Dr. Uriel Simonsohn
Vita
2013–now Lecturer, Department of Middle Eastern History, University of Haifa.
2010–2013 Post-doctoral fellow, The Martin Buber Society of Fellows, The Hebrew
University of Jerusalem.
2008–2010 Post-doctoral fellow, The Institute for Religious Studies, Leiden University.
Education
Ph.D. in Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University, 2008. Dissertation: „Overlapping
Jurisdictions: Confessional Boundaries and Judicial Choice among Christians and Jews under Early Muslim Rule.“ Committee: Mark Cohen, Michael Cook, Peter Brown, William Jordan.
M. Phil. in Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University, 2005. Generals fields: Late Antiquity,
early Islamic social history, Near Eastern Jewish history.
M.A. (cum laude) in Jewish and Islamic history, Tel Aviv University, 2003. Thesis: „The Status
of the Dhimmis within the Fatimid Imamate in Egypt.“ Committee: David Wasserstein, Camilla Adang.
B.A. in Modern Middle Eastern and Medieval Jewish History, Tel Aviv University, 2000.
Research Concentrations
- Early Islamic history
- Late antique and medieval Jewish history
- Late antique Christianity, Eastern Christianity
- Medieval Near Eastern and Mediterranean social and religious history
- Narrative and identity in Islamic and Eastern Christian historiography
- Gaonica
- Judeo-Arabic culture and society
- Intellectual and legal literature of the Eastern churches
- Inter-religious encounters
- Conversion to Islam
- Religiously-mixed families
Functions within the Center
Visiting Scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study Konstanz (July–August 2016)
Research project “Non-Muslim Women as Conduits of Religious Ideas and Practices in the Early Islamic Period”
Publications
A Common Justice: The Legal Allegiances of Christians and Jews under Early Islam. Divinations:
Rereading Late Ancient Religion, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011
„Communal Membership despite Religious Exogamy: A Critical Examination of East and West Syrian Legal
Sources of the Late Sasanian – Early Islamic periods“, JNES (2016) forthcoming
„The Introduction and Formalization of Civil Law in the East Syrian Church in the Late Sasanian – Early
Islamic Periods“, History Compass, 14/5 (2016): 231-44.
„The Legal and Social Bonds of Jewish Apostates and Their Spouses according to Gaonic Responsa“, Jewish Quarterly Review 105.4 (2015): 417-39.
„The Pact of ʿUmar in Religious and Cultural Contexts“, Historia, 35/1 (2015) [In Hebrew]: 31-64.
„Conversion to Islam: A Case Study for the Use of Legal Sources“, History Compass, 11/8 (2013): 647-662.
„‘Halting Between Two Opinions’: Conversion and Apostasy in Early Islam“, Medieval Encounters, 19/3
(2013): 342-370.
„The Biblical Narrative in the Annales of Saʿīd ibn Baṭrīq and the Question of Medieval Byzantine-
Orthodox Identity“, Islam and Christian Muslim Relations 22/1 (2011): 37-55.
„The Christians Whose Force is Hard: Non-Ecclesiastical Judicial Authorities in the Early Islamic
Period“, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 53/4 (2010): 579-620.
„Seeking Justice among the ‘Outsiders’: Christian Recourse to Non-Ecclesiastical Judicial Systems under
Early Islam“, Church History and Religious Culture 89/1-2 (2009): 191-216.
„Communal Boundaries Reconsidered: Jews and Christians Appealing to Muslim Authorities in the
Medieval Near East“, Jewish Studies Quarterly 14/4 (2007): 328-363.
Contact
e-mail usimonsohn[at]gmail.com