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Alumni News

Anna P. Ronell, (PhD  '04) has returned to Brandeis as the Director of the Brandeis-Genesis Institute for Russian Jewry. Dr. Ronell’s research focuses on the renewed interest in the Eastern European past in contemporary Jewish fiction as well as on Russian-language literature and art in Israel. Her fields of interest are Eastern European Jewish civilization, Hebrew-Russian literary relations, American-Jewish literature, ethnic, literary and cultural studies. >More

David Bernat, (PhD '02) has published his second book, "Sign of the Covenant, Circumcision in the Priestly Tradition" by the Society of Biblical Literature.

"Sign of the Covenant" is the first and only full-length scholarly study of circumcision in the Hebrew Bible. Making use of a “close-reading” approach to ritually oriented texts, it offers new and important insights into the biblical idea of covenant and into core aspects of the Torah’s views on God, ritual, and Israelite destiny.

David A. Bernat is Assistant Professor of Biblical Studies at Hebrew College in Newton Centre, Massachusetts, and Jewish Chaplain at Wellesley College. He is the co-editor of Religion and Violence: The Biblical Heritage (Sheffield Phoenix).

Sarah Shectman, (PhD '07) announces the publication of her first book, "Women in the Pentateuch:  A Feminist and Source-Critical Analysis" by Sheffield Phoenix Press. 

For the first time, literary source criticism and feminist biblical interpretation are brought together systematically. Taking into account recent trends in Pentateuchal source criticism, Shectman divides the narrative into priestly and non-priestly threads, tracing the portrayal of women in each. In both sources, as Moses comes to the fore, women recede increasingly into the background, with the result that far fewer women appear in Exodus–Numbers than appear in Genesis.

In addition to a new and detailed source-critical analysis of women in the Pentateuch, this book also provides a detailed overview of feminist biblical criticism, from the work of Elizabeth Cady Stanton up to the present, which will be useful for those interested in the history of biblical, particularly feminist, interpretation.

Sarah is Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Judaic Studies, Binghamton University (State University of New York).

Eitan Fishbane, (PhD '03) has published his first book, "As Light Before Dawn: The Inner World of a Medieval Kabbalist" by Stanford University Press. This book explores the mystical thought of Isaac ben Samuel of Akko, a major medieval kabbalist whose work has until now received relatively little attention. >More

He is Assistant Professor, Department of Jewish Thought at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York.

Avi (Goldman) Killip (MA '08) has been awarded a Wexner Fellowship for Rabbinical School and will be moving back to Boston this fall as a Rabbinical student at Hebrew College.

Robert Rabil (PhD '01) was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure at Florida Atlantic University. Robert and his wife recently welcomed a daughter, their second child.

Anton Weiss-Wendt (PhD '05) shares that his new book, "Murder Without Hatred:  Estonians and the Holocaust" will be available in May, 2009.

This first book-length exploration of this aspect of the Holocaust enriches our knowledge of ethnic violence and reinvigorates the current debates over the roots and operation of the Holocaust.  <More.

Shai Cherry (PhD '01) is receiving ordination from the American Jewish University and will be joining the Judaics faculty at the San Diego Jewish Academy. Congratulations!

Lori Gerber (MA '06) reports she has been enjoying teaching at the University of Massachusetts in Lowell for the past two years, most recently teaching a Russian History course.

Congratulations to Victoria Khiterer, Ph.D. '08, who received a tenure-track Assistant Professor position at Millersville University, Lancaster, Pennsylvania, beginning Fall 2009. She will be teaching undergraduate and graduate courses in Russian, European History and the Holocaust.

Sarah Shectman, Ph.D. '07, reports that she has been invited to participate in The Pentateuch: International Perspectives on Current Research, sponsored by the University of Zurich, in January 2010.