
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Textual Criticism of the Historical Books
Description: This unit aims at enhancing cooperation and exchange of ideas between scholars working on the text of Samuel and Kings in various languages. (At the present, there is activity in editorial projects on critical editions of the Septuagint text, various projects on the daughter versions of the Septuagint, and projects around the Hebrew text aiming at commentaries,text-editions, or monographs on text-history.) Such cooperation is necessary, due to the very complicated nature of the textual history of these books, and promises good results, as it is the advantage of all parties to be informed of the progress of work by their colleagues.
Call for papers: The Program Unit “Textual Criticism of the Historical Books” covers the breadth of text-critical and text-historical research on the Historical Books in their various textual traditions. This year we can look back over what the past decade of research in this field and this unit has taught us. All proposals must name the investigated biblical passages, describe the ancient sources, the chosen methodology, and explain how the proposal is linked with current text-critical research. We explicitly encourage submissions from students, early career researchers, women, and persons from underrepresented or traditionally marginalized backgrounds in the discipline. For the 2025 Annual Meeting, we are planning two general sessions on any text-critical topic relevant to the Historical Books. Papers may focus on one or several versions, including relevant data from medieval Hebrew manuscripts. In addition to text-critical papers in the strict sense, these sessions are open to papers with a focus on the intersection of textual criticism with literary, redaction, or narrative criticism, as well as with linguistics, such as lexicography and syntax. Papers in these related areas and cognate fields should either take advantage of text-critical findings or demonstrate the useful application of their approaches to textual criticism generally or specifically. Joint papers featuring cooperation between a textual critic and a specialist in another approach are especially welcome. We welcome presentations considering a particular version or versions, critical edition projects, or digital approaches to and resources for text-critical work.
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The Bible and Animal Studies
Description: Using animal studies and other critical theories (e.g., posthumanism,
decolonial theory), this unit examines representations of (nonhuman)
animals in biblical texts/contexts and related constructions of humanness
and animality. We explore new ways of reading that critique and move
beyond binaries like human-animal and nature-culture, aiming for
interpretive practice supporting multi-species flourishing. Though our
primary focus is the Bible, we aim to enrich biblical interpretation through
dialogue with other scriptures and often-marginalized oral traditions of
subjugated or colonized peoples.
Call for papers: In 2025, “The Bible and Animal Studies” program unit welcomes paper proposals in response to three calls: (1) OPEN SESSION. Papers may reflect on any aspect on animal studies in relation to the Bible and related texts. (2) THE BIBLE AND ANIMAL ETHICS, 50 YEARS AFTER "ANIMAL LIBERATION". 2025 marks half a century since the publication of Peter Singer’s seminal work on animal ethics, "Animal Liberation" (1975). In this book, Singer lays a large weight of blame on the Bible for Western anthropocentrism and oppression of animals. However, more recent research has demonstrated much more complexity to the connection between biblical texts and animal ethics. This session welcomes papers (which may or may not interact explicitly with Singer) exploring this complex interrelationship. (3) THEORETICALLY ANIMALS. This session, co-sponsored by Sacred Texts, Theory, and Theological Construction (AAR) and Reading, Theory and the Bible (SBL), will explore animal studies and/in sacred texts but with a particular focus on theory. This panel is seeking work that engages with animals and/in Sacred texts, but does so via strong engagement with sharply informed critical theory—including but also going well beyond Agamben, Calarco, Derrida, Haraway, and others—in an effort to address "what is 'the Animal'?" While some papers will be invited, we also invite submissions related to this theme. We will also run a fourth session, but it is not open to paper proposals: (4) BOOK PANEL. We will host an invited panel on the recently published book Reading the Bible Amid the "Environmental Crisis: Interdisciplinary Insights to Ecological Hermeneutics" by Sébastien Doane.
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The Enoch Seminar
Description: The Enoch Seminar is an academic group of international specialists in Second Temple
Judaism (Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Origins), who share the results of their research in the
field and meet to discuss topics of common interest. The Enoch Seminar was founded in 2001 at the initiative of Gabriele Boccaccini, University of Michigan. Members of the Enoch Seminar
are university professors and specialists in Second Temple Judaism, Christian Origins, and
early Islam.
