NAJIM, MICHEL

NAJIM, MICHEL, priest, Arab-American theologian, patristics scholar, translator (5 May 1949– ). After receiving his M.Div. at the St. Joh n of Damascus School of Theology (1974) in Lebanon, he obtained his M.Th. at the Aristotelian University (1976) in Salonica, Greece, and his Th.D. (1985) with excellence from the same institution. He was professor of patristics, history, and languages at the St. John’s School (1978–87) in Lebanon, while concurrently serving as dean (1980–87). Active in ecumenical affairs, he was a World Council of Churches Commissioner of Mission and Evangelism (1983–89), a member of the Ecumenical Committee for New Testament translation (1983–87), and an ecumenical dialogue representative of the Antiochian Orthodox Church (1980–87). After moving to the United States with his wife and family he taught patristics (1987–92) and participated in academic community life (1992–93) at the St. Athanasius School of the Antiochian Evangelical Orthodox Mission of the Antiochian Archdiocese of North America (q.v.) as the principal Orthodox theologian of this newly received group (with American evangelical roots in the Campus Crusade for Christ).

Active nationally in the Antiochian Archdiocese, he has served as a chairman of the department of liturgics and translation (1988–94), visiting professor at the Antiochian House (1994) in Pennsylvania, a member of the planning committee for the 1994 Clergy Symposium, and adjunct professor at Fuller Seminary (1994). In addition to his pastoral duties at St. Nicholas Cathedral in Los Angeles, Fr. Najim also serves as part of the motivating workforce behind the newly formed Liturgical Translation Committee of the Standing Conference of Orthodox Bishops in America.

Fluent in English, Greek, Arabic, and French, Najim has translated about a dozen important theological works since 1978 to make them available to a wider Orthodox readership. Supplementing his patristics bibliography of nine articles in various periodicals is a book list of a half dozen major works among which one finds An Introduction to Patrology (1980), The Theotokos according to St. Joh n of Damascus (1984), The History and Legacy of Arab Christianity in the Pre-Islamic Period, and Orthodox Mission in the United States. Unassuming in his demeanor and dedicated in his vocation as a churchman, Fr. Michel is quite possibly the foremost young Arab-American Orthodox theologian living in the United States.