Prof. Dr. Najib George Awad

Monographs

• 2024 Christian Muʽtazilism? Christian and Muslim Kalām and Rationalism During the Early Abbasid Era (in process)
• 2022 The Death of Metaphysics between Theology and Philosophy: A Comparative Study, Beirut: Mominoun Without Borders Publishers (Arabic).
• 2020 After-Mission, Beyond Evangelicalism: The Indigenous ‘Injīliyyūn’ in the Arab-Muslim Context of Syria-Lebanon, Leiden & Boston: Brill
• 2020 The Archeology of Understanding, the Historiology of Meaning: Studies on Culture, Religion and Politics, Amman/Beirut: The Arab Institute for Researches and Publishing (Arabic)
• 2018 Umayyad Christianity: John of Damascus as a Contextual Example of Identity Formation in Early Islam, Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press.
• 2017 Post-Modernism and the Future of the Religious Discourse in the West, Rabat: Mominoun Without Borders Publishers (Arabic).
• 2015 Orthodoxy in Arabic Terms: A Study of Theodore Abu Qurrah’s Theology in Its Islamic Context, Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter.
• 2014 Persons in Relation: an Essay on the Trinity and Ontology, Minneapolis: Fortress Press.
• 2012 And Freedom Became a Public-Square: Political, Sociological and Religious Overviews on the Arab Christians and the Arabic Spring, Berlin: LIT Verlag.
• 2011 God Without a Face? on the Personal Individuation of the Holy Spirit, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck GmbH & Co.
• 2004 God, Man and Evil: a Theologico-Existential Study, Damascus: Codmus Publishers (Arabic).
• 2003 The Passion Narrative in the Gospel of Matthew: A Historico-Narrative Criticism, Cairo: Al-Thaquafa Publishing House (Arabic).

Scholarly Articles (Peer-reviewed)

