Esther Menn

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EDUCATION

• B.A., Luther College
• M.A., Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago
• M.A., University of Chicago Divinity School
• Ph.D., University of Chicago Divinity School

Biography

Esther Menn is the the Ralph W. and Marilyn R. Klein Professor of Old Testament/Hebrew Bible at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, where she teaches courses in Old Testament and organizes events in Jewish-Christian relations. She joined the faculty of LSTC in the 2001-2002 academic year and has served as Director of Advanced Studies (2006-2013) and as Dean and Vice President of Academic Affairs (2014-2023). She taught previously in the department of religious studies at the University of Virginia (1995-2001), where she was promoted to associate rank and granted tenure in 2001. While at the University of Virginia, she spent a sabbatical year as a visiting scholar at Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a W.F. Albright associate fellow, supported by an American Council of Learned Societies Fellowship. She has been an adjunct faculty member at McCormick Theology Seminary (1995), a lecturer and adjunct professor at the University of Chicago Divinity School (1994-95, 2004-2006), and instructor at California Lutheran University, Department of Religion (1988-90).

She received the B.A. degree from Luther College with an art major (1980), concurrent M.A. degrees from the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago (1985) and at the University of Chicago Divinity School (1985), and a Ph.D. “with distinction” from the University of Chicago Divinity School (1995). She was awarded the Susan Colver Rosenberger Prize for constructive and original dissertation research. Additional studies were taken at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Kibbutz Revivim in Israel, Middlebury College, Duke University, Chicago Regional Organizing for Antiracism, and the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Menn is active in Jewish-Christian relations, recently chairing the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) study document task force that wrote Hope for the Future: A Study Document for Renewing Jewish-Christian Relations in advance of the 13^th General Assembly of the LWF held in Krakow, Poland in 2023. She is the chair of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Consultative Panel on Lutheran-Jewish Relations and a former member of the Christian Scholars Group on Christian-Jewish Relations. In 2001, she was a delegate to the LWF international consultation on anti-semitism and anti-Judaism held in Budapest, Hungary, and in 2014 was a contributor to an LWF conference on Lutheran Hermeneutics and the Gospel of Matthew held at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago. She was awarded a Texas Lutheran University Distinguished Church Service Award in 2009 for her work in Jewish-Christian relations. With New Testament colleague Barbara Rossing, Menn regularly co-hosts a World of the Bible travel seminar to Turkiye and Greece that features Biblical, Jewish, Christian and Muslim sites (next offered May 2026).

Menn’s first book Judah and Tamar (Genesis 38) in Ancient Jewish Exegesis: Studies in Literary Form and Hermeneutics was published in 1997. She is one of four co-editors of Contesting Texts: Jews and Christians in Conversation about the Bible (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), a volume emerging from a 2005 Hyde Park Cluster of Theological Schools conference of the same title. She has contributed numerous articles to edited collections and scholarly journals including Harvard Theological Review, Journal of Jewish Studies, Journal for the Study of Judaism, and Currents in Theology and Mission, and has delivered many papers at national and regional meetings of the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL). She has a long-time interest in biblical narratives of hope and courage during times of crisis, women in the Bible, King David in early Christian and Jewish interpretation, and the Psalms.

PUBLISHED WORKS

Books

• Hope for the Future: A Study Document for Renewing Jewish-Christian Relations, chair of LWF study document task force commissioned in advance of the 13^th General Assembly of the Lutheran World Federation, Krakow, Poland (Lutheran World Federation, 2023)
• Contesting Texts: Jews and Christians in Conversation about the Bible, ed. Melody D. Knowles, Esther Menn, John Pawlikowski and Timothy J. Sandoval, volume from 2005 Hyde Park Cluster of Theological Schools conference of same title. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007)
• Judah and Tamar (Genesis 38) in Ancient Jewish Exegesis: Studies in Literary Form and Hermeneutics (Journal for Jewish Studies Supplement Series 51; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1997).

