Boyarin was educated at Goddard College, the Jewish Theological Seminary, and Columbia University before earning his doctoral degree at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. He has taught at Ben Gurion University of the Negev, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Bar-Ilan University, Yale, Harvard, Yeshiva University, and the University of California at Berkeley. He is a member of the Enoch seminar, and of the Advisory Board of the journal Henoch. In 2005, he was elected fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.