Swarthmore College: Academics: Course Catalog

The Religion Department plays a central role in the Swarthmore academic program. More than one-third of the student body annually takes a course in religion, and about 40 students in the junior and senior classes choose to major or minor in the discipline.

One attraction of the study of religion is the cross-cultural nature of its subject matter. The discipline addresses the complex interplay of culture, history, text, orality, performance, and personal experience. Religion is expressed in numerous ways: ritual and symbol, myth and legend, story and poetry, scripture and theology, festival and ceremony, art and music, moral codes and social values. The department seeks to develop ways of understanding these phenomena in terms of their historical and cultural particularity and in reference to their common patterns.

Courses offered on a regular cycle in the department present the development of Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Afro-Caribbean religions, and Christianity as well as the development of religion and religions in the regional areas of the Indian Sub-Continent (Hindu, Jain, Buddhist, Muslim, Sikh), Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia (Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam), China (Taoist, Confucian, spirit cults), Japan (Buddhist and Shinto), Africa (Fon, Yoruba, Dahomey, and Kongo), the Middle East (Christian, Islamic, Jewish, Gnostic, Mandean), Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Europe and the Americas (from New World African traditions, Vodou and Candomblé, to Neo Paganism and Civil Religion in North America). Breadth in subject matter is complemented by strong methodological diversity; questions raised include those of historical, theological, philosophical, literary, feminist, sociological, and anthropological interests. This multifaceted focus makes religious studies an ideal liberal arts major.

REQUIREMENTS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Major and Minor in the Course Program

Normally, the student who applies for a major or minor in religion will have completed (or be in the process of completing) two courses in the discipline with an honor grade.

Majors successfully complete 8 credits in religion, including the required Senior Symposium (Religion Café) in the fall of the senior year, to meet departmental and College graduation requirements. Successful completion of the symposium will be the culminating requirement for the course major. For all religion majors, the symposium will be a 1-credit seminar and will include a term essay assignment.

Writing a thesis is an option for course students. Those seniors who desire to complete a long paper (1 credit) or thesis (2 credits) as part of the major will need to obtain permission from a faculty adviser in consultation with the department. For majors, this exercise will not substitute for the Senior Symposium.

Minors complete 5 credits in the Religion Department and are not required to take the Senior Symposium.

Up to three courses cross-listed but not housed within the Religion Department will count toward the major. Only one such cross-listed course will count toward the minor. Up to two non-Swarthmore courses (i.e., courses taken abroad or domestically) may count toward the major; only one such course is permissible for the minor. The department will accept two courses in language (Arabic, Hebrew, or other proposed research languages) toward the major or minor.

For many students, courses numbered RELG 001–013 serve as points of entry for advanced work in the department and sometimes as prerequisites for higher-level courses, though this is not always the case. Students come to the study of religion through various courses at various levels, and the department encourages this flexibility and diversity of entry points by having no introductory course requirements, nor are there required distribution courses. The major in religion is planned in consultation with faculty members in the department, the individual student’s adviser, along with other relevant faculty, who encourage curricular breadth (close work in more than one religious tradition) and methodological diversity in the proposed program. Such breadth and diversity in the program is encouraged at the beginning in the major’s sophomore paper statement.

The curriculum in the Religion Department is strongly comparative, thematic, and interdisciplinary, so it is relatively easy for students to propose programs that are cross-cultural and trans-disciplinary in scope. Religion majors are encouraged to include study abroad in their program, planned in collaboration with the department. Often a student’s independent study projects done while studying abroad is expanded into a 1 or 2-credit honors or course thesis upon return to Swarthmore.

Admission to the Major

The Religion Department considers two areas when evaluating applications: overall GPA and quality of prior work in religion courses. Applicants are sometimes deferred for a term so the department can better evaluate an application for the major. A student’s demonstrated ability to do at least B/B- work in religion is required for admission to the major in course.

