A native of Kansas, Bruce Birch attends the United Methodist Church and is an ordained member of the Baltimore-Washington Annual Conference. He has been a delegate to General and Jurisdictional Conferences of that denomination and served on its General Board of Church and Society. He lectured and consulted in a wide range of ecumenical events and taught at Yale, Iowa Wesleyan College and Erskine College before coming to Wesley in 1971. He serves on the council of the Society of Biblical Literature and the steering committee of the chief Academic Officers Society of The Association of Theological Schools. His interests include golf and tennis. He is currently writing articles for the New Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible.
Courses Taught:
- Introduction to Hebrew Bible
- Old Testament Exegesis: I and II Samuel
- Old Testament Exegesis: Job
- Hebrew Bible and the Arts (co-taught with Deborah Sokolove)
Education:
- Southwestern College, Kansas, B.A.
- Southern Methodist University, B.D.
- Yale University, M.A., M.Phil, Ph.D.
- Post-doctoral study at Tűbingen University, West Germany
Publications:
- What Does the Lord Require?
- Singing the Lord's Song
- Let Justice Roll Down: The Old Testament, Ethics and Christian Life
- Hosea, Joel, Amos for the Westminster Bible companion
- To Love As We Are Loved: The Bible and Relationships.
- With Larry Rasmussen, co-authored The Predicament of the Prosperous and Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life.
- One of the Old Testament editors for the New Interpreter's Bible and contributed the commentary on 1 and 2 Samuel.
- With Walter Brueggemann, Terence Fretheim, and David Petersen, co-authored A Theological Introduction to the Old Testament, now in its second edition.
- Co-authored with Lewis A Parks Ducking Spears, Dancing Madly: A Biblical Model of Church Leadership.
- Originator and editor of the curriculum, Steward: Living as disciples in Everyday Life.
