Nyasha Junior

Nyasha Junior is an American biblical scholar. Her research focuses on the connections between religion, race, and gender within the Hebrew Bible. She holds a PhD from Princeton Theological Seminary. She was associate professor at Temple University before moving to the University of Toronto in the department for the Study of Religion. She was a visiting associate professor and research associate at Harvard Divinity School for the 2020–21 academic year.

Early life and education Nyasha Junior grew up in Florida. Her family was very involved in the church, serving as ushers, pulpit speakers, and choir members. She earned a Master of Divinity from Pacific School of Religion and completed her PhD in Old Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary.

Career Junior is associate professor at the University of Toronto. She was previously associate professor of religion (Hebrew Bible) at Temple University. Her research examines intersections of gender, religion and race, including study of the life of evangelist Jarena Lee. She previously taught at Howard University. Elsewhere she has observed that: "Inclusion is not oppression, and student demands for greater inclusion are not bullying" with reference to university course alterations. She is described by Mitzi J Smith as being part of the third generation of womanist biblical scholars —although she personally does not identify as a womanist scholar.

In her first book, An Introduction to Womanist Biblical Interpretation, Junior compares feminist and womanist interpretations of the Bible and argues that "womanist biblical interpretation [was] a natural development of African American women engaging in activism instead of simply [as] a response to second-wave feminism". The book offers readers an understanding of how the lived experience of black women influences their interpretations of Christianity. It was one of the first texts to introduce womanist biblical interpretation.

Junior has co-authored a book on Samson with Temple University colleague Jeremy Schipper.

The project and subsequent book, Reimagining Hagar, was inspired by the insistence of some of her students that of all the female biblical characters, Hagar was the most strongly associated with blackness. Junior examines interpretations of Hagar and how markers of difference like gender, ethnicity, and status intersect in various portrayals of Hagar.

Black Samson: The Untold Story of an American Icon A collaboration between Nyasha Junior and Jeremy Schipper, Black Samson: The Untold Story of an American Icon was published July 1, 2020. The book details how the Biblical character Samson was a figure used to represent individuals who would fight for racial equality in America. Detailing how Samson from Judges 13–16 became a central figure for Black Americans and was used in literature and other means of social revolution to discuss racial inequality in the United States. The book also discusses various other Biblical figures as well as their connections to historical figures such as Frederick Douglass, Ida B. Wells, James Baldwin, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr.