Irish priest and world-renowned biblical scholar Jerome Murphy-O'Connor has died in Jerusalem, according to the institute where he taught in the Holy City.
The 78-year-old, a Dominican priest and specialist in Saint Paul and the New Testament, died of a long-term illness on Monday in the city where he had taught since the 1960s, the Ecole biblique et archeologique francaise de Jerusalem (EBAF) said in a statement.
Murphy-O'Connor wrote extensively on the Holy Land, including a 1980 archaeological guide that was translated into several languages, and expounded the theory that Jesus had what he described as a "nervous breakdown" after the Last Supper.
The Cork-born priest's brother is Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, Archbishop Emeritus of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Westminster in London.
Short link: