Dr. Seth Ward has been teaching at the University of Wyoming since January 2003, where he teaches Islam and Middle East. Previously, Ward directed the University of Denver’s Institute for Islamic-Judaic Studies for ten years, and Professor Ward continues to be a Research Associate of the Institute for the Study of Israel in the Middle East at the Graduate School of International Studies at the University of Denver. Ward has also taught at Colorado College and the University of Colorado, Denver. Ward also taught as a sabbatical replacement and lecturer at CU-Boulder for two years, where he taught Islamic Religion and introduced a program of studies in Jewish History. He came to the University of Denver after six years in Israel teaching at the University of Haifa and the Technion.  

Ward received his academic degrees from Yale University, with additional studies at Hebrew University and at the Jewish Theological Seminary. His teaching has included courses on Islam, Middle East, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad, Encounters between Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Women in Judaism, The Splendor of Spain, Jewish Mysticism, and other topics. Ward initiated and taught the Arabic program at the University of Denver, and has taught both Arabic and Hebrew at UW.  

As a Wyoming Council for the Humanities Forum presenter, Ward has lectured on Islam, Middle East and other issues in towns and community colleges throughout Wyoming; he has given community lectures in other regional states and is a frequent lecturer in Colorado, as well as academic and community lectures elsewhere in the US, in Canada and overseas. He leads the UW Study Abroad program in Israel, with side trips to Jordan and Egypt. Ward's academic interests include the Jews of Muslim Lands, Jewish-Muslim relations, Crypto-Jews, Mormon-Jewish relations (he is coeditor of a volume entitled Covenant and Chosenness in Judaism and Mormonism), and Islamic sacred and legal texts about Jews and Israel. He is widely published in a number of scholarly journals, and has written about Synagogues and Churches under Islam.