CraigKeener.com is the official website for the nontechnical Bible background research of Dr. Keener. Initiated and maintained with Craig’s approval and assistance, the goal of this site is to offer selections from his nontechnical writings (especially Bible studies or preaching) and teaching videos so that his research will reach a wider audience and help many who study the Bible to see the Scriptures in their historical context. Those of you who want to read his scholarly work—sorry, his publishers own that, so we can’t post more than a few samples of that here for free! 🙁
Dr. Craig S. Keener (PhD, Duke University) is F. M. and Ada Thompson Professor of the New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary. He is especially known for his work as a New Testament scholar on Bible background (commentaries on the New Testament in its early Jewish and Greco-Roman settings). His award-winning, popular-level IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament (now in its second edition [2014], and available in a number of languages) has sold over half a million copies.
Before joining the faculty of Asbury in July, 2011, Dr. Keener was professor of New Testament at Palmer Theological Seminary of Eastern University, just outside Philadelphia, where he taught happily for 15 years; before that time he was professor at Hood Theological Seminary.
Craig has authored 25 books, five of which have won awards in Christianity Today, and more than a million of which are in circulation. His recent books include Galatians (Cambridge, 2018); Mind of the Spirit: Paul’s Approach to Transformed Thinking (Baker Academic, 2016); Spirit Hermeneutics: Reading Scripture in Light of Pentecost (Eerdmans, 2016); Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts (Baker Academic, 2011); The Historical Jesus of the Gospels (Eerdmans, 2009); The Gospel of Matthew: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary (Eerdmans, 2009); Romans (Cascade, 2009); 1-2 Corinthians (Cambridge, 2005); The Gospel of John: A Commentary (Hendrickson/Baker Academic, 2003).
His award-winning, multivolume commentary on Acts (Acts: An Exegetical Commentary, 4 vols., Baker Academic, 2012-2015) includes some 45,000 references from ancient extrabiblical sources. He is New Testament editor, and author of most New Testament notes, for The NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible (Zondervan, 2016), which won Bible of the Year in the Christian Book Awards and first place in the Religion: Christianity category of the International Book Awards.
He has written for various journals, both academic (e.g., Journal for the Study of the New Testament; Journal of Greco-Roman Christianity and Judaism; Bulletin for Biblical Research; Perspectives in Religious Studies; A.M.E. Church Review) and popular (e.g., Christianity Today; Charisma; Christian History; Good News; A.M.E. Zion Missionary Seer). He has published roughly 100 academic articles and more than 150 popular ones. He wrote “2 Corinthians” in The New Interpreter’s Bible One Volume Commentary, and has published other popular materials with Abingdon, InterVarsity, and Zondervan. He was program chair for the Institute for Biblical Research (2010-12) and currently edits Bulletin for Biblical Research.
Craig has taught in various countries (on all continents except Antarctica). On rare occasions, he also speaks in other forums (in recent years, for example, for the Vida Nova conference in Brazil; for the Special Divine Action conference for the Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion, Oxford University; for pastors’ conferences in Cuba; for the national ministers conference of the American Baptist Churches USA; for the National Council of Churches Committee on the Uniform Series); for scholarly meetings (e.g., a plenary address for the Institute for Biblical Research; papers at Society for Biblical Literature or the Society for New Testament Studies); and lectures at a diverse range of academic institutions, in recent years including among others Houghton College; Talbot School of Theology; Northeastern Seminary of Roberts Wesleyan University; Missouri State University, religion department; Spring Arbor University; the Assemblies of God Seminary; Pentecostal Theological Seminary; New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary; John Leland Center for Theological Studies; Southern Adventist University; Andrews University; Macquarie University (Ancient History Department), Australia; New Theological College, India; Chongshin Theological Seminary, South Korea; Trinity Theological College, Singapore; Asia Pacific Theological Seminary in Baguio, Philippines; and Evangel Seminary in Hong Kong).
Craig is married to Médine Moussounga Keener, who holds a Ph.D. from University of Paris 7. She was a refugee for 18 months in her nation of Congo, and together Craig and Médine work for ethnic reconciliation in the U.S. and Africa (e.g., teaching on this subject among 1700 pastors in Côte d’Ivoire). Craig was ordained in an African-American denomination (National Baptist Convention) in 1991 and for roughly a decade before moving to Wilmore was one of the associate ministers at Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church, an African-American megachurch in Philadelphia. ***Craig and Médine’s story together is Impossible Love: The True Story of an African Civil War, Miracles, and Hope Against All Odds (Chosen Books, 2016).
Craig also used to maintain (it’s now way out of date) a personal website, which you can visit by clicking here.
One of Craig’s friends maintains for him a Facebook page. He also has a personal FB page, but it reached FB’s friend limit. (You can still follow it if you want, though …)