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 Theology,

#151

Roger Haight

#26675

Overall Influence

1936 - Present (88 years)

Roger Haight is an American Jesuit theologian and former president of the Catholic Theological Society of America. He is regarded as a knowledgeable and pioneering theologian, whose experiences with censorship have led to widespread debate over how to handle controversial ideas in the Catholic church today.

#152

Leo Scheffczyk

#25974

Overall Influence

1920 - 2005 (85 years)

Leo Scheffczyk was a German cardinal and theologian. He was a long-time theologian at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and one of the strongest advocates for orthodoxy during the long pontificate of John Paul II. During the 1980s and 1990s, he severely criticized some of his former students, e.g. Leonardo Boff, who advocated a Marxist version of liberation theology. Scheffczyk likely played a major role in drafting the most controversial documents, such as Ordinatio sacerdotalis and Ad tuendam fidem. He was made a cardinal in 2001. He was regarded as an important thinker in late...

#153

Joseph Fitzmyer

#13747

Overall Influence

1920 - 2016 (96 years)

Joseph Augustine Fitzmyer was an American Catholic priest and scholar who taught at several American and British universities. He was a member of the Society of Jesus . Fitzmyer was considered an important scholar of biblical studies, particularly the New Testament. He also contributed to the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and early Jewish literature.

#154

Kurt Koch

#21581

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (74 years)

Kurt Koch is a Swiss prelate of the Catholic Church. He has been a cardinal since November 2010 and president of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity since 1 July 2010. He was the bishop of Basel from 1996 until 2010.

#155

John F. Haught

#12012

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (82 years)

John F. Haught is an American theologian. He is a Distinguished Research Professor at Georgetown University. He specializes in Roman Catholic systematic theology, with a particular interest in issues pertaining to physical cosmology, evolutionary biology, geology, and Christianity.

#156

Joseph Bernardin

Joseph Bernardin

#7679

Overall Influence

1928 - 1996 (68 years)

Joseph Louis Bernardin was an American Cardinal of the Catholic Church. He served as Archbishop of Cincinnati from 1972 until 1982, and as Archbishop of Chicago from 1982 until his death in 1996 from pancreatic cancer. Bernardin was elevated to the cardinalate in 1983 by Pope John Paul II.

#157

Kathy Keller

#6822

Overall Influence

Kathy Louise Keller is an author, lecturer, church founder, and Christian theologian from New York City who has appeared on the New York Times best seller list. She was the wife of pastor Tim Keller of New York's Redeemer Presbyterian Church, which the former couple then co-founded.

#158

Leon Morris

#19649

Overall Influence

1914 - 2006 (92 years)

Leon Lamb Morris was an Australian New Testament scholar. Born in Lithgow, New South Wales, Morris was ordained to the Anglican ministry in 1938. He earned Bachelor of Divinity in 1943 and Master of Theology, both from University of London external system. He later received his PhD at the University of Cambridge in England on the subject which became his first major book, The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross. He served as warden of Tyndale House, Cambridge ; principal of Ridley College in Melbourne , Australia ; and Visiting Professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.

#159

José Míguez Bonino

José Míguez Bonino

#23047

Overall Influence

1924 - 2012 (88 years)

José Míguez Bonino was an Argentine Methodist theologian. Biography Bonino was raised in the Methodist Church, and participated actively in this denomination since his youth. He studied theology at a university in Buenos Aires between 1943 and 1948. He worked in church ministries in Bolivia, and after obtaining his degree he was a pastor in Mendoza. Bonino traveled to the United States to pursue a master's degree at the Candler School of Theology in Atlanta. In 1954, he became a professor of dogmatic theology in Buenos Aires. In 1958, he left teaching to pursue further study at Union Theologi...

#160

Krister Stendahl

#16089

Overall Influence

1921 - 2008 (87 years)

Krister Olofson Stendahl was a Swedish theologian, New Testament scholar, and Church of Sweden Bishop of Stockholm. He also served as dean, professor, and professor emeritus at Harvard Divinity School.

#161

Luis Antonio Tagle

Luis Antonio Tagle

#8466

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (67 years)

Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle is a Filipino prelate of the Catholic Church currently serving as the Pro-Prefect for the Section of Evangelization of Dicastery for Evangelization since June 5, 2022, and as the President of Interdicasterial Commission for Consecrated Religious since December 8, 2019. He was the 32nd Archbishop of Manila from 2011 to 2019. Tagle is the Cardinal-Bishop of San Felice da Cantalice a Centocelle and also serves as the President of the Catholic Biblical Federation, Grand Chancellor of the Pontifical Urbaniana University, and as a member of various departments and dicaste...

#162

Kenneth Gentry

#10170

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (74 years)

Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr. is a Reformed theologian, and an ordained minister in the Reformed Presbyterian Church General Assembly. He is particularly known for his support for and publication on the topics of orthodox preterism and postmillennialism in Christian eschatology, as well as for theonomy and Young Earth creationism. He holds that each of these theological distinctives are logical and theological extensions of his foundational theology.

#163

C. Robert Mesle

#15095

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (74 years)

Charles Robert Mesle is an American process theologian and was professor of philosophy and religion at Graceland University in Lamoni, Iowa, until his retirement in 2016. After earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in religion at Graceland University and a Master of Arts degree in Christian theology at University of Chicago Divinity School , Mesle received a Doctor of Philosophy degree in philosophy and religion from Northwestern University .

#164

I. Howard Marshall

#20977

Overall Influence

1934 - 2015 (81 years)

Ian Howard Marshall was a Scottish New Testament scholar. He was Professor Emeritus of New Testament Exegesis at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. He was formerly the chair of the Tyndale Fellowship for Biblical and Theological Research; he was also president of the British New Testament Society and chair of the Fellowship of European Evangelical Theologians. Marshall identified as an Evangelical Methodist. He was the author of numerous publications, including 2005 Gold Medallion Book Award winner New Testament Theology.

#165

Delores S. Williams

#14107

Overall Influence

1937 - Present (87 years)

Delores Seneva Williams was an American Presbyterian theologian and professor notable for her formative role in the development of womanist theology and best known for her book Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk. Her writings use black women's experiences as epistemological sources, and she is known for her womanist critique of atonement theories. As opposed to feminist theology, predominantly practiced by white women, and black theology, predominantly practiced by black men, Williams argued that black women's experiences generate critical theological insights and q...

#166

Robert L. Reymond

#18708

Overall Influence

1932 - 2013 (81 years)

Robert Lewis Reymond was an American Christian theologian of the Protestant Reformed tradition and the author of New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith . Reymond held B.A., M.A., and PhD degrees from Bob Jones University, was ordained into the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod in 1967, and taught at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri and Knox Theological Seminary in Fort Lauderdale, Florida . While at Covenant, Reymond also served in a pastoral role, pastoring an RPCES congregation in Hazelwood, MO between 1968 and 1973 and serving as interim pastor at another RPCES congregation in Waterloo, IL, between 1981 and 1985.

#167

Felix Genn

#25532

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (74 years)

Felix Genn is a German bishop of the Catholic Church who is currently the Bishop of Münster. Previously, he was the Bishop of Essen and, prior to that, was an Auxiliary Bishop of Trier. Since 2013, he has been a member of the Congregation for Bishops.

#168

Frederick Copleston

Frederick Copleston

#1205

Overall Influence

1907 - 1994 (87 years)

Frederick Charles Copleston was an English Roman Catholic Jesuit priest, philosopher, and historian of philosophy, best known for his influential multi-volume A History of Philosophy . Copleston achieved a degree of popularity in the media for debating the existence of God with Bertrand Russell in a celebrated 1948 BBC broadcast; the following year he debated logical positivism and the meaningfulness of religious language with his friend the analytic philosopher A. J. Ayer.

#169

Peter Lillback

#21383

Overall Influence

1952 - Present (72 years)

Peter A. Lillback is an American theologian who is President and Professor of Historical Theology and Church History at Westminster Theological Seminary, a Presbyterian and Reformed Christian graduate educational institution in Glenside, Pennsylvania. He also serves as the president of the Providence Forum and a senior editor at Unio cum Christo: An International Journal of Reformed Theology and Life. Lillback has been ordained in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church , and holds credentials as teaching elder in the Presbyterian Church in America . Lillback held degrees from Cedarville University , Dallas Theological Seminary , and Westminster Theological Seminary .

#170

Fred Phelps

#2878

Overall Influence

1929 - 2014 (85 years)

Fred Waldron Phelps Sr. was an American minister and disbarred lawyer who served as the pastor of the Westboro Baptist Church, worked as a civil rights attorney, and ran for statewide election in Kansas. A divisive and controversial figure, he gained national attention for his homophobic views and protests near the funerals of gay people, AIDS victims, military veterans, and disaster victims who he believed were killed as a result of God punishing the U.S. for having "bankrupt values" and tolerating homosexuality.

