The Most Influential People Across History
Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
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List of the most influential people in Religious Studies,
#4751
Johann Heinrich Winckler
1703 - 1770 (67 years)
Johann Heinrich Winckler was a German physicist and philosopher. Biography Early life Winckler was born in Wingendorf, a village in Silesia. He was educated at Leipzig University. One of his teachers was Andreas Rüdiger, an opponent of Christian Wolff. Winckler read Wolff's works and defended him against Rudiger during his lessons.
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Donal Herlihy
1908 - 1983 (75 years)
Donal Herlihy was an Irish Roman Catholic clergyman who served as the bishop of Roman Catholic Diocese of Ferns from 1964 to 1983. He was born in Knocknagree, Co. Cork in 1908 and studied at St. Brendan's College, Killarney. He studied for the priesthood in Rome was ordained priest there in 1931. Further studies in scripture led to him being appointed Professor of Sacred Scripture in All Hallows College Dublin.
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Johann Andreas Danz
1654 - 1727 (73 years)
Johann Andreas Danz was a German Lutheran theologian and Hebraist. Life Johann Andreas Danz was born at Sundhausen, a village just outside Gotha in central Germany. His initial schooling was provided locally at the village school, but his exceptional scholastic potential was soon brought to the attention of the local duke, Friedrich of Gotha who took on responsibility for funding his higher education. When he was ten he was sent away to school in Friedrichroda, some twenty kilometers distant. Four years later, in 1668 he was enrolled at the prestigious "Gymnasium" in Gotha, at that time oper...
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Polykarp Leyser the Elder
1552 - 1610 (58 years)
Polykarp Leyser the Elder or Polykarp Leyser I was a Lutheran theologian, superintendent of Braunschweig, superintendent-general of the Saxon church-circle, professor of theology at the University of Wittenberg and chief court-preacher and consistorial-councillor of Saxony.
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Jakob Miller
1550 - 1597 (47 years)
Jakob Miller was a Catholic reformist theologian, provost and administrator of the diocese of Regensburg. Life Miller was born in Kißlegg, Allgäu. He studied at the Germanicum in Rome and in 1578 was made a cathedral-preacher in Konstanz, then on his deposition from that post in 1585 as visitor to the bishopric of Konstanz. From 1586 he was spiritual overseer of the diocese of Regensburg. In Regensburg Miller tried to set up a Jesuit college, wrote new diocesan constitutions and enforced the decisions of the Council of Trent in the diocese. In 1592 he was made the first mitred provost of Regensburg, since the bishop Philipp of Bavaria was still in his minority.
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Charles Hastings Collette
1816 - 1901 (85 years)
Charles Hastings Collette was a British 19th-century solicitor and writer of Protestant popular controversialist apologetics. He was the father of actor Charles Henry Collette and the organizer of the Joseph Mendham library. As a volunteer in the First Middlesex Artillery, he compiled a handbook for drill instruction.
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William Francis Barry
1849 - 1930 (81 years)
William Francis Barry was a British Catholic priest, theologian, educator and writer. He served as vice president and professor of philosophy at Birmingham Theological College from 1873 to 1877 and then professor of divinity at Oscott College from 1877 to 1880. A distinguished ecclesiastic, Barry gave lectures in both Great Britain and the United States during the 1890s. He was also a popular author and novelist at the start of the 20th century, whose books usually dealt with then controversial religious and social questions, and is credited as the creator of the modern English Catholic novel...
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Joseph Jowett
1751 - 1813 (62 years)
Joseph Jowett was an English Anglican cleric and jurist. He was Fellow and Tutor of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and Regius Professor of Civil Law at Cambridge University from 1782 to 1813. He was the uncle of William Jowett.
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John of Ragusa
1390 - 1443 (53 years)
John of Ragusa was a Croatian Dominican theologian. He died at Lausanne, Switzerland in 1443. He was president of the Council of Basle, and a legate to Constantinople. He was created cardinal by Antipope Felix V, so would be considered by many a "pseudocardinal".
