Tim Vivian


Tim Vivian is an American scholar of early Christianity and Coptologist. He is Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies at California State University, Bakersfield, and a retired priest of the Episcopal Church.

Education and career

Vivian received a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of California, Santa Barbara, a Master of Arts in American literature from California Polytechnic State University, and a Master of Arts in comparative literature from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He then earned an interdisciplinary Doctor of Philosophy degree in classics, history, and religious studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara with a doctoral dissertation titled Saint Peter of Alexandria: Bishop and Martyr in 1985 under the direction of Birger A. Pearson. He next earned an M.Div. from the Church Divinity School of the Pacific and went on to do research from 1988 to 1990 as a Henry R. Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow at Yale Divinity School.
Vivian taught at CSUB from 1990 to 2022. He has published over 25 books, 50 journal articles, and 100 scholarly book reviews. He won the Faculty Scholarship & Creative Activity award at California State University, Bakersfield, in 2007/2008. He serves on the board of advisors for Cistercian Studies Quarterly and on the editorial board of Coptica.
Vivian is a priest of the Episcopal Church. He served as vicar of Grace/St. Paul's from 2007 to 2017. On April 26, 2018, Vivian was granted professor emeritus status at California State University, Bakersfield. On October 11, 2018, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from the Church Divinity School of the Pacific for his scholarship and work for social justice.

Research

Although Vivian's research emphasis is on early Christianity, especially Coptic studies and early Christian monasticism, he has published broadly in religious history. He is the recipient of the 2015 Nelson R. Burr Prize of the Historical Society of the Episcopal Church for his article “Wake the Devil from His Dream: Thomas Dudley, Quincy Ewing, Religion, and the ‘Race Problem’ in the Jim Crow South” published in the December 2014 issue of Anglican and Episcopal History.
Vivian is also a published poet with published collections including Other Voices, Other Rooms, Poems Written in a Time of Plague: Further Reflections on Scripture, and A Doorway into Thanks: ''Further Reflections on Scripture''.

Selected publications