Search People Result | Academic Influence

Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines

Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.

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List of the most influential people in Religious Studies,

#2351

Dennis Orme

#169754

Overall Influence

1938 - Present (86 years)

Dennis Frederick Orme is a former leader of Unification Churches in England, theologian and author. Orme and his wife were among the earliest Western followers of the Unification Church, and he is perhaps best known for his unsuccessful personal lawsuit for libel against Associated Newspapers Group. At that time, at $1.6m, it was the longest and most expensive libel case in British history.

#2352

Muhammad Sarfaraz Khan Safdar

Muhammad Sarfaraz Khan Safdar

#111033

Overall Influence

1914 - 2009 (95 years)

Muhammad Sarfaraz Khan Safdar was a Pakistani, Deobandi Scholar. Early life and education Sarfaraz Khan Safdar studied first with Ghulam Ghaus Hazarvi in his hometown. In 1939 he traveled to Darul Uloom Deoband with his brother Sufi Abdul Hameed Swati and studied ahadith under Husain Ahmad Madani.

#2353

Terry Wilder

#171185

Overall Influence

Terry L. Wilder is Professor of New Testament and Greek at Campbellsville University in Campbellsville, Kentucky. He previously served as Wesley Harrison Chair and Professor of New Testament at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, as Academic Acquisitions Editor for B&H Publishing Group in Nashville, Tennessee, and also as Professor of New Testament and Greek at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Missouri.

#2354

Hilary Carey

#95302

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (67 years)

Hilary Mary Carey, is an Australian historian whose research focused for many years on the religious history of Australia. She has been professor of imperial and religious history at the University of Bristol since 2014, where her research interests include religious missions in Canada and Greenland and missions to seamen.

#2355

Dominique Rey

#80130

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (72 years)

Dominique Marie Jean Rey is the Bishop of Fréjus-Toulon in the province of Marseille in southern France. He is a member of the Emmanuel Community, and he is considered one of the more conservative French bishops. He also frequently celebrates Tridentine Mass. He has been criticized for ordaining priests who have failed to qualify for the priesthood in their home countries, failing to supervise religious communities he has established, and for inadequate action against sex abusers in his diocese.

#2356

Christina Astorga

#176905

Overall Influence

Maria Christina "Tina" A. Astorga is a theologian and professor at the Theology Department in University of Portland. She served as chair and Professor of Theology Department in Ateneo De Manila University.

#2357

Mark Montebello

#104098

Overall Influence

1964 - Present (60 years)

Mark Montebello is a Maltese philosopher and author. He is mostly known for his controversies with Catholic Church authorities but also for his classic biographies of Manuel Dimech and Dom Mintoff. Private life Montebello, the son of Joseph, a RAF corporal, and Lucrezia née Sultana, a primary school teacher, both from Sliema, was born in Malta at the Mtarfa military hospital, the third of four siblings, and grew up at Sliema.

#2358

Erica Brown

#81363

Overall Influence

1966 - Present (58 years)

Erica Brown is an American writer and educator who lectures widely on subjects of Jewish interest and is scholar-in-residence for the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington, and a consultant to other Jewish organizations. Her "Weekly Jewish Wisdom" column has appeared regularly in The Washington Post.

#2359

Wilhelm Baum

#121432

Overall Influence

1948 - Present (76 years)

Wilhelm Baum is an Austrian historian, theologian, philosopher and publisher. Biography He studied history, German language, and theology in Innsbruck, Rome, Mainz and Tübingen . In 1971, he became a doctor of philosophy and in 1999 in Graz a doctor of theology. In 1995, he taught medieval history at the university of Klagenfurt and at Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz. Now he lives in Klagenfurt, Austria, and works as a chief of a publishing house Kitab-Verlag, which he founded in 1999. He's a member of PEN club.

#2360

David H. Price

#169188

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (67 years)

David Hotchkiss Price is an historian and a scholar of early modern culture. He teaches at Vanderbilt University, where he is Professor of Religious Studies, History, and Jewish Studies. Price studied classics and German literature at the University of Cincinnati before receiving his PhD in German Studies from Yale University . He also studied at the University of Tübingen and the University of Munich. From 2005 to 2016, he was a professor at the University of Illinois. He previously taught at Yale and the University of Texas at Austin. Price is the author of numerous books and articles on ...

