Jan Joosten | |
---|---|
Born | Ekeren, Belgium | 17 May 1959
Criminal charges | Possession of images and videos of child pornography |
Criminal penalty | One year in prison |
Ecclesiastical career | |
Religion | Christianity |
Church | United Protestant Church in Belgium |
Academic background | |
Alma mater | |
Academic work | |
Discipline | Biblical studies |
Institutions |
Jan Joosten (born 17 May 1959) is a Belgian biblical scholar,former pastor,and convicted sex offender. [1] [2] From 2014 to 2020,he was Regius Professor of Hebrew at the University of Oxford. [3] He was previously,and then concurrently,a professor at the University of Strasbourg,a position he started in 1994 and maintained alongside his chair in Oxford. [4] [5] [6] In June 2020,he was found guilty of possessing child pornography,and was dismissed from his chair at Oxford. [1] [7] He retired from his Strasbourg position in 2021.
His areas of interest are the Septuagint,Syriac versions of the Bible,a biblical manuscript found at Qumran,and the Diatessaron. He is considered one of the most distinguished biblical scholars of his generation. [8]
Joosten obtained a licentiate in theology in Brussels (1977–81) followed by a master's in Princeton (1981–82). He then earned two doctorates,one in Semitic languages at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1982–88) and another in theology,again in Brussels (1988–94). He received a French habilitation through Strasbourg (1994). [9]
After these qualifications,Joosten worked as Professor Old Testament at a school of theology in Butare,Rwanda. He then served as a pastor for six years in Belgium and worked at the Brussels Faculty for Protestant Theology. [1] From 1994 to 2004,he was Professor of Biblical Philology in Strasbourg;from 2004 to 2021,he was Professor of Old Testament in Strasbourg. From 2014 to 2020,Joosten held his chair in Oxford.
He was,until June 2020,also a member of the Society of Biblical Literature. Joosten was president of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies. [10] As of Friday 3 July 2020,Joosten was no longer employed by Oxford University nor was he a trustee of Christ Church College,and he was no longer affiliated in any way with the institution. [7]
Joosten maintained his position at Strasbourg during his time in Oxford and returned to it once dismissed. He retired,after serving his sentence,in 2021.
On 18 June 2020,Joosten was sentenced by the Saverne (he lives in the Bas-Rhin region) criminal court to one year in prison and placed on the sex offender registry in France for holding 27,000 images and one thousand videos of child pornography,including images of children being raped. [1] [2] [11] Joosten admitted to offences dating from 2014 to May 2020 after being exposed by Strasbourg LION (laboratoire d’investigation opérationnelle du numérique) as part of a lengthy investigation. [12] Joosten downloaded the images over a six-year period. He was 'relieved to be arrested'. [13] He described his addiction to pornographic images and videos of children as a "secret garden" that contradicted who he is as a person. [14]
On his conviction,he was not immediately incarcerated. His sentence would be supervised,and he would have to complete a three-year programme of treatment. [1] He was prohibited from any activity bringing him into contact with minors. Joosten has four children. [1]
Rémi Gounelle,the Dean of the Facultéde théologie protestante de Strasbourg,released this statement following Joosten's arrest:
Nous sommes tous tombés de haut. Il n'y avait aucune suspicion de ce genre, aucun problème avec les étudiants. C'est une affaire moralement très choquante mais qui ne remet pas en cause les grandes compétences pédagogiques et scientifiques de Jan Joosten. C’est surtout profondément triste. Jan est tombé dans une forme d'addiction dont il n'a pas réussi à sortir. Il luttait contre ses pulsions négatives sans parvenir à y échapper. Cela nous montre la complexité de l’être humain. Jan est un collègue très apprécié et il vivait avec ça. Cela rend humble de découvrir cette addiction, cette fragilité. [13]
Gounelle argued that, whilst the unmasking of Joosten as a paedophile was deeply shocking, it does not call into question his pedagogical and scientific skills. [13]
In a public statement that noted his "shocking crimes and... the suffering endured by those in the images he accessed," Oxford University announced Joosten's removal from employment. [7]
Joosten continued to have a role at Strasbourg, however, which lasted until 2021. [8]
The Bible is a collection of religious texts or scriptures which to a certain degree are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, Islam, the Baháʼí Faith, and other Abrahamic religions. The Bible is an anthology originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Koine Greek. The texts include instructions, stories, poetry, prophecies, and other genres. The collection of materials that are accepted as part of the Bible by a particular religious tradition or community is called a biblical canon. Believers in the Bible generally consider it to be a product of divine inspiration, but the way they understand what that means and interpret the text varies.
The Diatessaron is the most prominent early gospel harmony. It was created in the Syriac language by Tatian, an Assyrian early Christian apologist and ascetic. Tatian sought to combine all the textual material he found in the four gospels - Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John - into a single coherent narrative of Jesus's life and death. However, and in contradistinction to most later gospel harmonists, Tatian appears not to have been motivated by any aspiration to validate the four separate canonical gospel accounts; or to demonstrate that, as they stood, they could each be shown as being without inconsistency or error.
The Old Testament (OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible, or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew and occasionally Aramaic writings by the Israelites. The second division of Christian Bibles is the New Testament, written in Koine Greek.
The Septuagint, sometimes referred to as the Greek Old Testament or The Translation of the Seventy, and often abbreviated as LXX, is the earliest extant Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from the original Hebrew. The full Greek title derives from the story recorded in the Letter of Aristeas to Philocrates that "the laws of the Jews" were translated into the Greek language at the request of Ptolemy II Philadelphus by seventy-two Hebrew translators—six from each of the Twelve Tribes of Israel.
Tatian of Adiabene, or Tatian the Syrian or Tatian the Assyrian, was an Assyrian Christian writer and theologian of the 2nd century.
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Bibliolatry is the worship of a book, idolatrous homage to a book, or the deifying of a book. It is a form of idolatry. The sacred texts of some religions disallow icon worship, but over time, the texts themselves may come to be treated as sacred in the way idols are; believers may end up worshipping the book in effect. Bibliolatry extends claims of Biblical inerrancy to the texts, precluding theological innovation, evolving development, or progress. Bibliolatry can lead to revivalism, disallows reprobation, and can lead to persecution of unpopular doctrines.
Dura Parchment 24, designated as Uncial 0212, is a Greek uncial manuscript of the New Testament. The manuscript has been assigned to the 3rd century, palaeographically, though an earlier date cannot be excluded. It contains some unusual orthographic features, which have been found nowhere else.
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A biblical canon is a set of texts which a particular Jewish or Christian religious community regards as part of the Bible.
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