List of religious studies scholars

Religious studies is the academic field of multi-disciplinary, secular study of religious beliefs, behaviors, and institutions.

The list is in alphabetical order by the scholar's last name.

A-D

• Edwin David Aponte
• Raymond Apple, Australian Rabbi, writer on Jewish, interfaith and freemasonic issues
• Karen Armstrong, author of A History of God
• Miguel Asín Palacios, Spanish Arabist, work on the mutual influence between Christianity and Islam
• Robert Baker Aitken, author of numerous academic books on Zen Buddhism
• Reza Aslan, author of Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, professor of creative writing at the University of California, Riverside
• Edmond La Beaume Cherbonnier, professor and scholar, author of Hardness of Heart (1955)
• Catherine Bell, ritual studies scholar
• Herbert Berg, scholar of Islamic origins
• Peter Berger, author of The Sacred Canopy
• Pascal Boyer, author of Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought
• Joseph Epes Brown, author of The Sacred Pipe and Teaching Spirits: Understanding Native American Religious Traditions
• Rudolf Bultmann
• Frank G. Carver
• John Corrigan, co-author of Religion in America, editor of the "Chicago History of American Religion" book series (University of Chicago Press)
• Frank Moore Cross, emeritus professor Harvard Divinity School, interpreter of the Dead Sea Scrolls
• Ioan Petru Culianu, author of The HarperCollins Concise Guide to World Religions and Out of This World
• Miguel A. De La Torre
• Arti Dhand, associate professor at the University of Toronto, Department for the Study of Religion
• Wendy Doniger, (formerly published as Wendy O'Flaherty) is a leading researcher in Hinduism among other topics on religion.
• Émile Durkheim, author of The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, a seminal work on sociology of religion

E-H

• Diana L. Eck
• Bart D. Ehrman, author, and James A. Gray Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Mircea Eliade, author of The Sacred and the Profane and History of Religious Ideas, vol.I-III
• Steven Engler, Canadian scholar of religion
• Erasmus
• Carl W. Ernst, specialist in Islamic studies, author of Sufism: An Introduction to the Mystical Tradition of Islam
• E. E. Evans-Pritchard
• James George Frazer, author of The Golden Bough
• Sigmund Freud, author of Totem and Taboo, The Future of an Illusion, and Moses and Monotheism
• Rajmohan Gandhi, author of Revenge and Reconciliation
• Arnold van Gennep
• Anthony Giddens
• René Girard, whose theological works include Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World
• Stephen D. Glazier, editor of The Encyclopedia of African and African American Religions
• Richard Gombrich
• Justo L. González, author of The Story of Christianity and a leading figure in Hispanic theology
• John R. Hall, American sociologist of religion
• Wouter Hanegraaff, author of New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought
• Ishwar C. Harris
• Nathan O. Hatch, author of "The Democratization of American Christianity"
• Friedrich Heiler
• Steven Heine, scholar of East Asian Buddhism
• Susan Henking, scholar of religion, gender and sexuality
• Peter L Hobson, author of The Hermeneutics of Followship: Relocating Narratives of Discipleship
• Zora Neale Hurston, author of Mules and Men and Hoodoo in America

I-M

• Ada Maria Isasi-Diaz
• William James, author of The Varieties of Religious Experience
• Grace Jantzen
• Carl Jung
• Klaus Klostermaier
• Adam Kotsko, author of Zizek and Theology and The Politics of Redemption, and translator of Agamben
• Hans Küng, Catholic theologian, author of Tracing the Way. Spiritual Dimensions of the World Religions
• Gerard van der Leeuw
• Peggy Levitt
• Bruce Lincoln (University of Chicago), author of Holy Terrors: Thinking about Religion after September 11, Theorizing Myth: Narrative, Ideology, and Scholarship and Discourse and the Construction in Society
• Philip Lindholm
• Bronisław Malinowski
• Martin E. Marty (University of Chicago), author of the series Modern American Religion, editor of The Fundamentalism Project
• John Macquarrie
• Jean-François Mayer, Swiss religious historian
• Russell T. McCutcheon
• Josef W. Meri
• George Foot Moore, scholar and theologian, author of History of Religions (two volumes – 1914, 1919) and Judaism (two volumes, 1927)
• Max Müller, editor of Sacred Books of the East

N-S

• Seyyed Hossein Nasr, author of Islam: Religion, History, and Civilization
• Rudolf Otto, author of The Idea of the Holy
• Elaine Pagels, author of The Gnostic Gospels
• Christopher Partridge, author of The Re-enchantment of the West
• Geoffrey Parrinder, former professor at King's College London and author of What World Religions Teach Us (1968)
• Francis Edward Peters, Professor at New York University and author of numerous books on Christianity, Judaism and Islam
• Stephen Prothero, Professor at Boston University and author of "American Jesus"; "Religious Literacy"; and "God Is Not One."
• Roy Rappaport
• Olivier Roy
• Arne Runeberg (1912–1979), Finnish sociologist, anthropologist and linguist
• Annemarie Schimmel, author of Mystical Dimensions of Islam
• Wilhelm Schmidt
• Arvind Sharma, author of Women in World Religions
• Christian Smith, author of Soul Searching: the Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers
• Huston Smith, author of The World's Religions
• Jonathan Z. Smith (University of Chicago), author of Map is Not Territory; Imagining Religion: From Babylon to Jonestown and To Take Place: Toward Theory in Ritual
• Wilfred Cantwell Smith
• William Robertson Smith, Scottish theologian, early work in the "higher criticism" of the Bible
• Ninian Smart, author of Dimensions of the Sacred
• Nathan Söderblom
• Rodney Stark
• Michael Stausberg
• John Shelby Spong, author The Sins of Scripture: Exposing the Bible's Texts of Hate to Reveal the God of Love and other works

T-Z

• Einar Thomassen
• Toulmin, Joshua (1740–1815), English radical Dissenting minister
• Edward Burnett Tylor
• Joachim Wach
• James Webb, author of The Occult Underground and The Harmonious Circle
• Max Weber
• Christian K. Wedemeyer
• Wesley Wildman
• Linda Woodhead, MBE. Director of The Religion and Society Programme
• Zakir Naik
• Benjamin E. Zeller, American historian of religion and author
• Heinrich Zimmer, Indologist, author of Philosophies of India and Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization
• Volker Zotz
• Ghil'ad Zuckermann, linguist, revivalist, scholar of language, religion and nationhood