Qualifications:

M.A. (Cantab); M.Phil. (Cantab); Ph.D. (Cantab).

History:

Research Fellow in Old Testament, Tyndale House, Cambridge

Affiliated Lecturer in Hebrew and Aramaic, Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Cambridge

Senior Lecturer in New Testament in School of Divinity, History and Philosophy King's College, University of Aberdeen

Deputy Head of Divinity, History and Philosophy, University of Aberdeen

Currently:
Warden, Tyndale House, Cambridge
Honorary Senior Lecturer in Biblical Studies at the University of Aberdeen

Current Research Includes:

• The use of the early versions of the New Testament
• The structure of the opening of John’s Gospel
• The Rephaim in the Old Testament

Publications:  Books:

For some of the online publications you will need to access the free fonts SPAtlantis, SPEdessa, SPIonic, or SPTiberian at http://rosetta.reltech.org/TC/fonts/. Unfortunately it has not been possible to ensure that Hebrew or Syriac word-wrap appear correctly on all browsers, and for pagination reference needs to be made to the originals.

• Early Syriac Translation Technique and the Textual Criticism of the Greek Gospels(Texts and Studies; Gorgias Press, 2004).
  • Contents
  • Reviews
  • Appendices
• Studies in the Syntax of the Peshitta of 1 Kings (Monographs of the Peshitta Institute, Leiden 12; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2001).
  • Contents
  • Chapter 5
  • Summary
  • Reviews
  • Image
• P.J. Williams, A.D. Clarke, P.M. Head and D. Instone-Brewer, eds., The New Testament in Its First Century Setting: Essays on Context and Background in Honour of B.W. Winter on His 65th Birthday (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004).
  • Reviews
• Editor, Syriac Word Sources, Senses and Functions (Perspectives on Syriac Linguistics; Gorgias Press, in progress).
  

Select Articles:

• 'The Translation of Greek alpha-privatives in the Syriac Epistles', in P.J. Williams, eds., Syriac Word Sources, Senses and Functions (Perspectives on Syriac Linguistics; Gorgias Press, forthcoming 2007).
• 'On Matching Syriac Words with Their Greek Vorlage', in T.C. Falla et al., eds. (Perspectives on Syriac Linguistics; Gorgias Press, forthcoming 2006).
• 'Is God Moral? On the Saul Narratives as Tragedy', in R.P. Gordon, ed., The God of Israel: Studies of an Inimitable Deity (CUP, forthcoming).
• 'P115 and the Number of the Beast', Tyndale Bulletin (2006, forthcoming).
• 'On the Representation of Sahidic within the Apparatus of the Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Graece', Journal of Coptic Studies 8 (2006) 123-25.
• 'But Are the Variants All Real?', Bible League Quarterly 423 (2005) 135-38.
• 'Are the Biblical Rephaim and the Ugaritic RPUM Healers?', in R.P. Gordon and J. de Moor, eds., The Old Testament in Its World (OTS 52; Leiden: Brill, 2005) 266-75.
• 'The Linguistic Background to Jesus' Dereliction Cry (Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34)', in P.J. Williams, A.D. Clarke, P.M. Head and D. Instone-Brewer, eds., The New Testament in Its First Century Setting: Essays on Context and Background in Honour of B.W. Winter on His 65th Birthday (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004) 1-12.
• ‘The International Syriac Language Project (ISLP)’, Hugoye 7.1 (2004).
• 'Beginning to Study the Old Testament', in Philip Duce and Daniel Strange, eds., Encountering God's Word: Beginning Biblical Studies (Leicester: Apollos, 2003) 13-64.
• 'Textual Criticism', in Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch (2003) 834-41.
• 'Lying Spirits Sent by God? The Case of Micaiah's Prophecy', in Paul Helm and Carl Trueman, eds., The Trustworthiness of God: Perspectives on the Nature of Scripture (Leicester: Apollos, 2002) 58-66.
• 'Israel outside the Land: The Transjordanian Tribes in 1 Chronicles 5', in V. Philips Long, David W. Baker and Gordon J. Wenham, eds., Windows into Old Testament History: Evidence, Argument, and the Crisis of 'Biblical Israel' (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002) 147-60.
• 'The Difference between the Roots mlt and plt', Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 114 (2002) 438-42.
• ‘Bread and the Peshitta in Matthew 16:11-12 and 12:4’, Novum Testamentum 48 (2001) 331-33.
• 'Some Problems in Determining the Vorlage of Early Syriac Versions of the NT', New Testament Studies 47 (2001) 537-43.
• ‘“According to all” in MT and the Peshitta’, Zeitschrift für Althebraistik 12 (1999) 107-109.
• ‘The LXX of 1 Chronicles 5:1-2 as an Exposition of Genesis 48-49’, Tyndale Bulletin 49 (1998) 369-71. 
• ‘TMR in 1 Kings ix 18’, Vetus Testamentum 46 (1997) 262-65.
• 18 articles some published and some forthcoming in the Semantics of Ancient Hebrew Database.

Reviews Include:

• Joanna Weinberg, Azariah de' Rossi's Observations on the Syriac New Testament: A Critique of the Vulgate by a Sixteenth-century Jew, Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies Volume 9, Number 1 (January 2006).
• Cyrus H. Gordon and Gary A. Rendsburg, Eblaitica: Essays on the Ebla Archives and the Eblaite Language, Volume 4, Review of Biblical Literature, 2003.
• Colin R. Nicholl, From Hope to Despair in Thessalonica: Situating 1 and 2 Thessalonians, Review of Biblical Literature, 2004.
• Carroll D. Osburn, The Text of the Apostolos in Epiphanius of Salamis, Review of Biblical Literature, 2005.
• Peter M. Head and P.J. Williams, ‘Q Review’, Tyndale Bulletin 54.1 (2003) 119-44. This includes a lengthy analysis of Maurice Casey, An Aramaic Approach to Q (Cambridge: CUP, 2002).
• Ulrich Luz. Matthew 8-20, in TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism: Volume 8 (2003)
• E. Jan Wilson, The Old Syriac Gospels: Studies and Comparative Translations, Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies Volume 5, Number 2 (July 2002).
• ‘A Study on Translation Technique in the Peshitta to Jeremiah’, Aramaic Studies 1.2 (2003) 289-98. An extensive critical view of Gillian Greenberg, Translation Technique in the Peshitta to Jeremiah (Leiden: Brill, 2002).
• Riad Aziz Kassis, The Book of Proverbs & Arabic Proverbial Works, Tyndale Bulletin 51.1 (2000) 151-54.
• M.P. Weitzman, The Syriac Version of the Old Testament: An Introduction, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Series 3, 10, I (2000) 85-88.

Other Reviews:

• European Journal of Theology
• Evangelicals Now
• Journal for the Study of the New Testament Book List
• Journal of Semitic Studies
• Journal of Theological Studies
• Scottish Bulletin of Evangelical Theology
• Scottish Journal of Theology
• The Society for Old Testament Study Book List
• Themelios
• The Book List of Vetus Testamentum

Collaboration:

• International Greek New Testament Project
• International Syriac Language Project
• Semantics of Ancient Hebrew Database
• Syriac Interlinear Project
• New English translation of the Old Testament Peshitta
• Evangelical Textual Criticism Blog

Other:

• The Biesenthal Collection and the Aberdeen Codex of the Hebrew Bible - Interview with Gill Smith for BBC Greater Manchester Radio's 'It's Kosher' 13.5.04 (1.02MB MP3 file)
• The Great Pointing Crisis (a piece I wrote to help my students in Cambridge learn how to point Hebrew)