On research leave for the 2023-24 academic year.
Dr. Joel B. Kemp‘s research interests in biblical studies include the Old Testament, especially the latter prophets, biblical law, and the history of Judah and identity development. His additional scholarly pursuits include African-American appropriations of Scripture, the relationship between race, religion, and law within American society, and the use of the Bible in popular culture. He worked as both an attorney and a minister before pursuing graduate theological studies. Prior to joining the Candler faculty, Kemp served as assistant professor of theology at the University of Scranton.
His book, Ezekiel, Law, and Judahite Identity (Mohr Siebeck, 2020), investigates how the book of Ezekiel uses legal elements to advocate for the reconfiguration of a Judahite identity under Neo-Babylonian dominance. Other research interests include analyzing how prophetic texts and Second Temple texts were a resource to define and fortify a community, and examining the reception history of certain biblical texts in African-American contexts, informing discussions of racial identity, social justice, and political/legal equality in contemporary American discourse.
Kemp is a member of the Society of Biblical Literature, where he sits on the steering committee for “Theological Perspectives on the Book of Ezekiel,” and is a full member of the Catholic Biblical Association of America. In 2024, he was named a McDonald Distinguished Senior Fellow at Emory’s Center for the Study of Law and Religion.
