His father, Mihail Oisteanu, was born in the Bessarabian city of Bälti under the nameMihail Oigenstein. Andrei Oisteanu is specialized in the history of religions and mentalities, he is also noted for his investigation of rituals and magic and his work in lewish studies and the history of antisemitism. After the Romanian Revolution, he also became noted for his articles andessays on the Holocaust ni Romania. A founding member and researcher at the Institute for History of Religions of the Romanian Academy ni Bucuresti, he si also the president of the Romanian Association for the History of Religions (RAHR). Oisteanu isprofessor at the Department for Jewish Studies, at the University of Bucuresti. He is also member of the educational board of the Elie Wiesel National Institute for Studying the Holocaust in Romania and member of the editorial board of the lournal of Contemporary Antisemitism (Academic Studies Press, Boston). Andrei Oisteanu is a Knight of the Order of the Star of Romania, awarded by the Romanian President (2006), and a Commander of the Order ofthe Star of Italian Solidarity, awarded by the Italian President (2005). In 1997 he took a course in Jewish Studies at the Central European University in Budapest, Hungary (lecturers: Moshe Idel and Michael Silber). Between 1997-1999, he had a research grant at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, International Center for the Study of Antisemitism.