Steven T. Katz

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For other people called Steve, Stephen or Steven Katz, see Stephen Katz (disambiguation).

Steven T. Katz is a Jewish philosopher and scholar. He is the director of the Elie Wiesel Center for Judaic Studies at Boston University in Massachusetts, USA.

He received his Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge, England in 1972.

Prior to his appointment at Boston University, Prof. Katz taught at Dartmouth College from 1972 to 1984. He joined the faculty of Cornell University in 1984 through 1996 as a Professor of Near Eastern Studies (Judaica); during the years 1985–1989 he served as Chair of the Department of Near Eastern Studies and Director of the Jewish Studies Program.

He adopts a "Contextualist" interpretation of mysticism, and has contributed to and edited a number of books dealing with mysticism.

Prof. Katz is the editor of Modern Judaism, an academic quarterly. He was on the editorial board of the Encyclopaedia of the Holocaust (NY: Macmillan, 1990, Hebrew and English-language editions).

[edit] Selected publications

Jewish Philosophers (1975). ISBN 0819703877
Jewish Ideas and Concepts (1977)
Mysticism and Philosophical Analysis (1978)
Post-Holocaust Dialogues (1984)
Historicism, the Holocaust and Zionism (1992)
The Holocaust in Historical Context, Vol. 1 (1994)

[edit] Awards

1984 - National Jewish Book Award for Post-Holocaust Dialogues
1994 - "Outstanding book in philosophy and theology" (American Association of University Publishers) for The Holocaust in Historical Context
1999 - Lucas Prize (University of Tübingen)
2007 - National Jewish Book Award for Volume IV of The Cambridge History of Judaism, The Late Roman-Rabbinic Period
2007 - National Jewish Book Award runner-up for Wrestling with God: Jewish Theological Responses During and After the Holocaust