#2361

Fedric Anilkumar

#180067

Overall Influence

1962 - Present (62 years)

Fedric Anilkumar is a Theologian who teaches at the Karnataka Theological College, Mangalore, a Seminary established in 1965 and affiliated to the nation's first University, the Senate of Serampore College .

#2362

António dos Santos

#71803

Overall Influence

1932 - 2018 (86 years)

Antonio dos Santos was a Roman Catholic bishop. Dos Santos was ordained to the priesthood in 1956. He served as titular bishop of Tabbora and as auxiliary bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Aveiro, Portugal, from 1976 to 1979. He then served as bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Guarda, Portugal, from 1979 to 2005.

#2363

Ezra Schwartz

#96614

Overall Influence

1974 - Present (50 years)

Ezra Schwartz is a Rosh yeshiva and bochein at Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, an affiliate of Yeshiva University in New York City. In that role, he administers tests to incoming students and assigns students to classes. Schwartz is the fifth bochein in the history of RIETS. He succeeds Rabbi Yehuda Weil, Rabbi Mendel Zaks , Rabbi Shraga Feivel Paretzky, and Rabbi Eli B. Shulman.

#2364

Ogbu Kalu

#178026

Overall Influence

1942 - 2009 (67 years)

Ogbu Uke Kalu was a Nigerian theologian. He was known as a major figure in the study of African Christianity, especially with relationship to African Pentecostalism. Biography Born in Isiugwu one of the 26 towns of the Ohafia clan , Kalu first studied at Hope Waddell Training Institute in Calabar before moving to Canada, completing a BA at the University of Toronto , MA in history at McMaster University , and a PhD in history at the University of Toronto . He later completed an MDiv at Princeton Theological Seminary .

#2365

Christian Baëta

#171877

Overall Influence

1908 - 1994 (86 years)

Christian Gonçalves Kwami Baëta was a Ghanaian academic and a Presbyterian minister who served as the Synod Clerk of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of the Gold Coast from 1945 to 1949. He was among a number of prominent individuals, corporate organisations and civil society groups that were instrumental in the establishment of the University of Ghana, Legon in 1948.

#2366

David C. C. Watson

#111723

Overall Influence

1920 - 2004 (84 years)

David Charles Cuningham Watson, was an English teacher, author and creationist, born in Bharatpur, India. Biography Watson graduated from the University of Cambridge with First class honours in Classics, winning the Carus Greek Testament Prize in 1947. He was later a Senior Scholar at Trinity College.

#2367

Hossein Ayatollahi

Hossein Ayatollahi

#137101

Overall Influence

1931 - 2001 (70 years)

Seyyed Hossein Ayatollahi was a Shiite clergyman, Ruhollah Khomeini Representative and Imam of Friday prayer of Jahrom. See also Ayatollah Seyed Abdol Hossein Mousavi Najafi Lari

#2368

Vincent Cooke

#77791

Overall Influence

1936 - 2017 (81 years)

Vincent M. Cooke, S.J., was an American Jesuit priest, academic, and academic administrator who served as the 23rd President of Canisius College, a private Jesuit college in Buffalo, New York, from 1993 to 2010.

#2369

Mustafa Çağrıcı

#127721

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (74 years)

Mustafa Çağrıcı is a Turkish former mufti of Istanbul. In 2018 he claimed “The Diyanet of today has a more Islamist, more Arab worldview”. External links Office the Mufti of Istanbul official website Mustafa Cagrici personal web site

#2370

Todd D. Still

#122391

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (59 years)

Todd Dixon Still is an American New Testament scholar and serves as the Charles J. and Eleanor McLerran DeLancey Dean and the William M. Hinson Professor of Christian Scriptures at the George W. Truett Theological Seminary of Baylor University. He is also a licensed and ordained Baptist minister.

#2371

D. W. Jesudoss

#175021

Overall Influence

1939 - Present (85 years)

D. W. Jesudoss was the Principal from 1992 through 2001 at the Gurukul Lutheran Theological College, Chennai, affiliated to the nation's first University, the Senate of Serampore College . Studies Graduate Jesudoss graduated from the Gurukul Lutheran Theological College, Madras in 1965 earning a Bachelor of Divinity degree conferred by the Senate of Serampore College .

#2372

Harold D. Hunter

#179939

Overall Influence

Harold D. Hunter is a renewal theologian and historian within the Pentecostal movement. He serves the International Pentecostal Holiness Church.