Admission to the Honors Program

Because of the nature of different instructional formats (e.g., seminars) and of the culminating exercise in the Honors Program, the department expects applicants to this program to have at least a B+/B average in religion courses as well as an overall average above the College graduation requirement for admission to the Honors Program.

Major and Minor in the Honors Program (External Examination Program)

All honors major and minors fulfill requirements for the course program. Beyond this step, the normal method of preparation for the honors major will be done through three seminars, although with the consent of the department, single 2-credit thesis, a 1-credit thesis/course combination, or a combination of two courses (including attachments and study abroad options) can count for one honors preparation. In general, only one such preparation can consist of nonseminar-based studies.

In the religion major, the mode of assessing a student’s three 2-credit preparations in religion (seminars or course combinations, but not 2-credit theses) will be a 3-hour written examination set by an external examiner. In addition, with the exception of a thesis preparation, a student will submit to each external examiner a Senior Honors Study (SHS) paper. SHS papers will be between 2500 and 4000 words and will normally be a revision of the final seminar paper or, in the event of a nonseminar mode of preparation, a revised course paper. A final oral examination by the examiner follows the written examination. Two-credit theses will be read and orally examined by an external examiner (with no extra SHS requirement).

In the minor, the mode of assessing a student’s one 2-credit preparation in Religion will also be a 3-hour written examination (and the oral) set by an external examiner, along with an SHS paper.

Seminars and the written and oral external exam are the hallmarks of honors. Seminars are a collaborative and cooperative venture among students and faculty members designed to promote self-directed learning. The teaching faculty evaluates seminar performance based on the quality of seminar papers, comments during seminar discussions, and a final paper. Since the seminar depends on the active participation of all its members, the department expects students to live up to the standards of honors. These standards include attendance at every seminar session, timely submission of seminar papers, reading of seminar papers before the seminar, completion of the assigned readings prior to the seminar, active engagement in seminar discussions, and respect for the opinions of the members of the seminar. Students earn double-credit for seminars and should expect twice the work normally done in a course. The external examination, both written and oral, is the capstone of the honors experience.

COURSES

RELG 001. Religion and Human Experience

This course introduces the nature of religious worldviews, their cultural manifestations, and their influence on personal and social self-understanding and action. The course explores various themes and structures seminal to the nature of religion and its study: sacred scripture, visions of ultimate reality and their various manifestations, religious experience and its expression in systems of thought, and ritual behavior and moral action. Members of the department will lecture and lead weekly discussion sections.

Writing course.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 002. First-Year Seminar: Animal Human Spirit

We human beings define our uniqueness in relationship to a concept of the divine, but we also define ourselves against a concept of what is animal in other beings. How are the two relationships related? In other words, how does our relationship with our natural environment shape our experience of religion? This first-year seminar will explore these questions by taking a journey through the field of comparative religion. This journey will bring us to a place where we can interrogate the contemporary relationship between animals and spirituality in the context of our modern industrial consumer economy. We will examine the ethics of animal rights, theological critiques of “speciesism,” and the reduction of food to the product of an industry.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 002B. Religion in America

This course is an introduction to religion in the United States, beginning with Native American religions and European-Indian contact in the colonial era, and moving forward in time to present-day movements and ideas. The course will explore a variety of themes in American religious history, such as slavery and religion, politics and religion, evangelicalism, Judaism and Islam in the United States, “cults” and alternative spiritualities, New Age religions, popular traditions, and religion and film, with an emphasis on the impact of gender, race, and national culture on American spiritual life.

1 credit.

Spring 2006. Chireau.

RELG 003. Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East

An introduction to the Hebrew Bible and the religion of ancient Israel within the context of other ancient Near Eastern religious traditions. The Hebrew Bible will be read closely in English translation with special attention to mythological, exegetical, sociological, gender, and body issues. In addition to the Hebrew Bible, literature from Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Canaan will be read, including The Epic of Gilgamesh, The Enuma Elish, and The Theology of Memphis.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Deutsch.