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Peter of Poitiers
1130 - 1205 (75 years)
Peter of Poitiers was a French scholastic theologian, born in Poitiers around 1125-1130. He died in Paris on September 3, 1205. Life After his studies in Paris, he began teaching in the Faculty of Theology in 1167. Two years later he succeeded Peter Comestor in the chair of scholastic theology at the cathedral school of Notre Dame.
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Joseph Baylee
1808 - 1883 (75 years)
Joseph Tyrrell Baylee, D.D. , was a theological writer. Baylee received his education at Trinity College Dublin . To the residents of Liverpool and Birkenhead his name became for a quarter of a century a household word, on account of his activity as the founder and first principal of St. Aidan's Theological College, Birkenhead, where he prepared many students for the work of the ministry. This institution, which may be said to have been founded in 1846, originated in a private theological class conducted by Dr. Baylee, under the sanction of the Bishop of Chester, Dr. Sumner, afterwards advance...
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Timotheus Kirchner
1533 - 1587 (54 years)
Timotheus Kirchner was a Lutheran theologian, pastor, Protestant reformer, professor of theology and superintendent in Weimar. Life Kirchner was the son of a teacher. He attended school in Gotha, studied in Jena and Erfurt, and was the village priest at a young age.
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Peter of Limoges
1240 - 1306 (66 years)
Peter of Limoges was the author of A Moral Treatise on the Eye or On the Moral Eye , a popular guide for Catholic priests, composed at the University of Paris sometime in the 1270s or 1280s. The work depended heavily on Roger Bacon's earlier treatment of optics.
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John Pitts
1560 - 1616 (56 years)
John Pitts was an English Roman Catholic scholar and writer. Life Pitts was born in Alton, Hampshire in 1560 and attended Winchester College. From 1578 to 1580 he studied at New College, Oxford. In 1581 he was admitted to the English College, Rome.
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Niels Christian Gauslaa Danbolt
1900 - 1984 (84 years)
Niels Christian Gauslaa Danbolt was a Norwegian professor of medicine who was a specialist in skin diseases. Danbolt-Closs syndrome was named after him and Karl Philipp Closs. Danbolt was born in Bergen, Norway. He was the son of Ole Dominicus Danielsen and Gesine Gauslaa . He was the brother of the missionary priest Lars Johan Danbolt and theology professor Erling Danbolt. He was the uncle of professor Ole Danbolt Mjøs and professor Gunnar Danbolt . His sister Johanna Sophie Danbolt was married to Bishop Olav Hagesæther.
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Johann Pfeffinger
1493 - 1573 (80 years)
Johann Pfeffinger was a significant theologian and Protestant Reformer. His life and work Devoting himself to the religious life, Pfeffinger became an acolyte at Salzburg in 1515, and soon afterward was made subdeacon and deacon. Receiving a dispensation from the regulations concerning canonical age, he was ordained priest and stationed at Reichenhall, Saalfelden, and Passau, where his clerical activity soon found great approbation. Suspected of Lutheran heresy, he went to Wittenberg in 1523, where he was cordially welcomed by Martin Luther, Philip Melanchthon, and Bugenhagen.
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Stephan Gerlach
1546 - 1612 (66 years)
Stephan Gerlach was a German Lutheran theologian. Gerlach was an extremely important figure in the second half of the 16th century. He was tasked with a special mission in Constantinople, namely to establish an alliance between Orthodoxy and Lutheranism against Catholicism. This mission failed, nevertheless, he signed the Brest Union.
