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Annette Yoshiko Reed

@annetteyreed.bsky.social

5K followers 2.1K following 840 posts

Stendahl Chair at Harvard Divinity School / studying demons, apocalypses, and ancient identities, between memory and forgetting

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Annette Yoshiko Reed is an American religious historian. She holds the Krister Stendahl Chair at Harvard Divinity School. Reed's research interests span the topics of Second Temple Judaism, early Christianity, and Jewish/Christian relations in Late Antiquity, with particular attention to retheorizing religion, identity, difference, and forgetting. She is the daughter of political scientist Steven Reed and his wife Michiko. .. more

History 52%

Philosophy 20%

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · Mar 30

I'm at the point in my book on *Forgetting* that I am reflecting back on the years during which I've been working on it--from 2018 to now, an eventful era to say the least! 🧵 collecting some bibliography on memory/forgetting in the 2020s, to which I'd love further suggestions too!

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

The Digital Orientalist @digitalorientalist.bsky.social · 1d

#OTD 5 yrs ago: Jonathan Robker writes about online sources for critical editions of biblical texts besides Accordance, BibleWorks, and Logos.

Check it out 👇
#textstudies #DHinpractice #DHtools #biblestudies #critialedition #tbt #repost

digitalorientalist.com/2020/10/09/t...

Trustworthy, Freely Available Primary Sources for Biblical Studies

Though laity and scholars of other disciplines may not know them, most scholars involved in biblical studies will probably be familiar with some kind of software for engaging the primary sources, i…

digitalorientalist.com

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Reposted by Juan Cole, Andrew Jacobs, Annette Yoshiko Reed

Ellen Muehlberger @emuehlbe.bsky.social · 1d

My review of Paula Fredriksen's Ancient Christianities is up at BMCR:

Ancient Christianities: the first five hundred years – Bryn Mawr Classical Review share.google/agnGwlBZmvkJ...

Ancient Christianities: the first five hundred years – Bryn Mawr Classical Review

share.google

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

And-BOO 👻 Jacobs (he/him) @drewjakeprof.bsky.social · 2d

geo/chrono specialization open, but ad flags "expertise in the Roman Imperial or late antique periods" & notes "preference will be given to scholars whose work engages with the diversity and complexity of the Mediterranean world in such areas as ethnicity, gender, environment, or connectivity"

AHA Career Center @historyjobs.bsky.social · 2d

New History Job Posted Today: Assistant Professor of Ancient History | University of Maryland Department of History

Assistant Professor of Ancient History | University of Maryland Department of History

College Park, Maryland, The University of Maryland, College Park Department of History, invites applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position from historians of the Ancient Mediterranean worlds within the broad geographical zone that extends into Asia, Africa, and Europe. Chronological specialization is open. However, expertise in the Roman Imperial or late antique periods in particular aligns with existing areas of teaching and research expertise in the department. Preference will be given to scholars whose work engages with the diversity and complexity of the Mediterranean world in such areas as ethnicity, gender, environment, or connectivity. In addition to exceptional scholarly promise, the successful candidate will demonstrate excellence in teaching. Responsibilities include teaching a general survey of the ancient Mediterranean and the Near East, other lecture courses, and upper-level undergraduate and graduate seminars as they align with the candidate’s interests and departmental requirements, as well as engaging in curriculum development. MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS Education: A Ph.D. in History or a related field is required in hand by August 1, 2026 Experience: Teaching experience at the college or university level is required. PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS We seek candidates whose research, teaching, and service have prepared them to contribute to all the pillars of the College of Arts and Humanities’ Strategic Plan: Transformative Thinking; Boundless Creativity; Expansive Empathy; and Meaningful Futures. Contributions toward those goals and values might include leadership in teaching, mentoring, research, or service toward building an equitable and inclusive scholarly environment and/or increasing access or participation of all individuals equitably and fairly. The University of Maryland, College Park, actively subscribes to a policy of equal employment opportunity, and will not discriminate against any employee or applicant because of race, age, sex, color, sexual orientation, physical or mental disability, religion, ancestry or national origin, marital status, genetic information, political affiliation, and gender identity or expression. This search is contingent upon the availability of funds. Apply Here

dlvr.it

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

Ray E. Boomhower @rboomhower.bsky.social · 3d

"Writing is hard work. A clear sentence is no accident. Very few sentences come out right the first time, or even the third time. Remember this in moments of despair. If you find that writing is hard, it's because it is hard.”
William Zinsser, born on this day in 1922

