Background

Joan Elizabeth Taylor was born on September 13, 1958, in Horsell, Surrey, United Kingdom. She is the daughter of Robert Glenville and Birgit Elisabeth (Norlev) Taylor.

Education

After receiving a bachelor's degree at Auckland University, New Zealand, Taylor completed a three-year post-graduate degree in Divinity at the University of Otago in 1985 and then went to the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem (Kenyon Institute) as Annual Scholar. She undertook a Doctor of Philosophy degree in early Christian archaeology and Jewish-Christianity at New College, Edinburgh University, as a Commonwealth Scholar in 1989.

Career

In 1990 Taylor accompanied her husband, human rights lawyer Paul Hunt, to Geneva and then to Gambia, returning to New Zealand in 1992. She started her career when was appointed in 1992 to a position of lecturer (subsequently senior lecturer) at the University of Waikato, New Zealand, in the departments of both Religious Studies and History.

From 1996 to 1997 she was also a Visiting Lecturer and Research Associate in Women’s Studies in New Testament at Harvard Divinity School, a position she held in association with a Fulbright Award. She joined the staff of King's College London, Department of Theology and Religious Studies in 2009, and since 2012, she has been working as a Professor of Christian Origins and Second Temple Judaism there.

Achievements

• Joan E. Taylor is the prize-winning author of Christians and the Holy Places, and a leading authority on the Jewish world of Jesus, including women within that world. Her other scientific works include Beneath the Church of the Holy Sepulchre: The Archaeology and Early History of Traditional Golgotha, The Immerser: John the Baptist within Second Temple Judaism, Jewish Women Philosophers of First-Century Alexandria - Philo’s ‘Therapeutae’ Reconsidered, The Englishman, the Moor and the Holy City: The True Adventures of an Elizabethan Traveller, The Essenes, the Scrolls and the Dead Sea and What Did Jesus Look Like?
  
  Taylor is also known as a writer of narrative history, novels and poetry (sometimes using her mother’s maiden name of Norlev). Her first novel, Conversations with Mr. Prain, was published by Melville House Publishing in New York, and Hardie Grant in Melbourne, in 2006, and republished by Melville House. Her second novel, kissing Bowie, was published by Seventh Rainbow, London, in 2013. In 2016 her historical novel Napoleon’s Willow appeared.

Works

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  • Jewish Women Philosophers of First-Century Alexandria

    (This study focuses particularly on issues of history, rhe...)

    2006
  • The Body in Biblical, Christian and Jewish Texts

    (The Body in Biblical, Christian and Jewish Texts comprise...)

    2015
  • Christians and the Holy Places: The Myth of Jewish-Christian Origins

    (This book is a detailed examination of the literature and...)

    1993
  • Beneath the Church of the Holy Sepulchre

    (The archaeology and early history of traditional Golgotha...)

    1994
  • Living on Purpose: Discover Your Purpose, Find Your Why

    (Living on Purpose – The Experiential Journey, is a 4-week...)

    2018
  • What Did Jesus Look Like?

    (Leading Christian Origins scholar Joan E. Taylor surveys ...)

    2018
  • The Immerser: John the Baptist within Second Temple Judaism 1997
  • Conversations With Mr. Prain 2006

Membership

Taylor is a member of the Society of Biblical Literature.

Connections

Taylor married Paul Hunt on December 30, 1988. The couple has 2 children, Emily and Robert.

Father:

Robert Glenville Taylor

Mother:

Birgit Elisabeth (Norlev) Taylor

husband:

Paul Hunt

Daughter:

Emily Hunt

Son:

Robert Hunt