Todd R. Hanneken, Ph.D.

Ph.D., University of Notre Dame
M.T.S., Harvard University
B.A., University of Chicago

Todd R. Hanneken, Ph.D., studies the Hebrew Bible in the context of Jewish literature in antiquity, including the Dead Sea Scrolls, the non-canonical books, Josephus, Philo and Rabbinic literature.

His publications and presentations focus on apocalyptic literature and the Book of Jubilees, a book that was authoritative among the Dead Sea Scrolls but omitted from European bibles.

Hanneken teaches biblical and related Jewish literature in the context of the variety of interpretations in the Jewish and Christian traditions, historical-critical and contemporary-critical approaches.

Hanneken is the director of the Jubilees Palimpsest Project, an initiative that uses the latest imaging technology to make ancient books and manuscripts available to the public that have not be readable to the human eye for hundreds of years. His work has been supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

The Jubilees Palimpsest Project

The Jubilees Palimpsest project is devoted to recovering illegible text from ancient manuscripts through new tools in digital archaeology.

The project applied advanced digitization techniques to an ancient collection of books attributed to Moses and an interpretation of the Gospel of Luke. These writings reflect major movements and debates in early Judaism and Christianity. Later, they were rejected by the mainstream and nearly lost forever.

The technology allows Hanneken and the project team to distribute, without cost, not only the textual discoveries, but the experience of working with the manuscript as a cultural artifact. For many students and scholars, this interactive online copy will be the closest they come to handling a fifth-century manuscript.

With Morteza Maali Amiri and David W. Messinger, “Colorimetric Characterization of Multispectral Imaging Systems for Visualization of Historical Artifacts,” Journal of Cultural Heritage.

“The Origin and Development of the Prohibition of Eating on Blood.” Catholic Biblical Quarterly.

“What to Think About When Thinking About Digitization of Manuscripts.” Digital Philology.

Co-Editor, with Marilyn Lundberg, The Textual History of the Bible Volume 3D: Science, Technology, and Textual Criticism. Leiden: Brill 2022 print and online.

Theological Questions, Chicago: Atla Open Press, 2021.

“Early Judaism and Modern Technology.” In Early Judaism and Its Modern Interpreters Second Edition. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature Press (2020).

“Ten-Times-Tested Abraham in the Book of Jubilees.” In Testing and Temptation in Early Jewish and Christian Literature, edited by Loren T. Stuckenbruck and Daniel Smith. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament II. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck (2020).

“Texts Associated with Prophets.” In T&T Clark Companion to Second Temple Judaism, edited by Loren T. Stuckenbruck and Daniel Gurtner. London: T&T Clark (2019).

“Jubilees.” In Early Jewish Literature: An Introduction and Reader edited by Archie T. Wright, Ron Herms and Brad Embry. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans (2017).

“New Technology for Imaging Unreadable Manuscripts and Other Artifacts: Integrated Spectral Reflectance Transformation Imaging (Spectral RTI).” In Ancient Worlds in a Digital Culture, edited by Claire Clivaz and David Hamidovic. Digital Biblical Studies 1. Leiden: Brill (2016), pp. 180–195.

“Moses Has His Interpreters: Understanding the Legal Exegesis in Acts 15 from the Precedent in Jubilees.” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 77 (2015), pp. 686–706.

“The Sin of the Gentiles: The Prohibition of Eating Blood in the Book of Jubilees.” Journal for the Study of Judaism 45 (2015), pp. 1–27.

“The Book of Jubilees in Latin.” In The Textual History of the Bible. Armin Lange, General Editor; Matthias Henze, Editor of Volume 2, DeuteroCanonical Writings. Leiden: Brill (2015).

“The Use of the Book of the Watchers in Jubilees.” In The Fallen Angels Traditions: Second Temple Developments and Reception History. Edited by Angela Kim Harkins, Kelley Coblentz Bautch, and John C. Endres, S.J. Catholic Biblical Quarterly Monograph Series 53. Washington, D.C.: Catholic Biblical Association of America (2014), pp. 25–68.

The Subversion of the Apocalypses in the Book of Jubilees, Early Judaism and Its Literature 34. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012.

“The Status and Interpretation of Jubilees in 4Q390.” In A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam, edited by Eric F. Mason, Samuel I. Thomas, Alison Schofield and Eugene Ulrich. Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism 153/I. Leiden: Brill (2012), pp. 407–428.

“Creation and New Creation in the Hebrew Bible and Early Jewish Literature.” In God, Grace, and Creation, edited by Philip Rossi. Maryknoll: Orbis (2010), pp. 79–93.

“The Book of Jubilees Among the Apocalypses.” Dissertation, University of Notre Dame, 2008. online

“Angels and Demons in the Book of Jubilees and Contemporary Apocalypses.” Henoch 28, no. 2 (2006), pp. 11–25.