Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies

Maham Ayaz is a PhD candidate and Schusterman Scholar interested in Israeli laws on citizenship and nationality. She received her BA in International Studies from the University of Chicago in 2013 where she focused her thesis on citizenship and refugee rights in Bangladesh. She has since worked at the American Bar Foundation as a research analyst. She hopes to use her background in international studies, human rights, and constitutional law to study political membership in Israel.

Yair Bar Zuri is a doctoral student in the Near Eastern and Judaic Studies Department at Brandeis University, as well as a fellow at the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies.He is interested in modern Jewish philosophy and history, in particular, the cultural aspect of Zionism. He plans to explore the secularization of the Jewish culture as a significant element of the Zionist project, through different approaches to secularity in sociology, history and philosophy, focusing on the attempt to formulate the question of renewing of the Jewish culture in the Zionist project. To better understand the questionable paradox between secularity and religion in cultural Zionism, he hopes to delve deeper into the character of Jewish myth as it is portrayed in the writings of different Zionist scholars.

Daniel Berman is a doctoral student in Bible and Ancient Near East. His research interests include ancient Near Eastern religions and the development of biblical texts, especially the Pentateuch and Deuteronomistic History. Dan first became interested in biblical and ancient Near Eastern studies as an undergraduate at Cornell University. Upon earning his bachelors degree, he spent six months as a visiting graduate student at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, after which he enrolled in the master's program in Bible and Ancient Near East at Brandeis. Dan is delighted to continue his studies in Brandeis' PhD program. A passionate foodie, Dan cooks for his friends and roommates as often as he can, and in the winter, he enjoys taking ski trips with his family.

Esther Brownsmith is a PhD candidate in Bible and Ancient Near East, coming to Brandeis with an MA from Yale Divinity School, summa cum laude, and a BA from Rice University. Her interests include intersectionality, intertextuality, and interpretive techniques. (Also alliteration.) Her dissertation in progress, "Inconspicuous Consumption: Conceptual Metaphors of Women as Food in the Deuteronomistic History," explores three biblical texts of violence against women as they metaphorically portray the women as food. In her work, Esther draws on Brandeis's rich tradition of philological exegesis, applying it to modern questions of gender and violence.  Outside of studying ancient texts, Esther enjoys baking, social justice activism, cross stitch, and spending time with her spouse and pet degu.

Born in Israel and raised in Japan, Shirah completed her undergraduate studies in liberal arts at Doshisha University in Kyoto, during which she also spent time at Leiden University in the Netherlands and wrote her honour’s thesis on the impact of nationalism on the development of Modern Hebrew and Modern Japanese literatures. Her main interest is in the relationship between modernity and literature in the early 20th century, in particular in how writers processed their place in the world. She is especially interested in topics such as alienation and exile, as well as intertextuality and literary subversion. In her graduate studies, she hopes to further delve into these topics, focusing on Hebrew, Japanese, English, and German literatures.

Robert DeBoard received his MA in History from Baylor University, where he wrote his thesis on British security and counter-insurgency in Mandatory Palestine. Additionally, he worked at Baylor's Institute for Oral History on the Texas Holocaust Liberator's Project. Robert's research interests include military history and foreign policy in the Middle East, as well as the Mandatory Period in Palestine and Israel in the Cold War. Tentatively, his research at Brandeis will focus on Israeli defense strategy in the 1950s.

Rima Farah is interested in the history of Christians in the Middle East, with an emphasis on Christians in Israel. Her research on this issue is focused on the social, political, and cultural causes that contribute to conflicts among the various Christian congregations in Israel, with particular attention devoted to the contemporary divisiveness among Christians, in which there are those advocating for an Arab identity versus the anti-Arab faction who identify themselves as Aramaic and endorse Israel's recent official recognition of the Christian Aramaic nationality. This schism has become more evident today in the wake of the political upheavals in the Middle East and Israel. Rima holds a BA in French and English language and literature, and an MA in Middle Eastern Studies from Haifa University, as well as holding an MA in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies from Brandeis University. Fluent in Hebrew, Arabic, English, she has a good knowledge of French.

Eva Gurevich is a PhD student at NEJS. She is a cultural historian who is deeply interested in Israeli human geography. Her tentative dissertation topic will deal with left-wing ideological movements that supported Greater Israel and the transformation of the Israeli political spectrum between 1967 and 1981. She is looking specifically at the [Whole] Land of Israel Movement which included many prominent figures, among them Nathan Alterman, Moshe Shamir and Yitzhak Tabenkin.