#171

Clodovis Boff

#28799

Overall Influence

1944 - Present (80 years)

Clodovis Boff is a Roman Catholic theologian, philosopher, writer and professor. Biography Clodovis Boff is grandson of Italian immigrants who arrived from Veneto region to Rio Grande do Sul in the late nineteenth century. He did his primary and secondary studies in Concordia, Rio Negro and Agudos. Boff studied philosophy in Mogi das Cruzes and obtained a doctorate in theology at the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium. As early as 1986 Clodovis Boff declared that the acquisition of Marxist categories have performed in the early stages of liberation theology an attitude of carelessness and exaggeration.

#172

Aloys Grillmeier

#16985

Overall Influence

1910 - 1998 (88 years)

Aloys Grillmeier was a German Jesuit priest, theologian and cardinal-deacon of the Catholic Church. Pope John Paul II created him cardinal-deacon of San Nicola in Carcere on 26 November 1994. Life Aloys Grillmeier was born in Pechbrunn in the Kingdom of Bavaria in 1910 to Joseph Grillmeier and Maria Weidner. He entered the Jesuit Order in April 1929 after completing grammar school in Regensburg. He studied philosophy in Munich and theology in Valkenburg in the Netherlands. He was ordained priest on 24 June 1937 in the middle of further theological studies in Frankfurt am Main. After studyin...

#173

Giovanni Franzoni

Giovanni Franzoni

#22217

Overall Influence

1928 - 2017 (89 years)

Giovanni Battista Franzoni was an Italian Christian communist and dissident theologian. A former Benedictine, he was Abbot of St. Paul's Outside the Walls from 1964 to 1973. Having become involved in activism and politics, he was laicized by Pope Paul VI in 1976.

#174

Gregory Beale

#16989

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (75 years)

Gregory Kimball Beale is a biblical scholar, currently a Professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology at Reformed Theological Seminary in Dallas, Texas. He is an ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. He has made a number of contributions to conservative biblical hermeneutics, particularly in the area of the use of the Old Testament in the New Testament and is one of the most influential and prolific active New Testament scholars in the world. He served as the president of the Evangelical Theological Society in 2004. In 2013, he was elected by Westminster Theological Seminary to be the first occupant of the J.

#175

Robin Collins

#12141

Overall Influence

Robin Alan Collins is an American philosopher. He currently serves as the Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and chair of the Department of Philosophy at Messiah University in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. His main interests include philosophical issues related to the relationship between religion and science and philosophical theology.

#176

Tim Keller

#8841

Overall Influence

1950 - 2023 (73 years)

Timothy James Keller was an American Calvinist pastor, preacher, theologian, and Christian apologist. He was the chairman and co-founder of Redeemer City to City, which trains pastors for service around the world. He was also the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City and the author of The New York Times bestselling books The Prodigal God: Recovering the Heart of the Christian Faith , Prayer: Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God , and The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism . The prequel for the latter is Making Sense of GOD: An Invitation to the Skeptic...

#177

Piet Schoonenberg

#28129

Overall Influence

1911 - 1999 (88 years)

Piet Schoonenberg, SJ was a Dutch Jesuit priest, theologian and professor of theology. Closely associated with the nouvelle théologie movement, he is best known for his major contributions to the Dutch Catechism of 1966.

#178

Marcella Althaus-Reid

Marcella Althaus-Reid

#29329

Overall Influence

1952 - 2009 (57 years)

Marcella Maria Althaus-Reid was Professor of Contextual Theology at New College, the University of Edinburgh. When appointed, she was the only woman professor of theology at a Scottish University and the first woman professor of theology at New College in its 160-year history.

#179

Judith Plaskow

#12665

Overall Influence

1947 - Present (77 years)

Judith Plaskow is an American theologian, author, and activist known for being the first Jewish feminist theologian. After earning her doctorate at Yale University, she taught at Manhattan College for thirty-two years before becoming a professor emerita. She was one of the creators of the Journal for Feminist Studies in Religion and was its editor for the first ten years. She also helped to create B'not Esh, a Jewish feminist group that heavily inspired her writing, and a feminist section of the American Academy of Religion, an organization of which she was president in 1998.