RELG 004. New Testament and Early Christianity

A discussion-rich introduction to the New Testament in light of recent biblical scholarship. The class engages the issues of authorship and redaction, purpose and structure, and historical context and cultural setting. Some of the particular themes that are studied include the dynamic of canon formation, the synoptic problem in relation to the Gospel of John, first-century Judaism, Greek and Roman influences, the messianic consciousness of Jesus, the use of epistolary literature in Paul, the problem of apocalyptic material, and the wealth of extra-canonical writings (e.g. Gospel of Thomas) that are crucial for examining the rise of Christianity in the years from 30 CE to 150 CE. Novels and films inspired by the New Testament are read and viewed as well.

1 credit.

Spring 2006. Wallace.

RELG 005B. Introduction to Christianity

This course is a selective introduction to Christian religious beliefs and practices. This course introduces students to the development and diverse forms of Christianity, drawing on categories from the study of religion including ritual, narrative, art, and theology.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 007B. Women and Religion

This course will examine the variety of women’s religious experiences in the United States. Topics will include the construction of gender and religion, religious experiences of women of color, spiritual autobiographies and narratives by women, Wicca and witchcraft in the United States, and feminist and womanist theology.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 008. Patterns of Asian Religions

A thematic introduction to the study of religion through an examination of selected texts, teachings, and practices of the religious traditions of South and East Asia structured as patterns of religious life. Materials are drawn from the Buddhist traditions of India, Tibet, China, and Japan; the Hindu and Jain traditions of India; the Confucian and Taoist traditions of China; and the Shinto tradition of Japan. Themes include deities, the body, ritual, cosmology, sacred space, religious specialists, and death and the afterlife.

Writing course.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 009. The Buddhist Traditions of Asia

This course explores the unity and variety of the Buddhist tradition within its historical development in South, Central, and East Asia, by way of the study of its texts and visual arts, as well as other forms of material culture, such as shrines and their relics, pilgrimage places, mummies and portraits, and the cult of the book. The course will be organized thematically, and to a lesser extent chronologically and geographically, focusing on the formations of the Theravada in Sri Lanka and Thailand, Mahayana Zen traditions in China and Japan, and Vajrayana (tantra) traditions in Tibet. Themes include narratives of the Buddha and the consecration of Buddha images; gender, power, and religious authority; meditation, liberation, and vision; devotion, the body, and the social construction of emotions and asceticism. Texts will range widely from the Jataka Tales, Sinhala devotional narratives from Sri Lanka, nun’s Pali lyrics and narratives of the Therigatha, The Lotus Sutra, Zen koans, Basho’s haiku journals, the autobiography of Satomi Myodo to essays on Buddhist activism, peace, and social justice by Sulak Sivaraksa and Thich Nhat Hanh.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Hopkins.

RELG 010. African American Religions

What makes African American religion “African” and “American”? Using texts, films, and music, we will examine the sacred institutions of Americans of African descent. Major themes will include Africanisms in American religion, slavery and religion, gospel music, African American women and religion, black and womanist theology, the civil rights movement, and Islam and urban religions. Field trips include visits to Father Divine’s Peace Mission and the first independent black church in the United States, Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Chireau.

RELG 011. First-Year Seminar: Religion and the Meaning of Life

“Whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for my sake will save it.” One of the most intriguing contradictions in comparative religious studies is the claim that only when one forfeits the self can one discover genuine selfhood; the journey to the true self begins by first abandoning one’s assumptions about selfhood through practicing the disciplines of self-emptying and self-giving. In this seminar, we will analyze the collapse of the received notions of the stable self in classical thought and then move toward a postmodern recovery of the self-that-is-not-a-self founded on the spiritual practice of solicitude for the other, both humans and other beings. Readings will include Plato, Augustine, Rumi, Kierkegaard, Weil, Nishitani, Leopold, Levinas, Ricoeur, and Irigaray. This is a discussion-rich seminar with regular student presentations and a community service learning component.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 011B. Introduction to Islam

What are the basic symbols of Islam, and how are they understood and experienced by Muslims? This course will introduce students to the methodology of religious studies concentrating on symbols, myth, and ritual. We will apply these theoretical concepts to the Muslim experience of religion by exploring textual and historical sources, classical and contemporary, from Africa, Arabia, and Asia.

