Takamitsu Muraoka

Takamitsu Muraoka (村岡崇光; born 1938 in Hiroshima) is a Japanese Hebraist. He was Chair of Hebrew, Israelite Antiquities and Ugaritic at Leiden University in the Netherlands till 2003 and is most notable for his studies of Hebrew and Aramaic (including Syriac) linguistics and the ancient translations of the Bible, notably of the Septuagint.

After studying general linguistics and biblical languages under the late Prof. M. Sekine at Tokyo Kyoiku University, he studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, completing his dissertation Emphasis in Biblical Hebrew with the late Prof. C. Rabin as supervisor, and obtaining his Ph.D. in 1970. He taught Semitic languages including Modern Hebrew as Lecturer in Manchester University, U.K. (1970-80), as Professor of Middle Eastern studies at Melbourne University (1980-91), Australia, then moved in 1991 to Leiden.

In addition, he was editor of Abr-Nahrain [now Ancient Near Eastern Studies] 1980-92, and also edited or co-edited volumes on Ancient Hebrew Semantics, Qumran Aramaic, and Qumran Hebrew. His comprehensive syntax of Septuagint Greek appeared in 2016.

He is Fellow of the Australian Academy of Humanities, and since 2006 Honorary Fellow of the Academy of the Hebrew Language.

Since retiring in 2003 from the Leiden chair, he has been visiting every year, teaching biblical languages and the Septuagint as a volunteer a minimum of five weeks in Asian countries which suffered under Japanese militarism in the 20th century. His thoughts and reflections on this yearly teaching ministry up to the year 2015 can now be read in English in "My Via dolorosa: Along the trails of the Japanese imperialism in Asia" (AuthorHouse U.K. 2016).

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