Bio
Rabbi David Rudolph (PhD, Cambridge University) was born and raised in the Washington, D.C. metro area where he attended Congregation Beth El, a Conservative synagogue, and Beth Messiah Congregation, a Messianic synagogue. David had a profound encounter with the God of Israel when he was 16 and a junior at Walt Whitman High School. This changed the course of his life.
While studying at Sophia University (Tokyo) in the mid-1980s, David came across a community of Japanese Christians who prayed three times a day for the Jewish people. Their extraordinary love prompted David to ask how much he loved his own people (ahavat Yisrael) and what it meant to be a Messianic Jew.
During this time, David met Harumi, a beautiful Osaka University student who would one day become his wife.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, David completed a Bachelor of Theology and a Master of Theological Studies at Messiah Biblical Institute (Messiah Yeshiva), a Messianic Jewish seminary founded by Dr. Michael Brown and Rabbi Daniel Juster. After receiving smicha (ordination), he served for six years as the Rabbi of Shulchan Adonai Messianic Synagogue in Annapolis, Maryland.
Drawn to Jewish education in the late 1990s, David served as the Assistant Principal at Ets Chaiyim, a Messianic Jewish day school in Rockville, Maryland. While preparing classes, David became aware of the lack of Messianic Jewish voices in the field of New Testament studies and he resolved to help fill the gap.
In 1999, the Rudolph family moved to South Hamilton, Massachusetts where for three years David studied at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. He completed an MA in Old Testament and an MA in Biblical Languages.
From 2002-2007, David studied under Professor Markus Bockmuehl at Cambridge University (UK) where he completed a PhD in New Testament with a specialization in Pauline studies and Second Temple Judaism.
From 2008-2011, David served on the faculty at Messianic Jewish Theological Institute in Los Angeles and was Scholar-in-Residence at the MJTI Center for Jewish-Christian Relations in Beverly Hills. He subsequently served as the Rabbi of Tikvat Israel Messianic Synagogue in Richmond, Virginia, for four years.
In 2015, David took up his present post as Director of Messianic Jewish Studies and Professor of New Testament and Jewish Studies at The King's University in Southlake, Texas.
David has published numerous books and articles on the New Testament, Second Temple Judaism, and Jewish-Christian relations. His publications include and Covenant and the People of God: Essays in Honor of Mark S. Kinzer (with Jonathan Kaplan and Jennifer M. Rosner), the Second Edition of A Jew to the Jews: Jewish Contours of Pauline Flexibility in 1 Corinthians 9:19-23 (Pickwick, 2016; Mohr Siebeck, 2011), which won the Franz Delitzsch Prize from the Freie Theologische Akademie in Germany, and Introduction to Messianic Judaism: Its Ecclesial Context and Biblical Foundations (with Joel Willitts; Zondervan, 2013). David is currently working on several projects related to Messianic Judaism and post-supersessionist theology.
David and Harumi have been married now for 36 years and they have three daughters, two sons-in-law, and two grandchildren.
David considers himself to be the most blessed man on the planet. Every day he experiences the truth of Proverbs 18:22, "He who finds a wife finds happiness and has won the favor of the Lord."
