Ken M. Penner (PhD, McMaster University, 2006) is Associate Professor in the Religious Studies department of St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia. Ken studied Photogrammetry (British Columbia Institute of Technology), Computer Science (Simon Fraser University), and Biblical Studies (Columbia Bible College), before graduating from Regent College with a Master of Christian Studies degree in biblical languages focussing on Greek verbal aspect. His quest to better understand the context in which Jesus lived then set him on the path to completed an MA and PhD in Religious Studies at McMaster University with a major in Second Temple Judaism, and a minor in Early Christianity. Ken came to StFX in 2008 from Acadia, where he taught Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, Biblical Greek and Hebrew. Ken is a member of the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies, the Society of Biblical Literature, the National Association of Professors of Hebrew, and the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies.
His doctoral research, The Verbal System of the Dead Sea Scrolls was published by Brill in 2015. Always fascinated by the intersection of computers and biblical studies, he is editor of the Lexham English Septuagint and Brill’s series Digital Biblical Studies, and co-director of the Online Critical Pseudepigrapha. His commentary on the Greek text of Isaiah will be released soon in Brill’s Septuagint Commentary Series, and he is now working on a book on biblical allusions in the lyrics of U2 titled Bono’s Bible (bonosbible.com).
