Professor Petros Vassiliadis Joins the SFI Trustees’ Committee

Petros Vassiliadis is a Greek Orthodox Biblical theologian and honoured Professor of Aristotle University in Thessaloniki.  He is also the President of the Metropolitan Panteleimon Papageorgiu Centre for the Study of Ecumenism, Missiology and Ecology (CEMES), and Honourable President of the World Conference of Associations of Theological Institutions (WOCATI).

Petros Vassiliadis was born in Thessaloniki in 1945, and studied Theology and Mathematics at Aristotle University, and Biblical Criticism and Biblical Theology at King’s College (London) and the University of Heidelberg. His dissertation, which he defended at Aristotle University, is entitled “The Document Q Hypothesis: A Critical Analysis of Current literary-critical and theological Problems Associated with Document Q”  For almost 35 years he has taught New Testament and Interfaith Dialogue for the Aristotle University Faculty of Theology in Thessaloniki. From time to time he also teachers courses in Missiology, Liturgical Theology and Ecumenical Dialogue. He has also taught as a visiting professor at various institutes, universities and colleges in the USA (St. Vladimir’s Seminary, St. Athanasius College, Smith College in Lynchburg, PA) in Europe (Bossi, Bari Bologne, Ravenna, Copenhagen, Lund, Oslo, Joensuu and Reykjavik) and in Asia (South Korea).

One of the hallmarks of Professor Vassiliadis’s theological thought is to place priority on the eschatological experience of the early Christian community, rather than on its literary inheritance. His main theological perspective gives priority to a “horizontal” (ecclesiological and eschatological) perspective in the study of the New Testament, early church and later Christian literature, over against “vertical” (soteriological) teaching.

Professor Vassiliadis participates in various international projects in Biblical Studies, Missiology, and ecumenical dialogue. He is the editor of numerous collections of academic articles and journals and one of the authors of the translation of the New Testament into Modern Greek. He is the author and editor of approximately 20 books and 300 academic articles. From 1998 to 2006 he was an Orthodox Representative to the World Council of Churches Commission for Mission and Evangelization. He is a member of two Synodal Committees of the Greek Orthodox Church: Liturgical Reform, and Inter-Orthodox/Inter-Christian Relations. He is one of the of the founders and Vice-President of the Society for Ecumentical Study and Inter-Orthodox Relations (SESIOR).

He has earned highest awards from the Neapoli Municipality in Thessaloniki, for his contributions to the religious and cultural development of his home city, as well as of the municipality of Edessa, for his academic contributions, in general.