Pamela D. Winfield is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Elon University, NC. She specializes in Japanese Buddhist art and doctrine in the esoteric and Zen traditions. Her previous book Icons and Iconoclasm in Japanese Buddhism: Kukai and Dogen on the Art of Enlightenment (Oxford University Press, 2013) won the annual Book Prize from the Association of Asian Studies Southeast Conference in 2015.
Steven Heine is Professor of Religious Studies and History, and Director of the Asian Studies Program at Florida International University in Miami, FL. A 2007 recipient of the Order of the Rising Sun Award from the Japanese government, Heine is the author of more than two dozen books and one hundred articles and book chapters on East Asian religions, especially the role of Zen in China and Japan and the relation between religiosity and society.