Writing course.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Schomberg.

RELG 012. The History, Religion, and Culture of India I: From the Indus Valley to the Hindu Saints

A study of the religious history of India from the ancient Indo-Aryan civilization of the north to the establishment of Islam under Moghul rule. Topics include the ritual system of the Vedas, the philosophy of the Upanishads, the rise of Buddhist and Jain communities, and the development of classical Hindu society. Focal themes are hierarchy, caste and class, purity and pollution, gender, untouchability, world renunciation, and the construction of a religiously defined social order.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 013. History, Religion, and Culture of India II: From Akbar to Gandhi and the Voices of Untouchable Liberation

The religious history of India from the advent of Islam to the present. From the Moghuls to the Hindu nationalist movements and Ambedkar’s legacy to the present.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 014B. Christian Life and Thought in the Middle Ages

Survey of Western religious culture and thought from the early to the late Middle Ages. Among other topics, the course will consider debates about the nature of the Divine, the person and work of Jesus Christ, heresy and dissent, bodily devotion, love, mysticism, scholasticism, and holy persons. Readings may include Augustine, Anselm, Avicenna, Abelard, Hildegard of Bingen, Francis of Assisi, Catherine of Siena, Thomas Aquinas, Julian of Norwich, and John Wyclif.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 015B. Philosophy of Religion

(Cross-listed as PHIL 016)

Searching for wisdom about the meaning of life? Curious as to whether there is a God? Questioning the nature of truth and falsehood? Right and wrong? You might think of Philosophy of Religion as your guide to the universe. This course considers Anglo-American and Continental philosophical approaches to religious thought using different disciplinary perspectives; it is a selective overview of the history of philosophy with special attention to the religious dimensions of many contemporary thinkers’ intellectual projects. Topics include rationality and belief, proofs for existence of God, the problem of evil, moral philosophy, biblical hermeneutics, feminist revisionism, postmodernism, and interreligious dialogue. Thinkers include, among others, Anselm, Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Kant, Wittgenstein, Derrida, Levinas, Weil, and Abe. Recent films Wittgenstein and Angels in America will be viewed in class and discussed.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Wallace.

RELG 016B. Rabbinic Thought and Literature

This course will examine the thought, literature, and social context of rabbinic religion from the fall of Jerusalem to the redaction of the Babylonian Talmud.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 017B. Midrash Tisch

Before deconstructionism there was midrash, a sophisticated, imaginative, and entertaining method of interpreting the Bible. Open to students with intermediate knowledge of Hebrew and above.

1 credit.

Spring 2006. Deutsch.

RELG 018B. Modern Jewish Thought and Literature

A close reading of modern Jewish works. We will examine topics such as Hasidism, Haskalah (Jewish Enlightenment), Zionism, the Holocaust, and 20th-century Jewish philosophy.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 019. First-Year Seminar: Religion and Food

Why do some people eat the body of their god? What is soul food? Is the pig an abomination? Is there such a thing as “devils food” and “angel’s food”? Which is more spiritual, feasting or fasting? All of these questions are tied together by a common theme: They point to the relationship between food, eating, and the religious experiences of human beings. This seminar will introduce students to the study of religion, using food as an entry point. We will investigate the significance of food across a variety of traditions and explore such issues as diet, sacrifice, healing, the body, ethics, and religious doctrines concerning food. Topics will include religious fasting, vegetarianism, eating rituals, food controversies, purity and pollution, theophagy and cannibalism as sacred practice, with readings by Levi-Strauss, Douglas, Bynum, Feeley-Harnick, and others. There will also be a required seminar project that will involve preparing at least one food dish, which will be graded on research, organization, and presentation, though not necessarily on taste.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Chireau.

