Professor Dube, a leading international scholar in Biblical studies, has made groundbreaking contributions in feminist-postcolonial Biblical studies and in reading the Bible in the context of HIV/AIDS. In her multi-perspective approach she has developed new ways to gain a humanistic and liberative potential of Biblical interpretation beyond "Africanism". During her research stay in Germany, Professor Dube -will focus on a scientific critique of "superstitious reading" which plays an important socio-political role in African societies of today.

Professor Dube is hosted by Professor Joachim Kügler at the University of Bamberg.

Despite his young age Dr. Förster is a widely recognized researcher in Coptic and New Testament papyrology. He has made distinguished contributions sifting, identifying, and editing previously unpublished papyrus, thus being one of a very small number of publishing papyrologists among less than a dozen colleagues in the field of Theology worldwide. His dictionary of Greek words in Coptic documentary texts has become indispensable for all papyrologic collections as well as libraries worldwide and has therefore surely to be named as his most important opus.
During his stay in Germany, he intends to deepen his research dealing with the problems of the reception of the Gospel of John in late antiquity considering in particular a potential impact of its' interpretation trough linguistic tendencies of translations made in late antiquity.

It is well known that there are three great monotheistic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Scholarly research has shown that for the earliest of these, Judaism, monotheism developed over a long period of time. Dr. MacDonald's research project examines the development of post-exilic Judaism since the sixth century BC. It is normally assumed that from that period, Jewish monotheism took a fixed shape. Dr. MacDonald seeks to show that for some time Judaism had a variety of monotheistic forms. These understood the implications of God's exclusivity in significantly different ways. It took centuries for post-exilic Judaism to establish the consequences of her monotheistic claims. Dr. MacDonald will analyse this fascinating process in his project. It promises important insights into the formation of Jewish monotheism, which was the basis for all future monotheistic beliefs.

Professor Reinhartz is well known internationally for her outstanding research in the history and literature of Christianity and Judaism in the Greco-Roman period, the Gospel of John and early Jewish–Christian relations. Furthermore, she’s an expert on literary criticism including feminist literary criticism, feminist exegesis, and the impact of the Bible on popular cinema and television. During her stays in Germany she will continue her research on the so called "Parting of the Ways" between Judaism and Christianity and Early Jewish Diversity.

Professor Schmid is an international authority in the study of the Hebrew Bible. He developed new models for understanding ancient Israel’s religion and literature, particularly the books of the Pentateuch, prophetic texts, and wisdom texts. In Germany, he continues his research on the literary history of Genesis with a focus on the Joseph Story.

Eileen Marie Schuller was born on 26 November 1946 in Edmonton, Canada. Following her studies at the University of Alberta and the University of Toronto where she was awarded an MA in 1973, she went on to complete her Ph.D at Harvard University in 1984. She started her professional career at Colleges in Edmonton and the Atlantic School of Theology, Halifax and then accepted a position at McMaster University in Hamilton (Ontario) where she has taught and done research, since 1990 as an associate professor and, since 1996, as a tenured professor of the Department of Religious Studies. Her area of studies is ancient Judaism at the time of the Second Temple (6th century B.C.E - 2nd century C.E.) with special focus on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Her dissertation on the Non-Canonical Psalms from Qumran opened up a hitherto completely unknown and new area of research. She is a member of the editorial board of the main publication series "Discoveries in the Judaean Desert" (DJD) where she edited not only the Non-Canonical Psalms (DJD XI, 1988) but also additional narrative and poetic texts (DJD XXVIII, 2001 together with M. Bernstein) and, above all, the manuscripts of the famous "Songs of Praise" (Hodajot) and related texts from cave 4 of Qumran (DJD XXIX, 1999). In addition to the editions, Prof. Schuller has also written numerous articles on the Old Testament, the Apocrypha and Pseudeepigrapha and on the Dead Sea Manuscripts. In some of these articles, e.g. on "Women in Qumran", she once again ventured into unexplored territory. At the Göttingen Institute for Qumran Research Prof. Schuller will work on a critical commentary on the Hodajot for the "Hermeneia" series in cooperation with Prof. Dr. Dr. H. Stegemann as well as with the staff of the German Research Association's "Qumran Dictionary" project headed by Prof. Dr. Reinhard Kratz.