I wrote my Ph.D. dissertation under the direction of Prof. (emeritus) Michael Stone on early Jewish and Christian exegesis of the book of Daniel and from its completion (1986) the Dept. of Comparative Religion has been my academic home at the Hebrew University. My teaching touches on different aspects of the history of Christianity with an emphasis on the period of the early Church.

In addition to extended periods of chairing the Department, it has been my privilege to serve as the academic director of the Division of Graduate Studies of the Rothberg School fro Overseas Students, the Center for the Study of Christianity, and “Amirim”, the Hebrew University undergraduate honors program

My fields of research include Philo of Alexandria and Jewish Hellenism, Origen and early Christian rationalism, and the relations between philosophy and religion in Late Antiquity. My new book examines the nature of the teacher-student relationship in the school of Origen in Caesarea as part of a larger ancient literary and educational pattern.