Nordic New Testament Conference

Call for papers

New Testament scholars in the Nordic and Baltic countries, who either hold a PhD degree or are enrolled in a doctoral degree programme, are invited to submit proposals by 15 January 2025. Please send your proposal to nntc2026@lir.gu.se, using “Proposal” as the subject line. In the e-mail, specify your name and academic affiliation. Also specify for which of the below seminars your proposal is intended, if any; it is also perfectly fine to propose a paper that falls outside the seminar descriptions, and the committee will find or create an appropriate context for it. 

The proposals will be reviewed by the conference committee and confirmations of acceptance will be sent out by mid-January 2026.

Seminar 1: Apocalypticism in the NT

The focus of this seminar is on new perspectives on apocalypticism in the New Testament and its environment. The participants are urged to look for connections between early Christian apocalyptic writings, but contributions focusing on one piece of literature are also welcome. Possible objects of investigation include, but are not limited to, the Book of Revelation, the Synoptic Apocalypse, apocalypticism in the Epistles, as well as other early Christian literature where influence from the NT is traceable. We warmly welcome methods like narrative, rhetorical and social studies, as well as innovative reception-historical approaches about the impact of NT apocalypticism on more recent culture. Traditional exegetical views and methods, including textual criticism, are also appreciated.

Seminar 2: Graeco-Roman society and literature and the NT

We welcome papers for a seminar focusing on the relationship between New Testament texts and the Greek and Roman cultures of antiquity. Topics relevant for this seminar include, among others, the role played by ancient education and rhetoric in the production of New Testament texts, the authors’ use of classical literature, the reception and negotiation of dominant cultural values, and the material conditions for composing and collecting early Christian texts.

Seminar 3: Jewish texts and traditions in early Christianity

This seminar invites papers that deal with the subject of Jewish texts and traditions found in early Christianity. The topic of Hebrew Bible quotations and allusions in the New Testament has been, and continues to be, an engaging question, and especially to which extent the original text has influence the later text and tradition. Another subject of interest is how Jewish traditions affected and shaped the identity formation of the early Christian movement and how the movement negotiated its origins. Papers engaging with the question of how Jewish texts and traditions influenced and shaped the early Christian movement are all welcome to this seminar.

Seminar 4: Power, hierarchies and asymmetries and the NT

For this seminar, we welcome papers on power, hierarchies and asymmetries and the New Testament. This may include papers analysing power, hierarchies and asymmetries in New Testament texts, early Christian writings or in the later New Testament reception history. It may also include papers that apply theories and methods engaging with power, hierarchies and asymmetries to New Testament texts and their reception.

Seminar 5: Receptions of the NT

Sometimes a distinction is made between reception, which virtually refers to any response to the Bible or its books, and reception history, which is defined as the academic process of identifying which of these potentially infinite responses are considered significant. In this seminar, no such distinction is made. We invite papers on the reception of the Bible that seeks to examine the multiple responses (broadly defined) that are produced in the interplay between texts, traditions, and receivers including translations, material artefacts, manuscripts, and cultural expressions. We do not assume an underlying sense of reception of biblical texts as profound whether it is their importance for history or ability to affect the reader. We encourage proposals that explore both the significant and insignificant, the reverent and irreverent receptions of the New Testament in all of its beauty or ugliness.

Seminar 6: Socio-cognitive and evolutionary approaches to the NT

Papers are invited for this seminar that discuss New Testament and related texts from the perspective of human behaviour, broadly understood. Various theoretical and methodological approaches are welcome, particularly the heuristic use of social-scientific, psychological, anthropological, evolutionary, developmental, and cognitive perspectives.

Special session: PhD projects in progress

In a special plenary session, PhD candidates will give short oral presentations of their work in progress and receive feedback from other conferences attendees. PhD candidates interested in presenting in this session are invited to submit the working title and an abstract of their ongoing thesis project, together with information on when they started the project and when they expect it to be completed. PhD candidates who present in this session are more than welcome also to propose a paper for a seminar.

Keynote lectures will be given by the following speakers:

Karin Neutel, Umeå University

Kasper Bro Larsen, Aarhus University

Marianne Bjelland Kartzow, University of Oslo

Outi Lehtipuu, University of Helsinki

Rúnar Már Thorsteinsson, University of Iceland

Sign up for regular updates about the conference by sending an e-mail to nntc2026@lir.gu.se

Conference committee

Tobias Hägerland (coordinator)

Matthew Larsen (Denmark)

Lotta Valve (Finland)

Sigurvin Lárus Jónsson (Iceland)

Anders Martinsen (Norway)

Thomas Kazen (Sweden)

Ellen Aasland Reinertsen (doctoral students representative)

Lukas Hagel (doctoral students representative)