Rev. Dr. Renita J. Weems is a biblical scholar, a minister, and an author whose scholarly insights into modern faith, biblical texts, and the role of spirituality in everyday lives has made her a highly sought-after writer and speaker for more than four decades.  She has written widely for academics and general audiences on topics of Christian faith, prophetic religion, human rights, the black church, women’s spirituality, biblical justice, and human sexuality.  Rev. Dr. Renita Weems earned a Ph.D. degree at Princeton Theological Seminary in 1989 making her the first African American woman to earn a doctorate in Old Testament Studies. She is the first Black woman to deliver the Yale University Lyman Beecher Lecture (2008). Dr. Weems is featured in “Black Stars: African American Religious Leaders” (2008), a collection of biographies of some of the most important Black Religious Leaders over the last 200 hundred years, including such impressive figures as Adam Clayton Powell, Elijah Muhammad, Sojourner Truth, Howard Thurman, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

In addition to being a former professor at Vanderbilt Divinity School (1987-2004), Rev. Dr. Renita J. Weems, a scholar of Christian scriptures, has taught at Spelman College (Atlanta, GA), Howard University Divinity School (Washington, DC) and Memphis Theological Seminary (Memphis, TN).  She grew up in Atlanta, GA where she attended Atlanta public schools. She obtained her B.A. degree from Wellesley College in Wellesley, MA. She worked for a brief time after college as a public accountant and a stockbroker for Merrill Lynch.

Rev. Dr. Renita J. Weems is currently (2024 academic year) the Crump Visiting Professor and Black Religious Scholars Group Scholar-in-Residence at Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, TX.

Ordained in 1985 Dr. Weems is an itinerant minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church.

Rev. Dr. Renita J. Weems lives in Nashville with her family.