RELG 019B. Introduction to Jewish Mysticism

This course will survey the history and literature of Jewish mysticism, beginning with Merkabah mysticism, continuing through the German Pietists and the Kabbalah, and ending with Sabbatianism and Hasidism.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 020B. Prophets and Visionaries: Christian Mysticism Through the Ages

This course considers topics in the history of Christian mysticism. Themes include mysticism as a way of life, relationships between mystics and religious communities, physical manifestations and spiritual experiences, varieties of mystical union, and the diverse images for naming the relationship between humanity and the Divine. Readings that explore the meaning, sources, and practices of Christian mystical traditions may include Marguerite Porete, Francis of Assisi, Julian of Norwich, Simone Weil, Thomas Merton, and Dorothee Soelle.

1 credit.

Spring 2006. Ross.

RELG 022. Religion and Ecology

This course focuses on how different religious traditions have shaped human beings’ fundamental outlook on the environment in ancient and modern times. In turn, it examines how various religious worldviews can aid the development of an earth-centered philosophy of life. The thesis of this course is that the environmental crisis, at its core, is a spiritual crisis because it is human beings’ deep ecocidal dispositions toward nature that are the cause of the earth’s continued degradation. Course topics include ecological thought in Western philosophy, theology, and biblical studies; the role of Asian religious thought in forging an ecological worldview; the value of American nature writings for environmental awareness, including both Euroamerican and Amerindian literatures; the public policy debates concerning vegetarianism and the antitoxics movement; and the contemporary relevance of ecofeminism, deep ecology, Neopaganism, and wilderness activism. In addition to writing assignments, there will be occasional contemplative practicums, journaling exercises, and a community-based learning component.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 023. Living in the Light: Quakers Past and Present

This course explores Quaker history and religious ideas in America from the 17th century to the present. Topics we will study in this course include Quakers and social reform; Quakers and nature; Quakers and education, with a focus on the history of Swarthmore College; and Quaker writings about God, self, and the world. Readings will include the work of George Fox, Margaret Fell, William Penn, John Woolman, John Bartram, Lucretia Mott, Elias Hicks, Elise Boulding, and Rufus Jones.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Ross.

RELG 024B. From Vodun to Voodoo: African Religions in the Old and New Worlds

Is there a kindred spirituality in the ceremonies, music, and movements of African religions? This course explores the dynamics of African religions throughout the Diaspora and the Atlantic world.

1 credit.

Foreign study credit may be available.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 025B. Black Women and Religion in the United States

This course explores how social, cultural, and political forces have intersected to inform black women’s personal and collective attempts at the definition of a sacred self.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 030B. The Power of Images: Icons and Iconoclasts

This course is a cross-cultural, comparative study of the use and critique of sacred images in biblical Judaism; Eastern Christianity; and the Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain traditions of India. Students will explore differing attitudes toward the physical embodiment of divinity, including issues of divine “presence” and “absence”; icons, aniconism, and “idolatry”; and distinctions drawn in some traditions between different types of images and different devotional attitudes toward sacred images, from Yahweh’s back and bleeding icons to Jain worship of “absent” saints.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 031B. Religion and Literature: From the Song of Songs to the Hindu Saints

A cross-cultural, comparative study of religious literatures in Jewish, Christian, Islamic, and Hindu traditions. How “secular” love poetry and poetics have both influenced and been influenced by devotional poetry in these traditions, past and present.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 036. Christian Visions of Self and Nature