• 2022 “When the Intellectuals of Ḥarrān Contributed to Falsafa: Theodore Abū Qurrah as ‘Nāqil-wa-Mufassir’ of Proclean Legacy in Early Islam”, in Journal of Eastern Christian Studies, 74(1), 2022, pp. 1-43.   
• 2021 “al-Falsafah bi-Ṣifatha Haūwiyyah Muqāwimah? Ḥiwār fī al-Ikhtilāf al-Falsafī maʽ Ṭaha ʽAbdulraḥman” (Philosophy as a Resistance Identity? Dialogue on Philosophical Difference with Taha Abdul Rahman), in Dirasāt Journal, 1(2021), pp. 1-27 (Arabic)
• 2021 “The ‘End of Dialogue’ and Christian-Muslim Interrelations: Dialogue as Self-Perception Venue”, in The Journal of Interreligious Studies, 32, pp. 5-20.
• 2021 “Democracy without Democrats, Identity-Formation and Religions: the Challenge of Crosspollinating Self-Perception in the Post-Arabic Spring Contexts", in Journal of Philosophy & Social Criticism, XX (10), pp. 1-12.
• 2021 “Al-Mujādalah in al-Māʾmūn’s Court; When Could it Have Been Composed? Reflecting on Historicity Vis-à-vis Socio-Cultural Data” in Oriens Christianus, 103, pp. 144-169.
• 2021 “Do Interritual Practices Always Demonstrate Religions’ Theologies of God? Toward a Critical Assessment” in Journal of Interreligious Studies and Intercultural Theology, 5 1-2), pp. 177-198.
• 2019 “Dāwūd ibn Marwān al-Muqammaṣ on the Trinity:A Moment in Abbasid Jewish-Christian Kalām” in Studia Graeco-Arabica, 9, pp. 107-128.
• 2019 “Creatio ex Philosophia: Kalām as Cultural Evolution and Identity-         Formation Means in the Early Abbasid Era”, in The Muslim World Journal, 4(109), pp. 510-534.
• 2019 “Muṣṭalaḥ ‘Wajh’ fi Maymar Abū Qurrah ‛an al-Thālūth. “Wa Yabqa Wajhu Rabbika zul-Ijlāl wal-Ikrām’: Mufradat ‘Wajh’ ka-Muṣṭalaḥ Qurʾānī fi             Kalām Theodor Abū Qurrah ‛an ‛Aqīdat al-Thālūth”, in at-Turāth al-‛Arabī al-Masīḥī, 4, pp. 479-489.
• 2018    “Arab Orthodox Christianity”, in Oxford Islamic Studies Online,            http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t343/e0265?_hi=1&_pos=1#mat  
• 2018 “Interreligiosity as a Realist Learning Engagement: Theodore Abū Qurrah and ʽAlī b. Rabbān al-Ṭabarī—Two Comparative Theologians from Early Islam?” in Journal of Interreligious Studies and Intercultural Theology, 2.1, pp. 47-70.
• 2018 “From Pre-dialogue into Interreligious Dialogue: Interreligious Theologization as the Starting Point of a Reliable Religious Education,” in Journal of Religious Education, 66(1), pp. 1-11.
• 2017 “From Intact Wheat to Processed Bread: Theodore Abū Qurrah, Assaad Elias Kattan and the Nature of Tradition in Orthodox Theology,” in Communio Viatorum, LVIII: 2, pp. 191-206.
• 2016    “Is ‘Post-Christendom’ a Relevant Hermeneutical Framework to the Situation of the Christians in Greater Syria? Towards a Critical Appraisal,” in Postchristendom Studies Journal, 1, pp. 31-76. 
• 2016 “Understanding the Other From-Within: the Muslim Near East in the Eyes of Duncan Black Macdonald,” in The Muslim World, 106(3), pp. 523-538.
• 2016 “‘If His Crucifixion Was Figurative As You Claim, Then So Be It’: How Two Christian Mutakallims from the Abbasid Era Used An-Nisa᾽ 4:157-158 in Dialogues with Muslims,” in Journal of Eastern Christian Studies, 68(1-2), pp. 53-80.
• 2015 “‘Through You, Men Live Endowed with Reason’: Gregory Nazianzen’s  Trinitarian Thinking as a Window to His Personal Character,” in Scottish Journal of Theology, 2(68), pp. 127-142.
• 2014 “Is Secularity by Any Means Imaginable? A Reading of the Idea of ‘Civil State’ in the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood’s Contemporary Political Project for the Syria of the Future,” in Islamochristiana, 40 (2014) 105– 124
• 2014 “Religio-phobia; Western Islam, Social Integration and the Resurgence of Religiosity in Europe,” in The Muslim World, 103(4), pp. 433-447.
• 2014 “At the Dawn of ‘Practice’ or Re-Thinking the Nature and Role of Theology and Doctrine in the Church,” in Journal of Reformed Theology, 8(1), pp. 3-34.
• 2013 “What Has the Jerusalem of Dogmatics to Do with the Athens of Context, Or How Should One Do Contextual Theology?”, in PLURA:Revista de Estudos de Religião, 2(3), pp. 198-221.
• 2012 “Thomas Aquinas’ Metaphysics of ‘Relation’ and ‘Participation’ and Contemporary Trinitarian Theology”, in New Blackfriars Review, 93(1048), 2012, pp. 652-670.
• 2012 “Das Ziel ist noch fern – Zwischenbilanz des Aufbruchs in der arabischen Welt,” in Naher Osten: Christen in Der Minderheit, Jahrbuch Mission 2012, Hamburg: Missionshilfe Verlag, pp. 14-21.
• 2012 “‘Another Puzzle is…the Holy Spirit’: De Trinitate as Augustine’s Pneumatology,” in Scottish Journal of Theology, 65(1), pp. 1-16.
• 2012 “The Christians and the Syrian Revolution: Which Fears from the Rebellion? Which Political System in the Future?” in The Arabic Spring and the Christians of the Middle East, Mitri Raheb (ed.), Bethlehem: Diyar Publishers, pp. 113-127 (Arabic).
• 2011 “Extra Trinitate Nulla Salus: A Comparison between the Trinitarian and the Christological Language in Scripture,” in Theological Review, 2(32), pp. 125-152.
• 2011 “Theology of Religions, Universal Salvation and the Holy Spirit,” in Journal of Pentecostal Theology, 2(20), pp. 252-271.
• 2011 “Time/History, Self-disclosure and Anticipation: Pannenberg, Heidegger and the Question of Metaphysics,” in Sophia, 50(1), 2011, pp. 113-133.
• 2010 “Is a Perichoresis between Theological Interpretation and Historical Criticism Possible? toward a Balanced Hermeneutics of Scriptural Christology,” in Theological Review, 31/2, pp. 152-178.
• 2010 “The Influence of John Chrysostom’s Hermeneutics on John Calvin’s Exegetical Approach to Paul’s Epistle to the Romans” in Scottish Journal of Theology, 63: 4, 414-436.
• 2010 “Personhood as Particularity: John Zizioulas, Colin Gunton and the Trinitarian Theology of Personhood,” in The Reformed Journal of Theology, 4(1), pp. 1-22.
• 2009 “Where is the Gospel, What Happened to Culture? The Reformed Church in Syria and Lebanon,” in Journal of Reformed Theology, 3(3), pp. 288-306.
• 2008 “How the Church Fathers Read the Gospel of Mark as a Reliable Text? A Comparison between Early and Modern Scholarship,” in Theological Review, XXXIX, pp. 83-114.
• 2008 “Does God Save the Non-Christians? On the Universality of the Divine Salvation”, In Toward a Contemporary Arabic Theology, George Sabra (ed.), Cairo: Dar-Althaqafa, pp. 341-445 (Arabic).
• 2008 “Should We Dispense with ‘Sola Scriptura’? Scripture, Tradition and Postmodern Theology,”in Dialog: Journal of Theology, 47: 1, pp. 64-79.
• 2008 “Futural Ousia or Eschatological Disclosure? A Systematic Analysis of Pannenberg’s Trinitarian Theology, in Kerygma Und Dogma, 54: 1, pp. 37-52
• 2007 “Between Subordination and Koinonia: toward a New Reading of the Cappadocian Theology”, in Modern Theology, 32: 2, pp. 181-204.
• 2007 “The Holy Spirit Will Come upon You: The Doctrine of the Incarnation and the Holy Spirit,” in The Theological Review, 28: 1, pp. 23-45.
• 2005    “Revelation, History and Idealism: Re-examining the Conceptual Roots of Wolfhart Pannenberg’s Theology”, in The Theological Review, XXVI/2, pp.91-110.   

Chapters in Anthologies

• 2022 “Interfaith Relations and Middle East Christianity: Beyond Dialogue, Toward Interrelationality” in Levant, Cradle of Abrahamic Religions: Studies on the Interaction of Religion and Society from Antiquity to Modern Times, Catalin-Stefan Popa (ed). Berlin: LIT Verlag, pp. 291-326.  

• 2022 “John Zizioulas (1931-)”, in T&T Clark Handbook of Modern Theology London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark (in process)

• 2022 ‘Supposedly Encountered an Arian Monk’: Where Did Muḥammad Derive His Ideas from, According to John of Damascus’s De Haeresibus, Chapter 100/101?” in John of Damascus, More than a Compiler: Invited and Collected Essays, Leiden: Brill (in process)

• 2021 “Is ‘Minority’ Definitive of the Christians in Contemporary Syria?” in Towards Inclusive Societies: Middle Eastern Perspectives, Mitri Raheb (ed.), Bethlehem: Diyar Publisher, pp. 71-92.

• 2021 “Deciphering the Genome of ‘Crisis’ in the Syrian ‘Refugee Crisis’: Toward a Hermeneutic Tripod” in Church and Migration: Global (In)Difference, Darren Dias, Jaroslav Skira, Michael Attridge and Gerard Mannion (eds.), (New York:    Palgrave MacMillan, 167-184.

• 2021 “Theodore Abū Qurrah” in Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Christian                                East (forthcoming) “‘Supposedly Encountered an Arian Monk’: Where Did Muḥammad Derive his Ideas from, according to John of Damascus’s De Haeresibus, Chapter 100/101?”  in an Anthology on John of Damascus (forthcoming)

• 2018 “Inter-religious Relations,” in Christianity in North Africa and West Asia, Kenneth R. Ross; Mariz Tadros and Todd M. Johnson (eds.), Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

• 2017    “Min al-‘Aql wa-Laysa min al-Kutub”: Scriptural Evidence, Rational Verification and Theodore Abū Qurra’s Apologetic Epistemology,” in Exegetical Crossroads: Understanding Scripture in Judaism, Christianity and Islam in the Pre-Modern Orient, George Tamer, Regina Grundmann, Assaad Elias Kattan and Karl Pinggéra (eds.), Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter, pp. 95- 118.  

• “Social Harmony in the Middle East: The Christian Contributions,” in Christian Citizenship in the Middle East: Divided Allegiance or Dual Belonging? Mohammad Girma and Cristian Romocea (eds.), London & Philadelphia: Jessica Kingsley Publishers, pp. 63- 82.     

• 2015 “On Mapping Exile and Return: Comments in Relation to the Palestinian Diaspora,” in Syndicate: A New Forum for Theology, 2(2), Eugene, OR: Cascade Books/Wipf and Storck Publishers, pp. 11-15.   

