His research focuses primarily on Assyriology and Hebrew Scriptures, writing on the archives from eighteenth century BC found at Mari, Syria, by the Euphrates, near the modern-day Syria-Iraq border as well as on biblical studies.
Born in Aleppo, Syria, on October 1, 1941, Sasson immigrated to the United States in 1955 after a significant stay in Lebanon where he attended the Alliance Israélite Universelle schools.
[2] Immediately after completing his undergraduate education, Sasson accepted a scholarship to pursue his graduate studies at Brandeis University.
[2] Sasson taught at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, moving up the rank and becoming a full professor of Religious Studies in 1977.
[4] In 1991, Sasson was appointed to the prestigious William R. Kenan Chair in Religious Studies where he remained until joining the faculty of Vanderbilt University in 1999.