A New Book Covering Academic Journals

 I am pleased to report that I have just signed a book contract to publish Academic Journals in Biblical Studies: Their Value, Use, and Misuse. Most of the book is written already, but I will be sending out a survey to select academics that will provide me with some invaluable data. (My plan is that the survey will eventually be open to any interested academic who emails me and has published at least one peer-reviewed journal article in the relevant disciplines.) The publisher is Cambridge Scholars Publishing, not formally affiliated with Cambridge University but initially created by Cambridge alumni [and for the record, they do not charge authors for anything]. I intend to have the book completed and submitted to them by October 1st, 2027, if the Lord allows.

The working outline is as follows (though I may be moving chapters 3 and 4 more towards the end of the book):

Chapter 1--Academic Journals: What Are They and Why Should You Care?

Chapter 2--Writing for Peer-Reviewed Journals

Chapter 3--A Methodology for Determining Rankings for Academic Journals

Chapter 4--Ranking the Journals [a four-tiered ranking system, drawing from data from the survey, among other things]. This will improve on my current list, found here.

Chapter 5--What Do You Owe the Writer? A Respectful Challenge to Editors and Peer-Reviewers

Chapter 6--The Use and Abuse of Journals as Personal Metrics

Chapter 7--The Case against Journals that Charge Authors Money

Chapter 8---Conclusion

Appendix 1--The Survey

Appendix 2--The Survey Data

Appendix 3 [?]--Some Personal, Subjective Observations on Writing for Academic Journals

Ranking Academic Journals: A Sample of what I hope the Final List Will Look Like

Some time ago I wrote "Peer-Reviewed Journals Pt 2: The Top 100+ Academic Journals for Biblical Studies," which has turned out to be my most popular post on this rather obscure blog that I publish, with 12,000+ hits and a significant number of comments. I am hoping to publish a book on academic journals in biblical and theological studies (I'm submitting proposals to publishers right now), a book which will cover everything from how peer-review works, predatory journals, "author-pays" journals, and journal articles as a "metric" evaluation (fairly or unfairly) for one's academic value. One chapter in the book will also offer a word of admonition to editors and peer-reviewers on behalf of all the would-be authors who have felt that they wasted their time with a particular journal or been treated unfairly. (With fourteen published academic journal articles and three more forthcoming, I have a lot of experience with the process. In addition to publishing, I have also peer-reviewed for a major evangelical journal).

In this book, I intend to include an intensely researched 4-tier listing of journals, significantly improved from the original posting. This is based on my firm belief that such online rankings as Scopus, while possessing value for ranking journals in "religion" in general, are almost worthless for ranking journals in the narrower fields of Christian biblical and theological studies (I discuss this in the book).

Here is an example of what I hope the final list will look like, using just the tier-1 journals. (The list will almost certainly change based on the surveys I intend to conduct. For the record, of my 17 journal articles only two of them are in this top-tier, so I feel that I am being objective. Also, I am open to feedback on these rankings, and those on the earlier post, but only from people that have actually published peer-reviewed material).

This is only the 1st tier out of 4 tiers.

 

