Welcome to Professor Aaron Koller who will join the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the end of September 2025 as the newly appointed Regius Professor of Hebrew.
Professor Koller did his Undergraduate studies at Yeshiva University in 1999. After graduate work at the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University, and the Brooklyn Museum, he obtained his PhD degree at Yeshiva in 2008 with a thesis on lexicographic theory as applied to a group of words in ancient Hebrew. Having taught at Queens College in New York City, he is currently Professor of Near Eastern Studies at Yeshiva University.
He brings to our department of Middle Eastern Studies his 16 years of experience as teacher in Hebrew, Semitic languages, biblical studies, and Aramaic and Hebrew philology. He has also eight years of experience as department chair, two as the assistant dean of the college, supervising all undergraduate faculty and education, and four as director of the Hebrew language program, which teaches more than 400 students each year. He has also served as a visiting professor at the Hebrew University and been a research fellow at the Albright Institute for Archaeological Research in East Jerusalem, the Hartman Institute in West Jerusalem, as well as Oxford and Cambridge.
The aspects of his new role at Cambridge which most attract him are the interdisciplinary nature of the Faculty and the rich heritage of the University and the College, reflected in the extensive manuscript collections throughout Cambridge. He has a deep commitment to promoting work that crosses disciplinary boundaries – from texts to material cultures, from one language to another. Upon his appointment looks forward to completing a major research project on alphabets around the world, past and present, and new projects on Hebrew and Aramaic especially of Late Antiquity.
His vision for Hebrew Studies at Cambridge focusses on the many ways that Hebrew has connected to other languages throughout its three-thousand year history. This includes linguistic contact as well as inter-religious dynamics. Much of this can be studied through manuscripts held in Cambridge, including but not limited to the Cairo Genizah, and including texts in Arabic, Greek, Latin, Persian, and other languages. His research also extends to Biblical Hebrew and the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Professor Koller comments on the news of his appointment to Cambridge: “The opportunity to serve as Regius Professor comes along once in a generation. It is a great honor to succeed Professor Khan, who has done so much to raise Cambridge’s profile in Semitics and Hebrew, and to build on his accomplishments to attract the best and brightest students to Cambridge in the coming years. I hope that Hebrew will serve as an interdisciplinary hub in the university, interfacing with my many new wonderful colleagues in FAMES as well as in the Genizah Unit, Classics, History, and elsewhere.”