Daniel J. Lasker

Lasker served as a faculty member in the Goldstein-Goren Department of Jewish Thought at Ben Gurion University of the Negev (1978–2017) and as of 2017 is a professor emeritus. He served as department chair and was the incumbent of the Norbert Blechner Chair of Jewish Values. His main field of research and teaching is Medieval Jewish philosophy.

His areas of interest are medieval Jewish philosophy (including the thought of Judah Halevi, Maimonides, and Hasdai Crescas), the Jewish-Christian debate, Karaite Judaism , and other issues in Jewish theology and law. His first book, Jewish Philosophical Polemics Against Christianity (1977; second edition, 2007), details the use of philosophy in the medieval Jewish critique of Christianity. His most recent book, co-authored with Johannes Niehoff-Panagiotidis and David Sklare, is Theological Encounters at a Crossroads: A Preliminary Edition of Judah Hadassi’s Eshkol ha-kofer, First Commandment, and Studies of the Book’s Judaeo-Arabic and Byzantine Contexts (2019). This book serves as a partial edition and translation of a twelfth-century Karaite book of commandments and theology. His other books are an edition and translation of Hasdai Crescas’ Refutation of the Christian Principles (1990, 1992); (with Sarah Stroumsa), The Book of Nestor the Priest (1996), which presents the texts and translations of the earliest extant Jewish anti-Christian polemic, written in Judaeo-Arabic and then translated into Hebrew; From Judah Hadassi to Elijah Bashyatchi: Studies in Late Medieval Karaite Philosophy (2008), which describes developments in Karaite philosophy from the twelfth to fifteenth centuries in the Byzantine Empire He has also co-edited a jubilee volume and three conference proceedings and authored over 250 other publications.

He married Debbie (Debora) Dworkin in 1973. They have five children. In 1978 he made Aliyah to Beer Sheva, Israel, where he still lives.

Daniel Judah Lasker (born April 5, 1949) is an American-born Israeli scholar of Jewish philosophy. As of 2017, he is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Jewish thought at Ben Gurion University of the Negev.

Born on April 5, 1949 in Flint, Michigan, United States, to Arnold and Miriam Lasker, he grew up in Orange, New Jersey, where his father served as a congregational Rabbi. As a teenager he was active in USY and served as chapter head and on the regional board. He received his B.A., M.A. and PhD from Brandeis University, all in the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies, he also was a visiting research student at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His dissertation was advised by Alexander Altmann and is titled "Jewish Philosophical Polemics Against Christianity in the Middle Ages".