Discussion Topics
Day 1: Monday, March 24, 2025
Session #1 (9:45–11:30 am): Ancient Judaism
Benjamin Wright presiding
Hindy Najman (Oxford University): Prolegomena to Composition and Pluriformity in Ancient Jewish Texts
Katell Berthelot (CNRC, Aix-Marseille University): The History of the Jews in the Greco- Roman World: Shifting Paradigms
Adele Reinhartz (University of Ottawa): The New Testament in/and the Study of Early Judaism
Hanna Tervanotko (McMaster University): Scripture Divination as an Intuitive and Technical Method
Session #2 (1:30–3:15 pm): Dead Sea Scrolls
Loren Stuckenbruck presiding
Esther Chazon (Hebrew University of Jerusalem): Revolution and Evolution in the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls: 2000-2025 and Beyond
Charlotte Hempel (University of Birmingham, UK): The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Great Outdoors
Sidnie Crawford (University of Nebraska): The Cave 2Q Scroll Collection as Part of the Qumran Scroll Collection
Erich Gruen (UC Berkeley): The Rewritten Bible
Day 2: Tuesday, March 25, 2025
Session #3 (8:30–10:15 am): Apocalyptic/Apocalypses
Hindy Najman presiding
Judith Newman (University of Toronto): Rupture and Re-creation
Matthew Goff (Florida State University): Apocalypse Now and Then: Apocalypticism, QAnon and Conspiracy Theories
Matthias Henze (Rice University): As It Could Have Been: The Hebrew Bible and Jewish Apocalypses
Samuel Adams (Union Presbyterian Seminary, Richmond): Ben Sira’s Awareness of and Response to Enochic Traditions: A Reappraisal
Session #4 (10:30 am –12:15 pm): Scribes and Wisdom Literature*
Sidnie Crawford presiding
Greg Schmidt Goering (University of Virginia): Sound and Memory in Sirach: A Case for Investigating the Sensory Worlds of Early Judaism
Thomas Bolin (St. Norbert College): Searching for Scribes in Ancient Roman Judaism
Jacqueline Vayntrub (Yale University): From Generation to Generation: Theorizing Transmission through the Materiality of Speech
Jill Hicks-Keeton (University of Southern California): After ‘the Bible’ and Beyond ‘Reception History’: Studying Ancient Jewish Literature When It’s also Christian Scripture
*Note from Benjamin Wright: Due to unforeseen circumstances, Frédérique Michèle Rey will be unable to attend the conference and present her paper: Categorizing and Quantifying Variants in the Ben Sira Hebrew Manuscript Traditions.
Session #5 (2:00-3:45 pm): Reception of Scripture**
Adele Reinhartz presiding
Francis Borchardt (NLA University College, Bergen, Norway): Never Again Shall Masada Fall: The Discovery and Use of Masada in Zionist Discourse
Eva Mroczek (Dalhousie University): Manuscript Discovery Narratives as Theology and Scripture
Liv Ingeborg Lied (Norwegian School of Theology, Oslo): The Modern Academic Coproduction of Ancient Jewish Literature
Loren Stuckenbruck (Ludwig-Maximians-Universität, Munich): The Interface of Jewish and Christian Traditions in Ge'ez Manuscripts to 1 Enoch
**Note: Jill Hicks-Keeton’s paper has been moved from this session to the earlier session.
Day 3: Wednesday, March 26, 2025
Session #6 (9:15–11:00 am): Wrap-up Discussion
Benjamin Wright presiding