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 4d

“For entire history of US, federal govt has allowed colleges & univ to grow & flourish acc to their own determination of wht education means. The resulting system is, for all its flaws, the envy of the world…. This admin is trying to bring tht tradition to an end” www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

A Deal That Would End Universities’ Independence

The free-speech provisions of the so-called compact are an exercise in contradiction.

www.theatlantic.com

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

Alan Richardson @alanrichardson.bsky.social · 4d

Indeed. The Penn admin might just wander over the the History Dept and ask what happened to the reputations of German universities after the rise of Nazism. (Berlin and Göttingen were perhaps the two greatest science universities in the world in 1930.)

Philadelphia Science Action @philadelphiascienceaction.substack.com · 4d

"Each concession leaves institutions more entangled with the federal government and more vulnerable to future coercion. Resistance must be strong, early, and sustained, or the space for resistance will vanish."

Read our latest blog post by @dramandar.bsky.social

open.substack.com/pub/philadel...

Why Penn Must Reject Trump’s Higher Ed Compact

By Amanda Rabinowitz Ph.D.

open.substack.com

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 4d

For more on Harry Austryn Wolfson’s research on Christianity & his resistence of the reduction of Judaism to the Judeo- or Judeo-Christian open.substack.com/pub/humanhis...

From the Archives of Prof. Harry Austryn Wolfson: Jewish/Christian Relations in an Age of Judeo-Christian Rhetoric

In an earlier post, I engaged some of the archival materials at Harvard pertaining to Prof.

open.substack.com

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 4d

By a coincidence, I just wrote a Substack on such erasures open.substack.com/pub/humanhis...

Patristics: Jewish Scholarship on Church Fathers and Other Untold Stories

Reflecting on fifty years of the CSPS/ACÉP - Part 4

open.substack.com

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 4d

As HDS’s post on my piece inadvertently demonstrated why this work is so difficult in practice; most prefer easy path of self-congratulating a majority & imposing one perspective VS hard work of understanding across majority/minoritized perspectives. But this is arguably why the work is important +

To engage in such work, we may well need to set aside our yearning for peace at any price. Such work requires making space for tensions to stand without resolution, accepting that honest and inclusive conversations can’t always avoid conflict, and letting multiple stories from multiple perspectives stand as true without assimilating them into one narrative, polarizing them into “two sides,” or otherwise effacing multivocality in the name of harmony.

It is not a goal quite as lofty as peace, let alone “Religion and Just Peace.” But it is perhaps a place to begin.

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 4d

When I speak of hope, it pertains to this friendship across difference—precisely the opposite, thus, of the suggestion just to laud the *Christian* Harvard prof in isolation from his Jewish colleague and friend +

Yet I must confess that I felt some hope when working in the Harvard University Archives and finding those little notes. I found some hope in this smaller story, this local story, which resounds with the reminder that empires may proclaim peace and glorify war and erase difference, but sometimes between individuals, it can be possible to take up the harder, slower, and far more humbling work of talking and listening across difference.

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 4d

The point of my piece, and how it ends, though, is with the part of the story that’s NOT told—Wolfson’s parallel work on the Church Fathers and their friendship as one glimpses in his archives +

Wolfson lauds Moore’s 1927 Judaism for precisely this, including in a talk at Harvard Divinity School where he credits Moore’s efforts with inspiring him to write—as a Jew—a book on philosophy that takes the Church Fathers seriously.48 Within Wolfson’s ample archives at Harvard, one can also glimpse the little story behind this bigger one. His files include tiny pieces of papers, scraps and stray receipts, onto which are written notes between the two.49 Tiny but nevertheless kept. Notes that speak to their friendship.

