Thomas A. Boogaart

Dennis & Betty Voskuil Professor of Old Testament

Education
A.B. Calvin College, M.Div. Western Theological Seminary, Ph.D. University of Groningen
Tom.Boogaart@westernsem.edu

Courses
BF103 Old Testament Life and Witness
BF110 Biblical Hebrew
BF111 Hebrew Translation and Interpretation
BF513 Studies in Prophets
BF522 Old Testament Narratives
BF523 Old Testament Theology 
BF614 Hebrew Reading
BF615 Advanced Biblical Hebrew

I help students recover the sacred in the scriptures; that is, its power to bless them and energize their ministries. Together we explore the ways Western culture has silenced the scriptures, and together we listen again to its song of peace.

Background

Tom Boogaart has spent a lifetime immersed in the scriptures, as a student and teacher in the Netherlands and in England, and later at Central College in Iowa and at Western Seminary. He was ordained into the ministry of the Reformed Church in America in 1982. 

In all his scholarship and teaching, Dr. Boogaart is committed to helping the church recover the Scriptures as a spiritual resource.  He tries to show his students how delving deeper into Scriptures brings them closer to God.  Most recently he has worked on writing a new curriculum for teaching Hebrew in which students take the words into their hearts through various practices, such as singing, memorization, and enactment. 
 
Dr. Boogaart helps his students to see the world through the lens of Scripture and to see more clearly God working for peace and justice.  His own vision for peace and justice is seen in the ministries he has initiated at Western Theological Seminary: The Bridge, a fair trade store on 8th Street in Holland, and the Community Kitchen, a hot meal program served at noon in the Commons of the seminary.