Muslim Scholar Joins Interreligious Staff

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Monday, March 9, 2020
Contact: Laura Urban
ICJS / Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies
(410) 494-7161, ext 204;  lurban@icjs.org

Baltimore, MD (3/10/2020): Baltimore’s principal interreligious educational organization announced today that Zeyneb Sayilgan, Ph.D., will join its staff this summer as the Muslim scholar. The Institute of Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies (ICJS) will welcome Dr. Sayilgan to its academic and program staff to advance interreligious dialogue and understanding through education, outreach, and scholarship.

“We are honored to welcome Dr. Sayilgan, an insightful and compassionate interreligious leader, to Baltimore,” said Heather Miller Rubens, executive director and Roman Catholic scholar at ICJS. “Her scholarly expertise and personal experience helping others to understand religious pluralism will be important to ICJS’s work building interreligious understanding in the Greater Baltimore region.”

Dr. Sayilgan is currently the Henry Luce Visiting Assistant Professor of Islamic Theology and Religious Pluralism at Virginia Theological Seminary. She previously taught at Catholic University of America and at Georgetown, where she also served as a residential chaplain for students from all backgrounds.

She earned her doctorate in Theological and Religious Studies from Georgetown University with a focus on Islam and Christianity; a M.A. in Islamic Studies and Christian-Muslim Relations from Hartford Seminary; and a M.A. and B.A. in Islamic Studies and Law from Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany.

A native of Germany, where she was born to Kurdish immigrants from Turkey, Dr. Sayilgan’s personal experience with religious diversity and Muslim immigration informs her academic work. Her current research focuses on the intersection of religion and immigration, particularly in relation to Muslims living in the West. She is currently working on her book, Islam and Immigration: Theological Insights from the Qur’an (Baylor University Press). She is also the co-editor of The Companion to Said Nursi Studies (2017) and Faithful Neighbors: Christian-Muslim Vision & Practice (2016).

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The Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies is an independent, educational non-profit that promotes interreligious dialogue and understanding through public programs; fellowships for civic leaders, teachers, and clergy; and scholarly research. ICJS works to confront religious bigotry and bridge faith-based differences to make Baltimore a model interreligious city.