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 4d

Moore is rightly lauded, not least for his commitment to taking post-Christian Judaism seriously at a time other Christian scholars of Judaism didn’t +

Moore was one of Wolfson’s teachers and played a part in Wolfson’s hiring at Harvard. His efforts thus contributed to the establishment of the very first chair dedicated specifically to Jewish Studies in the United States.46 In addition, Moore—as a Christian—famously wrote a history of Judaism that takes Jewish perspectives and Rabbinic sources seriously.47

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 4d

When we tell the history of research on ancient Judaism, it is conventional to just celebrate those *Christians* who spoke against anti-Judaism; this is how Moore is usually understood, but the habit reinscribes the denial of Jewish agency—inaccurately in this case +

I have read Moore’s “Christian Writers on Judaism” more times than I can count. One of my teachers, John G. Gager (himself a Harvard PhD), always assigned it in his classes. I’ve assigned it in many of my own classes. But I didn’t connect it to the context of the debate here at Harvard about limiting Jewish enrollments until I was working through the archives of his Jewish colleague, Harry Austryn Wolfson, and encountered a 1922 letter in which Wolfson adduces the article in this context.

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 5d

My discussion of Moore is not lauding him for his understanding—it’s about his friendship with Harry Austryn Wolfson, and the hope that I found seeing how this friendship rooted real conversations across difference +

“Moore was a brilliant scholar. It is tempting to credit his rigor and erudition with enabling him to see beyond centuries of erasures, but also to see and name the erasures. What I suspect, however, is that his insights may also pertain to something far more quotidian, but arguably much more powerful—namely: friendship.”

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 5d

Here’s a link to the piece—it traces how Roman rhetoric of “peace” become adapted by late antique Christians to erase Jews bulletin.hds.harvard.edu/empire-and-e... +

Empire and Epistemicide

Precisely at the times when Jews and Christians were most experiencing the violence of the Roman Empire, some of Rome’s rulers were most vociferously claiming to bring and keep peace. By Annette Yoshi...

bulletin.hds.harvard.edu

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Reposted by Andrew Jacobs

Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 5d

Hmm… I wrote a piece about the epistemic erasure of Jews & my institution posted about it in a manner that doesn’t mention Jews—should I be happy they proved my point or upset…? 🤔

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Substack

Patristics: Jewish Scholarship on Church Fathers and Other Untold Stories

Reflecting on fifty years of the CSPS/ACÉP - Part 4 When teaching, I often emphasize to my students that there is no “view from nowhere.” All of us are shaped by our cultural and historical contexts. Likewise, from a theoretical perspective, I often critique scholarly appeals to “objectivity” that presume a disembodiment as ideal and/or possible; it’s pressing to acknowledge every perspective is situated…

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 13d

“Poll: Public Confidence in Higher Ed Growing” www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-t...

Despite the Trump administration’s ongoing attacks on colleges and universities, American confidence in higher education is growing.

According to a poll the Vanderbilt Project on Unity and American Democracy published Thursday, 47 percent of 1,030 Americans surveyed said they have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in higher education institutions, with a net positive rating of 33—up 13 percentage points since 2023. Survey respondents reported more confidence in higher education than in the police (44 percent), the medical system (38 percent) and large tech companies (25 percent)

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Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · 13d

🤔

Sarah E. Bond @sarahebond.bsky.social · 14d

Story here, but like, come on. www.theverge.com/ai-artificia...

Peter Thiel: strict AI regulation will summon the Antichrist

This is a real thing Peter Thiel told a group of tech professionals recently.

www.theverge.com

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

Harvard Divinity School @harvarddivinity.bsky.social · 13d

For the Center for the Study of World Religions, Prof. Francis X. Clooney, S.J. reflects on his work with the immersive early Tamil devotional poetry.

Until One Is Immersed: A Journey through Early Tamil Devotional Poetry | Center for the Study of World Religions

cswr.hds.harvard.edu

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

Karl Jacoby @karl-jacoby.bsky.social · 13d

p.p.s. It is important to connect Hegseth et al's effort to rewrite history to erase the genocide of Native Americans to the Trump Administration's recent attack on the Smithsonian, including the National Museum of the American Indian

nativenewsonline.net/currents/nat...

