Youth Ministry Institute

Dr. Michal Beth Dinkler is Assistant Professor of New Testament at Yale Divinity School. Professor Dinkler’s research lies at the intersection of New Testament and literary theory, focusing especially on the usefulness of narratological theories for the study of New Testament narratives. Her first book, Silent Statements: Narrative Representations of Speech and Silence in the Gospel of Luke (2013), demonstrates how close attention to speech and silence illuminates the plot, characterization, themes, and narrative rhetoric of Luke’s Gospel. Her second book, Literary Theory and New Testament Scholarship (YUP, in progress), guides students and scholars of the New Testament through the maze of heterogeneous phenomena associated with contemporary literary theory, and offers practical examples that illustrate the interpretive benefits of an updated literary approach to the New Testament. Professor Dinkler’s work has been published in journals such as the Journal of Biblical Literature, Journal for the Study of the New Testament, and Biblical Interpretation, among others. She co-chairs the Speech and Talk: Discourses and Social Practices in the Ancient Mediterranean World Section of the Society of Biblical Literature and serves on the Steering Committee for the Book of Acts Section. She is a candidate for ordination in the Presbyterian Church (USA).