Nathanael Vette, Ph. D.

Nathanael Vette is a British-Australian scholar of Early Christianity and Second Temple Judaism, with a special focus on the Gospels and Jewish-Gentile relations in the first-century CE. He is currently the Issachar Fund Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the School of Divinity, University of Edinburgh. In this capacity, he has worked with Professor Mona Siddiqui on two projects, sponsored by the Issachar Fund, focusing on gratitude and loyalty in Christian and Muslim thought. A volume resulting from the first project, Gratitude: Christian and Muslim Perspectives, is expected with Cambridge University Press in 2021. Nathanael holds a PhD in New Testament and Christian Origins from the University of Edinburgh. His doctoral research explored how the Hebrew Bible was used to tell new stories in Jewish antiquity, a process which can be seen in the earliest Gospel, the one attributed to Mark. The resulting monograph, Writing with Scripture: Scripturalized Narrative in the Gospel of Mark and Second Temple Literature, is forthcoming with Bloomsbury T&T Clark in 2021. His next project explores how the Gospel of Mark was shaped by ethnic conflict stemming from the first Jewish revolt of 66-74 CE. His research has been published in journals like Biblical Interpretation and The Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha and with publishers like Peeters and Walter de Gruyter. Nathanael is interested in the complicated role of gratitude in ethnic-religious conflict, particularly how debates about gratitude in antiquity can inform the present. He looks forward to partnering with Professor Michael Trice and Seattle University on this exciting project. Outside of academic life, Nathanael enjoys playing old guitars and hiking in the Scottish countryside with his wife, Rachel, a native of Maple Leaf, Seattle.