Call for papers: The Enoch Seminar is an academic group of international specialists in Second Temple
Judaism (Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Origins), who share the results of their research in the
field and meet to discuss topics of common interest. The Enoch Seminar was founded in 2001 at the initiative of Gabriele Boccaccini, University of Michigan. Members of the Enoch Seminar
are university professors and specialists in Second Temple Judaism, Christian Origins, and
early Islam.
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The Forum on Missional Hermeneutics
Description: The Forum on Missional Hermeneutics fosters interdisciplinary scholarship at the intersection of
critical biblical interpretation, contextual theology, and mission studies. The Forum gives special
attention to the concepts and practices of Christian mission in their historical, postmodern, and
postcolonial manifestations and to their significance for the reception, interpretation, and usage
of biblical texts in a variety of social, cultural, ethical, theological, and religious contexts.
Call for papers: This unit is not accepting proposals.
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The Historical Paul
Description: This program unit aims to reinvigorate the study of Paul as a historical figure. Through attention to biographical detail and social context, careful consideration of historical method, and engagement with a diverse range of comparanda, it seeks to describe him as a contextually plausible social actor.
Call for papers: The Historical Paul unit is sponsoring three sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting. Our (1) open session invites papers that think about Paul’s interactions with named and unnamed women in the letters. Who are these women and how do they shape our imagination of Paul as an historical actor? How do these women interact with Paul’s mission, affect his actions, or shape his biography as we understand it? How might we understand the diverse titles Paul assigns to various women across his letters and how does that shape how we understand Paul’s own self-designations and self-fashioning as an apostle (1 Cor 15:9)? What role might these women have played in the life of the historical Paul that is obscured by the legacy of the apostle Paul? We have two invited sessions planned. (2) Hot Takes on Paul will give panelists a chance to present a first airing of a hunch, a “hot take,” or an undeveloped intuition about the historical Paul and submit it to discussion by other panelists in front of a live audience. (3) Retheorizing Early Christian Dating will feature responses to the recent, provocative work of Markus Vinzent, Nina Livesey, and others who have challenged broad consensus positions on the dating of a wide range of early Christian texts, with a focus on the development of the Pauline tradition.
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Theological Interpretation of Scripture
Description: This seminar explores the hermeneutical innovations and theological implications that ensue when critical biblical interpretation is conducted within diverse confessional communities, especially, but not only, those of the Christian tradition. It is this complex exploration itself that amounts to what may be called theological interpretation, an approach to biblical interpretation that gives particular attention to (1) the relationship between theological and other approaches to biblical studies, including historical criticism; (2) the significance and the challenges of expanding the contexts of biblical interpretation to include canon, creed, community, and constructive theology; (3) the relationship between biblical studies and systematic theology, practical theology, and philosophical theology; (4) the impact of theological convictions and religious practices (both traditional and contemporary) on biblical interpretation, and of theological interpretation on religious and academic communities; and (5) the actual theological interpretation of biblical texts. (Formerly Theological Hermeneutics of Christian Scripture)
Call for papers: The Theological Interpretation of Scripture will sponsor the following four sessions at the 2025 annual meeting:
1) An invited panel session reviewing Brian Brock’s Joining Creation’s Praise: A Christian Ethic of Creatureliness (Baker Academic, 2025);
2) A partially invited/partially open review session on the rise of “digital lectors” (i.e., popular podcasts and online videos reciting, explaining, or exegeting the Bible) and their relationship to the standards, methods, and ends of academic theological interpretation;
3) A partially invited/partially open review session on the essays collected in Figural Reading and the Fleshly God: The Theology of Ephraim Radner, ed. Joseph Mangina and David Ney (Baylor University Press, 2024), focusing especially on Radner’s theology of Scripture and its proposals regarding figural interpretation.
4) Along with the Christian Theology of the Bible section, an invited panel session reviewing Kevin Vanhoozer’s Mere Christian Hermeneutics: Transfiguring What It Means to Read the Bible Theologically (Zondervan Academic, 2024).
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Theology of the Hebrew Scriptures
Description: The purpose of the Theology of Hebrew Scriptures section is to promote sustained reflection, dialogue, and research on the various theological ideas, themes, and motifs that are found throughout the Hebrew Bible. It seeks to facilitate Jewish-Christian dialogue, creating a venue where Jewish and Christian interpreters can reflect together on a theological interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures.
Call for papers: Call for Paper: The Theology of the Hebrew Scriptures section will host four sessions, one co-sponsored with the “Wisdom in Israelite and Cognate Traditions” unit.
