University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Graduate Student, Religious Studies

Other Affiliations: Florida State University, Religion

Jacob K. Javits Fellow

Thesis Title: Paul, the Gentiles, and the Restoration of Israel

About

I specialize in Second Temple Judaism and Early Christianity. My research focuses on the intersections between Judaism and Christianity in the first century, particularly how each group uses and interprets the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament to make its own claim upon the heritage of ancient Israel.

My dissertation, "Paul, the Gentiles, and the Restoration of Israel," examines early Jewish expectations of Israelite restoration and how these expectations shaped the early Jesus movement. Specifically, the dissertation examines how Paul understands his Gentile mission as a necessary component of the restoration of Israel through the promised "new covenant." Early returns from this research are presented in the (forthcoming, 2011) JBL article, "What Do the Gentiles Have to Do with 'All Israel'? A Fresh Look at Romans 11:25–26."

Additionally, I am interested in conceptions of ethnicity in late antiquity, most notably how religious conversion in both early Judaism and Christianity involved a fundamental change of ethnic identity—with the convert’s identity as a “Jew” or “Christian” superseding language or place of origin. Such a flexible conception of group identity and ethnicity is a sharp contrast to modern Western national/racial identity.

My other work ranges from the Dead Sea Scrolls (presently finishing an article on 4Q372 1), the historical Jesus, the Gospels and Acts, Philo of Alexandria, Apostolic Fathers, wisdom & apocalyptic literature, and Imperial Platonism.

I also regularly provide football analysis for www.noledigest.com, a subsidiary of FoxSports and Scout.com, and have been published in The Journal of Religion and Film and Facts on File's Encyclopedia of World History.

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