[3] Jenkins is a contributing editor for The American Conservative and writes a monthly column for The Christian Century.
[4] Jenkins was born in Port Talbot, Wales, in 1952, and studied at Clare College, Cambridge, taking double first–class honours in both History[citation needed] and, in 1974, Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic.
Between 1977 and 1980, Jenkins worked as a researcher for Sir Leon Radzinowicz, the pioneer of criminology studies at Cambridge.
[6] In 1980, Jenkins was appointed Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice at Pennsylvania State University, which marked a change in his research focus.
Jenkins went on to state that Christianity, Islam, and Judaism had undergone a process that he refers to as "holy amnesia" in which violence in sacred texts became symbolic action against one's sins.