Mayer I. Gruber papers

Mayer Irwin Gruber was born in 1944 to Rabbi David Samuel Gruber and Mathilde Nover Gruber of Schenectady, New York. In 1950, Gruber moved with his parents and brother Louis Nover Gruber to Columbia, South Carolina, where his father was rabbi of the Tree of Life Congregation, while his mother worked as a vocational rehabilitation instructor. After graduating from high school in 1961, Mayer attended Duke University where, four years later, he received his A.B. in history. He obtained his rabbinic ordination in 1970 from the Jewish Theological Seminary and in 1977 earned a Ph.D. in ancient Semitic languages and cultures from Columbia University. Gruber's scholarly research and publications deal primarily with biblical lexicography, the Book of Job, women in the biblical world, and medieval Jewish biblical commentaries.

Mayer Gruber served as assistant rabbi of Congregation Oheb Shalom in South Orange, New Jersey, from 1970 to 1972; and rabbi of Mikdosh El Hagro Hebrew Centre in Evanston, Illinois, from 1976 to 1980. During this ten-year span, he was also a faculty member at Spertus College of Judaica in Chicago. In 1980, Gruber joined the faculty at Ben-Gurion University of Negev in Beersheva, Israel. Since then he has held visiting scholar positions at the University of Chicago; Victoria University (Wellington, New Zealand); the University of Melbourne; Brite Divinity School (Fort Worth, Texas); University of Manchester (UK); Lady Doak College (Madurai, India); and St. Kizito's Seminary (Dedza, Malawi).

In 2010, a Festschrift was published in Gruber's honor- Or LeMayer, edited by Shamir Yona.