171 - 180 of 236 results for: RELIGST

In recent years, there has been growing interest in the works of Syriac speaking Christians in antiquity and beyond. This course offers an introduction to the Syriac language, including its script, vocabulary and grammar, and a chance to read from a selection of foundational Syriac Christian texts.

Sufism through original texts and specialized scholarship. Prerequisite: ability to read at least one major language of Islamic religious literature (Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Urdu).

The course is based on readings in primary Arabic sources in the key fields of pre-modern Islamic scholarship. The list of readings and topics will depend on the interests of the students. In addition to focusing on the language, contents, and context of the texts covered, the course introduces genre-specific historical research methods. The reading selections may be derived from Qur¿anic interpretation (tafsir), the hadith literature, adab, biographical dictionaries, fiqh, ta'rikh, kalam, or Sufism. Reading knowledge of Arabic is required.

Poetry and prose in translation as well as historical studies. Islamic movements invested in the idea that the sensory world has a hidden or esoteric counterpart that can be understood or experienced through following particular religious programs. Various forms of Shi'ism and Sufism, millenarian and apocalyptic movements, the Nation of Islam and its offshoots. Philosophical propositions, historical contexts, and the role of ritual in the construction of religious systems.

interactions and conflicts between Jews and Greeks in the centuries following the conquests of Alexander the Great and the cultural/religious repercussions of their encounter. In what ways were Jews influenced by Greek culture? In what ways, and for what reasons, did they resist it? And how the interaction of these cultures shape the subsequent development of Judaism and Christianity? Jewish texts in the Greco-Roman period, including Jewish-Greek writers like Philo of Alexandria, the Apocrypha, the Dead Sea Scrolls, selected writings from the New Testament, and the Passover Haggadah.

Early history, themes, structure, chronology, and premodern interpretation. Relative chronology of passages.

Two-week block seminar; four sessions. Talmudic philology; development and transmission of the Talmudic text and manuscripts. Relationship between Midrash and Mishnah and between Mishnah and Tosefta; development of talmudic sugiot; relationship between the Babylonian and Palestinian Talmud.

Stretching from India to Ethiopia, the Persian Empire the largest empire before Rome has been represented as the exemplar of oriental despotism and imperial arrogance, a looming presence and worthy foil for the West and Greek democracy. This course will provide a general introduction to the Persian Empire, beginning in the 6th century BCE to the fall of Persia to Alexander the Great in 331 BCE. We shall not only examine the originality of the first world empire of antiquity, but the course will also attempt to present a broad picture of the diverse cultural institutions and religious practices found within the empire. Readings in translation from the royal edicts and the inscriptions of Cyrus, Darius, and Xerxes will allow us to better appreciate the subtle ways in which these Persian kings used religion to justify and propagate the most ambitious imperial agenda the world had ever seen. In concluding the quarter, students will evaluate contemporary representations of Persia and the Persians in politics and popular culture in a wide array of media, such as the recent film 300 and the graphic novel on which it is based, in an attempt to better appreciate the enduring legacy of the Greco-Persian wars.

This course will train students in the transcription and editing of original Medieval and Early Modern textual materials from c. 1000 to 1600, written principally in Latin and English (but other European languages are possible, too). Students will hone their archival skills, learning how to describe, read and present a range of manuscripts and single-leaf documents, before turning their hand to critical interpretation and editing. Students, who must already have experience of working with early archival materials, will focus on the full publication of one individual fragment or document as formal assessment.