Prof. Dr. Zlatko Pleše

Adjunct Professor

E-Mail
plese@unc.edu
Postal Address
Theologische Fakultät
Universität Bern
Institut für Neues Testament
Länggassstrasse 51
3012 Bern
Consultation Hour
By appointment

Ph.D., Yale University, 1996
Ph.D., University of Zagreb, 1996
M.Phil., Yale University, 1990
M.A., University of Zagreb, 1989
B.A., University of Zagreb, 1985

  • Early Christianity and Classical Culture
  • Gnosticism and Hermetism
  • Ancient Rhetoric and Hermeneutics
  • Plutarch and Middle Platonism
  • Coptic Language and Literature

Pleše, Z. Die Hintergründe des Corpus Hermeticum: Autoren, Leser, Gemeinschaften.” In D. Gall (ed.): Die göttliche Weisheit des Hermes Trismegistos. Pseudo-Apuleius, Asclepius. SAPERE XXXVIII. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020, pp. 145-170.

Pleše, Z. “Dualism in the Hermetic Writings.” In F. Jourdan (ed.): Le dualisme: une notion caractéristique de la pensée occidentale dès son origine ou un concept issu des polémiques religieuses et simplifications critiques? Chōra: revue d’études anciennes et médiévales. Numéro spécial, 2016, 261-278.

Pleše, Z. “Bible et la littérature gnostique." In S. Parizet (ed.): La Bible dans les littératures du monde. Paris: Editions du Cerf, 2016, vol. 1, 1034-1038.

Aufrère, S.H., P. A. Alexander, and Z. Pleše (eds.). On the Fringe of Commentary: Objectives and Strategies of Metatextuality in Ancient Near Eastern and Ancient Mediterranean Cultures. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta. Leuven-Paris: Peeters, 2015.

Pleše, Z. and A. Lange. “Derveni-Alexandria-Qumran: Transpositional Hermeneutics in Jewish and Greek Culture.” In S.H. Aufrère, P.A. Alexander, and Z. Pleše (eds.): On the Fringe of Commentary: Objectives and Strategies of Metatextuality in Ancient Near Eastern and Ancient Mediterranean Cultures. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta. Leuven-Paris: Peeters, 2015, pp. 89-160.

Pleše, Z. “Evil and Its Sources in Gnostic Traditions.” In F. Jourdan and R. Hirsch-Luipold (eds.): Die Wurzel allen Übels. Vorstellungen über die Herkunft des Übels und des Bösen in der Literatur des 1.-4. Jahrhunderts. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 2014, pp. 93-125.

Pleše, Z. and A. Lange. “Text between Religious Cultures: Intertextuality in Hellenistic Judaism." In M, Bauks, W. Horowitz, and A. Lange (eds.): Between Text and Text: The Hermeneutics of Intertextuality in Ancient Cultures and Their Afterlife in Medieval and Modern Times. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2013, pp. 328-350.

Pleše, Z. and B.D. Ehrman, eds. and trans.The Other Gospels: Accounts of Jesus from Outside the New Testament. Oxford-New York: Oxford University Press, 2013.sd

Pleše, Z. “Intertextuality and Conceptual Blending in the Apocryphon of John.” Adamantius 18 (2012) 32-49.

Pleše, Z. and A. Lange. “Transpositional Hermeneutics: A Hermeneutical Comparison of the Derveni Papyrus, Aristobulus of Alexandria, and the Qumran Pesharim.” Journal of Ancient Judaism 3 (2012) 14-66.

Pleše, Z. and A. Lange. “The Qumran Pesharim and the Derveni Papyrus: Transpositional Hermeneutics in Ancient Jewish and Greek Commentaries.” In A. Lange, E. Tov, and M. Weigold (eds.) in association with B.H. Reynolds III: The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages, and Cultures. 2 vols, VTS 140.1-2. Leiden: Brill, 2011, vol. 1, pp. 895-922.

Pleše, Z. “Plato and Parmenides in Agreement: Ammonius’s Praise of God as One-Being in Plutarch’s The E at Delphi.” In J.M. Turner and K. Corrigan (eds.): Plato’s Parmenides: History and Interpretation from Speusippus to Plotinus and Later Neoplatonism (4th C BCE-6th C CE), Writings from the Greco-Roman World. Atlanta-Leiden: SBL Publications and Brill Academic Publishers, 2010, pp. 93-113.

Pleše, Z. and B.D. Ehrman. 2010. The Apocryphal Gospels, edited and translated. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press.


Pleše, Z. 2009. “Gnostic Literature.” In M. von Albrecht, H. Görgemanns und R. Hirsch-Luipold (eds.): Religiöse Philosophie und philosophische Religion der früher Kaiserzeit. Literaturgeschichtliche Perspektiven. Ratio Religionis Studien 1. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 163-198.

Pleše, Z. 2007. Fate, Providence and Astrology in Gnosticism. MHNH 7: 237-268.


Pleše, Z. 2006. Poetics of the Gnostic Universe: Narrative and Cosmology in the Apocryphon of John. Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies vol. 52. Leiden: Brill.

Pleše, Z. 2005. “Platonist Orientalism.” In A. Pérez Jiménez and F. Titchener (eds.): Historical and Biographical Values of Plutarch’s Works. Studies devoted to Professor Philip Stadter by the International Plutarch Society. Leuven/Madrid, pp. 245-271.