Curriculum Vitae

Derek R. Nelson
18 S 400 W
Crawfordsville, IN  47933   USA
office: (765) 361-6274; home: (612) 968-4930
nelsond@wabash.edu

Bio

Derek Nelson was born among the white oaks and silver maples of the Richard J. Dorer Memorial Hardwood State Forest in Goodhue County, Minnesota. Waters in his childhood flowed generally east and south, as they made their way to the Mississippi, in whose waters Derek fished and dreamed of even bigger things. He continued south and east to Wabash College, where he graduated with the legendary class of ’99, like most Wabash employees, evidently. (Marc Welch, Kim King, Mark Elrod, etc. etc.). More interested in chemistry and physics when he began at Wabash, Derek ended up going to seminary at Yale Divinity School in New Haven, Connecticut, once famous as the “Elm City,” where many place names refer to the trees that are no longer there, having all died of Dutch Elm disease. Derek then moved west to the high sierra and chaparral of Northern California for a PhD from UC Berkeley and the Graduate Theological Union. He hiked the Sequoias, living trees of which were there since Abraham and Moses, and the much younger Redwoods, living specimens of which are merely as old as Gautama the Buddha and Confucius, all of whom Derek counts as friends.  He is the author or editor of twelve books and dozens of articles. He is a pastor and avid woodworker, which you’ll soon learn more about. He and his wife the Rev. Kelly Nelson are the proud parents of Madeleine, age eight years, and Maya, age eight months.

Academic Positions

2012-present: Wabash College, Crawfordsville, IN.
Professor and Chair of Religion;
Director of Wabash Pastoral Leadership Program, (2012-2021)
Director of Early Career Pastoral Leadership Development Initiative, (2013-present)
Stephen S. Bowen Professor of the Liberal Arts (2017- present)
(Assoc. Prof., 2012-17);
2006-2012: Thiel College, Greenville, PA.
Chair of Religion (2008-12), Assistant (2006-10) and Associate (2010-12) Professor; Co-Director of Thiel Global Institute, 2007-2012

Education

Degrees Earned:
2006          Ph.D., Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, CA, Systematic & Philosophical Theology
Dissertation Readers: Ted Peters, chair, David Kelsey, Rosemary Ruether and Richard Schenk, OP. Title: “Some Aspects of the Doctrine of Sin in Selected Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Theologies.”
2002          M.Div., Yale University, New Haven, CT.  Major Areas: Philosophy of Religion, History of Christianity and Systematic Theology.
1999          A.B., Wabash College, Crawfordsville, IN.  Major: Religion; Minor: Chemistry; summa cum laude.
Additional Study:
2006          Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA.  Certification in Clinical-Pastoral Education.
2003          Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität and Goethe Institut, Munich, Germany, Summer Term.
1998          Karlstads Universitet, Karlstad, Sweden, Winter and Spring Term.

“Lutheran Theology” — under contract as part of Brill Research Perspectives, ed. Philip Ziegler, expected completion 12/2022

“What Is It to Have a Home? Creation Theology and Domestic Life” — collaborative project connected with Scandinavian Creation Theology research program, expected 12/2022

“Vision of God: A Mystical Theology for Pastors” – sabbatical project aimed at gleaning what has been learned from Early Career Pastoral Leadership Development Initiative of Lilly Endowment, with pastors engaging in social ethics as leaders in their communities. Uses Nicholas of Cusa’s (1401-1464)  multimedia icon de Visione Dei as its framing question. Expected to be completed 2021.

“God and Home: Materiality, Creation Theology and Domestic Life” – monograph on human relationships with the natural world in its material manifestations. Expected to be completed 2023.

Two articles currently underway: “Reformation Observed: The Ottoman Empire’s Understanding of Religion in the Sixteenth Century Holy Roman Empire.” (co-authored with John J. Jefferson, using sources of Ottoman spies and diplomats to the HRE, as well as Transylvania (under Ottoman rule after 1570) to assess what the Protestant Reformation looked like to Muslim observers. And “Luther’s Vow of Poverty,” which examines the changing attitudes to private property and the Christian’s relationship to material goods in Luther’s monastic and then Reformation theology.

  • “Big History, Theology and the Concept of “Threshold” in Origin Stories,” in Theology and Science 18:2 (2020): 149-58.
  • “Pastoral Leadership as Creativity and Resilience,” in Dialog: A Journal of Theology, 59:2 (2020): 126-34.
  • “Theologies of Pastoral Leadership” in Dialog: A Journal of Theology, 59:2 (2020): 97-102.
  • “A Campus Walk with Tillich and What’s App,” in Teaching Theology and Religion 22:4 (2019): 336-7.
  • “Loss and trauma in Le Fils and Manchester-by-the-Sea:Redemption as Resilience,” in Dialog: A Journal of Theology, 57:4 (2018): 308-314.
  • “Interpreting the Apostles Creed,” in By Heart: Conversations with Martin Luther’s Small Catechism (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017).
  • “Law in Doctrine and Life according to Luther: Unity, Reciprocity, and Narrative” with Risto Saarinen, in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Martin Luther (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017).
  • “Portrayals of Luther: Dis-membering and Re-membering the Reformer in Literature, Theatre and Biography” in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Martin Luther (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017).
  • “What the Reformation Meant to Tillich” in Bulletin of Paul Tillich Society 42:3 (2016): 21-29.
  • “Light of the World,” in Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception, ed. Christine Helmer, et al., (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2017), forthcoming.
  • “Reformation and Eco-Reformation: Works Righteousness in the Environmental Movement,” co-authored with Robert C. Saler in Dialog: A Journal of Theology, 55:2 (2016): 141-6..
  • “North America’s Cool Reception of Scandinavian Creation Theology,” in Niels-Henrik Gregersen, Bengt Uggla, and Trygve Wyller, eds., Scandinavian Creation Theology (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht), 2016.
  • “Human and Divine Justice in America’s Criminal Justice System,” in Lutheran Forum 49:2 (2015): 51-55.
  • “Justification, Self-Justification, and Forgiveness,” in Adam Pryor and Carol Jacobson, eds., Remembering God’s Future (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015), forthcoming.
  • “The Cautions of Justice: Jüngel’s Engagement with Politics and the State” in R. David Nelson, ed., Indicative of Grace: Essays in Honor of Eberhard Jüngel in His Eightieth Year (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014), 189-203.
  • Enhancements for e-textbook, History of Christianity, ed. Tim Dowley, (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2013), chapters 22-43
  • “The Speaking That Silence Is,” in Dialog: A Journal of Theology, 52:4 (2013), 332-339.
  • Guest editor, Theology and Criminal Justice, Summer 2013 issue of Dialog: A Journal of Theology, including contribution, “With Liberty and Some Justice for a Few: Thinking Theologically about Criminal Justice.”
  • “Kierkegaard on Grace,” in Steven Emmanuel, William McDonald, and Jon Stewart, eds., Kierkegaard’s Concepts : Tome III, Envy to Incognito (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2014), 119-26.
  • “Prayer as Invocation and Vocation in Kierkegaard,” in Steven Emmanuel, William McDonald, and Jon Stewart, eds., Kierkegaard’s Concepts , Tome IV (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2015), 107-13.
  • “The Logic of Punishment and the Ethics of Sentencing,” in Journal of Lutheran Ethics.11:5 (2011).
  • “Problematizing ‘Conscience’ in Modern Protestant Thought,” in Journal of Lutheran Ethics 10:11 [November 2010].
  • “Unity, Ecumenicity and Difference in the Augustana Synod,” in Lutheran Quarterly 24:1 [2010], 76-96.
  • “Charles Finney and John Nevin on Selfhood and Sin: Reformed Anthropologies in 19th Century American Religion,” in Calvin Theological Journal, 46:1 [2010], 301-27.
  • “Ritschl and Schleiermacher on Social and Individual Sin,” in Zeitschrift für Neuere Theologiegeschichte 16:2 [2009], 131-54.
  • “Gerhard Ebeling’s Critical Appropriation of Kierkegaard,” in Jon Stewart, ed., Kierkegaard’s Influence on Theology, (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2012), 97-111.
  • “Inquiry, Conversation and Belief: William James and Richard Rorty Get Religion,” Heythrop Journal 50:3 [May 2009], 495-507.
  • “Theological Themes in Criminal Justice,” in Journal of Lutheran Ethics 9:9 [September 2009].
  • “Sins of Commission, Sins of Omission: Girard, Ricoeur and the Armenian Genocide,” in The Evolution of Evil, ed. Robert John Russell, Martinez Hewlett, Ted Peters, and Gaymon Bennett, (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 2008), 318-33.
  • “Encountering the World’s Religions: Nathan Söderblom and the Concept of Revelation,” Dialog 46:4 [2007], 362-70.
  • “The Vulnerable and Transcendent God: The Postliberal Theology of William Placher,” Dialog 44:3 [2005], 273-84.
  • “The Indicative of Grace, the Imperative of Freedom: An Invitation to the Theology of Eberhard Jüngel,” Dialog 44:2 [2005], 164-80.

Renewed Support for Early Career Pastoral Leadership Development Initiative: $690,420 from Lilly Endowment, 2018.

Continuing Support for Wabash Pastoral Leadership Program: $1,747,070.00 from Lilly Endowment, 2016.

Supplemental Grant, Wabash Early Career Pastoral Leadership Development Initiative: $525,000.00, Lilly Endowment, 2015.

Support for Wabash Early Career Pastoral Leadership Development Initiative: $500,000.00, Lilly Endowment, 2013.

Support for Wabash Pastoral Leadership Program, $1,570,231.00 from Lilly Endowment, 2012.

Fellow, St Cross College, Oxford University 2012-13.  In residence for Trinity Term, 2013.

Lilly Endowment Grant, to fund program on Lutheran traditions in higher education at Thiel. 2011-12.

