Hoos’ List

Classical Tibetan language has been an essential language of Buddhist teachings for 1500 years and is still an active part of Buddhist and Tibetan life across Asia--a Latin of the Buddhist world. This course is an introduction to Classical Tibetan, a gateway to the vast worlds of Tibetan and Indian Buddhism. In the first year the focus is on the writing system, the vocabulary, and the grammar of Classical Tibetan. No prior experience is necessary.

Classical Tibetan language has been an essential language of Buddhist teachings for 1500 years and is still an active part of Buddhist and Tibetan life across Asia--a Latin of the Buddhist world. This course is an introduction to Classical Tibetan, a gateway to the vast worlds of Tibetan and Indian Buddhism. In the first year the focus is on the writing system, the vocabulary, and the grammar of Classical Tibetan. No prior experience is necessary.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Buddhism.

Provides a systematic introduction to Tibetan Buddhism with a strong emphasis on tantric traditions of Buddhism - philosophy, contemplation, ritual, monastic life, pilgrimage, deities & demons, ethics, society, history, and art. The course aims to understand how these various aspects of Tibetan religious life mutually shape each other to form the unique religious traditions that have pertained on the Tibetan plateau for over a thousand years.

An introduction to environmental ideas, texts and practices of Buddhism in broad historical and geographical context. Engages Buddhist "environmental imagination" through readings of primary texts, considers the ways that contemporary Buddhists around the world have interpreted environmental problems, and the ways that Buddhist modernist movements draw upon Buddhist ideologies in the service of social-environmental change.

Theravada, Mahayana, and Tantrayana Buddhist developments in India.

This course examines the ways in which Chinese Buddhism differs from the Buddhisms of other countries. The first half of the course introduces Buddhism with a focus on the historical development of the tradition.The second half of the course surveys several philosophical schools and forms of practice including Huayan, Chan, Pure Land, and Tantric Buddhism.

This course focuses on meditation from three overlapping perspectives: traditional Buddhist practices, contemporary scientific research, and modern secular adaptations; students also learn secular meditative practices firsthand. Each day we will explore a major type of meditation that relates to a variety of topics and practices - attention, insight, compassion, aesthetics, somatic work, visualization, open awareness, and so forth.

This is a lecture-based course--an idiosyncratic but hopefully helpful introduction to Buddhist philosophy. A few aspects of Buddhist philosophy, at any rate. The subject is potentially endless and can be grabbed from several different ends. Note: this course emphasizes the history of Buddhist concepts and arguments in premodern South Asia. But we will explore what are hopefully ideas of interest: in philosophy of mind; metaphysics; gender.

This course is an introduction to Buddhism and an exploration of the place of Buddhism within contemporary Asian, European, and North American cultures through film. The goals are 1) to identify longstanding Buddhist narrative themes in contemporary films, 2) to consider how Buddhism is employed in films to address contemporary issues, and 3) to gain through film a vivid sense of Buddhism as a complex social and cultural phenomenon.

This course explores the close and dynamic relationship between religion and environmental thinking in East Asia: on the one hand, religions and religious institutions are situated within environmental contexts and, on the other, how people perceive their environments is shaped by religious practice and ethical ideas.

Studies the development and history of the thought, practice, and goals of Zen Buddhism.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Buddhism.

This course serves as an introduction to the religious beliefs and practices of China, Taiwan, and the Chinese diaspora. The course covers several broad themes in Chinese religion, including ritual, self-cultivation, means of communicating with the gods, and the intersection of political authority and religion. We will engage with textual, material, and visual traditions.

This course surveys the history of Daoist literature, thought, and practice. We will consider how early Daoism emerged in the context of other religious practices, how it developed institutional forms, and how textual revelations led to new traditions. We will also examine how Daoism defined itself against Buddhism and the role Daoist ritual plays in the contemporary religious landscape of Taiwan and China

The goal of this course will be to examine different conceptions of Buddhist meditation and how these different conceptions affect the nature of practice and the understanding of the ideal life within a variety of Buddhist traditions. Thus, the study of Buddhist meditation traditions reveals not just intricate forms of practice, but reveals the nature of the good life and how one lives it.

Buddhist Mysticism and Modernity

Classical Tibetan language has been an essential language of Buddhist teachings for 1500 years and is still an active part of Buddhist and Tibetan life across Asia--a Latin of the Buddhist world. This course is an introduction to Classical Tibetan, a gateway to the vast worlds of Tibetan and Indian Buddhism. In the second year you will use this knowledge to read Buddhist texts in Classical Tibetan.  No prior experience is necessary.

Classical Tibetan language has been an essential language of Buddhist teachings for 1500 years and is still an active part of Buddhist and Tibetan life across Asia--a Latin of the Buddhist world. This course is an introduction to Classical Tibetan, a gateway to the vast worlds of Tibetan and Indian Buddhism. In the second year you will use this knowledge to read Buddhist texts in Classical Tibetan.  No prior experience is necessary.

This seminar takes as its point of departure Carolyn Bynum's statements: "No scholar studying religion, no participant in ritual, is ever neuter. Religious experience is the experience of men and women, and in no known society is this experience the same." The unifying theme is gender and Buddhism, exploring historical, textual and social questions relevant to the status of women and men in the Buddhist world from its origins to the present day.

Common to all the world's philosophies is engagement with the claim that all that exists in the universe is ultimately one, whether in one's awareness or in actual fact. This course examines how Hindus and Buddhists have articulated this idea, basing the same in detailed analysis of one's subjective awareness of reality, in an examination of the nature of existence independent of one's experience of it, and on the basis of scriptural revelation.