#2373

Rajula Annie Watson

#178116

Overall Influence

1960 - Present (64 years)

Rajula Annie Watson is a Theologian who presently teaches at the Karnataka Theological College, Mangalore, a Seminary established in 1965 and affiliated to the nation's first University, the Senate of Serampore College. Annie has been a member of the Association of Theologically Trained Women of India since 1991 as well as Associate Presbyter at CSI-Hebich Memorial Church, Mangalore.

#2374

Stanisław Ziemiański

#157106

Overall Influence

1931 - Present (93 years)

Stanislaw Ziemiański is a Jesuit philosopher and theologian, and a composer of numerous religious songs and hymns. Life and academic activity Ziemiański was born on September 7, 1931, in Besko, near Sanok, Poland. He entered the Jesuit Order 1949 and studied at the Jesuit Faculty of Philosophy in Kraków and theology at the Jesuit Faculty of Theology Bobolanum in Warsaw . He was ordained a priest in 1959. He continued his philosophical studies at the Catholic University of Lublin , obtaining a Ph.D. His doctoral dissertation, "" , was supervised by Prof. M.A. Krąpiec OP.

#2375

George Wesley Buchanan

#121505

Overall Influence

1921 - 2019 (98 years)

George Wesley Buchanan was an American biblical scholar who was a Professor of New Testament at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. He was on the Editorial Advisory Board of the Biblical Archaeology Review.

#2376

David Boys

#176144

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (71 years)

David Boys or Boschus , Carmelite, was educated at Oxford University, and lectured in theology at that university; he also visited for purposes of study the University of Cambridge and several foreign universities. He became head of the Carmelite community at Gloucester, and died there in the year 1461. The following are the titles of works written by Boys: 1. De duplici hominis immortalitate. 2. Adversus Agarenos. 3. Contra varios Gentilium Ritus. 4. De Spiritus Doctrina. 5. De vera Innocentia.

#2377

Adam Dyczkowski

#98218

Overall Influence

1932 - 2021 (89 years)

Adam Feliks Dyczkowski was a Polish Roman Catholic bishop. Dyczkowski was born in Poland and was ordained to the priesthood in 1957. He served as titular bishop of Altava and as an auxiliary bishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Wrocław, Poland, from 1978 to 1992. He also served as an auxiliary bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Legnica in 1992 and 1993. Later, he became the bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Zielona Góra-Gorzów, Poland, holding the position from 1993 to 2007.

#2378

Nancy L. deClaisse-Walford

#148714

Overall Influence

1954 - Present (70 years)

Nancy L. deClaissé-Walford is an American theologian, specialist in the Hebrew language and Biblical studies. She is Carolyn Ward Professor of Old Testament and Biblical Languages and Advisor for the Academic Research Track at McAfee School of Theology, Mercer University, Atlanta.

#2379

Beatriz Melano

#177631

Overall Influence

1931 - 2004 (73 years)

Beatriz Melano was a Uruguayan, Protestant theologian from Buenos Aires, Argentina. Melano is the first known, Protestant woman in Latin America to earn a doctorate in theology. Her participation in international theological conferences established a foundation for future women and Latin American theologians. Melano's books, articles, and presentations on a wide range of theological topics contributed to Latin American feminist and liberation theology. Her influence as a theologian extended beyond Latin America to the United States and Europe. In 1994, a meeting of "Women Professors of Theolo...

#2380

Edvin Larsson

#184088

Overall Influence

1925 - 2009 (84 years)

Gustav Edvin Larsson was a Swedish theologian. Publishing Christus als Vorbild in 1962, he took the dr.theol. degree. He was a docent at Uppsala University from 1962 and then professor at the MF Norwegian School of Theology from 1966 to 1992. He was a member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters from 1986.

#2381

John A. Dick

#176671

Overall Influence

1943 - Present (81 years)

John "Jack" Alonzo Dick is a historical theologian, now retired from the KU Leuven. His areas of research, lecturing, and writing are religion and values in the United States, secularization, and religious fundamentalism.

#2382

Gordon Wakefield

#177777

Overall Influence

1921 - 2000 (79 years)

Gordon Stevens Wakefield was a Methodist minister, academic and author. He was educated at Crewe County Secondary School, the University of Manchester, Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, Wesley House and St Catherine's College, Oxford.

#2383

Macy Nulman

#114699

Overall Influence

1923 - 2011 (88 years)

Macy Nulman was an American Orthodox cantor and a scholar of Jewish music and Jewish liturgy. Personal background Nulman was married to Sarah, with whom he raised Judy Z. Nulman-Koenigsberg and Efrem Nulman .

