As part of the opening event of the ICCJ international conference in Boston on Sunday, June 18, Prof. Joseph Sievers will be awarded the 2023 SEELISBERG PRIZE
The SEELISBERG PRIZE is named in memory of the ground-breaking gathering that occurred in the small Swiss village of Seelisberg from 30 July to 5 August 1947 to address perennial Christian teachings of contempt for Jews and Judaism. It issued the very influential "A Call to the Churches: The Ten Points of Seelisberg" which is widely recognized as inaugurating the transformation in relations between Jews and Christians that has unfolded over the past seventy years
The SEELISBERG PRIZE is awarded annually (since 2022) by the International Council of Christians and Jews (which originated out of the Seelisberg conference) and the Center for Intercultural Theology and Religions at the University of Salzburg.
It honours individuals who have played major roles through their scholarship and teaching in advancing the rapprochement between Jews and Christians.
The 2023 Seelisberg Prize awardee, Dr. Joseph Sievers, was born and raised in Germany and began his studies at the University of Vienna and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He holds a Ph.D. in Ancient History from Columbia University (1981) and a Lic. Theol. from the Pontifical Gregorian University (1997). He has taught at CUNY, Seton Hall U., Fordham U., and
other institutions in the U.S., Italy, and Israel.
From 1991 until his retirement in 2023, he taught Jewish history and literature of the Hellenistic period at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome, where he was a full Professor. In addition, from 2003 to 2009 he served as Director of the Cardinal Bea Centre for Judaic Studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University.
Since October 28, 1965, he has been a member of the Focolare Movement, with whose Center for Interreligious Dialogue he has collaborated since 2002.
Dr. Sievers has published several books and numerous articles, primarily in the areas of Second Temple History (especially Flavius Josephus) and Christian-Jewish relations. With Amy-Jill Levine, he edited The Pharisees (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2021; Italian translation Milan: San Paolo, 2021; German translation scheduled for 2024).