This course explores the origins and development of Buddhism in South Asia. It assumes students have no prior knowledge of Buddhism. The goal is to understand the complex of teachings, practices, and relationships that would become known later as Buddhism and, simultaneously, how such a complex has developed within specific cultural contexts.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Buddhism.

This course is a seminar that examines the development of Buddhism in America going from its earliest appearance to contemporary developments.

This topical course provides upper level undergraduate students in Religious Studies an opportunity for advanced coursework in Buddhism

This course will explore how scholars have understood the concept of Orientalism to describe processes in which Westerners have distorted (and even constructed wholesale) understandings of what Buddhism can be to serve their own interests. We will begin with Edward Said's foundational work, Orientalism, then consider how his ideas have been used to develop critiques of Western understandings of Buddhism up to the present day.

A history of Tibetan Buddhist literature from the origins in the 7th century to the early 20th century, focused on literature produced in Tibet, covering major genres and styles from all the major schools, traditions, eras and regions. Weekly readings of excerpts and short pieces. Course is entirely in English translation. Knowledge of Tibetan language encouraged but not required. Seminar format, active discussion required.

Study of the Pali and Sanskritic Buddhist philosophical traditions.

There is widespread and rapidly expanding interest in practices that allow individuals to explore, understand, engage, and optimize their body, minds, and world for a variety of reasons ranging from stress management and physical health, to achieving new insights, peak experiences, and fundamental transformation. These are referred to as "mind-body" or "spiritual exercises" practices in contemporary times, as well as more ancient terms such as "meditation," "mindfulness," and "yoga."

Examines selected topics in the major schools of Japanese Buddhism, Tendai, Shingon, Pure Land, Nichiren, and Zen. Prerequisite: RELB 2130 or 3160, or instructor permission.

Examines the Dzokchen tradition of Tibetan Buddhist Tantra focusing on its philosophical and contemplative systems and its historical and social contexts.

This class explores the issue of modernities as they take shape in relation to Buddhist cultures. As part of this, the class will also explore notions of the secular, as secular ideas often coincide with forms of modernity. Such explorations will require sustained side-glances at developments in Western countries and in some non-Buddhist contexts (particularly Hindu South Asia).

Studies the Middle Way School of Madhyamika, including Nagarjuna's reasoning and its intent and place in the spiritual path.

Advanced study in the philosophical and spiritual language of Tibet, past and present. Prerequisite: RELB 5000, 5010, 5350, 5360, or equivalent.

Advanced study in the philosophical and spiritual language of Tibet, past and present. Prerequisite: RELB 5000, 5010, 5350, 5360, or equivalent.

This course introduces the structure, scope, and contents of the Tibetan-language Buddhist canonical collections. We will read and discuss selections in both English and Tibetan from the 5000 works in the Scripture (Bka' 'gyur) and Treatise (Bstan 'gyur) collections, as well as reference aids and current research on the canons. The course goal is to develop a firm basis for all research involving Tibetan-language canonical literature.

Topics on the history, scripture, thought, and practice of religious Daoism, with an emphasis on the formative period (2nd-10th c.).

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Buddhism.

Studies Chinese religion and society within the context of a specific period of Chinese history, or in terms of a specific theme. Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism, and popular religion will be covered (along with other forms of religion, as appropriate).

Examines the Yogachara-Svatantrika system as presented in Jang-kya's Presentation of Tenets, oral debate, and exercises in spoken Tibetan. Prerequisite: RELB 5000, 5010, 5350, 5360, 5470, 5480 or equivalent.

Examines the Yogachara-Svatantrika system as presented in Jang-kya's Presentation of Tenets, oral debate, and exercises in spoken Tibetan. Prerequisite: RELB 5000, 5010, 5350, 5360, 5470, 5480 or equivalent

Examines the major schools of Chinese Buddhism: T'ien-t'ai, Hua-yen, Pure Land, and Ch'an.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Buddhism.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Buddhism.

This tutorial introduces the structure, scope, and contents of the Tibetan-language Buddhist canonical collections. We will read and discuss selections in both English and Tibetan from the 5000 works in the Scripture (Bka' 'gyur) and Treatise (Bstan 'gyur) collections, as well as reference aids and current research on the canons. The course goal is to develop a firm basis for all research involving Tibetan-language canonical literature.

This course is exploring one of the most important scriptures in the history of esoteric Buddhism, the Thalgyur, and its extensive commentary attributed to Vimalamitra. The two texts are over a thousand pages in length, only existent in Tibetan, and extremely difficult to understand. This course explores the texts through detailed philological and interpretative analysis.

This tutorial constitutes a reading course in Sanskrit, the classical language of India. Students will read the original texts and translate them into English, analyzing and interpreting the materials in light of the Indian tradition of commentary and exegesis and in light of contemporary scholarly and other analyses of the relevant subject matter: Buddhist esoteric literature, a.k.a. Buddhist Tantra.

This course explores classical Tibetan literature and religious systems through a variety of genres in the original Tibetan texts.

In this course students will read a selection of Pali canonical and commentarial texts.

This tutorial will focus on the translation of Chinese Buddhist texts into English. Texts will be drawn from a variety of time periods, traditions, and genres. Students will gain familiarity with Buddhist Chinese, and the themes and conventions of Buddhist texts.

This tutorial will examine the field of Buddhist Studies from its formation in Asia, Europe, and North America to contemporary critiques. We will consider the underlying assumptions, historical changes in what is taken to be the object of study, and the contributions of different methodological approaches. The aim is to provide students of Buddhism with a means to situate their own research in the context of the larger field of Buddhist Studies.