#2384

Eugenijus Bartulis

Eugenijus Bartulis

#178639

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (75 years)

Eugenijus Bartulis is a Lithuanian Roman Catholic prelate, who serves as a Bishop of Šiauliai. Biography In 1968, he graduated from the secondary school in Kaunas. He studied at the Kaunas Seminary in 1971–1976. Bartulis was ordained a priest on May 30, 1976. From 1976 to 1986, Bartulis worked as a vicar in the parishes of Kelmė, Radviliškis and Kaunas. In 1986–1989, he was pastor of the parishes of Deltuva and Bukonys. In 1989, Bartulis was appointed administrator of Kaunas Cathedral. In 1990, he was appointed chancellor of the curia of the Archdiocese of Kaunas. Afterwards, he was appointed pastor of one of the biggest parishes of Kaunas.

#2385

Joan Planellas i Barnosell

Joan Planellas i Barnosell

#184243

Overall Influence

1955 - Present (69 years)

Joan Planellas i Barnosell is a Spanish theologian and priest of the Catholic Church who was appointed Archbishop of Tarragona on 4 May 2019. Biography Planellas was born in Girona on 7 November 1955. He grew up in Colomers. He studied at the Diocesan Seminary of Girona from 1968 to 1979 and was ordained a priest on 28 March 1982. He studied at the Pontifical Gregorian University from 1979 to 1981 and in 2003–2004, earning a doctorate in dogmatic theology.

#2386

John Mathews

#182655

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (72 years)

John Mathews is a New Testament scholar and Metropolitan of the Indian Orthodox Church. John Mathews is the Secretary of the St. Thomas Orthodox Vaideeka Sangam, the Association of all Priests of the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church as well as the publisher of Purohithar, a magazine published by the St. Thomas Orthodox Theological Group from Kottayam. He is the Co-Secretary of the joint commission between the Catholic Church and the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church.

#2387

Rivka Schatz Uffenheimer

#95296

Overall Influence

1927 - 1992 (65 years)

Rivka Schatz Uffenheimer was a Jewish scholar of Jewish mysticism. Schatz Uffenheimer was a student of Gershom Scholem. Biography Rivka Schatz-Uffenheimer was born in Poland and raised in Brazil. She received her BA, MA, and Ph.D. at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem where she was later employed as a Professor of Jewish mysticism. Her main research was in the realm of Hasidism, particularly regarding the Maggid Rabbi Dov Ber of Mezeritch' and his students. She also wrote about Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, and many other figures in modern Jewish Mysticism. She and her students collected hundreds...

#2388

Fridolin Ambongo Besungu

Fridolin Ambongo Besungu

#107567

Overall Influence

1960 - Present (64 years)

Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, OFM Cap. is a Congolese prelate of the Catholic Church who has served as Archbishop of Kinshasa since 2018. He was previously Bishop of Bokungu-Ikela from 2004 to 2016, Apostolic Administrator of Kole from 2008 to 2015, Archbishop of Mbandaka-Bikoro from 2016 to 2018, Apostolic Administrator of Bokungu-Ikela from 2016 to 2018, and Coadjutor Archbishop of Kinshasa in 2018.

#2389

Jacqueline Lapsley

#170604

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (59 years)

Jacqueline E. Lapsley serves as President, and Professor of Old Testament at Union Presbyterian Seminary, and served as Dean and Vice President of Academic Affairs and Professor of Old Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary . Her research interests lie in various fields, including literary theory, ethics , theological anthropology, and gender theory. These disciplines serve as valuable tools for Lapsley when approaching theological interpretations of the Old Testament.

#2390

Maggi Dawn

#179661

Overall Influence

Maggi Eleanor Dawn is a British musician, author, theologian and Anglican priest. She was Principal of St Mary's College at the University of Durham, and remains a professor in the Department of Theology and Religion. Previously she was associate professor of Theology and Literature and Associate Dean of Marquand Chapel at Yale Divinity School.

#2391

Valentí Fàbrega

#180139

Overall Influence

1931 - Present (93 years)

Valentí Fàbrega i Escatllar is a Catalan Philologist and Theologian, who lives since 1971 in Cologne. Life Valentí Fàbrega i Escatllar was born in 1931 in Barcelona. He belonged until 1971 to the Jesuit Order. During this time he got several university degrees . He became Doctor of Theology in the University of Innsbruck. He studied for two years in the Protestant Faculty of Theology of the Heidelberg University. He was also temporary teacher in the Theology College of the Jesuits in Sant Cugat del Vallès and in the Comillas Pontifical University . Because of a two-year grant for research th...

