Marc H. Ellis

Marc H. Ellis (born 1952) is an American author, liberation theologian, and a retired University Professor of Jewish Studies, Professor of History and Director of the Center for Jewish Studies at Baylor University. He is currently visiting professor of several international universities, including the University of Innsbruck, Austria and the United Nations University for Peace, Costa Rica.
Biography.
Ellis was a member of the Catholic Worker Movement in 1974-1975. He wrote an autobiographical book (1997) "Unholy alliance: religion and atrocity in our time". He earned B.A. and M.A. degrees in Religion and American Studies at Florida State University, where he studied under Richard Rubenstein and William Miller. In 1980 he received his doctorate in contemporary American Social and Religious Thought from Marquette University. He then became a faculty member at the Maryknoll School of Theology in Maryknoll, New York, and director of the M.A. program at the Maryknoll Institute for Justice and Peace. He was made full professor in 1988, and remained at Maryknoll until 1995. He was a Senior Fellow and then visiting scholar at Harvard Divinity School's Center for the Study of World Religions and Harvard University's Center for Middle Eastern Studies, as well as a visiting professor at Florida State University. In 1998 he was appointed Professor of American and Jewish Studies at Baylor University, where the next year he was named University Professor of American and Jewish Studies. In 1999 he founded Baylor University's Center for American and Jewish Studies. In 2006, the Center was renamed The Center for Jewish Studies.
His current writings deal with contemporary Judaism, Jewish liberation theology, Jewish-Arab relations, justice, and peace.
Ellis retired from Baylor University in 2012 and is currently visiting professor of international universities such as the United Nations mandated University for Peace in Costa Rica and the University of Innsbruck, Austria.
Among those who have commented positively on the work of Ellis are George McGovern, Noam Chomsky, Edward Said, Professor Susannah Heschel, Elliot Dorff and Desmund Tutu.
Ellis's departure from Baylor was controversial as he and his supporters, including Cornel West, Rosemary Ruether, and Desmond Tutu, stated that a concerted effort was made to remove him due to his views on Israeli-Palestinian relations. Baylor President Ken Starr and the university administration denied that Ellis was being targeted for his views but that the investigation had to do with privacy rules. Ellis responded that the privacy rules he was charged with violating were selectively enforced.