This tutorial will examine the making of gender in Buddhist practice across Asia. We will interweave discussions in three regions of Asia: We will read historical texts on men, women, and Paaka from South Asia; women as patrons of Buddhist art in East Asia; and contemporary ethnographic accounts of gender and gendered Buddhist movements in Southeast Asia

This tutorial will examine how Buddhists have thought about time and temporality, with a focus on East Asia. We will consider how scriptures transform and transcend time, and how Buddhists thought about the time after the Buddha's death. Other readings will explore how specific subtraditions understood time, especially as it related to salvation. Finally we will explore practices of keeping time in Buddhist monasteries through incense, observing the heavens, and agricultural cycles.

Studies the history, literature, and religion of ancient Israel in the light of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. Emphasizes methods of contemporary biblical criticism. Cross listed as RELJ 1210.

Studies the history, literature, and theology of earliest Christianity in light of the New Testament. Emphasizes the cultural milieu and methods of contemporary biblical criticism.

Surveys Jewish and Christian interpretations of the Torah (the first five books of the Bible). Examines how the Bible becomes sacred scripture for Jews and Christians.

This course traces the rise of Christianity in the first millennium of the Common Era, covering the development of doctrine, the evolution of its institutional structures, and its impact on the cultures in which it flourished. Students will become acquainted with the key figures, issues, and events from this formative period, when Christianity evolved from marginal Jewish sect to the dominant religion in the Roman Empire.

This course is designed to add substantive depth to a general understanding of American religious pluralism and insight into the socio-historical context of American religion through the study of Mormonism. In addition to introducing Mormonism's basic beliefs and practices, the course will explore issues raised by Mormonism's move toward the American mainstream while retaining its religious identity and cultural distinctiveness.

The story of Christianity's emergence in the Middle East and its migration into Europe and then North America is just one aspect of Christian history, which also has a rich and long history in Africa, Asia and other parts of the global South. This course looks at the shape Christianity is taking in non-Western parts of the world and how this growth impacts Christianity in the West.

This course considers the complex world of Christian thought, examining various perspectives on the nature of faith, the being and action of God, the identity of Jesus of Nazareth, the role of the Bible in theological reflection, and the relationship between Christian thought and social justice. Students will read various important works of Christian theology and become acquainted with a range of theological approaches and ideas.

This course engages in a historical survey of American Catholicism from colonial beginnings to the present. It especially explores the theme of how Catholicism has been enculturated in America, how Catholic faith and practice have interacted with the social, cultural, and political environment of the nation.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Christianity

"The Black Church" carries unique symbolic weight in America--but why? This course explores how the idea of the Black Church gained moral authority, whether there is a collective Black Church or only black churches, the traditions and practices the concept names, who the concept celebrates and who it marginalizes, and how--or whether--the Black Church, as myth or reality, is still relevant in African American life today.

This course examines the influence of theological ideas on social movements in twentieth- and twenty-first-century America and investigates how religious commitments shape everyday living, including racial perception and economic, political, and sexual organization. The course will examine the American Civil Rights Movement, late 1960s counter-cultural movements, and recent faith-based community-development movements and organizing initiatives.

A text-focused class that will read the entire City of God, supplementing that work with several other of Augustine's smaller texts (particularly letters and sermons) to attempt to understand that work's argument, paying attention to the various audiences to which it was addressed, and to Augustine's larger thought as captured in that one great and difficult book

This course focuses on Jesus of Nazareth as an historical figure, that is, as he is accessible to the historian by means of historical methods. Our most important sources of information on Jesus are the canonical Gospels, and so much of the course will involve reading and attempting to understand these texts. We will attempt to reconstruct at least the broad outlines of Jesus activity and teachings, keeping in mind the limits of our sources.

Intensive study of the theological ideas and arguments of the Apostle Paul in relation to their historical and epistolary contexts.

This course is an introduction to the thematic core of the Orthodox Christian tradition. There is first reviewed the major elements of the Orthodox faith, its theology and doctrine, that developed over the course of the Byzantine era, This study is followed by an examination of writings on scripture and tradition, iconography. liturgy and sacrament, as well as the relationship of Orthodox Christianity to the culture.

In the context of Christian thought, "liberation theology" refers to scholarship that links reflection on God, Jesus of Nazareth, human beings, creation, the Holy Spirit, and ethics with normative analyses of race, sex and gender, economic injustice, poverty, sexuality, post-colonialism, and human rights. This course engages both landmark and cutting-edge texts in this field of study.

From the revivals of George Whitefield to the antebellum abolitionists to the unexpected rise of Donald Trump, Evangelicals have played a vital and contested role in American society. Evangelicalism has also burgeoned into a truly global faith tradition, with an estimated 600 million+ adherents around the world. This course presents a multidisciplinary and polyperspectival introduction to this religious movement in World Christianity.

Reading historical and social analyses along with a range of environmental theologies, this seminar investigates entanglements of Christianity with modern environmental problems. It considers the influence of Christianities in various environmental imaginations, and the role of ecological science and environmental stress in reshaping religious imaginations.

This course introduces students to the extensive philosophical, theological and exegetical work of St. Thomas Aquinas. Students will read his foundational texts, a range of important tractates from the *Summa theologiae*, and a range of Aquinas's scriptural exegeses. Comparisons will be made to other scholastic theologians and commentators, including those of the previous generation, i.e., the monastic theologians.

