Faculty & Staff

Dr. Appold has been at Truman since 1976 where he has taught in the disciplines of Classical Languages, International Education Abroad, and Philosophy and Religion.  He received his Th.D in Biblical Studies with a concentration in New Testament under Ernst Käsemann at the University of Tübingen, Germany.  His dissertation on the “Oneness Motif in the Fourth Gospel” was published in 1976 in the Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen z. N.T. as the inaugural text to Reihe 2:1.  Due to increased readership demand, this text was reprinted by Wipf and Stock Publishers in June 2011.  Following undergraduate studies at Concordia College in Milwaukee and undergraduate studies in psychology and graduate studies in philosophy at Washington University in St. Louis, he completed seminary training at Concordia in St. Louis where he received his M. Div. degree.  In addition to his past 35-year tenure as pastor of Faith Lutheran Church and Student Center in Kirksville, he served in ministry at Washington D.C. and in campus ministry at Köln, Germany.  Since 2003 he has been serving as part-time pastor at St. Paul’s in Memphis, MO.  As Visiting Professor, he taught at the Nagercoil Seminary in India, the University of Iowa, Christ Seminary in St. Louis, and the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago.  In addition to his work in biblical theology and Johannine studies, his most recent publications appear in the four-volume Bethsaida series published by Truman State University Press. Articles may also be found in the John, Jesus, and History series of the SBL, in the Character Studies in the Fourth Gospel (Mohr Siebeck 2013), and in Bethsaida in Archaeology, History, and Culture (Cambridge Scholars, 2014). An extensive article on The Parting of the Ways is scheduled for publication the end of 2016.  He has given presentations at the International Meetings of the Society of Biblical Literature in Budapest, Hungary; Lausanne, Switzerland; Capetown, South Africa; Rome, Italy; Cambridge, England; Singapore; Edinburgh, Scotland; Vienna, Austria; Auckland, New Zealand; Tartu, Estonia;  Buenos Aires, Argentina; and Seoul, South Korea.   He is a member of the American Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature, a contributor to the UNO Archaeological Conferences, and a Project Director for the Bethsaida Archaeological Excavation in Israel.  He also serves as faculty advisor for SMEP, Truman’s Students for Middle East Peace, an action group that sponsors campus-wide seminars, film presentations, and falafel sales.  Additionally, he is the moderator for Truman’s AIL chapter of Theta Alpha Kappa, the national Honor Society for Religious Studies.