Religion of the Semites: The Fundamental Institutions

by William Robertson Smith

The classic anthropological investigation into the origins and development of Semitic religions.

Genres: Religion, History, Nonfiction

558 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1889

About the author

Rev. Prof William Robertson Smith DD FRSE LLD was a Scottish orientalist, Old Testament scholar, professor of divinity, and minister of the Free Church of Scotland. He was an editor of the Encyclopædia Britannica and contributor to the Encyclopaedia Biblica. He is also known for his book Religion of the Semites, which is considered a foundational text in the comparative study of religion.

Smith's writing approached religious topics without endorsing the Bible as literally true. The result was a furore in the Free Church of Scotland, of which he was a member as well as criticism from conservative parts of America. As a result of a heresy trial, he lost his position at the Aberdeen Free Church College in 1881 and took up a position as a reader in Arabic at the University of Cambridge, where he eventually rose to the position of University Librarian, Professor of Arabic and a fellow of Christ's College. It was during this time that he wrote The Old Testament in the Jewish Church and The Prophets of Israel (1882), which were intended to be theological treatises for the lay audience.