This course is about America's newer religious movements: Scientology, Nation of Islam and Mormonism. The class will be using theories of ritual and text to understand how religious communities constitute themselves around an originating vision and retain a sense of continuity notwithstanding dramatic change. We will ask also why these three movements have created such crisis for the American state and anxiety among its citizens.

A seminar focused upon some of the most significant philosophical and religious thinkers that have shaped and continued to shape American religious thought and culture from the founding of the Republic to the Civil Rights Movement, including Thomas Jefferson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Jane Addams, William James, Reinhold Niebuhr and Martin Luther King, Jr. We will explore how their thought influenced the social and cultural currents of their time.

Introduces the major mystical traditions of the Middle Ages and the sources in which they are rooted.

An examination of the legal evolution, philosophical underpinnings and political application of the First Amendment religion clauses. Analysis of specific controversies and court opinions will be supported by attention to such key concepts as "secularism," "tolerance," "civilization," "gender" and "race" in the application of these clauses domestically and in U.S. foreign policy.

Surveys the history of Christianity in the Byzantine world and the Middle East from late antiquity (age of emperor Justinian) until the fall of Constantinople.

A seminar on the biblical book of Job (with attention to its literary artistry and compositional history) and its subsequent interpretation.

Survey of development of Christian ethical thought and teaching from beginnings through Reformation era. Major ethical themes are traced through the centuries, as the church's scripture, evolving doctrine, and emerging tradition interact with secular society, politics, and philosophy. Readings will be taken mostly from primary texts, such as the Bible and the writings of selected Christian thinkers.

This course examines the history of the interplay between theology, morality, social movements, and politics in America. Topics covered include temperance and prohibition, abolition, labor, civil rights, anti-war and pacifism, and environmentalism. Lecture, weekly readings (often a book), class presentations, short papers, and original research.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new topic in the subject of Christianity.

Anxiety is the affliction of most striving college students and the most common mental health disorder of our time. What are its religious and theological meanings, causes, and consolations?

Who are the great modern Christian theologians? What do they have to say to us? What do they argue about? Who did they offend and why? In this seminar we shall read major works by four of the truly great modern theologians of the twentieth century. Two are Protestant (Karl Barth and Paul Tillich), and two are Catholic (Karl Rahner and Henri de Lubac).

This course is an introduction to Christology, that part of Theology concerned with the claim that Jesus is the Christ. How is this doctrine built up from Scripture, Church Councils, and the Fathers? What roles do heresies and creeds play in the construction? What events in the life and death of Jesus are most relevant to Christological claims? Particular attention is given to Jesus's preaching of the Kingdom of God.

Why were women excluded from the priestly hierarchy of the church? How did male clerics subsequently circumscribe women's roles in the church? And how did women respond? These are the questions that we will explore in this course on the intersection between gender and power in pre-modern Christianity.

This class engages debates about Christianity, gender, and sexuality in past and present. Topics addressed include: biblical treatments of sex, gender, and sexuality; theological views of the human in patristic, medieval, and modern theology; Christianity, feminism, and feminist theology; sexuality and sexual ethics; and queer theology.

Examines the life and thinking of Augustine of Hippo, a major figure in Christian history and a formative influence on Christian thought to this day. Prerequisite: Any RELC course or instructor permission.

Historical and topical survey of Christianity in Africa from the second century c.e. to the present. Cross listed with RELA 389. Prerequisite: a course in African religions or history, Christianity, or instructor permission.

An examination of Christian missions in Africa in the 21st Century. Through a variety of disciplinary lenses and approaches, we examine faith-based initiatives in Africa--those launched from abroad, as well as from within the continent. What does it mean to be a missionary in Africa today? How are evangelizing efforts being transformed in response to democratization, globalization and a growing awareness of human rights?

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new topic in the subject of Christianity.

A text-focused class that will read the entire City of God, supplementing that work with several other of Augustine's smaller texts (particularly letters and sermons) to attempt to understand that work's argument, paying attention to the various audiences to which it was addressed, and to Augustine's larger thought as captured in that one great and difficult book

The course has four goals: (1) to understand the theologies of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Martin Luther King Jr.; (2) to explore the themes of resistance and reconciliation in their writings and actions; (3) to examine their ambivalent relationships with academic theology; and (4) to consider the promise of lived theology for contemporary religious thought.

In this course, students will read a selection of early Christian "gospel" literature, including 1) works that would be included in the New Testament canon, 2) works that would not be included in the New Testament canon, and 3) works that were composed after the New Testament canon was well established and effectively closed. 

A graduate seminar overview of Christianity's remarkable cross-cultural presence, highlighting the community's global scope, cultural pluriformity, and confessional diversity, as well as its historic and current centers in the Global South. Throughout, the class examines how a range of chronological, ideological, social, political, linguistic, and cultural contexts interact with Christian communities, beliefs, and practices.

This course considers the complex world of Christian thought. Engaging a wide range of ancient, medieval, modern, and contemporary sources, it considers various approaches to theological reflection and diverse views on the identity of Jesus of Nazareth, the meaning of salvation, the being and action of God, and the nature of creation.

Intensive consideration of a selected issue, movement or figure in Christian thought of the second through fifth centuries. Prerequisite: RELC 2050 or instructor permission.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new topic in the subject of Christianity

Anxiety is the affliction of most striving college students and the most common mental health disorder of our time. What are its religious and theological meanings, causes, and consolations?

This seminar examines perspectives on freedom in landmark texts of Christian theology, western philosophy, and recent critical theory. It engages diverse accounts of (a) the relationship of divine and human action; (b) the nature of sin and grace; and (c) gender, sex, race, and class as they bear on human subjection and/or liberation.