This course is a thematic introduction to Christianity. Beginning with early Christian writings and moving historically up through the contemporary period, we will explore a wide variety of ideas about God, self, and nature. Readings will focus on scientific and natural history treatises in dialogue with theological texts. We will explore the writings of Christian naturalists to study the linking of science and religion, and we will investigate a multiplicity of views about Christian understandings of the relationship between the human and non-human world. This class includes a community-based learning component: Students will participate in designing and teaching a mini-course on “Nature and Chester” to students in the nearby community of Chester. Readings include Aristotle (critical for understanding science in the later Middle Ages), Hildegard of Bingen, Roger Bacon, Galileo Galilei, Charles Darwin, Herman Melville, Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Muir, Graceanna Lewis, Thomas Berry, Nalini Nadkarni, and Terry Tempest Williams.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 045. Torah and Logos: Judaism and Philosophy

(Cross-listed as PHIL 045)

This course will consider the relations between Judaism and philosophy. Among the topics we will examine are ethics, history and memory, the role of reason, and hermeneutics.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 046. Justice and Conscience in Islam

Muslim intellectuals and religious leaders reacted to the political success of Islam with a strong emphasis on justice and conscience to critique this prosperity and power. “Classical Islam” was shaped by the varied movements of jurists, mystics, and philosophers (and revolutionaries) who upheld conflicting visions of justice and conscience.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 047. Islamic Poetry and Prophecy

An investigation of inspiration, metaphor, and interpretation in Islamic discourses. Islam has been characterized as “religion of the word.” Whether in scripture or poetry, song or calligraphic art, the word and its adornment are central features of the civilization created by Muslims.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 048. The Summoned Self: Levinas and Ricoeur

This course will ask how Paul Ricoeur and Emmanuel Levinas use philosophical and biblical texts to construe the project of selfhood in terms of being called to take responsibility for one’s neighbor. Other topics include Christian-Jewish dialogue, rabbinic exegesis, moral philosophy, political theory, and biblical hermeneutics.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 053. Gender, Sexuality and the Body in Islam

This course explores the complexities of gender roles and sexuality norms in Islamic societies. It includes examples from the time of the prophet Muhammad through the medieval era and into the present. The course will focus on the roles of women in Islamic history, law, literature, and scripture. The goal is for students to understand the complex background to contemporary debates on the status of women and to assess movements of Islamic feminism.

1 credit.

Spring 2006. Staff.

RELG 056. Arabic for Text Study I: First Year

(Cross-listed as LING 009)

This course gives students the basic skills in classical Arabic (which is also called “Standard” Arabic). This is the language of the Quran, Islamic texts, medieval literature, contemporary scholarship, and media throughout the Arab world. The focus will be on reading and writing as well as spoken articulation and listening skills. With these introductory skills, students can pursue their studies of Islam or the Middle East in new depth, or study abroad with more facility. The course is for students with no prior background or with the ability to recite phonetically. The fall and spring courses under this title are in a progressive series; it is highly recommended to take both in sequence.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Romaine.

RELG 057. Hebrew for Text Study I

(Cross-listed as LING 007)

This course is designed both for students who have no Hebrew experience and for those who are already able to read phonetically without comprehension. In two semesters, students will learn enough grammar and vocabulary to read the Hebrew Bible and some rabbinic material with the help of a Hebrew-English dictionary. In addition to the primary textbook for the course, students will use the BDB Hebrew Lexicon of the Bible and the Hebrew Concordance to investigate the meanings and uses of word roots. Beginning early in the semester, students will be presented with selected passages from the Bible and the rabbinic midrash collections that illustrate the grammatical forms they are studying. Students will work in groups to prepare these passages and will then present their interpretations to the class.

1 credit.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 059. Hebrew for Text Study II

(Cross-listed as LING 010)

This course is a continuation of Hebrew for Text Study I. Students who have not completed that course will require the permission of the instructor to enroll in this course. The goal of the course is to learn the grammar and vocabulary required to read the Hebrew bible and some rabbinic material with the help of a Hebrew-English dictionary. In addition to the primary text for the course, students will read and translate passages from the Hebrew Bible, midrash, and Mishna. Students will work with the BDB Hebrew Lexicon of the Bible and the Hebrew Concordance to investigate the meanings and uses of word roots.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Plotkin.