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Sir Edwyn Hoskyns, 13th Baronet
1887 - 1937 (50 years)
Sir Edwyn Clement Hoskyns, 13th Baronet, was an English Anglican priest and theologian. Career Hoskyns was born on 9 August 1884 in Notting Hill, London, the eldest child and only son of Bishop Edwyn Hoskyns and his wife Mary Constance Maude Benson. He was educated at Haileybury College, Jesus College, Cambridge and Wells Theological College, graduating from the latter in 1907. Hoskyns was a fellow and Dean of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and a notable biblical scholar. On his father's death in 1925, he succeeded to the Hoskyns baronetcy. His influence on the next generation of clergym...
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Luther Tracy Townsend
1838 - 1922 (84 years)
Reverend Luther Tracy Townsend was a professor at Boston University and an author of theological and historical works. Biography He was born on September 27, 1838, in Orono, Maine, to Luther K. Townsend and Mary True Call. His father died on November 16, 1839, and his mother took the family to New Hampshire. He started work at the Boston, Concord and Montreal Railroad in 1850. He infrequently attended the New Hampshire Conference Seminary, now known as the Tilton School. He graduated from Dartmouth College with an A.B. in 1859. He then attended Andover Theological Seminary and graduated in 1862.
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Adam Boreel
1603 - 1667 (64 years)
Adam Boreel was a Dutch theologian and Hebrew scholar. He was one of the founders of the Amsterdam College; the Collegiants were also often called Boreelists, and regarded as a small sect. Others involved in the Collegiants were Daniel van Breen, Michiel Coomans, Jacob Otto van Halmael and the Mennonite Galenus Abrahamsz de Haan.
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Philip of the Blessed Trinity
1603 - 1671 (68 years)
Philip of the Blessed Trinity was a French Discalced Carmelite theologian and missionary. Life He took the habit at Lyon where he made his profession on 8 September 1621. Choosing the missionary life, he studied in Paris and two years at the seminary in Rome, proceeded in February 1629 to the Holy Land and Persia, and then to Goa where he became prior of the Order convent and teacher of philosophy and theology . After the martyrdom of his pupil Dionysius, a Nativitate, and Redemptus a Cruce on 29 November 1638, Philip collected evidence and set out for Rome in 1639 to introduce the cause of t...
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Juan Bautista de Lezana
1586 - 1659 (73 years)
Juan Bautista de Lezana was a Spanish Carmelite theologian. Lezana was an authority on canon law, dogmatic theology, and philosophy; his historical works are not of the same standard. Life Lezana was born at Madrid. He took the habit at Alberca, in Old Castile, on 18 October 1600, and made his profession at the house of the Carmelites of the Old Observance, at Madrid, in 1602. He studied philosophy at Toledo, theology at Salamanca, partly at the college of the order, partly at the university under Juan Marquez, and finally at Alcalá under Luis de Montesion.
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Bartholomew Mastrius
1602 - 1673 (71 years)
Bartholomew Mastrius was an Italian Conventual Franciscan philosopher and theologian. Life Born at Meldola, near Forlì, in 1602, he received his early education at Cesena and took degrees at the University of Bologna. He also frequented the 'studia' of his religious order in Padua and Rome before assuming the duties of a lecturer in Cesena, Perugia and Padua.
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Urbanus Rhegius
1489 - 1541 (52 years)
Urbanus Henricus Rhegius or Urban Rieger was a Protestant Reformer who was active both in Northern and Southern Germany in order to promote Lutheran unity in the Holy Roman Empire. He was also a popular poet. Martin Luther referred to him as the "Bishop of Lower Saxony".
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Luis de Montesinos
1552 - 1620 (68 years)
Luis de Montesinos was a Spanish theologian. Nothing is known of Montesinos' childhood. As an adult, he joined the Dominican Order and studied philosophy and theology in several Spanish universities. He was known there for both his scholarship and for his piety. After receiving his degree, he began teaching philosophy at university level, eventually becoming the foremost exponent of Thomistic theology at the University of Alcalá. Because of his great ability in persuading and explaining, he was given the surname Doctor clarus. He possessed a singular charm of manner which secured for him at once love and respect.