Theological assessments of culture, considered as the human-made environment comprising: language and patterns of living; structures of belief, norms, and practices; and forms of work, thought, and expression. Topics include cultures as contexts for identity, secular experience and secularization, critiques of religion as an aspect of culture, cultural conflict and religious plurality, and theological interpretations of culture and nature.

Examines various conceptions of love and justice in selected Protestant and Catholic literature mainly from the last fifty years.

Amid a global resurgence of localism, populism, strong identity heritages, and nationalist political cultures, this graduate seminar explores the history, ideology, current form, and critiques of Christian Nationalism. It further raises questions about how Christians have thought, do think, and should think about their cultural contexts, national identities, and political orders.

A semester-long engagement with the writings of the most important Protestant theologian in the twentieth century. While we will read some of Barth's earlier work, our main focus will be the *Church Dogmatics*.

An advanced graduate class, run tutorial-style, which will acquaint graduate students with core texts, themes, and thinkers in Christian thought.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Christianity.

In this tutorial, students will work on developing translation skills: grammar will be reviewed as necessary.

A tutorial covering major themes and texts in Christian moral thought from antiquity to present.

Tutorial introducing graduate students to advanced scholarly inquiry into the history of the category of "peace" from Greco-Roman antiquity until today, and its associated and secondary literature.

This individualized tutorial will introduce graduate students to some of the major Roman Catholic documents and theologians of/following the Second Vatican Council, with coverage of a variety of themes (including theological aesthetics, mysticism and contemplation, inculturation, liberation theology, and theopoetics) and geographies.

This tutorial will focus upon the doctrine of God in 19th and 20th century theology with a special focus on Schleiermacher, Karl Barth and the Barthian tradition. It will examine both the features of the doctrine of God and the theological methods used by the various thinkers to construct their doctrine of God. Authors include Immanuel Kant, Friedrich Schleiermacher, Karl Barth, Jürgen Moltmann, Eberhard Jüngel, Robert Jenson and John Webster.

In the academic study of Christian thought, ¿liberation theology¿ encompasses scholarship that ties reflection on God, Jesus of Nazareth, human beings, creation, the Holy Spirit, and ethics to analyses of race and racism, sex and gender, economic injustice, poverty, sexuality, and colonialism. This graduate tutorial engages landmark and contemporary texts by liberation theologians, many of whom hail from North and South America.

This tutorial examines icon and their position in Christian practice and theology, with an emphasis on Eastern Christian traditions (Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, Church of the East). The tutorial will address the theology of icons, the iconoclasm controversy, the spiritual practice of creating icons, and the use of icons in prayer and worship.

This course provides advanced graduate training in Twentieth Century Christian Thought through careful analysis of selected landmark texts. The survey covers a range of thinkers, traditions, theological movements, and doctrinal loci in conversation with major historical events and the context of the era. It provides excellent beginning preparation for comprehensive exams in the field.

In this tutorial, students will work on developing translation skills in Coptic. Grammar will be reviewed as necessary. We will meet 12 times over the course of the semester; each meeting will last 60-90 minutes. Students will prepare translations of Coptic literature, receiving weekly feedback as well as end-of-semester feedback on polished translations.

What is religion? Why do people reach out to God(s) or other unseen powers? How are beliefs in spiritual entities expressed and perpetuated? Why do people come together to form religious communities? How does religion order people's lives, and what impact have religious visionaries and institutions had on societies through the ages? This is a co-taught seminar that introduces students to the rich and interdisciplinary field of Religious Studies.

Studies the major religious traditions of the Western world; Judaism, Eastern Orthodox Christianity, Roman Catholicism, Protestantism, and Islam.

Introduces various aspects of the religious traditions of India, China, and Japan.

This course introduces key figures in early Chinese philosophy, and how they defined the good life, ethical ideals, and exemplary rulership. Through close readings, we will consider where these philosophers located what they called the Dao----in human society, in the natural world, or in the cosmos---and how they thought humans could best apprehend truths about their world. Intended for first and second year students.

This course explores human flourishing, well-being, and resiliency across academic, personal, and professional spheres. The course presents a balance of theory and practice, organized into five domains: self-awareness, well-being, connection, wisdom, and integration. Each week explores a single quality of flourishing through scientific research, humanistic reflection, and artistic expression, as well as a detailed set of contemplative practices.

These seminars introduce first- and second-year students to the academic study of religion through a close study of a particular theme or topic. Students will engage with material from a variety of methodological perspectives, and they will learn how to critically analyze sources and communicate their findings. The seminars allow for intensive reading and discussion of material. Not more than two Intro Seminars may count towards the Major.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Religious Studies.

Includes American religious pluralism, religious responses to social issues, and the character of contemporary American religious life.

Studies religious meanings in modern literature, emphasizing faith and doubt, evil and absurdity, and wholeness and transcendence in both secular fiction and fiction written from traditional religious perspectives.

This course interprets humanity's changing ecological relationships through religious and philosophical traditions. It takes up ethical questions presented by environmental problems, introduces frameworks for making sense of them, and examines the symbols and narratives that shape imaginations of nature.

Engaging commentary from a range of religious traditions and media sources, this course examines the enduring intellectual and political challenges of engaging religion in a pluralistic and democratic context. In addition to religious studies and theology, course readings will include material from media studies, law, political science, philosophy, and cognitive psychology.

Politics and religion are links to the exploration to culture, history, and current events. This course seeks to understand what is meant by religion and the multiple ways in which it is politically important by examining the world views of various religious traditions and their political implications.

