Dear Affectionate Siblings,

For those who recently returned from the Annual Meeting in Denver, hope your travels were safe and successful.

We would like to invite anyone who has interest in the intersection between the Bible & the Qur’an to please consider submitting a paper to the Qur’an and Islamic Tradition in Comparative Perspective Unit at the International Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature (https://www.sbl-site.org/meetings/Congresses_CallForPaperDetails.aspx?MeetingId=34&VolunteerUnitId=518), which will be held in Rome between 1 - 5 July 2019.

Please mark your calendars: the deadline for abstracts is on 30 January 2019.

We especially encourage people of different voices, and from senior scholars to graduate students and anyone in between.

You may have hermeneutical connections or intertextuality between Biblical or extra-Biblical texts and the Qur’an that you might like to share with other colleagues. The opportunities are endless. As long as it is academic and not polemic, with a sincere search for truth without any personal agendas, we welcome it. This is an opportunity to appreciate the synergy between great scriptures and have all voices heard.

Anyway, what better place to engage in an academic discourse between the Bible and the Qur’an other than in Rome.

Even if you are not an SBL member, and do not wish to be an SBL member, we can still request a waiver for you to present your paper at the conference.

For those of you who wish to travel to IQSA International Meeting in Tangier, held between 25-26 July 2019, we still encourage you to come to Rome, and perhaps spend a holiday traversing within the Mediterranean basin between both conferences to enjoy the symbiosis of two beautiful cultures on opposite sides of the Mediterranean. That would be a perfect way to study the Bible and the Qur’an each within its context."

We look forward to your contributions.

Thanks,