Bar Guzi is interested in American Jewish thought and theology in the twentieth-century, especially among the liberal wings of American Judaism. He is particularly interested in exploring the various ways in which American Jewish thinkers revisit old theological questions – such as concepts of God, the problem of evil, supernaturalism, and questions of religious pluralism – and in the influence of the American intellectual and religious climate on their thought. Among the main themes Bar is focusing on are the American Jewish manifestations of process theology, religious pragmatism, religious naturalism, panentheism, and post-Holocaust theology. Bar holds a BA in philosophy and Jewish philosophy, and a high school teaching diploma in Jewish thought, both from Tel Aviv University.

Iddo Haklai received his BA in Jewish Thought and Political Science and MA in Political Science (both Magna Cum Laude) from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He worked for several years at Yad Vashem, Israel's national Holocaust research and education center. His research interests focus on modern Orthodox thought, religious-Zionist thought, and especially the theological frameworks and concepts developed by thinkers within the religious-Zionist labor movement in British Mandatory Palestine. He is interested in the integration of religious traditionalism, Zionism, modernism and social-democratic ideas by individuals affiliated with the 'Torah Va-Avodah' movement in the interwar period and in the implications of that integration to contemporary dilemmas facing the Israeli society.

Justin Huguenin is a doctoral student in Bible and Ancient Near East. His research interests focus on Canaanite and Mesopotamian mythology, particularly those dealing with netherworld cult and ritual. He also enjoys studying early biblical literature and seeks to understand its place within the larger Near Eastern milieu. Before enrolling in Brandeis' PhD program, he earned a BA in History at the Ohio State University and an MA in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies here at Brandeis.

Anthony Lipscomb is a PhD student in Bible and Ancient Near East. His research interests include the formation of the Hebrew Bible, Ezekiel, the reception of biblical traditions in the Second Temple period, emotions in the Bible, and history of emotions. Prior to Brandeis, he completed an MA in Biblical Studies at Regent University and a ThM in Hebrew Bible at Trinity International University. He is happily married and a proud father of two awesome kiddos.

Ari Moshkovski, Schusterman Scholar, is a PhD student focusing on the history and politics of Israel and the contemporary Middle East. Ari holds a B.A. (Summa Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa) in Jewish Studies and Political Science, and an M.A. in History from Queens College, CUNY. At Queens College, he engaged in extensive research and curriculum development on Israel and the Middle East as part of a project funded by the Clinton Global Initiative and the Ford Foundation. He was also a co-founder of the Queens College Center for Ethnic, Racial and Religious Understanding under a grant from the United States Department of Education. Ari's research interests focus on the nexus between religion, narrative, and security in shaping Israeli foreign policy. During the 2012-2013 term, Ari served on the Graduate Council of Arts and Sciences and the Dean of Arts and Sciences Mentoring Award Committee.

Jared Pfost is a doctoral student in Bible and the Ancient Near East. He holds a BA from Brigham Young University in Ancient Near Eastern Studies. His research interests are primarily focused on the impact Mesopotamian literature and culture had on ancient Israel and the creation of the Hebrew Bible, especially the ways in which biblical authors used and reformulated Mesopotamian texts and traditions. He specifically seeks to illuminate the chronological relationships between Pentateuchal sources based on their potential reliance on other ancient Near Eastern texts. Jared is also interested in the history of religions and how ancient beliefs and traditions continue to influence our world today.

Lenny Prado is a PhD student focusing on Bible and Ancient Near East. He is married and has three beautiful children. His primary research interests include such topics as the composition and compilation of the Torah; development of Israelite Religion (e.g., representation of deities, portrayals of human/divine interaction, cultic ritual practices); scribes and scribal culture in the ancient Near East; and Oral Tradition and Memory. When he is not spending time with his family or hitting the books, you can find him rooting for New York sports teams, especially the Yankees and the Knicks.

Karen Spira is a PhD candidate and Schusterman Scholar, focusing on Israel Studies. Her dissertation examines the development of Jewish orphanage institutions and child welfare in Mandatory Palestine. Karen holds a dual BA in Religious Studies and English from the University of Arizona, an MA in Religion from the University of Georgia, and an MA in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies from Brandeis University. She is the program coordinator at the Crown Center for Middle East Studies and the Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies program. She also teaches courses on Jewish and Israeli history at Brandeis and as a community educator in a variety of settings throughout the Greater Boston area and New York.