Alan Avery-Peck
Kraft-Hiatt Professor in Judaic Studies
Biography
Alan J. Avery-Peck is the College’s Kraft-Hiatt Professor of Judaic Studies. Specializing in Jewish history and religion in the first six centuries C.E., he is a co-author and editor of The Encyclopaedia of Judaism (second edition in 4 vols., Brill, 2005), The Mishnah in Contemporary Perspective (Brill, 2006), and of The Blackwell Companion to Judaism (Blackwell Publishers, 2000), an introduction to Judaism that covers Judaism’s history, doctrines, movements, and contemporary condition. He is most recently a co-editor and author of Targums and Rabbinic Literature (Ancient Literature for New Testament Studies, vol. 7; Grand Rapids: Zondervan Academic, 2024), editor of the journal The Review of Rabbinic Judaism, and a co-author of A Comparative Handbook to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke: Comparisons with Pseudepigraph, the Qumran Scrolls, and Rabbinic Literature (Brill, 2021). His commentary on 2 Corinthians appears in The Jewish Annotated New Testament (3nd edition, 2025), and he is a member of the translation team of Readings from the Roots: A New Historically Sensitive Translation of the Revised Common Lectionary (a project of the McFarland Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture; https://readingsfromtheroots.org).
News, Research & Publications
“At Hanukkah, a celebration of eternal light − from the desert tabernacle to synagogues today, ” in The Conversation (https://theconversation.com/at-hanukkah-a-celebration-of-eternal-light-from-the-desert-tabernacle-to-synagogues-today-243241)