Title and abbreviation	Years	Affiliation and/or   publisher	What sort of paper does it publish?	Misc.
Biblica (Bib)	1920–present	Pontifical Biblical Institute	Broad, biblical studies in general (including extra-canonical Christian literature)	Maximum of 55,000 characters; articles published in “English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish.” No author fees.
Bulletin of the American Society of Overseas Research (BASOR). Multiple previous titles.[1]	1919–present	ASOR; The University of Chicago Press	Ancient Near East archaeology, society, and languages	Maximum of 12,000 words.
Catholic Biblical Quarterly (CBQ)	1939–present	Catholic Biblical Association of America	Broad, biblical studies in general (including extra-canonical Christian literature)	Maximum of 10,000 words.
Dead Sea Discoveries (DSD)	1994–present	Brill	“. . . the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and their cultural, historical, and archaeological contexts” (from website).	Only British or American English.
Ephemerides theologicae lovanienses (ETL)	1924–present	KU Leuven and Université catholique de Louvain	“all aspects of theology and canon law” (from website).	Publishes articles in English, French, and German.
Harvard Theological Review (HTR)	1908–present	Harvard Divinity School	“. . . the history and philosophy of religious thought in all traditions and periods, including Hebrew Bible, New Testament, Christianity, Jewish studies, theology, ethics, archaeology, and comparative religious studies” (from website).	12,000 words is the upper limit (with some exceptions). Note that I am open to debate as to whether or not HTR belongs in tier-1, especially after the whole “Gospel of Jesus’ Wife” issue.
The Jewish Quarterly Review (JQR)	1889–present	University of Pennsylvania Press	Jewish studies, but broad, including biblical, theological, philosophical, and cultural matters.	12,000 word limit.
Journal for the Study of the New Testament (JSNT)	1978–present	Sage Journals	New Testament studies, but broad.	Generally prefers 5,000–10,000 words.
Journal for the Study of the Old Testament (JSOT)	1976–present	Sage Journals	Old Testament studies, but broad.	Generally prefers 5,000–10,000 words.
Journal of Biblical Literature (JBL), formerly known as the Journal of the Society of Biblical Literature and Exegesis.	1881–present, with a hiatus of 1 year (current title 1890–present)	Society of Biblical Literature	Very broad, anything connected to Old and New Testament studies, as well as discussions of the nature of modern biblical scholarship itself.	Quarterly. Upper limit of 10,000 words, including footnotes.
Journal of Early Christian Studies (JECS), formerly known as The Second Century (SecCent).	1981–present (current title 1993–present)	North American Patristics Society; John Hopkins University Press	Church History, from C.E. 100–700.	Upper limit of 12,500 words (with endnotes). Adamantly declares that it does not charge author fees, and warns against websites claiming to represent Hopkins Press that charge a fee.
Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages (JNSL)	1971–present	Stellenbosch University	Publishes “linguistic, translational, literary, text-critical, historical, religious and cultural issues related to Ancient Near Eastern texts and societies, as well as articles addressing theoretical issues underlying these fields” (from the website). Elsewhere clarifies that ANE “includes Nubian, Coptic and Ethiopian studies.”	Bi-annual. 6,000 words is considered the approximate maximum amount.
Journal of Religious Ethics (JRE)	1973–present	Wiley Online Library	Not limited to Christianity and Judaism; includes discussions on a variety of ethical issues including climate change and AI. Also includes “historical studies of influential figures and texts” (from the website).	Prefers between 8,000–10,000 words, though willing to consider longer articles in special cases.
Journal of the American Oriental Society (JAOS)	1843–present	American Society for Premodern Asia (formerly the American Oriental Society)	Very broad, including studies on the culture, history, and religion of the Ancient Near East, Islamic Near East, South Asia, Southeastern Asia, and Eastern Asia.	“Preferably not exceeding 15,000 words, including footnotes . . .” The author retains the copyright for their journal article.
Journal of Theological Studies (JTS)	1899–present	Oxford Academic	Very broad, “the entire range of theological research, scholarship and interpretation” (from the website). Covers New Testament, Hebrew Scriptures, Church history, textual criticism, etc.	Biannual. “The length of articles in the Journal ranges from less than 1,000 to over 30,000 words” (from the website).
Maarav: A Journal for the Study of the Northwest Semitic Languages and Literatures (Maarav)	1978–present	University of Chicago Press	The journal “is devoted to the texts and verbal objects of the ancient Levant featuring Aramaic, Hebrew, Phoenician, and related languages” (from the website).	Biannual.
Mission Studies (MIST)	1984–present	Brill; International Association for Mission Studies	The journal intends to be “a forum for the scholarly study of Christian witness and its impact in the world, and the related field of intercultural theology, from international, interconfessional and interdisciplinary perspectives.”	Triannual. Prefers articles about 6,000 words long, but with some “reasonable leeway,” including footnotes, etc., but not including “Tables and Figures” (from the website).
New Testament Studies (NTS)	1955–present	Cambridge University Press; Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas	Broad, anything related to New Testament studies and early church history.	Quarterly. Will publish articles in English, German, and French. Limit of 8,500 words, including footnotes.
Novum Testamentum (NovT)	1957–present.	Brill	Broad, anything related to New Testament studies and early church history.	Quarterly. Will publish articles in English, German, and French. Limit of 8,500 words, including footnotes.
Old Testament Essays (OTE)	1987–present	Old Testament Society of South Africa	Broad, anything related to the Old Testament, both Hebrew and Greek.	Triannual. Word limit of 7,000–10,000 words, including footnotes, etc.  Publishes in English,,  German. Requires that authors pay a fee of 400 Rand per page (equivalent, as of 9/10/2025, to $22.89 per page), if accepted for publication.
Philosophy	1926–present	Cambridge University Press; Royal Institute of Philosophy	Broad, anything related to modern and ancient philosophy, including overlapping concerns from language, religion, medicine, etc.	Quarterly Upper limit of 10,000 words.
Revue biblique (RB), two other former names[2]	1892–present (current name from 1946)	L’École Biblique et Archéologique Française de Jérusalem	Very broad, virtually all matters relating to biblical studies, including Old Testament, New Testament, ANE archaeology, and church history.	Quarterly. Publishes articles in French, English, German, Italian, and Spanish.
Scottish Journal of Theology (SJT)	1948–present	Cambridge University Press	Covers “systematic, historical, and biblical theology” (from the website).	Quarterly. Prefers articles of 5,000–6,000, with 8,000 words as the upper limit.
Theologische Zeitschrift (TZ)	1945–present	University of Basel	The focus of this journal is on theology, but also how various “subfields of theology” can enter “into an interdisciplinary conversation” with other subfields, including subfields from non-theological disciplines.	Quarterly.  Publishes articles in German, French, and English. Maximum of 60,000 characters (this would probably come out to a maximum of 10,000 words).
Vetus Testamentum (VT)	1951–present	Brill; International Organization for the Study of the Old Testament	Broad, everything related to Old Testament studies.	Quarterly. Publishers in English, French, and German. Prefers articles less than 8,000 words, as well as “short notes” (2,000–3,000 words).
Vigiliae christianae (VC)	1947–present	Brill	Publishers material “of an historical, cultural, linguistic or philological nature on early Christian literature written after the New Testament, as well as on Christian epigraphy and archaeology” (from the website).	Five issues per year. Publishes articles in English, French, and German.
Zeitschrift für alttestamentliche Wissenschaft (ZAW)	1881–present	De Gruyter Brill	Broad, anything connected to the Old Testament and early Judaism.	Upper limit of 38,000 characters, including footnotes and spaces. Quarterly. Publishes articles in English, French, and German.
Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft (ZNW)	1900–present	De Gruyter Brill	Broad, anything connected to the New Testament.	Biannual. Publishers articles in English and German.