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Michael Creizenach
1789 - 1842 (53 years)
Michael Creizenach was a German Jewish educator, mathematician, theologian, and proponent of the Reform movement. Creizenach is typical of the era of transition, following the epoch of Moses Mendelssohn. Creizenach was educated in the traditional way, devoting his whole time to Talmudic studies; and he was sixteen years old when he began to acquire the elements of secular knowledge. This was during the French occupation. He studied mathematics with great zeal, and wrote text-books on it. Through his influence a Jewish school was founded in Mayence, whose principal he was, at the same time giving private instruction.
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William Hogarth
1786 - 1866 (80 years)
William Hogarth was an English prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He was the first Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle. Early life and ministry Born at Dodding Green, Kendal, Westmorland on 25 March 1786, he began his early education at Crook Hall, near Consett on 29 August 1796. Hogarth received the tonsure and the four minor orders from Bishop William Gibson on 19 March 1807. The hall became inadequate for its purpose and the establishment was moved to Ushaw College in 1808. He was ordained a sub-deacon on 2 April 1808, a deacon on 14 December 1808, and a priest on 20 December 1809 at Ushaw.
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John Fawcett
1739 - 1817 (78 years)
John Fawcett was a British-born Baptist theologian, pastor and hymn writer. Early years Fawcett was born on 6 January 1739 in Lidget Green, Bradford. In 1762, Fawcett joined the Methodists, but three years later, he united with the Baptist Church and became pastor of Wainsgate Baptist Church in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, England.
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Paton James Gloag
1823 - 1906 (83 years)
Paton James Gloag was a Scottish minister and theological author. He was Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1889. Life Born in Perth on 17 May 1823, he was the eldest son of William Gloag , a banker in Perth, by his wife Janet Burn , daughter of John Burn, WS of Edinburgh. William Gloag, Lord Kincairney was his younger brother, and his eldest sister was Jessie Burn Gloag, who founded a ragged school in Perth.
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Charles Woodruff Shields
1825 - 1904 (79 years)
Charles Woodruff Shields was an American theologian. Biography Charles Woodruff Shields was born in New Albany, Indiana on April 4, 1825. He graduated from the College of New Jersey in 1844 and at Princeton Theological Seminary in 1847.
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Tobias Lohner
1619 - 1697 (78 years)
Tobias Lohner was an Austrian Jesuit theologian. Life He entered the Society of Jesus on 30 August 1637, at Landsberg am Lech, and spent his first years in the classroom, teaching the classics. Later at Dillingen, he was professor, first of philosophy for seven years, then of speculative theology for four years, and finally of moral theology. He was rector of the colleges of Lucerne and Dillingen and master of novices.
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Alexander MacWhorter III
1822 - 1880 (58 years)
Alexander MacWhorter was an American theologian and author. Early life MacWhorter, the third of his name, was born in Newark, New Jersey on January 1, 1822. He was the only surviving child of Alexander C. MacWhorter and Frances C. G. MacWhorter. His paternal grandfather was fellow clergyman Alexander MacWhorter. He graduated from Yale College in 1842. He studied for three years in the Theological Department of Yale College, and was licensed to preach in 1844.
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Jonathan Edwards
1629 - 1712 (83 years)
Jonathan Edwards was a theologian and Principal of Jesus College, Oxford, from 1686 to 1712. Born in Wrexham, Wales, Edwards studied at Christ Church, Oxford, from 1655 to 1659. He became a Fellow of Jesus College in 1662, Vice-Principal in 1668 and Principal on 2 November 1686. He was also Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford from 1689 to 1691, the first principal of the college to be so. He was rector of Kiddington, Hinton Ampner and Llandysul and vicar of Clynnog Fawr. He was also appointed Treasurer of Llandaff Cathedral.
