Amy Kalmanofsky

Biography

BA, Wesleyan University; MHL and Rabbinical Ordination, Reconstructionist Rabbinical College; MPhil and PhD, The Jewish Theological Seminary.

Dr. Amy Kalmanofsky, Blanche and Romie Shapiro Professor of Bible, is dean of Albert A. List College of Jewish Studies, JTS’s undergraduate school, and dean of the Gershon Kekst Graduate School. As professor of Bible, she teaches courses on biblical literature, religion, and feminist interpretation of the Bible. In her writing and teaching, Dr. Kalmanofsky combines contemporary ideas and critical methods with traditional text study, teaching students to be careful, creative interpreters of Torah.

Dr. Kalmanofsky’s first book, Terror All Around: The Rhetoric of Horror in the Book of Jeremiah (T&T Clark, 2008) uses horror theory to argue that the biblical prophets constructed monsters and crafted language that worked to terrify their audience. Her book The Dangerous Sisters of the Hebrew Bible (Fortress Press, 2014) explores the biblical portrayal of sisters and sisterhoods and argues that both play a vital role in the Bible’s narrative. Her book Gender-Play in the Hebrew Bible (Routledge, 2017) examines the ways in which the Bible defies and challenges its gender norms. Her book The Power of Equivocation: Complex Readers and Readings of the Hebrew Bible (Fortress, 2022) addresses the Bible’s inherent complexity, as well as the complexity of those who seek to read the Bible critically, generously, and honestly.

Dr. Kalmanofsky also has written numerous articles examining the biblical representation of women and the roles women play in the Bible, as well as articles that consider the biblical rhetoric of violence. She serves on two editorial boards: The Journal of the Feminist Studies in Religion and the Biblical Interpretation Series.

Publications

• “Grasping the Threshold:  Family Violence in Judges 19,” in The Bible and Violence (eds. Chris Greenough, Mmapula Dian Kebaneilwe, Johnathan Jodamus and Johanna Stiebert; T&T Clark/Bloomsbury, forthcoming 2023.
• “Hosea 1-3 and the Ties that Bind Us to the Marriage Metaphor,” in The Oxford Handbook of the Book of Hosea (ed. Brad Kelle; Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2023).
• “Moses and his Problematic Masculinity,” Biblical Masculinities Volume 3 (ed. Ovidiu Creangă; London and New York:  T&T Clark/Bloomsbury, 2019).
• “Poetic Violence in the Book of Jeremiah,” in The Oxford Handbook of the Book of Jeremiah (ed. Louis Stulman; Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2018).
• “Gender and Ezekiel,” in The Oxford Handbook of the Book of Ezekiel (ed. Corrine L. Carvalho; Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2018).
• Sacred Text and Sexual Violence, editor, Feminist Studies in Religion, forthcoming.
• “The Sound and the Fury:  Women and Suffering in Ezekiel and Lamentations,” in Reading Lamentations Intertextually (New York and London:  T&T Clark, forthcoming).
• Gender-Play in the Hebrew Bible:  The Ways the Bible Challenges Its Gender Norms (New York and London:  Routledge, 2017).
• “Israel’s Open Sore in the Book of Jeremiah,” JBL 135:2 (2016), pp. 247–263.
• “Body Language:  A Postmodern Interpretation of the Body in the Biblical Prophets,” in The Oxford Handbook of the Prophets (ed. Carolyn J. Sharp; Oxford University Press, 2016) pp. 548–568.
• “A Perspective on the Trends and Challenges of Biblical Studies.” Expositions 9, no. 1 (2015), 114–20.
• “Gender-bending in the Bible.” The Bible and Interpretation (June 2015).
• ” ‘As She Did, Do to Her!’: Jeremiah’s OAN as Revenge Fantasies.” In Declare Ye Among the Nations: Oracles Against the Nations in Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, edited by Else K. Holt, Hyun Chul Paul Kim, and Andrew Mein. New York and London: Bloomsbury, 2014.
• “Bare Naked: A Gender Analysis of the Naked Body in Jeremiah 13.” In Jeremiah Invented, edited by Carolyn J. Sharp and Else K. Holt. New York and London: Bloomsbury, 2014.
• Dangerous Sisters of the Hebrew Bible. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014.
• “Women of God: Maternal Grief and Religious Response in 1 Kings 17 and 2 Kings 4.” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 36, no. 1 (September 2011): 55–74.
• “The Dangerous Sisters of Jeremiah and Ezekiel.” Journal of Biblical Literature 130, no. 2 (Summer 2011): 299–312.
• “How to Find Monsters in the Bible and Why It Matters.” Bibliana (January 2011): 22–27 [in Danish].
• “The Monstrous Feminine in the Book of Jeremiah.” In Jeremiah (Dis)placed: New Directions in Writing/Reading Jeremiah, edited by A. R. Pete Diamond and Louis Stulman, 190–208. New York and London: T&T Clark, 2011.
• “Outside Insiders and the Future of Feminist Biblical Studies.” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 25, no. 2 (Fall 2009): 129–33.
• Terror All Around: The Rhetoric of Horror in the Book of Jeremiah. New York and London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2008.
• The Torah: A Women’s Commentary, central commentary to Numbers 4:21–7:89; supplementary commentary to Numbers 16:1–18:32. New York: Union of Reform Judaism, 2008.
• “Israel’s Baby: The Horror of Childbirth in the Biblical Prophets.” Biblical Interpretation 16, no. 1 (2008): 60–82.
• “Their Heart Cried Out to God: Gender and Prayer in the Book of Lamentations.” In A Question of Sex? Gender and Difference in the Hebrew Bible and Beyond, edited by Deborah W. Rooke, 53–65. Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2007.

Lectures

• “The Motif of Sacrifice in the Bible”
• “Fatal Attractions: The Problem of Desire in the Biblical Text” 
• “Women in Power and Powerful Women in the Bible” 
• “Bodies and Theology in the Bible” 
• “Is the Bible a Patriarchal Text?”

Learn with Dr. Kalmanofsky at JTS Torah Online