Examines several contemporary moral problems from the perspective of ethical thought in the Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish traditions.

This course introduces undergraduates to seminal writings in modern Western thought that explore and question the meaning, truthfulness, and uses of religious belief. The goal is to develop a multi-storied narrative of the variety of interpretations given to the idea of God in modernity and to clarify the conditions of responsible religious belief in a pluralistic world. Requirements include two exams and a research paper.

This course examines how Latine religious traditions--including Latine Catholicism, Pentecostalism, Mainline Protestantism, Indigenous traditions, and religious "nones"--interact with political and democratic cultures in the United States.

If religious teachings so often focus on love and peace, why is so much violence committed in the name of religion? In this course, we will consider the ways in which religion and violence have intersected in Western religions (particularly Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) over the past two millennia, from the persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire to the modern world.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Religious Studies.

This course examines cultural and religious perspectives on cause and effect: why do things happen, and how is morality implicated? After a short historical overview of karma in Hinduism, Jainism, and Buddhism in the Indian subcontinent, we turn to karma in legal, philosophical, political, and religious practices of contemporary Southeast Asia. Finally, we move beyond 'karma' by name and ask how ideas of moral causation are part of diverse global religious and scientific and systems of thought.

This course studies how to be a moral agent in a market society. It attends to how economic issues influence different spheres of human life, both public and private, and discusses the ethics of a professional career, the moral obligations of corporations, the nature of inequality, the economic ethics of major world traditions, and how to live a morally sane human life in a market system.

Analyzes various moral problems in medicine, health care, and global health from Christian (Catholic and Protestant), Jewish, and Islamic theological perspectives with reference to salient philosophical influences.

This course asks: what does "spiritual but not religious" mean, and why has it become such a pervasive idea in modern America? We'll study everything from AA to yoga to Zen meditation, with stops in Christian rock, Beat poetry, Abstract Expressionist painting and more. In the end, we'll come to see spirituality in America as a complex intermingling of the great world religions, modern psychology, and a crassly commercialized culture industry.

Readings will include contemporary ethnographies of religious festivals in the Caribbean ans South, Central, and North America, and increase their knowledge of the concepts of sacred time and space, ritual theory, and the relationships between religious celebration and changing accounts of ethnicity.

Seeing is believing. Or is it? In this course, we will examine the role of sensory perception in religious imagination. We will consider how religious practitioners think about the senses, utilize the senses to experience the world, and assign meaning to the senses. We will also probe the ways in which religious traditions deploy sensory metaphors to describe human experience of the sacred.

This course serves as an introduction to the religious beliefs and practices of China, Taiwan, and the Chinese diaspora. The course covers several broad themes in Chinese religion, including ritual, self-cultivation, means of communicating with the gods, and the intersection of political authority and religion. We will engage with textual, material, and visual traditions.

This course traces the history of Jerusalem with a focus on its significance in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. How has Jerusalem been experienced and interpreted as sacred within these religious communities? How have they expressed their attachments to this contested space from antiquity to modern times? Discussion will be rooted in primary texts from Jewish, Christian, and Muslim sources, with attention to their historical context.

The growing role of robots in society presents new challenges, but many of the ethical and philosophical issues raised by robots have long histories. This course will examine golems, automatons, robots, and cyborgs to consider what distinguishes humans, what it means to create other beings, what it means to be embodied, and what relationships we should have with the nonhuman.

Critical appraisal of classical and contemporary approaches to the sociological study of religion and society.

An analysis of African-American social criticism centered upon, but not limited to, the life and thought of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X

Explores how ethical issues in religious traditions and cultural narratives are addressed in literature, scripture, essay, and memoir. How do stories inquire into "the good life"? How may moral principles and virtues be "tested" by fiction? How does narrative shape identity, mediate universality and particularity, reflect beliefs and values in conflict, and depict suffering?

This course is about the felt experience of religion across time and place. Through readings, essays, presentations and exercises we will become familiar with a variety of perspectives on the relationships between religions and bodies in their multiple cultural contexts.

Beginning with Islamic-ruled Spain and the Aztec and Incan empires, the course examines historical changes in the religious practices of indigenous peoples, enslaved Africans and European settlers in Latin America and the Caribbean under European colonization and the transatlantic slave trade. Topics include: religious violence, human sacrifice, the Inquisition; missions; race, gender and sexuality; slavery, revolts, revolutions, nationalism.

Is thought always already racialized, gendered, sexed? This Introduction to Black and Womanist Thought course argues that thought does not have to submit itself to modern regimes of knowledge production, that there are alternative ways to think and practice and be in the world with one another. An introduction to major thinkers in both religious thought and traditions with attention to theology, philosophy, and history.

To what extent does the pursuit of sustainability require restraining or retraining our desires? How can people be encouraged to consume less, or in less destructive ways, when cultures of consumption prove resistant to change? This seminar will explore these questions from the perspective of South Asian traditions (Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain). We will consider classical sources as well as contemporary debates about sustainable development.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Religious Studies.

Beginning with Biblical sources and concluding with contemporary texts, this course will examine the philosophical framework of casting idolatry as an unspeakable sin: What is an idol, and why is idolatry so objectionable? With an emphasis on Judaism, though not exclusively, we will discuss idolatry in the context of representation, election, otherness, emancipation, nationalism, secularism, religious innovation, and messianism.

This course examines the relationship between black religion and the criminal justice system in the U.S. from Jim Crow to the Black Lives Matter era. We will focus on the ideas, lived experiences, and activism of the incarcerated; religious engagements with policing; and movements for criminal justice reform and prison abolition. Authors likely will include Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, and Elijah Muhammad.

