Building Bridges Seminar

Seyed Amir Akrami is an Iranian scholar with research interests that include​Islamic philosophy and interreligious relations. Currently based at the Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies (Tehran), he was a visiting professor at the Eastern Mennonite University Center for Interfaith Engagement from 2012 to 2015. He has also been a lecturer at the Al-Mahdi Institute in Birmingham, United Kingdom, and a member of the Iranian Institute of Philosophy. Akrami holds a B.A. in Islamic studies, M.A. in religion and mysticism, and Ph.D. in the philosophy of religion.

John Azumah is a professor of world Christianity and Islam and the director of international programs at Columbia Theological Seminary. He specializes in Islam and Christian-Muslim relations and is interested in Islamic and Christian theology of religions, missions, and missiology. Previously the director for the Centre of Islamic Studies at the London School of Theology, he has taught in theological seminaries in India, South Africa, and Ghana and was a research fellow at the Akrofi-Christaller Institute in Ghana. He is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church of Ghana. Azumah earned his Ph.D. at the University of Birmingham.

Sheikh Zaki Badawi, who died in 2006, was a prominent Egyptian Islamic scholar, community activist, and promoter of interfaith dialogue. After studying at al-Azhar University, Badawi received his Ph.D. in modern Muslim thought from the University of London and went on to teach in Egypt, Malaysia, Singapore, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, and Britain. He served as director of the Islamic Cultural Centre and chief imam of the London Central Mosque; Badawi also co-founded the Three Faiths Forum and was vice chairman of the World Congress of Faiths. He was the principal of the Muslim College in London, a frequent writer and broadcaster on Islamic affairs, and an honorary Knight Commander of the British Empire.

Vincent J. Cornell is the Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Middle East and Islamic Studies at Emory University. His interests span Islamic thought from the doctrinal and social history of Sufism to philosophy and Islamic law. From 2000 to 2006, he was professor of history and director of the King Fahd Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies at the University of Arkansas; from 1991 to 2000 he taught at Duke University. He is the editor of the five-volume Voices of Islam (2007) and author of, among others, Do Jews, Christians, and Muslims Worship the Same God? (2012, with Baruch Levine, Jacob Neusner, and Bruce Chilton) and Realm of the Saint: Power and Authority in Moroccan Sufism (1998). Cornell received his Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Ellen Davis is Amos Ragan Kearns Professor of Bible and Practical Theology at Duke Divinity School. Her research interests focus on the bearing of biblical interpretation on faith communities and their response to public issues, particularly the environmental crisis and interfaith relations. She is the author of, among others, Preaching the Luminous Word (2016), Biblical Prophecy: Perspectives for Christian Theology, Discipleship and Ministry (2014), and Scripture, Culture, and Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible (2009). Davis holds an M.Div. from the Church Divinity School of the Pacific and Ph.D. from Yale University.

Lejla Demiri is Chair of Islamic Doctrine at the Center for Islamic Theology, University of Tübingen. Her research interests include the history of Islamic theology, Islam and religious pluralism, Christian-Muslim theological interactions, Ottoman intellectual history, and Islamic manuscripts. She holds a B.A. and M.A. from Marmara University (Istanbul), licentiate degree and postgraduate diploma from the Pontifical Gregorian University (Rome), and a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge. She held postdoctoral fellowships at Trinity Hall, Cambridge (2007–2010) and the Free University of Berlin (2010-2012). She is the author of Muslim Exegesis of the Bible in Medieval Cairo (2013). She also serves as team leader (Middle East and North Africa) and section editor (Turkish world) for the CMR1900 project: Christian-Muslim Relations: A Bibliographical History (1500–1900) (2012–present) and publishes extensively on theological and interfaith matters.

Rešid Hafizović is a professor at the Faculty of Islamic Studies of Sarajevo University and a member of the Iranian Academy of Philosophy. He is the author of The Human Image in the Mirror of Sufi Literature (2005) and has translated many books, essays, and articles from Arabic, English, French, and Italian into Bosnian. Hafizović holds a B.A. from the Faculty of Islamic Studies, Ph.D. from the University of Sarajevo, and has done postgraduate work at the Catholic Theological Faculty.

The Right Reverend Dr. Michael Ipgrave is the bishop of Lichfield in the Church of England. Ipgrave has lectured and written extensively about interfaith relations, Christian-Muslim dialogue, and religion and human rights. He is a member of the Archbishop of Canterbury's Commission for Dialogue with the Chief Rabbinates of Israel. He previously served as the bishop of Woolwich and archdeacon of Southwark. He was Inter Faith Relations Adviser to the Archbishop's Council of the Church of England and executive secretary of the ecumenical Churches' Commission for Inter Faith Relations from 1999 to 2004. Ipgrave is the author of Trinity and Inter Faith Dialogue (2003) and has edited several volumes recording Building Bridges seminars. He has a Ph.D. from the University of Durham.