Terence E. Fretheim (January 27, 1936 – November 16, 2020) was an

Old Testament The Old Testament (OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible, or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew and occasionally Aramaic writings by the Isr ...

scholar and the Elva B. Lovell professor of Old Testament at

Luther Seminary Luther Seminary is a seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in Saint Paul, Minnesota. It is the largest seminary of the ELCA. It also accepts and educates students of 41 other denominations and traditions. It is accredited ...

. His writings have played a major part in the development of

process theology Process theology is a type of theology developed from Alfred North Whitehead's (1861–1947) process philosophy, but most notably by Charles Hartshorne (1897–2000), John B. Cobb (1925–2024), and Eugene H. Peters (1929–1983). Process ...

and open theism.

Biographical Information

Terence Fretheim was first connected with the

faculty as a teaching fellow in Greek in 1958-60 while he was still a seminary student. He returned as assistant professor in 1968 and became professor of Old Testament in 1978. He was dean of academic affairs (1978–88) and also served as acting chair of the Old Testament department (1977–78) and chair of the curriculum committee (1976–77). He was an instructor in Old Testament at Augsburg College and Seminary, Minneapolis, in 1961–63, and assistant professor of religion at Augsburg College in 1967–68. Ordained in 1968, Fretheim was pastor of Dennison (Minn.) Lutheran Church in 1968–71. He has been visiting professor at McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago, and both visiting professor and lecturer at the University of Chicago Divinity School. Fretheim received the Fulbright Scholarship for study in England, the Lutheran Brotherhood Seminary Graduate Scholarship, the Martin Luther Scholarship, the Fredrik A. Schiotz Fellowship Award, and the ATS Scholarship for Theological Research. A graduate of

Luther College (Iowa) Luther College is a private college, private Lutheran Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Decorah, Iowa, Decorah, Iowa. Established as a Lutheran seminary in 1861 by Norwegian Americans, Norwegian immigrants, the ...

(B.A., 1956), Fretheim earned the M.Div. degree from Luther Seminary in 1960 and the Th.D. degree from Princeton Seminary in 1967. He has also studied at the University of Durham, England, the University of Minnesota, the University of Heidelberg in Germany, Oxford University in England, and the University of Chicago. As a Luther College alumnus, he was elected to

Phi Beta Kappa The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States. It was founded in 1776 at the College of William & Mary in Virginia. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal arts and sciences, ...

in 1995. He was a member of the

Catholic Biblical Association The Catholic Biblical Association of America (CBA) is an American learned society dedicated to the academic study of the Bible. The suggestion to form a permanent association of biblical scholars was made at the beginning of 1936 at a meeting in ...

and the

Society of Biblical Literature The Society of Biblical Literature (SBL), founded in 1880 as the Society of Biblical Literature and Exegesis, is an American-based learned society dedicated to the academic study of the Bible and related ancient literature. Its current stated mis ...

and was Editor of SBL Old Testament Monographs. He served on the Buddhist and Muslim Task Forces of the American Lutheran Church, was co-chair of the Theological Consultation for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, has been president of the Minnesota Consortium of Theological Schools, and Old Testament Book Editor for the Journal of Biblical Literature. Terence Fretheim died on November 16, 2020.

Works Published

Fretheim published numerous books, including: ''The Pentateuch'' (Abingdon, 1996); ''Proclamation 6'' (Fortress, 1997); ''The Bible as Word of God in a Postmodern Era'' (Fortress, 1998; with K. Froehlich); ''First and Second Kings'' (Westminster, 1999); ''About the Bible: Short Answers to Big Questions'' (Augsburg, 1999); ''In God's Image: A Study of Genesis'' (Augsburg, 1999); ''A Theological Introduction to the Old Testament'' (Abingdon, 1999), with B. Birch, W. Brueggemann, and D. Petersen; and ''Jeremiah: A Commentary'' (Smyth & Helwys, 2002). ''God and World in the Old Testament: A Relational Theology of Creation'' (Abingdon, 2005); ''Hope in God in Times of Suffering'' (with Faith Fretheim) (Augsburg/Fortress, 2006); ''Abraham: Trials of Family and Faith'' (University of South Carolina Press, 2007). His 1984 book, '' The Suffering of God: An Old Testament Perspective'' is an exegetical approach to many of the themes and issues associated with process theology and open theism.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fretheim, Terence E. Luther Seminary faculty University of Minnesota alumni University of Chicago faculty Living people Luther College (Iowa) alumni Old Testament scholars American biblical scholars Year of birth missing (living people)