James Henry Leuba (April 9, 1868 – December 8, 1946) was an American psychologist best known for his contributions to the psychology of religion. His son Clarence James Leuba was also a psychologist and taught at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio.^[1]

Leuba was born in Neuchâtel Switzerland, and later moved to America. He took his Ph.D. at Clark University under G. Stanley Hall.^[1] His work was marked by a tendency to explain mysticism and other religious experiences in psychological terms. Philosophically, his position may be described as naturalism.^[2] His work points to similarities between religious mysticism and yoga or drug-induced mysticism; he does accept differences between these in terms of moral motivation and to what uses mysticism is put.^[3] His psychological study of religion aroused opposition from churchmen.^[1] He argued for a naturalistic treatment of religion, which he considered to be necessary if religious psychology was to be looked at scientifically. He was an atheist.^[4]

• Leuba, J. H. (1909). The Psychological Origin and the Nature of Religion.
• Leuba, J. H. (1912). The Psychological Study of Religion: Its Origin, Function, and Future. New York: Macmillan.
• Leuba, J. H. (1916). The Belief in God and Immortality. Boston: Sherman, French.
• Leuba, J. H. (1925). The Psychology of Religious Mysticism. New York: Harcourt, Brace. (1925 UK edition. London: Kegan Paul, Trench & Trubner).
• Leuba, J. H. (1933). God or Man? A Study of the Value of God to Man. New York: Henry Holt and Company. (1934 UK edition. London: Kegan Paul, Trench & Trubner).

• Psychology of religion