(1) For the first session, we invite paper proposals that explore the topic “theological responses to trauma” with particular emphasis on lament and protest. Consider, for example, the various laments and protests in Jeremiah, Lamentations, Job, and the Psalms. This is “part 2” of a series on “Theological Responses to Trauma in the Hebrew Scriptures.” Papers that engage specific texts, trauma theory, lament, and protest are especially welcome.
(2) For the second session, we will invite speakers for a panel discussion of Jon D. Levenson’s Israel’s Day of Light and Joy: The Origin, Development, and Enduring Meaning of the Jewish Sabbath (2024).
(3) For the third session, co-sponsored with the “Wisdom in Israelite and Cognate Traditions” unit, we are planning a panel of invited papers on three recent commentaries on the book of Proverbs: Paul Overland, Proverbs, 2022, 670 pages; John Goldingay, Proverbs, 475 pages; and Chris Ansberry, Proverbs, 2024, 720 pages.
(4) For the fourth session, we invite proposals on any theme relevant to the purpose of the Theology of the Hebrew Scriptures unit.
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Theta Alpha Kappa
Description: Theta Alpha Kappa is the national honor society for religious studies and theology and is a member of the Association of College Honor Societies. Founded in 1976 at Manhattan College, the society has chartered over 350 chapters in institutions ranging from small religiously affiliated colleges and seminaries to large public research universities. Theta Alpha Kappa exists to encourage, recognize, and promote student excellence in the academic study of religion and theology through its local chapters, multiple scholarship opportunities offered by the national organization, publication of student articles in Journal of Theta Alpha Kappa, and other national programs. For more information, please see www.ThetaAlphaKappa.org or contact us at theta_alpha_kappa_inquiries@ThetaAlphaKappa.org.
Call for papers: Theta Alpha Kappa is the national honor society for religious studies and theology and is a member of the Association of College Honor Societies. Founded in 1976 at Manhattan College, the society has chartered over 350 chapters in institutions ranging from small religiously affiliated colleges and seminaries to large public research universities. Theta Alpha Kappa exists to encourage, recognize, and promote student excellence in the academic study of religion and theology through its local chapters, multiple scholarship opportunities offered by the national organization, publication of student articles in Journal of Theta Alpha Kappa, and other national programs. For more information, please see www.ThetaAlphaKappa.org or contact us at theta_alpha_kappa_inquiries@ThetaAlphaKappa.org.
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Transmission of Traditions in the Second Temple Period
Description: The unit will concentrate on the transmission of traditions particularly in the Second Temple period. It will focus on both transmission processes themselves and the practical mechanics employed in such processes. While literary evidence is central to this investigation, physical manuscripts, other material artefacts, iconography, and traces of oral transmission processes will be factored into the discussion whenever possible. In the textual evidence particular emphasis will be placed on texts in which two or more empirically attested versions of the same story (or book) differ considerably. All such cases in the different available corpora from the general time period will be taken into consideration.
Call for papers: The Unit will host an open session. We hope that the proposed papers would focus on processes of transmitting traditions in the Second Temple period and the practical mechanics employed in such processes. We understand transmission broadly, encouraging questions regarding the material, iconographic, theological, textual and/or historical transmission of biblical texts.
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Ugaritic Studies and Northwest Semitic Epigraphy
Description: Our purpose is to foster the academic study of ancient Ugarit, the associated cuneiform alphabetic texts, and ancient Northwest Semitic epigraphic texts, especially in order to explore areas of commonality between these fields of study and Biblical literature.
Call for papers: The Ugaritic Studies and Northwest Semitic Epigraphy invites papers for two sessions.
(1) An open, non-thematic session of papers on any topic relevant to Ugaritic and Northwest Semitic studies.
(2) A panel of open submissions and invited papers on “Frank Moore Cross's Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic at 50”. Just over 50 years ago, Cross presented North-West Semitic philology as a field that could bring the concrete evidence of epigraphy and linguistics to bear on fundamental questions of human expression. Most distinctive about Cross's method was its dialectical quality, putting a theory of how we expect languages and cultures to change in dialogue with ancient empirical evidence of how they did.
