The AFU School of Divinity is dedicated to the formation of scholars, leaders, and practitioners of exceptional depth — offering rigorous academic training within a diverse, non-sectarian intellectual community that honors the full breadth of religious inquiry. The School integrates scholarly excellence with practical formation, preparing graduates for positions of leadership and service across the religious, public, and civic sectors.
Through a comprehensive program of study spanning the bachelor’s, master’s, doctoral, and postdoctoral levels, the School offers sustained engagement with the foundational aspects of faith, doctrine, and religious tradition in dialogue with the complexities of contemporary life. Students are equipped not only with theological knowledge, but with the analytical frameworks and communicative capacities required to engage religion meaningfully in a pluralistic and rapidly changing world.
The School’s mission is the formation of globally minded scholars capable of understanding, articulating, and engaging religious traditions with intellectual rigor, hermeneutical sophistication, and genuine respect for interreligious dialogue. Graduates are prepared to navigate the intersection of faith and contemporary society with clarity, conviction, and scholarly integrity.
The curriculum is designed to harmonize theological and religious disciplines across confessional and secular perspectives, situated within a broad global framework that reflects the diversity and complexity of religious experience worldwide.
Students may pursue their studies within the following areas of academic concentration:
- Hebrew Bible / Old Testament
- Jewish Studies
- African American and African Religious Studies
- Buddhist Studies
- Comparative Religious Studies
- East Asian Religious Studies
- History of Christianity
- Hindu Studies
- South Asian Religious Studies
- Islamic Studies
- New Testament and Early Christianity
- Philosophy of Religion
- Religions in the Americas
- Religion, Ethics, and Politics
- Religion, Literature, and Culture
- Religious Studies and Education
- Theology
- Women, Gender, Sexuality, and Religion