• “Unmasking Leviathan: Theology, the Public Square and the Issue of Human Rights,” in Begegnungen in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart: Beiträge dialogischer Existenz, Claudia Rammelt; Cornelia Schlarb and Egbert Schlarb (eds.), Berlin: LIT Verlag, pp. 504-516. 

• 2013 “When Identity is Constructed on a Procrustean Bed: ‘Arab Christianity’ and the Missionary-Planted Churches in the Eyes of Muslim Authors,” in Zur Situation der Christen in der Türkei und in Syrien: Exemplarische Einsichten, Martin Tamcke (ed.), Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, pp. 201-214.

• 2012 “Is Christianity from Arabia? Examining Two Contemporary Arabic Proposals on Christianity in the Pre-Islamic Period,” in Orientalische Christen und Europa Kulturbegegnung zwischen Interferenz, Partizipation und Antizipation, Martin Tamcke (ed.), Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, pp. 33-58.

Book Reviews

• Sacred Misinterpretation: Reaching Across the Christian‐Muslim Divide, by Accad,
  Martin, Grand Rapids, Mich: W.B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2019, in The Muslim World Journal, 2020.
• Early Christian-Muslim Debate on the Unity of God: Three Christian Scholars an their Engagement with Islamic Thought 99th Century C.E.), by Sara Leila Husseini, Leiden: Brill, 2014, in Interpretation Journal, 2016.
• Envisioning Islam: Syriac Christians and Early Muslim World, by Michael Philip Penn, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015, in The Muslim World Journal, 2016. 
• God the Revealed, Christology, by Michael Welker, translated by Douglas W. Stott, Grand Rapids, Mich/ Cambridge, UK, W.B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2013, in Interpretation Journal, Early Arabic Christian Contributions to Trinitarian Theology: the Development of the Doctrine of the Trinity in an Islamic Milieu, by Thomas W. Ricks, Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2013, in Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations, 25(3), 2014. (English)
• The Other Hand of God: The Holy Spirit as the Universal Touch and Goal, by Killian McDonnell, Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2003, in International Journal of Systematic Theology, Vol. 6, N. 4, Oct. 2004. (English)
• God: An Open Question, by Anton Houtepen, John Bowden (trans.), London & New York: Continuum, 2003, in, Near East School of Theology Theological Review, Vol. XXV, N.1, Apr. 2004 (English). 
• Holy Trinity, Perfect Community, by Leonardo Boff, Phillip Berryman (trans.), Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2001, in International Journal of Systematic Theology, Vol.5, N.2, July. 2003 (English)
• The Christian Faith: An Introduction to Christian Doctrine, by Colin E. Gunton.  Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, ltd. 2002, in, Near East School of Theology
• Theological Review, Vol. XXIV, N.2, Apr. 2003 (English) In Search for Ecumenical Dialogue: Theological, Evangelical Essays, by George Sabra, Beirut: An-Nafeer Publishing, 2001, in, Alnashra, Beirut, N.29, May. 2002. (Arabic)

Najib George Awad

• born on April 6, 1972, US-Citizen, Married

Academic education

• 2014  Doctor Theol. Habil. in Historical/Arabic-Oriental Theology

  Philipps Universität, Marburg, Germany, Interlocutors: Assad Elias Kattan & Karl Pinggèra

• 2007 Doctor Phil. in Systematic Theology
  King’s College, University of London. Supervisor Colin Gunton & Murray Rae

• 2001 M.A. Systematic Theology
  King’s College, London. Supervisor Colin Gunton

• 1997 B.A. Theology 
  Near East School of Theology, Beirut, Lebanon

Teaching and Academic Experience

• Feb. 2021 - Sept. 2021 Westfälische Wilhelm-Universität Münster, Germany
  Visiting-Scholar/Gastwissenschaftler
• 2019 - 2021 Hartford Seminary, CT 
  Professor of Christian Theology & Eastern Christian Thought
  
  
• 2012 - 2019 Hartford Seminary, CT 
  Associate Professor of Christian Theology
• 2010 - 2012 Goettingen University/EL Missionsseminar
  Lecturer in Systematic and Intercultural Theology
• Aug. 2008 - Jul. 2009 Yale Divinity School, Yale University
  Visiting-Fellow
  
• 2006-2007 Near East School of Theology, Beirut, Lebanon
  Part-time Lecturer in Systematic Theology & Christian Doctrine
  
  
• 2006 Université La Sagesse, Faculté des Sciences Ecclésiales, Beirut, Lebanon
  Lecturer on the Theology of the Reformation