Prof. Rebecca Copeland awarded Louisville Grant for Researchers
Boston University School of Theology (BUSTH) is pleased to announce Assistant Professor of Theology Rebecca Copeland has been awarded a Louisville Institute Grant for Researchers for the coming academic year. This competitive grant will support Prof. Copeland during her upcoming sabbatical as she works on her next book, tentatively titled Replanting the Uprooted: A Social-Ecological Approach to the Agricultural Parables.
Prof. Copeland’s project offers a novel approach to biblical interpretation by reconstructing agricultural and ecological contexts shared by Jesus, the Gospel writers, and their earliest audiences. Through a combination of classical sources on ancient farming practices, environmental archaeology, and social-scientific research, her work explores how the relationships between people and their environments shaped the meanings of the agricultural parables in the Synoptic Gospels.
“In Replanting the Uprooted, I aim to provide preachers, scholars, and other readers of scripture with resources for understanding the meanings these parables would have conveyed to their earliest audiences,” says Prof. Copeland. “This is both significant for historical studies and provides new insights for interpretation and application of these parables today.”
In addition to her research and writing, Prof. Copeland will also participate in the Louisville Institute’s 2026 Winter Seminar, a multidisciplinary gathering of scholars engaged in new theological research.