Jonathan Z. Smith (1938-2017) was Robert O. Anderson Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of the Humanities at the University of Chicago. He also held appointments in the Committees on the Ancient Mediterranean World and on the History of Culture, and in the College. He was also an associate faculty member in the Divinity School. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Academy of Religions, and served as president of the Society of Biblical Literature.

In 2013, when he was named to an Honorary Lifetime Membership in the International Association for the History of Religions, the citation read, in part: "Smith's enormous contributions to the field from the 1960s to the present have unwaveringly insisted upon, and been exemplary of, methodological rigor and self consciousness. He has probably done more than any single scholar to promote an analytic or critical approach to the study of religion."

He was the author of numerous works, including some published by the University of Chicago Press.