Biographical and Genealogical Information
Biography by Religious Tradition or Denomination
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Biographical dictionaries, such as Dictionary of Catholic Biography, and subject encyclopedias, such as Encyclopaedia Judaica, limited to one religious tradition can be used to find biographical sketches. Library of Congress call number ranges for each religious tradition can be used to find subject dictionaries/encyclopedias, and the specific call number ranges allocated to biography can help locate biographical dictionaries for that religious tradition in the reference collection. For example: |
- Judaism
- Library of Congress subclass BM
- Subject encyclopedia: Encyclopaedia Judaica [Ref. folio DS102.8.E496 1972a]
- Biography BM 750-755
- Islam
- Library of Congress subclass BP
- Subject encyclopedia: The Encyclopaedia of Islam [Ref. DS37.E523] (Note: This is an example of a subject encyclopedia that is not classified using the BP Islam classification, but DS History, Asia instead)
- Biography BP 70-80
- Buddhism
- Library of Congress subclass BQ
- Subject encyclopedia: Encyclopedia of Buddhism [Ref. BQ128 .E62 2004]
- Biography BQ 840-999
- Christianity
- Library of Congress subclass BR
- Subject encyclopedia: Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church [Ref. BR95 .O8 1997]
- Biography BR 1690-1725
- Examples of biographical dictionaries:
- Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexicon [Ref. BR1700.2.B38]
- Twentieth Century Dictionary of Christian Biography [Ref. BR1700.2 .T9 1995]
- The Blackwell Dictionary of Evangelical Biography: 1730-1860 [Ref. BR1640 .B53 1995]
- Christian denominations
- Library of Congress subclass BX
- Some major denominations:
- Catholic Church: Biography BX 4650-4705
- Protestantism: Biography BX 4800-9999
- Church of England: Biography BX 5197-5199
- Baptists: Biography BX 6493-6495
- Other denominations and denomination groups follow the Baptists in alphabetical order in BX
The biographical sources mentioned here are only a small number of those available. For more information, contact a reference librarian.
Contents: The Place to Start | Current Biography | American Biography | American Religious Biography | Biography by Religious Tradition or Denomination | Christian Theologians | Faculty of Harvard Divinity School | Graduates and Others Enrolled at Harvard Divinity School | Unitarian, Universalist, and Unitarian Universalist Clergy | Colonial Clergy | Church Records / Genealogy Resources
The complete guide is also available in a one-page format, which is especially useful for viewing and printing the entire guide at once.
This guide was originally written by Clifford Wunderlich and Renata Kalnins in January 2005. It was last updated March 11, 2005.