John Punnett Peters was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 Episcopal clergyman and Orientalist, born in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

. He graduated from Hopkins School

Hopkins School

The Hopkins School is a private, college-preparatory, coeducational day school, located in New Haven, Connecticut....

 in 1868 and then from Yale

Yale University

Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...

 in 1873. He studied at Berlin

Humboldt University of Berlin

The Humboldt University of Berlin is Berlin's oldest university, founded in 1810 as the University of Berlin by the liberal Prussian educational reformer and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt, whose university model has strongly influenced other European and Western universities...

 and at Leipzig

University of Leipzig

The University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...

. He was professor

Professor

A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...

 of Old Testament

Old Testament

The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...

 languages and literature at the Protestant Episcopal Divinity School in Philadelphia (1884 -91) and professor of Hebrew

Hebrew language

Hebrew is a Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Culturally, is it considered by Jews and other religious groups as the language of the Jewish people, though other Jewish languages had originated among diaspora Jews, and the Hebrew language is also used by non-Jewish groups, such...

 at the University of Pennsylvania

University of Pennsylvania

The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...

 (1885-93) and from 1888 to 1895 conducted excavations at Nippur

Nippur

Nippur was one of the most ancient of all the Sumerian cities. It was the special seat of the worship of the Sumerian god Enlil, the "Lord Wind," ruler of the cosmos subject to An alone...

 with John Henry Haynes

John Henry Haynes

John Henry Haynes was an American traveller, archaeologist, and photographer, best known for his archaeological work at the first two American archaeological excavations in the Mediterranean and Mesopotamia at Nippur and Assos...

 and Hermann Volrath Hilprecht

Hermann Volrath Hilprecht

Hermann Volrath Hilprecht was a German-American Assyriologist and archaeologist.Hilprecht was born in 1859 at Hohenerxleben, Germany. He graduated from Herzogliches Gymnasium at Bernburg in 1880. Afterwards he went on to the University of Leipzig where he studied theology, philology, and law,...

. He became rector of St. Michael's Church, New York, in 1893, and from 1904 to 1910 he was also canon residentiary of the cathedral of St. John the Divine. Architect Frazier Forman Peters

Frazier Forman Peters

Frazier Forman Peters was an American builder and architect specializing in stone houses. He also wrote books on the subject.-Career:...

was his son.

Peters wrote:

• Nippur, or Explorations and Adventures on the Euphrates (two volumes, 1897)
• The Old Testament and the New Scholarship (1901)
• Early Hebrew Story: Its Historical Background (1904)
• Annals of St. Michael's, New York, for One Hundred Years, 1807-1907 (1907)
• Modern Christianity (1909)
• Jesus Christ and the Old Commandments (1913)
• The Religion of the Hebrews (1914)