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Matthew Del Nevo grew up in Oxford in England and went into social work after leaving school. He moved to Jerusalem and lived there for a few years working with people with physical and intellectual disabilities at the Four Homes of Mercy in Bethany. He studied Creative Writing at the Bezalel Foundation and brushed up his Arabic at the Hebrew University (Mt Scopus). Matthew met Jean Vanier in Jerusalem and lived for a while at Jean’s community outside Paris – he then went to Calcutta to stay at Jean’s community there. Matthew emigrated to Australia in 1986 and while continuing social work, undertook theological studies at the University of Sydney, completing a Bachelor of Divinity (Hons) and later a Ph.D. on Edmond Jabès' poetic and philosophical writings. Subsequently Matthew moved into teaching, initially at the University of Sydney in the graduate program, then in various other colleges in Sydney, including a Catholic school, where Matthew introduced a philosophy in school program.

Since 2001 Matthew has worked within Sydney College of Divinity, a consortium of theological colleges. Currently Matthew is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the Catholic Institute of Sydney, a Pontifical institute, where he lectures mainly in the area of the history of ideas and modern continental philosophy.

Matthew is married to Chinese choreographer Su-zhen Xu and they have one daughter.

Books:

   
        2008, The Valley Way of Soul. Sydney: St. Pauls Publishing.
   

        2002, The Continental Community of Inquiry. Sheffield: International Society for Philosophers.

Forthcoming chapters in edited books:

Johannine Christianity and Secularisation, in Religion and Spirituality in a Postmodern Globe (Lambert Academic
    Publishing House).
Living Toward the End of Time in Augustine’s City of God, in St. Augustine: His Thought, Relevance and Legacy
    (Adelaide, ATF 2010)
Shestov and Gilson: Two Types of Faith and Reason in From Faith in Reason to Reason in Faith: Transformations in
    Philosophical Theology from the 18th to 20th Centuries (Adelaide, ATF, 2009)
Levinas and the Traces of God’s Absence, The Absent God: Theological Remnants in 2oth Century French Philosophy
    (Adelaide, ATF 2010)

Articles in refereed journals:

2009, ‘Buber invites Barth to Dance – in Jerusalem’ McAuley Ejounal of Theology.
2009, “Parameters of Pentecostal Aesthetics”. CyberJournal of Pentecostal-Charismatic Research #18 Feb 2009
2008 ‘Pentecostalism and the Age of Interpretation’. Australasian Pentecostal Studies 11.
2008 ‘Melancholy and the Good Life’, eOikonomia 3.
2008, “Rosenzweig the Three Ages of the Church” in  INTER, The Romanian Review for Inter-Orthodox, Inter-Confessional
    and Inter-Religious Studies Vol II, nr. 1-2
2007 ‘Resources for Christian Philosophy in the World Wide Web’ eOikonomia.
2007 ‘Pentecostalism and the Three Ages of the Church’ in Australasian Pentecostal Studies 10.
2007 ‘The New Catholic Modernists’ in McAuley Ejournal of Theology, 9.
2005 ‘The Need for Philosophy in Values Education’ in Dialogue Australasia.
2005 ‘Man’s Irreconcilable Freedom’ Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas, Conference Papers, Volume III:
    Metaphysics, Angelicum, Rome.
2003 ‘Michael Rosenak: Tree of Life, Tree of Knowledge: Conversations with Torah,’ Australian Religion Studies Review,
    16/1, 2003, 141-143.
2003 ‘On Morals and Universals’, Australian Ejournal of Theology (AEJT) Vol.1
2002 ‘Le nom Derrida’, Australian Ejournal of Theology Vol.2
2002 “Theology, Technology and Aesthetics”, Phronema, Vol 17, 41-49.
2001 ‘Philosophy is Not a Technology’, Critical and Creative Thinking, (March).
1999 ‘Rilke and Wallace Stevens: Theologians of the Poetic Imagination’,
1998 ‘Blanchot’s  Amitié’, The Philosopher Magazine, No.6, 43-44
1997 'Edmond Jabès and Kabbalism After God', Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 65/2, 403-442.
1996 'Edmond Jabès and The Book', Literature and Theology, 10/4, Oxford University Press, 301-336.
1995 'Reading Edmond Jabès', Literature and Theology, 2/4, Oxford University Press, 399-422.
1993 'Edmond Jabès, Jewish Destiny, & Deconstruction', Australian Journal of Jewish Studies, 6/2, 37-52.
1992 'Imaginal Psychology's Disability, St. John of Damascus and the truth about Iconoclasm', Spring 53: A Journal of
    Archetype & Culture. U.S.A., 113-120.

Book Chapters:

2009 Goethe, First Father of the Third Age of the Church in The Cross and the Star: The Post-Nietzschean Christian and
    Jewish Thought of Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy and Franz Rosenzweig, ed. Wayne Cristaudo and Frances Huessy
    (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2009).
2009, Spirituality in a Feminine Key, in Raising Women Leaders: perspectives on liberating women in Pentecostalism
    (with Robyn Wrigly-Carr). (Sydney: APS/SCD).
2007  ‘Sergei Bulgakov’. ‘Nicolai Berdyaev’. ‘Joachim of Fiore’ in Encyclopedia of Christian Civilisation. (Oxford:
    Blackwell).
2007 ‘John Paul II: A Poetic Impulse’ in John Paul II: Legacy and Witness (Sydney: St Pauls).
2006 “Rosenzweig” in Hodder Encyclopedia of Philosophy and Ethics (London: Hodder).
2004 “Philosophy is at the heart of good pedagogy”, in On Education and the Ideal (Sydney: New Frontier).
2003, ‘On Spiritual Knowledge’, in Esotericism and the Control of Knowledge, (Louvain: Peeters).
2000, ‘Edmond Jabès and the Question of Death’, in Strange Fire: Reading the Hebrew Bible after the Holocaust (New
    York: SUNY).

Qualifications:

BA Hons AppSocSci (Lanchester Poly UK), BD (Honours) (USyd, 1991), GradDipRE (ACU, 2001); PhD (USyd 1996)

BD Hons thesis title: An Anatomy of Comparative Spirituality: Common Ground in St Augustine and the Eastern Fathers

PhD thesis title: Reading Edmond Jabès

[Edmond Jabès is the author the Le livre des questions in seven volumes (1963-1973) Le Livre des ressemblances in three volumes (1978-1980) and Le Livre des limites in four volumes (1982-1987). He died in 1991.]

Current position:

Senior Lecturer in Philosophy – Catholic Institute – Full time

Specialisations:

Aesthetics, arts, education, spirituality; psychology; European literature

Current research activity:

A book on the philosopher Emmanuel Levinas for ATF press to be translated for the Chinese market

Aesthetics and poetics

The applicability today of the theological philosophy, cultural theory and new sociology of Franz Rosenzweig and Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy

Professional Associations:

International Society for Philosophers  (ISFP) – Fellow
The Australasian Philosophy of Religion Association (APRA)
Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy (ASCP)
Australasian Association of Philosophy (AAP)
Society for Literature and Aesthetics (Sydney)