#180

Henri Blocher

#18761

Overall Influence

1937 - Present (87 years)

Henri A. G. Blocher is a French Baptist evangelical theologian. Biography Blocher earned a B.D. degree from Gordon Divinity School . Ministry In 1961, he became a professor at the Biblical Institute of Nogent-sur-Marne until 2016. In 1965, he became professor of systematic theology at the :fr:Faculté libre de théologie évangélique de Vaux-sur-Seine in Vaux-sur-Seine, in France, until 2003, of which he is one of the honorary deans. In 2003, he became professor of systematic theology at Wheaton College in Wheaton until 2008.

#181

David Chilton

#18017

Overall Influence

1951 - 1997 (46 years)

David Harold Chilton was an American pastor, Reconstructionist, speaker and author of several books on economics, eschatology and Christian Worldview from Placerville, California. He contributed three books on eschatology: Paradise Restored , The Days of Vengeance , and The Great Tribulation .

#182

Andrzej Jeż

#26767

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (61 years)

Andrzej Jeż is a Polish Roman Catholic bishop, being the bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tarnów since 2012. He was previously the auxiliary bishop of Tarnów and titular bishop of Tigillava from 2009 to 2012.

#183

Roger Nicole

#19147

Overall Influence

1915 - 2010 (95 years)

Roger R. Nicole was a native Swiss Reformed Baptist theologian and proponent of Christian egalitarianism and biblical inerrancy. He was an associate editor for the New Geneva Study Bible, assisted in the translation of the New International Version, and was a founding member of both the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy and the Evangelical Theological Society, serving as president of the latter in 1956.

#184

Thomas L. Thompson

#9059

Overall Influence

1939 - Present (85 years)

Thomas L. Thompson is an American-born Danish biblical scholar and theologian. He was professor of theology at the University of Copenhagen from 1993 to 2009. He currently lives in Denmark. Thompson is a part of the minimalist movement known as the Copenhagen School, a group of scholars who hold that the Bible cannot be used as a source to determine the history of ancient Israel, and that "Israel" itself is a problematic concept.

#185

J. Kenneth Grider

#24796

Overall Influence

1921 - 2006 (85 years)

J. Kenneth Grider was a Nazarene Christian theologian and former seminary professor primarily associated with the followers of John Wesley who are part of the Holiness movement. Biography Early life J. Kenneth Grider was born October 22, 1921, in Madison, IL to William Sanford and Elizabeth Grider. In 1948, he got a M.A. from the Drew University, Madison, New Jersey in 1950. In 1947, he graduated from the Nazarene Theological Seminary. He received his PhD from the University of Glasgow in 1952.

#186

Frederick G. Lawrence

Frederick G. Lawrence

#10478

Overall Influence

Frederick G. Lawrence is an American hermeneutic philosopher and theologian, and a specialist in Bernard Lonergan, teaching in the Department of Theology at Boston College, Boston, US. Life Fred Lawrence is married to Sue Lawrence. He has been running the annual Lonergan Workshop at Boston College for many years, and is editor of Lonergan Workshop, which publishes the proceedings. He also convened the First and Second International Lonergan Conferences at Rome and Toronto , and the Third and Fourth International Lonergan Conferences at Mainz and Jerusalem respectively.

#187

Arthur Peacocke

#12398

Overall Influence

1924 - 2006 (82 years)

Arthur Robert Peacocke was an English Anglican theologian and biochemist. Biography Arthur Robert Peacocke was born in Watford, England, on 29 November 1924. He was educated at Watford Grammar School for Boys, Exeter College, Oxford , and the University of Birmingham .

#188

Stylianos Harkianakis

Stylianos Harkianakis

#21764

Overall Influence

1935 - 2019 (84 years)

Stylianos Harkianakis was the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of Australia and Primate of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Australia. He served as inaugural and permanent Chairman of the Standing Conference of Canonical Orthodox Churches in Australia and Dean of St Andrew's Greek Orthodox Theological College. He was a theologian specialising in ecclesiology and also an award-winning poet.

#189

Bruce A. Ware

#24388

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (71 years)

Bruce A. Ware is an American theologian, former president of the Evangelical Theological Society, and a key figure in the debate over open theism. Education A.S. Judson Baptist CollegeCertif. Capernwray Bible SchoolB.A. Whitworth CollegeM.Div. and Th.M. Western Conservative Baptist SeminaryM.A. University of WashingtonPh.D. Fuller Theological Seminary

#190

Wolfgang Ullmann

#16233

Overall Influence

1929 - 2004 (75 years)

Wolfgang Ullmann was a German journalist, theologian, politician. Life Wolfgang Ullmann was born in Bad Gottleuba near Dresden. From 1948 to 1954 he studied Protestant theology and also philosophy, first in Berlin and then at the University of Göttingen.

