Biblical Studies

For millennia the biblical texts have stood at the heart of societal issues, theological reflection, and scholarly debate. Their legacy affects modern laws, attitudes, politics, arts and sciences, and world faiths.

Here at Nottingham we take an interdisciplinary approach to Biblical Studies, combining close textual readings with insights from ancient Near Eastern and ancient Mediterranean history, archaeology, gender and feminist studies, classics, textual criticism, philosophy, and the arts, to explore what ancient Jewish and Christian texts meant to their original audiences, how they developed, and how they have inspired and influenced the traditions that came after them.

Main research interests

•  History, archaeology, and politics of ancient Israel

• Prophecy, poetry and narratives in the Hebrew Bible

• Historical Jesus, the Radical New Perspective on Paul, and the theology of the New Testament

• Parting of the Ways between Judaism and Christianity

• Women and gender in Apocrypha, Pseudepigrapha, and Early Christianity

• New Testament, philosophy and music 

Key staff

• Richard Bell
• Tom O'Loughlin (emeritus)