But the questions Cross raised were never fully addressed in the field; we propose to reopen them: 1) Cross, following Cassuto and in dialogue with Robert Alter, raised vital questions about why imaginative prose narrative first arose in Hebrew (in contrast to earlier Semitic imaginative literatures, which take poetic form) 2) He used typological arguments to connect the genres of myth and poetry, history and prose which was based on evolutionary assumptions that have been refuted in certain key ways but not really replaced. Can 50 years of new discovery and thought provide fresh perspectives on these issues of the directions and meanings of change in North-West Semitic language and culture?
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Use, Influence, and Impact of the Bible
Description: This program unit explores how the Bible has been used and/or influential in the way it has been received in society. The focus is upon the reception of the text in contexts other than a narrow critical-academic one.
Call for papers: For 2025 we are planning three sessions. First, we invite proposals for a session on the theme “What is a Bible?” This question can be taken in many different directions, and we leave it open for you to suggest your take on it. Second, we will have an invited review session to consider new publications on the reception of Eve Finally, as usual we will have an open session: proposals are welcome on any aspect of the Bible's reception history. For the open session our preference is for papers that do not focus on the narrower history of scholarship but explore wider aspects of the Bible's impact on religions, society and culture, art, literature and music.
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Utopian Studies
Description: The Utopian Studies consultation provides a forum in which (1) to foster a
sustained and focused conversation about the intersection of the fields of
utopian studies and biblical studies and (2) to examine the applicability of
methodological and theoretical insights from utopian studies for biblical
studies.
Call for papers: The Utopian Studies section provides a forum in which (1) to foster a sustained and focused conversation about the intersection of the fields of utopian studies and biblical studies and (2) to examine the applicability of methodological and theoretical insights from Utopian Studies for Biblical Studies. Utopian Studies will be holding two sessions at the 2025 Annual Meeting. For both sessions, we have an open call for proposals that address texts, issues, and imagery often treated as exemplars of utopia within Biblical Studies. We welcome papers from across the breadth of literatures, art, and material culture that SBL encompasses, and we aim to incorporate papers using a variety of methodological approaches. We are particularly interested in proposals addressing the topics of “prayer,” “performance” (including ritual), “prophecy,” and “politics” in ancient (Israelite, Jewish, or Christian) literature. Papers should attend to theoretical issues of Utopian Studies. Scholars at all levels are encouraged to submit.
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Violence and Representations of Violence in Antiquity
Description: This section promotes a robust discussion of violence and its representations in the ancient world. Papers utilize a variety of approaches and theoretical tools to consider what constitutes violence, seeking to advance knowledge about power and its effects in antiquity while also providing analogical materials for thinking about contemporary manifestations of religiously inflected violence.
Call for papers: Our section will be hosting two panels this year, one of which is an open call. The first is an invited panel to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Violence and Representations of Violence unit. We plan to invite scholars, past participants, steering-committee members, and co-chairs, and more, to contribute to a 20-year retrospective. We will ask participants to offer insights, reflections, and milestones as we delve into the rich history of VRSV. Additionally, we will encourage submissions that explore the unit's ongoing relevance in today's world, engaging with contemporary issues and global developments. This special session promises to be a unique opportunity for collaboration, reflection, and celebration of the enduring impact of VRSV within the SBL community. Secondly, we will have an open call for papers on verbal violence in the ancient Mediterranean world, which was not only a theatrical display of rhetorical prowess but also a significant precursor to discursive violence, exerting a profound influence on lived experiences and societal dynamics. Discursive violence transcended formal debates, permeating everyday interactions and contributing to a culture where insults, clever wordplay, and scathing remarks were prevalent in various social contexts. The palpable impact of discursive violence on lived experiences is evident in its role as a catalyst for physical altercations, feuds, and even legal disputes.
In this open call, we ask participants to discuss how verbal conflicts in public forums were not merely performative but had real consequences, shaping power dynamics, influencing social hierarchies, and contributing to the intricate tapestry of interpersonal relationships in a highly competitive and verbally charged environment.
Co-Sponsored Open Call: "Religious Violence and the Affective Turn" (with the Society for Ancient Mediterranean Religions Group)
This session will explore the emotional dimensions of religious violence in the ancient wo
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Vulgate and Latin Bible
Description: This program unit is devoted to research on the Latin Bible in general
and on the Vulgate and Old Latin tradition in particular. The unit covers a
broad range of topics, from textual history of the Latin Bible to translation
studies, reception studies, and patristics, as well as to modern
interpretative-exegetical and theological disciplines that spring from the
Latin Biblical tradition. It is the unit's explicit goal to be open to scholars
from adjacent fields who occasionally deal with (aspects of) the Vulgate
and the Latin Bible in their own research.