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François Lamy
1636 - 1711 (75 years)
François Lamy was a French Benedictine ascetical and apologetic writer, of the Congregation of St-Maur. Life Lamy was born at Montireau in the Department of Eure-et-Loir. While fighting a duel, he was saved from a fatal sword-thrust by a book of the Rule of St. Benedict which he carried in his pocket. Seeing the finger of God in this, he took the Benedictine habit at the monastery of St-Remi at Reims in 1658. Shortly after his elevation to the priesthood he was appointed subprior of St-Faron at Meaux, but a year later resigned this position.
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Roger Marston
1201 - 1303 (102 years)
Roger Marston was an English Franciscan scholastic philosopher and theologian. He studied under John Pecham in Paris, in the years around 1270, and probably also at Oxford a few years later, during the time he was a pupil of John Pecham he was a fellow student with Matthew of Aquasparta. He generally followed Pecham's views on the Eucharist. He regarded time as absolute.
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George Gillespie
1613 - 1648 (35 years)
George Gillespie was a Scottish theologian. His father was John Gillespie, minister of Kirkcaldy. He studied at St Andrews University, and is said to have graduated M.A. 1629, though the date is probably that on which he entered the University. He became bursar of the Presbytery of Kirkcaldy. He became chaplain to John Viscount Kenmure; to John, Earl of Cassilis, and tutor to his son, James, Lord Kennedy. He was ordained to Wemyss on 26 April 1638. He had calls to Aberdeen and St Andrews. He was translated to Greyfriars, Edinburgh, 23 September 1642.
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Patrick Murray
1811 - 1882 (71 years)
Patrick Aloysius Murray DD STP was an Irish Roman Catholic theologian. Life Murray was born in Clones, County Monaghan, Ireland. He was educated at Maynooth College, he was elected a Dunboyne, or senior student, 1835. He received a curacy in Dublin, was appointed professor of English and French in Maynooth, 1838, and became professor of theology there, 1841. The remainder of his life he devoted mainly to theological science. In 1879, he was made prefect of the Dunboyne Establishment, a position he held until his death.
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Jean Cabassut
1604 - 1685 (81 years)
Jean Cabassut was a French Oratorian theologian. Life He was born at Aix and entered the Oratory at the age of twenty-one. Though devoted to his labour he was always ready to interrupt even his most favourite study to assist the needy. He had taught canon law at Avignon for some time, when Cardinal Grimaldi, Archbishop of Aix, took him as a companion to Rome, where Father Cabassut remained about eighteen months.
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Pier Paolo Vergerio
1498 - 1565 (67 years)
Pier Paolo Vergerio , the Younger, was an Italian papal nuncio and later Protestant reformer. Life He was born at Capodistria , Istria, then part of the Venetian Republic and studied jurisprudence in Padua, where he delivered lectures in 1522. He also practiced law in Verona, Padua, and Venice. In 1526, he married Diana Contarini, whose early death was at least a partial cause of his entering upon an ecclesiastical career.
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Jacques Du Frische
1640 - 1693 (53 years)
Jacques Du Frische was a French Benedictine theologian.
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John Watts Ditchfield
1861 - 1923 (62 years)
John Edwin Watts-Ditchfield was an eminent 20th century Anglican priest and distinguished author. Educated at the Victoria University of Manchester and ordained in 1891, he began his career with a curacy at St Peter Highgate after which he was Vicar of St James-the-Less, Bethnal Green. Here, he made a name for himself, particularly with the development of the Church of England's Men's Society. He believed that the contemporary view of the Church of England was that it was for women and children, and he succeeded in attracting vast numbers of men to his church whose families followed. A gift...
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James Luce Kingsley
1778 - 1852 (74 years)
James Luce Kingsley was an American classical and biblical scholar. Biography Born in Windham, Connecticut, Kingsley was educated at Williams and Yale, where he was graduated in 1799. He afterward taught for two years, first in Wethersfield, Connecticut and then in Windham, and in 1801 became a tutor at Yale. In 1805 he was appointed to the newly established professorship of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin in there. Kingsley was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1825. He was relieved of a part of his duties in 1831, when a separate professorship of Greek was establishe...