This seminar explores the major conversations that scholars of religion are having, and have had, about what "religion" is and the best ways to study it. Focusing on classical controversies, ongoing debates, and new developments, this course will help students map out the field of religious studies and begin to situate their own studies within it. This course is geared towards Religious Studies majors but open to any interested student.

Investigates how modern thinkers have understood the character of evil and the challenge it poses to human existence. Evaluates the proposals made in response to that challenge. Prerequisite: Any course in religious studies.

This course will explore the role of religion in the black freedom struggle in the United States, with a focus on the twentieth century to the present. We will consider the question, how have black people harnessed religion to conceptualize and fight for various notions of black progress and the salvation of black people (broadly construed) amid the persistence of racial inequality?

Multidisciplinary examination of religious self-perception in relation to the dominant values of American life. Readings represent a variety of spiritual traditions and autobiographical forms.

Students in this course will fashion their own approach to studying religion and develop a retrospective project that interweaves the various strands of their prior study over the course of the major. Building on earlier courses in Religious Studies, this capstone seminar completes the major's sequence by applying questions and conversations in the study of religion to some advanced theme crafted by the instructor.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Religious Studies.

This course offers third- and fourth-year Religious Studies majors resources for conceiving and executing a major research project. As a follow-up, students usually take RELG 4900 ("Distinguished Major Thesis"), which affords them an opportunity to write the research project they have conceived in this course. Whether you plan to write a thesis or not, RELG 4800 offers an accessible introduction to the craft of research in Religious Studies.

Students write a thesis, directed by a member of the department, focusing on a specific problem in the theoretical, historical or philosophical study of religion or a specific religious tradition. The thesis grows out of the project proposal and annotated bibliography developed in the Research Methods seminar. Prerequisite: Selection by faculty for Distinguished Major Program and completion of RELG 4800.

Analyzes existentialist, phenomenological, structuralist, literary, historical, and psychological approaches to the interpretation of texts, especially narrative religious texts; and the interactions of language, history, and understanding.

Examines classic and contemporary discussions of problems in the philosophy of religion.

How do, might, or ought the aesthetic dimensions of human experience inform engagement with religion in the public life of a pluralistic society? Employing the theological aesthetic principles of foregrounding and interlacing to structure our investigation, our study examines philosophical, theological, and ethical (both religious and theological) responses to this question.

How is a religiously pluralistic society to pursue a societal common good? This graduate seminar explores responses to this question within religious ethics at local, national, and global levels. Readings will address major contributions to this topic within political philosophy before pivoting to responses in religious and theological ethics, including broadly Augustinian, Thomistic, and critical theological approaches.

This course introduces graduate students to classic and major recent scholarly texts in the field of African American religious history, from transatlantic slavery to the civil rights movement and Black Power.

Over the past decade, Sylvia Wynter has emerged as one of the most influential voices in Black Studies, Decolonial Studies, and Religious Studies.  Her distinct oeuvre has occasioned multiple edited volumes, collections, special issues of journals, conferences, and more.

An examination of the social and political thought of selected religious thinkers.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new topic in the subject of general religion.

Caring well for an aging population is among the greatest challenges facing both the United States and the world. Significant gaps persist between the health and social systems that older adults need, and those to which they have access. This course uses a multidisciplinary approach--encompassing history, public health, ethics, the social sciences, and literature--to explore these gaps, their impact, and their meaning

This course offers MA students in Religious Studies resources for conceiving and executing a major research project or thesis. By the end of the semester, each participant will have completed a well-organized, detailed prospectus. The prospectus will reflect the guidance of one's thesis advisor as well as the scrutiny of the instructor and input from peers. Each student will thus be poised to begin writing his/her thesis the following semester.

A study of key texts by G. W. F. Hegel and their impact on philosophical, theological, ethical, and religious thought in the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries. Topics considered include philosophical method, the relationship between philosophy and theology, the meaning of Spirit, dialectical materialism, critical theory, and key topics in Christian theology (God, Christology, pneumatology, etc.).

This course familiarizes students with a range of ways of studying practice in religions as it is evidenced in sacred texts, religious artifacts, images and locations; as it is chronicled in historical documents; as it is reflected in literary and artistic creations; and as it revealed in contemporary practice.

This course will explore the interrelations between evil and suffering of 20th- and 21st- century European and American thinkers, theologians, and theorists, as well as literary authors and artists, with particular attention to the Holocaust and American slavery.

This seminar examines responses to climate change from law and from ethics in order to ask questions about the relation of regulatory instruments and moral culture. Co-taught by a scholar of environmental law and a scholar of environmental ethics, the course is jointly listed in the Law School and the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences.

The modern state is often depicted in irreparable conflict with visions of sovereignty and ethical goals of diverse religions, earthy and transcendent. However, recent research has pointed not only to shared genealogies between state and religion, but also how both have come to shape one another. Readings will consist of ethnographic and micro-historical cases of religions within and beyond the state from the dawn of modernity to the present.

What is "spirituality" and why has it become such a pervasive term in contemporary American culture? This course explores this question through historical interrogation of the category and its development since the early nineteenth century. The encounter of historic religious traditions, especially Protestant Christianity, with the intellectual, cultural, economic, and social currents of modernity will form the larger background for our analysis.

Given the multidisciplinary character of religious studies, it is imperative for new scholars to gain a basic sense of theoretical and methodological options in the field. By way of an examination of landmark texts, this course surveys the formation of religious studies in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and considers some important contemporary approaches.