Call for papers: At the 2025 Boston Annual Meeting, this program unit will organize two sessions: a general one on any topic related to the Vulgate and Latin Bible, and one on the Latin tradition of deuterocanonical and pseudepigraphical books, organized jointly with the Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature program unit. Proposals for the joint session can be submitted to either of both program units involved (when going through the online submission procedure, please designate either the Vulgate and Latin Bible or the Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature program unit as the primary unit). Please direct any queries to Reinhart Ceulemans at Reinhart [dot] Ceulemans [at] kuleuven [dot] be.
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Wabash Center for Teaching and Learning in Theology and Religion
Description: The Wabash Center encourages excellent teaching in departments of religion and theological schools through careful attention to the issues that every faculty member faces including course design, assessment, student learning goals, understanding the institutional context and the broader purposes of teaching. We offer programs at the SBL Annual Meeting as well as workshops, colloquies, and conferences which are organized throughout the year. Fully funded by Lilly Endowment Inc. and located on the Wabash College campus in Crawfordsville, Indiana, we also offer grants for institutions or individuals who wish to propose projects or research relating to teaching and learning. Our consultants program can facilitate on-site faculty conversations about pedagogical issues through a brief application process available online. Teaching and learning resources (both books and those available through the Internet) are also available through our website. See our website for a full listing of programs, grant deadlines, and resources: www.wabashcenter.wabash.edu.
Call for papers:
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Westar Institute
Description: Westar Institute — home of the Jesus Seminar — is dedicated to fostering and communicating the results of cutting-edge scholarship on the history and evolution of the Christian tradition, thereby raising the level of public discourse about questions that matter in society and culture.
Call for papers: Westar Institute — home of the Jesus Seminar — is dedicated to fostering and communicating the results of cutting-edge scholarship on the history and evolution of the Christian tradition, thereby raising the level of public discourse about questions that matter in society and culture.
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Wisdom and Apocalypticism
Description: We support work on Jewish & Christian sapiential & apocalyptic texts,
ideas, and their interplay, committed to inquiry into both production &
circulation and to grounding analysis in social-historical locations, as
relates to knowledge production, economy, gender & sexuality, and race &
ethnicity.
Call for papers: In collaboration with the research project ANINAN based at Aarhus University (https://projects.au.dk/an-intersectional-analysis-of-ancient-jewish-travel-narratives), we invite papers for an open session on travel in early Judaism and Christianity. We especially invited papers exploring travel and the acquisition of knowledge (whether this-worldly or heavenly), and encourage the presenters to reflect on social and intersectional dynamics in the selected sources
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Wisdom in Israelite and Cognate Traditions
Description: The Wisdom Section seeks to provide a forum for the exploration of new ideas in the study of Israelite and cognate conceptions of wisdom, focusing on wisdom in the Hebrew Bible and Deuterocanon along with related literature from elsewhere in the ancient Near East.
Call for papers: The Wisdom Section seeks to provide a forum for the exploration of new ideas in the study of Israelite and cognate conceptions of wisdom, focusing on wisdom in the Hebrew Bible and Deuterocanon along with related literature from elsewhere in the ancient Near East.
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Womanist Interpretation
Description: Womanist Interpretation is a unit that provides a space where black women
who identify as womanist biblical scholars and graduate students present
and receive generative affirming feedback on their intellectual work and
respectful sustained critical dialogue with other womanist scholars/ship,
students, and SBL units. It is a think tank for womanist epistemologies
engaged in the intersectional political work of interpretation with a
teleological goal of justice. As a mentoring space, it increases our presence
and impact while facilitating hope, stamina, and longevity in the academy.
Call for papers: SESSION ONE is an invited panel of four womanist biblical scholars who address the topic "Is womanist interpretation a method, an interpretative lens, or both?" SESSION TWO is an open call; we especially welcome womanist biblical interpretation submissions that address Black women's role in the 2024 presidential election, Black women's political activism, or Black women and Afrofuturism. SESSION THREE is an invited book review panel of Vanessa Lovelace's recent book titled "A Womanist Reading of Hebrew Bible Narratives as the Politics of Belonging from an Outsider Within."
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