#191

Norman Shepherd

#31684

Overall Influence

1933 - Present (91 years)

Norman Shepherd is an American theologian who served as associate professor of systematic theology at Westminster Theological Seminary from 1963 to 1981. Shepherd had a number of views that were criticized as being contrary to the Westminster Standards, and this led him to be dismissed from his post at Westminster. First and foremost, Shepherd was found to have taught students in the classroom that Justification was by the twofold instrument of faith and good works. This directly contradicted one of the two foundational Christian truths recovered during the Protestant Reformation—and a doctri...

#192

R. J. Rushdoony

R. J. Rushdoony

#10680

Overall Influence

1916 - 2001 (85 years)

Rousas John Rushdoony was an Armenian-American Calvinist philosopher, historian, and theologian. He is credited as being the father of Christian Reconstructionism and an inspiration for the modern Christian homeschool movement. His followers and critics have argued that his thought exerts considerable influence on the evangelical Christian right.

#193

Peter Enns

#13115

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (63 years)

Peter Eric Enns is an American Biblical scholar and theologian. He has written widely on hermeneutics, Christianity and science, historicity of the Bible, and Old Testament interpretation. Outside of his academic work Enns is a contributor to HuffPost and Patheos. He has also worked with Francis Collins' The BioLogos Foundation. His book Inspiration and Incarnation challenged conservative/mainstream Evangelical methods of biblical interpretation. His book The Evolution of Adam questions the belief that Adam was a historical figure. He also wrote The Bible Tells Me So: Why Defending Scripture ...

#194

Colin S. Smith

#28015

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (66 years)

Colin S. Smith is an American evangelical pastor and author. Smith is currently the senior pastor of The Orchard Evangelical Free Church in Illinois, where he has been since 1996. The Orchard Evangelical Free Church has Seven campus locations: Arlington Heights, Barrington, Itasca, Marengo, Chicago, Northfield and Vernon Hills.

#195

Yung Suk Kim

#20788

Overall Influence

Yung Suk Kim is a Korean-American biblical scholar. Kim is professor of New Testament and early Christianity at the Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology . He studied in Korean and American schools. Kim obtained a PhD in New Testament studies from Vanderbilt University in 2006, an M.Div. from McCormick Theological Seminary in 1999, and a B.A. from Kyungpook National University in 1985. He is the editor of the Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Religion.

#196

Don Saliers

#34486

Overall Influence

1937 - Present (87 years)

Don E. Saliers is an American theologian specializing in homiletics and liturgics. He was the William R. Cannon Distinguished Professor of Theology and Worship at the Candler School of Theology of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. Although he retired from Candler in 2007, Professor Saliers returned to Candler as Theologian-in-Residence in 2015.

#197

Christopher Partridge

#3853

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (63 years)

Christopher Hugh Partridge is an author, editor, professor at Lancaster University, and founding Co-director of the Centre for the Study of Religion and Popular Culture. According to Gordon Lynch, Partridge is a leading scholar of topics in popular culture.

#198

Sasagu Arai

#36412

Overall Influence

1930 - Present (94 years)

Sasagu Arai is a Japanese researcher of early Christianity and Gnosticism. Arai is a Doctor of Theology Professor emeritus of University of Tokyo and Keisen University, and a member of the Japan Academy. He graduated at Erlangen-Nürnberg University in Germany.

#199

Germain Grisez

#5962

Overall Influence

1929 - 2018 (89 years)

Germain Gabriel Grisez was a French-American philosopher. Grisez's development of ideas from Thomas Aquinas has redirected Catholic thought and changed the way it has engaged with secular moral philosophy. In 'The First Principle of Practical Reason: A Commentary on the Summa Theologiae, I-II, Q. 94, A. 2' Grisez attacked the neo-scholastic interpretation of Aquinas as holding that moral norms are derived from methodologically antecedent knowledge of human nature. Grisez defended the idea of metaphysical free choice, and proposed a natural law theory of practical reasoning and moral judgeme...

#200

J. Steven Wilkins

#16116

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (74 years)

J. Steven Wilkins is a conservative American Calvinist and evangelical pastor and author known for views on slavery in the United States. Biography Steve Wilkins holds degrees from the University of Alabama and the Reformed Theological Seminary of Jackson, Mississippi. He was ordained as a minister in the Presbyterian Church in America in 1976, and has served as the pastor of Church of the Redeemer in West Monroe, Louisiana since 1989.

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