Rowley Endowment Award, 2011, to fund exploratory trip for planning Germany immersion trip.

Manuscript Reviewer: Fortress Press, Continuum Press, Concordia Publishing, Routledge, Palgrave Macmillan, Oxford University Press.

Article Reviewer: International Journal of Systematic Theology, Scottish Journal of Theology, Lutheran Quarterly and many other journals.

Elected Member, Editorial Council, Dialog: A Journal of Theology, 2010-present

Scholar of the Year, Thiel College, 2008-9.

Lambda Sigma Honorary Society “Professor of the Year” award, Thiel College, 2006-7.

Distinction (Highest Honors) on Comprehensive Exams (doctoral).

Grant for Advanced Study, Ev. Lutheran Church in America, 2002-2005 (awarded 3 times).

Summer Research Fellowship, Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland, 2003.

Newhall Research Fellowship, Graduate Theological Union, 2003.

Presidential Fellow, Graduate Theological Union, 2002-5.

Dwight-Hooker Prize for Theology, Yale University Divinity School, 2002.

Book Table
The Oxford Encyclopedia of Martin Luther: 3-Volume Set

The Oxford Encyclopedia of Martin Luther: 3-Volume Set

Author: Derek Nelson

This encyclopedia is a collaboration of the leading scholars in the field of Reformation research and the thought, life, and legacy of influence - for good and for ill - of Martin Luther. In 2017 the world marks 500 years since the beginning of the public work of Luther, whose protest against corrupt practices and the way theology was taught captured Europe's attention from 1517 onward.

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By Heart: Conversations with Martin Luther’s Small Catechism

By Heart: Conversations with Martin Luther’s Small Catechism

Author: Derek Nelson

This comprehensive resource for the study of Martin Luther's Small Catechism examines the Small Catechism as a historical, confessional document rich with history and applicable to life today.

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Luther Refracted: The Reformer’s Ecumenical Legacy

Luther Refracted: The Reformer’s Ecumenical Legacy

Author: Derek Nelson

Luther Refracted speaks to the currency that Luthers life and thought continue to enjoy in todays Christian reflection. The contributors, representing a variety of Christian denominations, demonstrate Luthers lasting impact on their own traditions and, together with the Lutheran respondents, encourage a fresh understanding of the Reformer.

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One Hope: Re-Membering the Body of Christ

One Hope: Re-Membering the Body of Christ

Author: Derek Nelson

One Hope: Re-Membering the Body of Christ is a rich ecumenical resource designed to help Catholic and Lutheran communities mark the approaching 500th anniversary of the Reformation.

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Resilient Reformer: The Life and Thought of Martin Luther

Resilient Reformer: The Life and Thought of Martin Luther

Author: Derek Nelson

Some would argue that there is no need for yet another biography of Martin Luther. The story has been told many times, and very well at that! And yet, interest in Luthers life and thought remains high, and each generation brings its own set of questions to the task.

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Readings in the History of Christian Theology, Volume 2, Revised Edition: From the Reformation to the Present

Readings in the History of Christian Theology, Volume 2, Revised Edition: From the Reformation to the Present

Author: Derek Nelson

William Placher and Derek Nelson compile significant passages written by the most important Christian thinkers, from the Reformers of the sixteenth century through the major participants in the contemporary theological conversation.

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Readings in the History of Christian Theology, Volume 1, Revised Edition

Readings in the History of Christian Theology, Volume 1, Revised Edition

Author: Derek Nelson

William C. Placher and Derek Nelson compile significant passages written by the most important Christian thinkers, from the early church through the Middle Ages, and up to the beginning of the sixteenth century.

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A History of Christian Theology, Second Edition: An Introduction

A History of Christian Theology, Second Edition: An Introduction

Author: Derek Nelson

A modern classic, A History of Christian Theology offers a concise yet complete chronicle of the whole of Christian theology, from its background in the history of Israel to the liberation and postliberal theologies of recent years. This updated 30th anniversary edition includes ...

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Theologians in Their Own Words

Theologians in Their Own Words

Author: Derek Nelson

Theologians in Their Own Words is a volume of 24 brief, straight-forward autobiographical statements from many of the most important theologians and scholars of religion of recent decades.

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Sin: A Guide for the Perplexed

Sin: A Guide for the Perplexed

Author: Derek Nelson

Christianity concerns itself with salvation. But salvation implies something from which one must be saved, as reconciliation implies an estrangement and redemption a loss. The classical theological...

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What’s Wrong with Sin: Sin in Individual and Social Perspective from Schleiermacher to Theologies of Liberation

What’s Wrong with Sin: Sin in Individual and Social Perspective from Schleiermacher to Theologies of Liberation

Author: Derek Nelson

This title portrays two primary doctrines of sin, posited in the last half-century, the 'structural sin' type and the 'relational self' type. After an introduction to the current discussion on the doctrine of sin, two nineteenth century rejections of individualistic conceptions of sin are exposited and critiqued. The book concludes with recommendations drawn from the preceding analyses for further understanding of the social dimensions of sin.

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