RELG 066. Arabic for Text Study I: Second Year

(Cross-listed as LING 011)

This course is a continuation of Arabic for Text Study I first year (RELG 056 and 058). It is designed to give students skills in classical Arabic (which is also called standard Arabic, taking them from a beginning level to intermediate level). The course emphasizes grammar for reading texts such as the Quran and literary prose, and aims to help students internalize and master grammar through listening, speaking, and writing.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Romaine.

RELG 093. Directed Reading

1 credit.

Staff.

RELG 095. Religion Café: Senior Symposium

A weekly symposium for all senior majors on seminal themes, theories, and methods in the comparative, cross-cultural study of religion. This course will argue for the inherently multidisciplinary nature of religious studies by examining various approaches to the phenomenon of religion, from psychoanalysis and poststructuralist theory to anthropology, literature, philosophy, and social history. Themes include religion, violence, and the sacred; ritual, symbol, and pilgrimage; purity and pollution; religious experience, gender, and embodiment; civil religion, orientalism, colonialism, and power. Interpreters may include Mircea Eliade, Victor Turner, René Girard, Mary Douglas, Mikhail Bakhtin, Martin Buber, Jacques Derrida, and Michel Foucault.

1 credit.

Fall 2005. Deutsch.

RELG 096. Thesis

1 credit.

Staff.

SEMINARS

RELG 101. Jesus in History, Literature, and Theology

This seminar explores depictions of Jesus in narrative, history, theology, and popular culture. We consider Jesus as historical figure, trickster, mother, healer, suffering savior, visionary, embodiment of the Divine, lover, victorious warrior, political liberator, and prophet.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 102. Folk and Popular Religion

This seminar investigates the cultural complexity of the American religious experience through the lens of folk and popular traditions. We will utilize historical, anthropological, and literary approaches to explore folk Catholicism in the United States, local religious celebrations, 19th- and 20th-century popular movements, and folk art and other material representations of religion. Topics include serpent handling in Appalachia; American consumerism as religion; heterodox spiritualities in America; Marian shrines and spirit apparitions; and black Gods and racial folk religions.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 108. Poets, Saints, and Storytellers: Religious Literatures of India

The major forms of Indian religious culture through the lenses of its varied regional and pan-regional literatures, focusing on gender, the passions, constructions of the body, and religious devotion.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 109. Afro-Atlantic Religions

This seminar explores the historical experiences of the millions of persons who worship African divinities in the West. We will consider the following questions: How were these religions and their communities created? How have they survived? How are African-based traditions perpetuated through ritual, song, dance, drumming, and healing practices? Special attention will be given to Yoruba religion and its New World offspring, Santeria, Voodoo and Candomblé.

2 credits.

Spring 2006. Chireau.

RELG 110. Religious Belief and Moral Action

The seminar will explore the relationship between religion and morality. Basic moral concepts in Buddhism, Christianity, Judaism, Taoism, Islam and Hinduism will be studied in relationship to their cosmological/theological frameworks and their historical contexts. The course will analyze concepts of virtue and moral reasoning, the religious view of what it means to be a moral person, and the religious evaluation of a just society.

2 credits.

Spring 2006. Deutsch.

RELG 112. Postmodern Religious Thought

This seminar asks whether religious belief is possible in the absence of a “transcendental signified.” Topics include metaphysics and theology, the death of God, female divinity, apophatic mysticism and deconstruction, ethics without foundations, the question of God beyond Being, and analogues to notions of truth in ancient Buddhist thought. Readings include Eckhart, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, Derrida, Nagarjuna, Nishitani, Ricoeur, Marion, Rorty, Loy, Taylor, Pannikar, Vattimo.

2 credits.

Fall 2005. Wallace.