National Museum of the American Indian Among Smithsonian Museums Under Trump-Era Review

The National Museum of the American Indian—with locations in New York City and Washington, D.C.—is one of eight Smithsonian Institution museums currently undergoing a “comprehensive internal review” t...

nativenewsonline.net

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Reposted by Dustin Mulvaney, Kevin Kenny, Annette Yoshiko Reed

Karl Jacoby @karl-jacoby.bsky.social · 13d

p.s. My essay on the Wounded Knee massacre can be found here (open access!):

www.jstor.org/stable/10.25...

Of Memory and Massacre: A Soldier's Firsthand Account of the “Affair on Wounded Knee” on JSTOR

Karl Jacoby, Of Memory and Massacre: A Soldier's Firsthand Account of the “Affair on Wounded Knee”, The Princeton University Library Chronicle, Vol. 64, No. 2 (Winter 2003), pp. 333-362

www.jstor.org

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed, Candida R. Moss

Sarah E. Bond @sarahebond.bsky.social · 14d

Story here, but like, come on. www.theverge.com/ai-artificia...

Peter Thiel: strict AI regulation will summon the Antichrist

This is a real thing Peter Thiel told a group of tech professionals recently.

www.theverge.com

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

John Garrison Marks @johngmarks.com · 14d

Delivering a webinar about the @aaslh.org ”Reframing History” project to the @alliancetxhistory.bsky.social this evening, helping their members use research-backed tools for communicating about inclusive history in a challenging time.

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

rogueclassicist ~ david meadows @rogueclassicist.bsky.social · 14d

Sardis named a UNESCO World Heritage Site — Harvard Gazette
news.harvard.edu/gazette/stor...

Sardis named a UNESCO World Heritage Site — Harvard Gazette

Designation comes as Harvard’s decadeslong archaeological dig uncovers new secrets from remains of ancient Turkish city.

news.harvard.edu

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Reposted by Martin Paul Eve, Annette Yoshiko Reed

Caroline (Carrie) T. Schroeder @ctschroeder.bsky.social · 14d

NEH Collaborative research grant program now explicitly prohibits digital projects. Output should be a book or journal issue. FFS
www.neh.gov/grants/resea...

Collaborative Research

Supports groups of two or more scholars engaging in significant and sustained research in the humanities.

www.neh.gov

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Reposted by Andrew Jacobs, Annette Yoshiko Reed, Morwenna Ludlow

Ellen Muehlberger @emuehlbe.bsky.social · 14d

Got an idea for a panel in early Christian studies?

Tomorrow's the last day to submit proposals for thematic sessions for next year's NAPS meeting!

Google form is here: t.e2ma.net/click/qiaxmj...

Proposal for Thematic Session with Open Call for Papers NAPS 2026

Propose a session for the 2026 NAPS Meeting with a specific theme to which you will invite submissions from any interested participants.

t.e2ma.net

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Substack

Prof. Martha Himmelfarb and the Study of Second Temple Judaism

My comments at “'One of the Glorious Ones': Celebrating the Career of Martha Himmelfarb," held at Princeton University in May 2022 Next month, Angela Kim Harkins, Matthew Goff, and I are organizing a pre-SBL workshop in Boston, which includes a “Fireside Chat” with Prof. Martha Himmelfarb. I’m excited about it, and I was reminded of the 2022 Princeton University event convened on the occasion of her retirement. Martha was my Doktormutter so I was honored to have a chance to speak a…

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Reposted by Annette Yoshiko Reed

Steve Herman @newsguy.bsky.social · 15d

Forbes - On TikTok, Christian Evangelicals were under the impression that the Rapture was due on Tuesday, but the day came and went without divine judgment. www.forbes.com/sites/danidipl...

The Internet Is Disappointed The Rapture Didn’t Happen

On TikTok, Christian Evangelicals were under the impression that the Rapture was due on Tuesday, but the day has come and gone without divine judgment.

www.forbes.com

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