Richard Swinburne’s academic life is closely associated with the University of Oxford, where he pursued studies in philosophy and theology. He was particularly interested in the question of whether belief in the teachings of the Christian religion is rationally justified.

Richard Swinburne had a Christian upbringing. In 1995 he left the Anglican Church and converted to Orthodoxy.

Swinburne devoted years to the history of the physical and biological sciences, which was the source of his philosophical reflection.

In 1963 he started lecturing in philosophy at the University of Hull. Since 1972 he has been a  Professor of Philosophy at Keele University. Throughout this period his academic interest was the philosophy of religion. From 1985 to 2002 he was Professor of Philosophy of Christian Religion at the University of Oxford. In 1993 he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy. He has lectured at many universities around the world.

His first book, Space and Time, was published in 1968. In 1971, The Concept of Miracles was published. Between 1981 and 1997, he published the trilogy Faith and Thought, The Existence of God, and The Coherence of Theism. His later works include Responsibility and the Atonement (1989), Revelation (1992), The Christian God (1994), Providence and the Problem of Evil (1998), Epistemic Justification (2001), The Resurrection of the Incarnate God (2003), Mind, Brain and Free Will (2013), and a debate with James Sterba entitled Would a Good God Allow So Much Suffering? (2023).

Richard Swinburne is the author of the popular books: “Is There a God?” (1996), “Was Jesus God?” (2008).

Richard Swinburne was awarded honorary doctorates by the Catholic University of Ljubljana (2015), the Dimitri Cantemir Christian University of Bucharest (2016), and the International Academy of Philosophy of Liechtenstein (2017).

In 2023, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by Ilia State University.