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Thomas Halliwell
1900 - 1982 (82 years)
Thomas Halliwell was the Principal of Trinity College Carmarthen in the middle part of the 20th Century. Early life and education Thomas Halliwell was born in Wigan in 1900, the only child of John Halliwell, a noted Lancashire cricketer, and his wife Annie whose father was company secretary to Pearson and Knowles. Educated at Wigan Wesleyan Methodist School and Wigan Grammar School, Halliwell left school at age 15 to work in the Midland Bank.
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Louis Legrand
1711 - 1780 (69 years)
Louis Legrand, S.S. was a French Sulpician priest and theologian, and a Doctor of the Sorbonne. Life After studying philosophy and theology at the Seminary of Saint-Sulpice, Paris, Legrand taught philosophy at Clermont, 1733–1736, and then resumed his studies in Paris, where he entered the Society of Saint-Sulpice in 1739 and obtained the licentiate in 1740. He taught theology at Cambrai, 1740–1743, was superior of the seminary in Autun, 1743–1745, and, having been recalled to Paris, received the degree of Doctor of Theology from the Sorbonne in 1746. Henceforth he remained at the Seminary of...
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Albert Réville
1826 - 1906 (80 years)
Albert Réville was a distinguished French Protestant theologian, known for his 'extremist' liberal views. He is also known for being one of the first intellectuals to join the Dreyfusard cause when the Dreyfus Affair erupted in the 1890s.
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Antoine Thomas
1644 - 1709 (65 years)
Antoine Thomas was a Jesuit priest from the Spanish Netherlands, and missionary and astronomer in Qing China. His Chinese name was 安多. Early life Born in Namur, Belgium in 1644, Thomas joined the Society of Jesus in 1660 and first taught in the schools of Armentières, Huy and Tournai. Equipped with a thorough training in Mathematics and Astronomy he was sent, at his own request, as a missionary to China . After a long and difficult sea journey - passing through Goa, Siam , and Malacca - he reached Macau in 1682 just in time to observe an eclipse of the Sun .
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Josse van Clichtove
1472 - 1543 (71 years)
Josse van Clichtove or Judocus Clichtoveus Neoportuensis , was a Flemish theologian, priest and humanist. Life He received his education at Leuven and at Paris under Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples. He became librarian of the Sorbonne and tutor to the nephews of Jacques d'Amboise, bishop of Clermont and abbot of Cluny. He is best known as a distinguished antagonist of Martin Luther, against whom he wrote extensively.
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Celestyn Myślenta
1588 - 1653 (65 years)
Celestyn Myślenta was a Polish Lutheran theologian and rector of the University of Königsberg. Celestyn was the son of Mateusz Myślenta and Eufroza née Wiercinska. His father was once employed by Duke Radziwill and belonged to the Polish nobility. As a stipendiary of the duke of Prussia he studied at University Königsberg, then became Lutheran pastor in Kuty from 1581-1599.
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Sebald Heyden
1499 - 1561 (62 years)
Sebald Heyden was a German musicologist, cantor, theologian, hymn-writer and religious poet. He is perhaps best known for his De arte canendi which is considered to have had a major impact on scholarship and the teaching of singing to young boys. He wrote hymns such as "O Mensch, bewein dein Sünde groß". It has been speculated that Heyden was the world's first true musicologist.
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Jordan of Pisa
1260 - 1310 (50 years)
Jordan of Pisa , also called Jordan of Rivalto , was a Dominican theologian and the first preacher whose vernacular Italian sermons are preserved. His cultus was confirmed on 23 August 1833 by Pope Gregory XVI and he was beatified in 1838; his day is either March 6 or August 19. His relics are in the church of Santa Caterina in Pisa.
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