Alfred Bloom (November 9, 1926 – August 25, 2017)[1] was an American Shin Buddhism scholar, who pioneered Jōdo Shinshū studies in the English-speaking world.
At the time of Bloom’s birth, his mother had been a recent convert to an Evangelical tradition of Christianity, and he was raised in that religious setting.
This sparked a lifelong interest that grew from curiosity to academic pursuit to personal faith, always through rigorous intellectual reflection and dialogue.
While in seminary, he was encouraged to pursue his intellectual interests in the newly founded degree of Comparative Religious Studies at Harvard Divinity School.
He received a Fulbright grant to study in Japan (1957-1959) and was awarded his doctorate from Harvard Divinity School with his thesis "Shinran’s Gospel of Pure Grace" in 1963.