Allison L. Gray, Ph.D.

Ph.D., M.A., The University of Chicago
M.A., The University of Chicago Divinity School
B.A., University of Puget Sound

Allison L. Gray, Ph.D., studies the New Testament and early Christian literature of the first four centuries CE. Her current research focuses on tales about saints, martyrs, and miracle workers, and she examines how biographers adopt and adapt features of Greco-Roman literature from their contemporary world to present Christianity to a variety of readers. She is more broadly interested in the many ways early Christian writers (including the evangelists) thought about education and the ongoing role of texts in shaping religious people and religious communities. What work did ancient authors think their stories could accomplish? How do religious communities today use stories to describe or motivate social change?

Gray teaches courses on New Testament texts and their historical contexts, including the religions and philosophical traditions of the Roman Empire. She also teaches a two-semester sequence of Koine Greek, the language used by New Testament authors and their contemporaries. Her classes are designed to introduce students to the history of New Testament composition and interpretation; courses also offer students practical experience applying historical-critical methods and various contemporary interpretive lenses to the academic study of the Bible and early Christianity.

Gray is the recipient of the 2019 Alice Wright Franzke Feminist Award and the 2020 Distinguished Faculty Award. She was also invited to teach a week-long Bible study series on Reforming the Household of God in August 2019 at Holden Village in Chelan, Washington.

What Does the Bible Say About Education? (New City Press, 2023).

Reforming the Household of God: Paul’s Models of Belonging (Paulist Press, 2022).

Gregory of Nyssa as Biographer: Weaving Lives for Virtuous Readers, Studies and Texts in Antiquity and Christianity, Volume 123 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2021).  

“Passing Notes and Throwing Rocks: Catechesis and Episcopal Authority in the Life of Gregory Thaumaturgus,” Vigiliae Christianae 74.5 (November 2020): 515-539.

“Marriage, New Testament,” Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception Volume 17, ed. Christine Helmer, Steven L. McKenzie, Thomas Römer, Jens Schröter, Barry Dov Walfish, and Eric J. Ziolkowski. Boston: De Gruyter, 2019. pp. 998-1000.

“‘Away with the Atheists!’ The Motivations for Early Christian Martyrdom,” The Bible Today, Volume 55, Number 3 (May/June 2017): 203-210.

Teaching Materials

“Graphic Insight: Hands-on Biblical Reception History” The Wabash Center Journal on Teaching 2.1 (March 2021): 223. https://serials.atla.com/wabashcenter/article/view/1809

Study Guide for Course Hero – The Sermon on the Mount (invited subject matter expert) 

Study Guide for Course Hero – The New Testament (writer and editor)

Study Guide for Course Hero – The Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (editor)

Videos and teaching materials for the La Biblia Project at https://labiblia.stmarytx.edu