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Workshop Halle–Jerusalem, February 28 – March 4, 2027 (!)

The workshop scheduled for March 8 to 12, 2026, can not be held as scheduled and is postponed for February 28 to March 4, 2027 (!).

A joint workshop of the Old Testament Seminar at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg and the Department of Biblical Studies at the Hebrew University, will be held in Halle and Erfurt February 28 to March 4, 2027, entitled:
"Jewish, Protestant, German, Israeli?
Contemporary Scholarly Exegesis of the Hebrew Bible and the Question of Context."

יהודי, פרוטסטנטי, גרמני, ישראלי?
פרשנות מדעית מודרנית של המקרא ושאלת הקונטכסט

All interested are welcome to attend! The conference languages are Ivrit and German.

כולם מוזמנים! לשונות הסדנה הם עברית וגרמנית.

Please send registrations to or

Program of the Halle-Jerusalem Workshop / תוכנית הסדנה (PDF)
Programm_neu.pdf (458.5 KB)  vom 03.03.2026

Summer course in Hebrew

Information on the Hebrew Summer Course can be found here.

General description

Old Testament Studies covers the following areas:

  • Ancient history of the people of Israel
  • Introduction to the Old Testament from a literary-historical perspective
  • Interpretation (exegesis) of biblical scriptures
  • Theology of the Old Testament within the context of its religious history and hermeneutics

Core courses

Language courses

  • Biblical Hebrew
  • Cursory reading of the Old Testament
  • New Hebrew
  • Information on the Hebrew Summer Course can be found here.

Lecture courses and seminars

  • History of Israel
  • Introduction to the Old Testament
  • Theology, Anthropology and Cosmology of the Old Testament
  • Exegesis of biblical books and thematically linked textual complexes

Proseminar (Introductory seminar)

Scientific methods of textual interpretation

Recitation classes (tutorials)

Biblical Studies, Hebrew language tutorial, tutorials for the subject area

Special course offerings

  • Biblical Aramaic
  • Ugaritic
  • Training in epigraphy
  • Palestinology and biblical archaeology
  • Samaritanology

People

Professors

Prof Dr Frank Ueberschaer
Chair for Old Testament

Prof Dr Stefan Schorch Chair for Biblical Studies
personal website    (independently maintained)

Email:

Emeriti

Prof Dr Arndt Meinhold (Emeritus)

Research interests: narrative theology in the Old Testament; wisdom of the Old Testament; cosmology; minor prophets (commentaries on the writings of Malachi)
Email: meinhold@theologie.uni-halle.de

Prof Dr Ernst-Joachim Waschke Research interests: messianism; anthropology; theology of the Old Testament
Email: waschke@theologie.uni-halle.de

Research Associates and other instructional staff

Research Assistants

  • see the Homepages of Prof. Stefan Schorch und Prof. Frank Ueberschaer

Doctoral candidates

  • Amrei Koch: "Autoritätskonstruktion im Recht der Hebräischen Bibel" [Construction of Authority in Law of the Hebrew Bible] (Schorch)
  • Martin Tscheu: "Ezechielbuch und spätpriesterliche Texte der Tora: Kultgesetzliche Interdependenz in den Textüberlieferungen" [The Book of Ezekiel and late priestly texts of the Torah: Interdependence of law and cult in the textual traditions] (Schorch)

Projects

The Samaritan Project

The aim of this project is to compile and publish a critical editio magna of the Hebrew Samaritan Pentateuch (Samaritan Torah). The project is being carried out in close cooperation with two working groups at the Faculties of Theology at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (Project Director: Prof Dr Stefan Schorch) and at the Reformed University of Károli Gáspár, Budapest (Project Director: Prof D. József Zsengellér) respectively. The project is being funded by the German Research Foundation    (Halle) and the Hungarian Academy of the Sciences    (Budapest).


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Special collections

  • Otto-Eißfeldt-Collection: Library comprising about 10,000 volumes relevant to the study of the Old Testament as well as of religion, history and archaeology of ancient Near East; special prints collection, bequest of letters.
  • Extensive map collection of Palestine and the ancient Near East
  • Collection of models representing different styles of historical buildings in Palestine (on permanent loan to the Canstein Bible Centre (Canstein-Bibelzentrum)
  • Collection of historical photographs from Palestine, curated by Hans Schmidt

Administrative Assistant

Kathrin Engelmann

Email:

Tel: +49 (0) 345 / 55 230 13

Fax: +49 (0) 345 / 55 272 14

Office hours: Mon, Tue, Thu 9:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m., Wed 9:00 a.m. - 11:30 a.m.

Office hours, telephone numbers and email addresses of the professors and associates are listed on the websites of the individual persons (use the navigation bar on the left side of the page).

Address and location

Mailing address for (campus) offices
Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg
Faculty of Theology
Institute for Biblical Studies
06099 Halle (Saale)

Location
Francke Foundations
Franckeplatz 1, House 25, 2nd Floor
06110 Halle (Saale)

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