RELG 114. Love and Religion

An exploration of the concept of “love” in selected Western, Near-Eastern, and Indian traditions. The uses of love and sexuality, the body and the passions, in religious discourse to describe the relationship between the human and divine. Sources range from Plato and the Troubadours to Angela of Foligno and from Bengali devotional poetry to motions of “love” in a Tamil family. Major theoretical questions—the culture construction of emotions, the erotic life, the body, and religion—will be derived from Nussbaum, Biale, Bynum, Ramanujan, and Trawick.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 115. The Gnostic Imagination: Dualism from Antiquity to Harold Bloom

This course examines the problem of dualism and the history of dualistic religious traditions from the Gnostics and Mandeans of Late Antiquity to the recent writings of Harold Bloom.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 116. The Body in Late Antiquity

An examination of different views of the body (human, angelic, and divine) in Late Antiquity, with special emphasis on sexuality, gender, divinity, and mystical transformation.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 117. Hasidism: From Bialystok to Brooklyn

We will examine the origins of Hasidism, read the tales of its legendary founder (in Shivhei Ha-Besht), and discuss the rapid spread of the movement throughout Eastern Europe.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 119. Sufism: Muslim Mystics, Saints, and Poets

An exploration of mystical experience, sainthood, and literary expression among Muslims in South Asia. Islam is one of the most active and widespread religious traditions in Asia; Sufi mysticism is the religious practice of most Muslims in Asia. These two often-ignored facts act as the frame for this seminar that focuses on Sufi communities and saints in South Asia. The seminar will cover material from the medieval period through the present, primarily from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan. Poems, saints’ biographies, guides to mystical contemplation, and parables will be presented in translation from Persian, Urdu (Hindi), Punjabi, and Bengali. The seminar is multidisciplinary, involving interpretive strategies from religious studies, history, literature, anthropology, ethnomusicology, and gender studies.

2 credits.

Spring 2006. Staff.

RELG 121. Midrash Tisch

(See RELG 017B)

Before deconstructionism there was midrash, a sophisticated, imaginative, and entertaining method of interpreting the Bible. Open to students with intermediate or advanced knowledge of Hebrew.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 125. Islamic Society in North Africa and Andalusia

This seminar focuses on what Arabs called “The West” (al-Maghrib: the Mediterranean region from North Africa to Spain). The seminar will trace the foundations of Islamic society in the region, focusing on the complex interplay between Islamic law, mysticism, and rational philosophy through primary Arabic sources (in translation) as well as secondary scholarly studies.

2 credits.

Not offered fall 2005 or spring 2006.

RELG 126A. The Poetry and Prophesies of William Blake

This course focuses on the lyric poems, extended epic cycles, and illuminated books of one of the most unique poets in English literature, William Blake (1757–1827). We will do a close reading of the poetry and images of the major works of Blake, with the help of text-critical, theoretical, and historical perspectives of scholars such as Saree Makdisi, Mary Lynn Johnson, Robert Essick, Harold Bloom, Leopold Damrosch Jr., David Erdman, W.J.T. Mitchell, Irene Tayler, and the early seminal work of Northrup Frye. Themes will include symbol, myth, and perlocutionary language in Blake’s “prophetic” texts; religion, politics, writing, and resistance in Blake’s “impossible” 1790s; women, gender, and the problem of “otherness”; the asymmetry and ironies of word and image in the illuminated books; views of the body, sexuality, the “margins” of literature, and Blake’s ideas of unity, opposition, and synthesis in the poems and in the designs. Images from the on-line “Blake Archive” of Eaves and Viscomi will be used for “close reading” of Blake’s illuminated books and visionary designs. Additional readings from Jewish, Christian, Buddhist, and Hindu sources, along with passages from Irigaray, Derrida, Idel, and Wolfson, will complement our readings of this most remarkable artist/engraver/poet.

2 credits.

Fall 2005. Hopkins.

RELG 199. Senior Honors Study

0.5 credit. Staff.