#2392

Dwight Hopkins

#180829

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (71 years)

Dwight Nathaniel Hopkins is an American theologian and ordained Baptist minister who serves as a professor of theology at the University of Chicago. Biography Hopkins was born on February 22, 1953, in Richmond, Virginia. In 1976, he graduated Harvard University with a bachelor's degree. He earned his Master of Divinity , Master of Philosophy , and Doctor of Philosophy degrees from Union Theological Seminary. He has a second earned PhD degree from the University of Cape Town in South Africa, which became a basis for his book Down, Up and Over: Slave Religion and Black Theology .

#2393

Brahim Boushaki

#48185

Overall Influence

1912 - 1997 (85 years)

Brahim Boushaki , was an Algerian Scholar, Imam and Sufi Sheikh. He was born in the village of Soumâa near the town of Thénia 53 km east of Algiers. He was raised in a very spiritual environment within Zawiyet Sidi Boushaki with high Islamic values and ethics. He had great interpersonal skills and devoted his entire life in service of Islam and Algeria according to the Algerian Islamic reference.

#2394

John the Deacon

#92528

Overall Influence

The Byzantine John the Deacon is the author of a tract on the veneration of saints and against the doctrine of soul sleep. He was one of several Byzantine writers who wrote on this theme, from Eustratios of Constantinople and Niketas Stethatos, to Philip Monotropos and Michael Glykas.

#2395

Sigurd Lunde

#118047

Overall Influence

1916 - 2006 (90 years)

Sigurd Lunde was a Norwegian theologian, teacher, author, broadcaster, and Bishop of the Diocese of Stavanger. Lunde also wrote music and lyrics to hymns and psalms. He was the father of news anchor Einar Lunde.

#2396

E. W. Jackson

#75164

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (72 years)

Earl Walker Jackson Sr. is an American conservative politician, Protestant minister, and lawyer in Virginia who is a candidate in the 2024 Republican Party presidential primaries. He was the Republican Party nominee for Lieutenant Governor of Virginia in 2013. Jackson unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for the United States Senate in Virginia in the 2012 and 2018 elections. He is head pastor at Exodus Faith Ministries, located in Chesapeake, Virginia and founder of Staying True to America's National Destiny, a Christian political organization.

#2397

Steven Weitzman

#176663

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (59 years)

Steven Phillip Weitzman is an American scholar of Jewish studies and religious studies, with interests that include the origins and early history of Judaism and the history of the Bible's reception. He has served as the Ella Darivoff Director of the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania since 2014. He is also the Abraham M. Ellis Professor of Semitic Languages and Literatures in the department of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

#2398

Robert Willis

#146074

Overall Influence

1947 - Present (77 years)

Robert Andrew Willis KStJ DL is an Anglican priest, theologian, chaplain and hymn writer. He was Dean of Canterbury from 2001 to 2022, having previously served as Dean of Hereford between 1992 and 2000. During the COVID-19 pandemic, after public worship was suspended, Willis received media attention for his popular daily video broadcasts of Morning Prayer from the deanery garden at Canterbury Cathedral.

#2399

Åke V. Ström

#176313

Overall Influence

1909 - 1994 (85 years)

Åke Viktor Ored Ström was a Swedish theologian who specialized in the study of Germanic religion. Biography Åke V. Ström was born in Karlskrona, Sweden on 28 February 1909, the son of Tord Ström and Agnes Palm. He gained his fil kand from Stockholm University in 1930, and his teol kand from Uppsala University in 1935. Ström was ordained as a priest in 1936. He gained his teol dr from Uppsala University in 1945. Since 1965, Ström was a docent in religious history at Lund University. He was a highly regarded religious scholar, and a known authority on Old Norse religion. Ström died in Kista, Sw...

#2400

Gerhard Besier

#174835

Overall Influence

1947 - Present (77 years)

Gerhard Besier is a German Lutheran theologian, historian and politician best known for his work on church-state relations in the Third Reich and in the German Democratic Republic. Work Besier's publications have focused on church history, including church history during the Third Reich and the German Democratic Republic, and religious freedom issues in contemporary society. His views on religious freedom follow the libertarian American model, a stance which has made him controversial in Germany.

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