Articles and Chapters in Books and Journals

• Biblical Interpretation and Jewish-Christian Relations,” Lutheran Study Bible, NRSVUV revised edition (forthcoming)
• “Introduction, Commentary, and Notes on Exodus,” Lutheran Study Bible, NRSVUV revised edition (forthcoming)
• “Sarah in Jewish Christian Relations,” Encyclopedia of Jewish Christian Relations Online (De Gruyter, 2023)
• “Preface,” Knowing Ourselves, Engaging Our Neighbor, with Peg Schultz, ELCA Inter-religious Case Studies (2016)
• “Partnership with Mar Thomas Church of India Enriches Church and LSTC” LSTC Epistle Vol. 43 No. 1 (Winter, 2013) 11-12
• “A Little Child Shall Lead Them: the Role of the Little Israelite Servant Girl (2 Kings 5: 1-19,” Currents in Theology and Mission, Vol. 35, No. 5 (October 2008): 340-348
• “Repentance in the Wilderness: Sons of Korah in Rabbinic Psalms Commentary,” in Scripture in Early Judaism and Christianity volume, ed. Kenneth Pomykala, (forthcoming).(2008)
• “Law and Gospel,” in conversation with Krister Stendahl, in Talking Points: Topics in Jewish-Christian Relations, ed. Darrell Jodock, ELCA Consultative Panel on Lutheran-Jewish Relations (forthcoming, Minneapolis: Fortress). (2007)
• “Land, Displacement, and Hope in Jeremiah and in Today’s World,” in God and Human Dignity, ed. R. Kendall Soulen and Linda Woodhead (Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans) 161-78. 2006
• “Prayer of the Queen: Esther’s Religious Self in the Septuagint,” in Religion and the Self in Antiquity, ed. David Brakke, Michael L. Satlow, and Steven Weitzman, (Bloomington: Indiana University) 70-90. 2005
• “Prayerful Origins: David as Temple Founder in Rabbinic Psalms Commentary (Midrash Tehillim),” in Of Scribes and Sages: Early Jewish Interpretation and Transmission of Scripture, Vol. 2: Later Versions and Traditions, ed. Craig A. Evans (Studies in Scripture in Early Judaism and Christianity 10; Library of Second Temple Studies 51; London: T & T Clark International) 77-89. 2004
• “Sweet Singer of Israel: David and the Psalms in Early Judaism,” in Psalms in Community: Jewish and Christian Textual, Liturgical, and Artistic Traditions, ed. Harold W. Attridge and Margot E. Fassler (SBL Symposium Series 25; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature) 61-74. 2003
• “Inner-Biblical Exegesis,” in History of Biblical Interpretation 1, ed. Alan J. Hauser and Duane F. Watson (Grand Rapids, MI: W. B. Eerdmans) 55-79. 2003
• “Thwarted Metaphors: Complicating the Imagery of Desire in the Targum of the Song of Songs,” Journal for the Study of Judaism 34:3 (2003) 237-273. 2003
• “Praying King and Sanctuary of Prayer II: David’s Deferment and Temple Dedication in Rabbinic Psalms Commentary (Midrash Tehillim),” Journal of Jewish Studies 53:2 (2002) 298-323. 2002
• “Praying King and Sanctuary of Prayer I: David and Temple Origins in Rabbinic Psalms Commentary (Midrash Tehillim),” Journal of Jewish Studies 52:1 (2001) 1-26. 2001
• “No Ordinary Lament: Relecture and the Identity of the Distressed in Psalm 22,” Harvard Theological Review 93:4 (2000) 301-41. 2000
• “Targum of the Song of Songs and the Dynamics of Historical Allegory,” in The Interpretation of Scripture in Early Judaism and Christianity: Studies in Language and Tradition, ed. Craig A. Evans (Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha Supplement Series 33; Studies in Scripture in Early Judaism and Christianity 7; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000) 423-45. 2000
• “Sanctification of the Divine Name: Targum Neofiti’s ‘Translation’ of Genesis 38:25-26,” in The Function of Scripture in Early Jewish and Christian Tradition, ed. Craig Evans and James Sanders (Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series 154; Studies in Scripture in Early Judaism and Christianity 6; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1998) 206-40. 1998.

Writings for General Audiences

• “Rooted in God’s Rich Blessings,'” Lutheran Woman Today, September 2007, 36-39. 2007
• “Judaism and Christianity,” The Lutheran, March 2007, 14-16. 2007
• “Understanding Our Relations with Judaism and Jews,” in Windows for Understanding: Jewish-Muslim-Lutheran Relations, http://www.elca.org/ecumenical/interreligious/windows.html 2006;
• “Faculty Dialogue on ‘Peace Not Walls: Stand for Justice in the Holy Land,'” with Harold Vogelaar,” LSTC Epistle, 35:3 (2005) 13-14, and 35:4 (2006) 13-14. 2005-06
• “The Gospel and Interfaith Understanding: How Do We Hold Them Together?” Currents in Mission and Theology 32:4 (2005) 256-63. 2005
• “Taking Stock at Mid-Career: Challenges and Opportunities for Faculty at Theological Schools,” co-authored with Karen Baker-Fletcher, David Carr, and Nancy Ramsey, in Teaching Theology and Religion 8:1 (2005) 3-10. 2005
• “Critical Incident #6: Facing War: Engaging Pedagogy,” case study on the LSTC Faculty 2002 Memorial Day Resolution, in “Taken with Surprise: Critical Incidents in Teaching,” Teaching Theology and Religion 8:1 (2005). 2005
• “Sexuality in the Old Testament: Strong as Death, Unquenchable as Fire,” in Currents in Theology and Mission 30:1 (2003) 37-45. 2003
• “Statement of Concern in Anticipation of the Release of the Film ‘The Passion of Christ'” co-authored by ELCA Consultative Panel on Lutheran-Jewish Relations, released December 3, 2003.
• “Talking Points: Issues in Jewish-Christian Relations,” set of eight discussion pamphlets, co-authored by ELCA Consultative Panel on Lutheran-Jewish Relations, available at: http://www.elca.org/ecumenical/interfaithrelations/jewish/talkingpoints/index.html