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[1] Initially Bulletin of the American School of Oriental Research in Jerusalem, then Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research (1922). Current title from 2022 onward.

[2] Began as Revue Biblique in 1892, switched to Vivre et Penser in 1941, then returned to Revue Biblique in 1946.

Genocide in Esther? My Response in JSOT to a Recent Attempt to Defend Haman (and my first ever tier-1 article!)

The Lord has a sense of humor, or at least irony. I am a New Testament specialist, with multiple academic publications on 1 Peter, yet I have striven in vain to get published in a tier-1 journal! And now, suddenly, I have an article in Journal for the Study of the Old Testament on Esther, which until a few years ago was my least favorite book of the Bible, if having a "least favorite book" is not heretical for somebody committed to the inerrancy of all 66 books! (Click here to see the article and abstract on JSOT's website; email me personally at phimes@gmail.com if you would like a copy).

Here is the abstract:

"A 2021 article in HTS Teologiese Studies advances the thesis that in the book of Esther ‘lawlessness by the Jewish diaspora community triggered genocide in the Persian Empire’ and that ‘Jews provoked the Persian authorities by disobeying the laws of the land’. Much of that article is devoted to a defense of Haman in responding to what the author portrays as the ‘lawlessness’ of the Jewish diaspora community. This article offers a three-fold response: (1) a critical analysis of both Haman and his accusation of ‘lawlessness’ against the Jewish diaspora minority, along with that article’s affirmation of that lawlessness; (2) a critique of that article’s accusation of ‘genocide’ against the Jewish diaspora community along with a discussion of the alleged violent vengeance of that same community vis-à-vis Esther 8–9; (3) a warning that the attempted vindication of Haman is nothing new, but possesses a disturbing Wirkungsgeschichte."

For the record, one of the anonymous peer-reviewers of my article for JSOT spoke of "the almost explicit antisemitism" in the HTS article. It is indeed extremely troubling.

The journey to this, my first and so far only tier-1 publication, is bizarre. In 2021, Temba Rugwiji published "A Critical Evaluation of Causalities of the Genocide in Esther 3:8–15: Lawlessness and Revolt of the Jewish Diaspora Community" in the formerly prestigious HTS Teologiese Studies. The article basically offered a defense of Haman in Esther. Don't take my word for it, you can see for yourself (click here to read this open access article). I was aware of this article by 2022, and was "stirred up," so to speak, but did not at first commit to a course of action until a guest speaker at our college spoke on the plight throughout history of the Jewish people. I wrote the article and initially sent it to a different journal, which was not interested in it (no peer review), and after their response sent it in to JSOT. I received a "heavy revision" decision. Both initial peer-reviewers were overall favorable (though one of them wondered if the article really needed to be written), but both had some good recommendations for revision, which I almost completely implemented. The third reviewer, after revision, was also favorable, and had just a few more suggestions, which I implemented. The process only took 2 months from submission of the paper to the decision to "heavily revise," and then it took 9 months for revision and publication (most of that was the time I needed to revise).

A closing thought: JSOT, of course, does not charge its authors for publication. Almost no respectable journal does this in biblical studies (I can't speak for journals in other disciplines)! I cannot help but wonder if the extremely high price HTS charges its authors (click here to see their "Article Processing Charge"), combined with the fact that they are putting out an extremely high number of digital articles per issue (click here to see the list of 100+ articles they published in the same issue with Rugwiji's article, vol. 77 issue 4), contributes to a lack of quality control. I don't know, it's just a thought.