LLoyd Geering

Retired Professor of Religious Studies

Lloyd Geering was made Principal Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, topping New Zealand’s new year’s honors list for 2001. This is the first time the strictly New Zealand honors have been given. Previously New Zealand granted Imperial Honors, under which Lloyd Geering would have been made a knight commander.

Previously honored in 1988 as a Companion of the British Empire, Lloyd Geering is a public figure of considerable renown in New Zealand, where he is in constant demand as a lecturer and as a commentator on religion and related matters on both television and radio. In 1966, he published an article on “The Resurrection of Jesus” and, in 1967, another on “The Immortality of the Soul,” which together sparked a two-year public, theological controversy that culminated in charges by the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand—of which he is an ordained minister—of doctrinal error and disturbing the peace of the church. After a dramatic, two-day televised trial, the Assembly judged that no doctrinal error had been proved, dismissed the charges and declared the case closed.

Live footage from the heresy trial can be viewed in the 2007 Top Shelf documentary The Last Western Heretic, available in North American format from Westar Institute.

Books by Lloyd Geering

• A Time to Speak, 2020
• Reimagining God: The Faith Journey of a Modern Heretic, 2014
• From the Big Bang to God: Our Awe-Inspiring Journey of Evolution, 2013
• Why Weren’t We Told: A Handbook on ‘progressive’ Christianity, 2013 (contributor)
• Christianity without God, 2002
• Christian Faith at the Crossroads, revised edition 2001
• The World to Come: From Christian Past to Global Future, 1999
• Tomorrow’s God: How We Create our Worlds, reprint 2000
• In the World Today, 1988
• The World of Relation: An Introduction to Martin Buber’s I and Thou, 1983
• Faith’s New Age: A Perspective on Contemporary Religious Change, 1980
• Resurrection – A Symbol of Hope, 1971
• God in the New World, 1968

Academic Credentials

• B.A., University of New Zealand
• M.A., University of New Zealand
• B.D., Melbourne College of Divinity, 1942
• B.D., Melbourne College of Divinity, 1946
• D.D., University of Otago

Academic Appointments

• Lecturer, St. Andrew’s Trust for the Study of Religion and Society, 1983–
• Emeritus Professor of Victoria University, 1984-
• Foundation Professor of Religions Studies, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, 1971-1984
• Professor of Old Testament Studies, Theological Hall, Knox College, Dunedin, New Zealand, 1960-1971
• Professor of Old Testament Studies, Emmanuel College, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, 1956-1960

Awards and Honors

• Principal Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, 2001
• Companion of the British Empire, 1988