James W. Barker, PhD’11, has been awarded the 2014 Paul J. Achtemeier Award for New Testament Scholarship. Barker, a visiting assistant professor of religion at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, was honored for his essay “Ancient Compositional Practices and the Gospels: A Reassessment.”
The Achtemeier Award was established to stimulate the finest and most penetrating work in New Testament studies and to foster the future of biblical scholarship. Recipients must have completed their doctorates within the past decade.
Barker, who received his doctorate from the Graduate Department of Religion, also was selected as the 2014 Society of Biblical Literature Regional Scholar for the Midwest after presenting “Micro-Conflation and the Synoptic Problem: A Reappraisal.” Barker’s doctoral dissertation, “John’s Use of Matthew,” is under contract with Fortress Press, and his article “The Reconstruction of Kaige/Quinta Zechariah 9,9” is forthcoming in the journal Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft.