Prof. Dr. Eileen M. Schuller

Profile

Academic positionFull Professor
Research fieldsTheology
KeywordsDead Sea Scrolls, Psalms, Second Temple Judaism

Current contact address

CountryCanada
CityHamilton
InstitutionMcMaster University
InstituteDepartment of Religious Studies

Host during sponsorship

Prof. Dr. Reinhard Gregor KratzSeminar Altes Testament, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Göttingen
Start of initial sponsorship01/08/2005

Programme(s)

2004Humboldt Research Award Programme

Nominator's project description

Eileen Marie Schuller was born on 26 November 1946 in Edmonton, Canada. Following her studies at the University of Alberta and the University of Toronto where she was awarded an MA in 1973, she went on to complete her Ph.D at Harvard University in 1984. She started her professional career at Colleges in Edmonton and the Atlantic School of Theology, Halifax and then accepted a position at McMaster University in Hamilton (Ontario) where she has taught and done research, since 1990 as an associate professor and, since 1996, as a tenured professor of the Department of Religious Studies. Her area of studies is ancient Judaism at the time of the Second Temple (6th century B.C.E - 2nd century C.E.) with special focus on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Her dissertation on the Non-Canonical Psalms from Qumran opened up a hitherto completely unknown and new area of research. She is a member of the editorial board of the main publication series "Discoveries in the Judaean Desert" (DJD) where she edited not only the Non-Canonical Psalms (DJD XI, 1988) but also additional narrative and poetic texts (DJD XXVIII, 2001 together with M. Bernstein) and, above all, the manuscripts of the famous "Songs of Praise" (Hodajot) and related texts from cave 4 of Qumran (DJD XXIX, 1999). In addition to the editions, Prof. Schuller has also written numerous articles on the Old Testament, the Apocrypha and Pseudeepigrapha and on the Dead Sea Manuscripts. In some of these articles, e.g. on "Women in Qumran", she once again ventured into unexplored territory. At the Göttingen Institute for Qumran Research Prof. Schuller will work on a critical commentary on the Hodajot for the "Hermeneia" series in cooperation with Prof. Dr. Dr. H. Stegemann as well as with the staff of the German Research Association's "Qumran Dictionary" project headed by Prof. Dr. Reinhard Kratz.

Publications (partial selection)

2007Eileen M. Schuller: 'Penitential Prayer in Second Temple Judaism: A Research Survey' and 'Afterward' . In: Mark Boda, Daniel Falk, Rodney Werline, Seeking the Favor of God, Vol II: The Development of Penitential Prayer in Second Temple Judaism. Society of Biblical Literature and Brill, 2007. 1-15-227-37
2006Eileen M. Schuller: 'Prayers and Psalms from the Pre-Maccabean Period,'. In: Dead Sea Discoveries, 2006, 306-318
2006Eileen M. Schuller: The Dead Sea Scrolls: What Have We Learned 50 Years On?. SCM Press, 2006
2004Eileen M. Schuller: 'Prayer in Qumran Literature'. In: Renate Egger-Wenzel and Jeremy Corley, Prayer from Tobit to Qumran, Deuterocanonical and Cognate Litearture Yearbook. Walter de Gruyter, 2004. 411-428