This interdisciplinary class acquaints graduate students with landmark texts that consider the place, significance, and purpose of religion in late modernity. Focusing on works written over the last few decades, it draws on multiple genres of study: philosophy, anthropology, social science, religious studies, and theological inquiry.

Examination of a major topic in modern religious thought--e.g., religious imagination, ethical and religious subjectivity, metaphor and religious language, religious and ethical conceptions of love.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Religious Studies.

Examines ways in which tragedy (and other forms of imaginative literature), scripture and theology, and hermeneutics and criticism portray and reflect on aspects of suffering and evil.

Examines current historiographical issues in the interpretation of religion in American history. Prerequisite: instructor permission.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new topic in the subject of general religion.

Tutorial on important themes, topics, and figures in religious ethics, both historically and in the present moment.

This course analyzes how theology and black studies intersect with psychoanalysis, structuralism, and phenomenology. It examines how conceptions of blackness, social death, and fugitivity relate to theorizations of completeness, conceptuality, givenness, revelation, libidinal economy, abyss, apocalypse, and difference. Authors include Fanon, Marriott, Wilderson, Marion, Spillers, Fink, Moten, Levi-Strauss, and Malabou.

What is "spirituality" and why has it become such a pervasive term in contemporary American culture? This course explores this question through historical interrogation of the category and its development since the early nineteenth century. The encounter of historic religious traditions, especially Protestant Christianity, with the intellectual, cultural, economic, and social currents of modernity will form the larger background for our analysis.

Study of cultural encounters between Jews, Christians, and Muslims in the Mediterranean world, ca. 500-1300. The tutorial explores themes such as translation movements, science, exegesis, conversion and polemic, inviting broad comparison of cultural and intellectual encounters between communities.

Modern thought has been captivated by reflection on the problem of evil. This tutorial studies modern thinkers' efforts to understand evil, to help us understand evil and to understand the challenge that evil presents to the modern world's self-understanding. Focus will be on theoretical efforts both to understand the phenomenon and to explain and reframe the question of why we seek to understand it.

Advanced training in American Religious History through careful analysis of landmark scholarship, including critical questions about historical epistemology and historiographical patterns. The course also seeks to develop an understanding of the ways in which religious history interacts with wider disciplinary & theoretical conversations, with a range of religious traditions in American context, and with varying sites of American culture.

This interdisciplinary research collaboration explores religious ways of sensing and sense-making. In recent decades, cultural anthropology, history, sociology, philosophy, literature, and religious studies, among others, have taken a sensory turn, resulting in the emergent field of sensory studies. Students will read and analyze sensory theory, case studies in sensory religion, and contribute original research on a topic of their choice.

This tutorial examines Black Religious Studies and Black Studies scholarship that utilizes apocalyptic ideas to analyze Black religion, thought, politics, culture, and metaphysics.

This graduate tutorial has two aims: to introduce graduate students in the study of religion to the main currents of scholarship in cultural studies, with a particular focus on the theories and methods of the Frankfurt and Birmingham schools of cultural studies. After reading extensively in the primary and secondary literature of these schools of thought, the seminar will shift to the second course objective, which is to study how scholars of religion in the modern and contemporary United States have applied the tools of cultural studies in their own work.

This tutorial investigates the ethical dimensions of colonialism, neocolonialism, and resistance in Latin America. Through foundational and contemporary sources -- including Indigenous, Afro-Latinx, and feminist voices -- students will analyze ethical frameworks that critique violence and extractivism, and explore concepts of healing, restitution, and decolonial thought.

This individualized graduate tutorial provides an introduction to the relationship between Religion and Poetry across a number of traditions, exploring the concept of "poetic knowledge" and the relationship between poetry and spiritual realization.

Surveys the Hindu religious heritage from pre-history to the 17th century; includes the Jain and Sikh protestant movements.

An investigation of yoga practice throughout history from multiple disciplinary perspectives. Topics include yoga's origins in ancient India, systematic yoga theories in Buddhism and Hinduism, Tantric Yoga, and the medicalization and globalization of Yoga in the modern period. Students' readings and writing assignments are supplemented throughout with practical instruction in yoga.

his course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Hinduism

This course will explore Hindu views of the relationship between human, natural, and divine worlds, as well as the work of contemporary environmentalists in India. We will read texts both classical and modern (from the Bhagavad Gita to the writings of Gandhi), and will consider case studies of Hindu responses to issues such as wildlife conservation, pollution, deforestation, and industrial agriculture.

Examines Jain history, belief, and practice. Prerequisite: RELG 1040, RELH 2090, 2110, or instructor permission.

Common to all the world's philosophies is engagement with the claim that all that exists in the universe is ultimately one, whether in one's awareness or in actual fact. This course examines how Hindus and Buddhists have articulated this idea, basing the same in detailed analysis of one's subjective awareness of reality, in an examination of the nature of existence independent of one's experience of it, and on the basis of scriptural revelation.

Yoga is practiced by millions of people across the world and comes in an astonishing variety of forms. Historically, yoga has roots in ancient Indian practices of asceticism and meditation. But how are these practices related to yoga as it practiced today? This seminar will trace the history of yoga from its earliest origins to the present. Readings will include both primary sources (in translation) and works of contemporary scholarship.

The purpose of this course is to study the phenomenon of religious violence in one geographic and cultural context. We will examine the roles of religion and violence in Indian political life from the British period until contemporary times, and through the Indian example, we will explore current questions and problems regarding the relationship between religion and politics.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Hinduism.

This course examines western encounters with India by reading the fiction and travel writing of Europeans, expatriate Indians, and Americans in India. In reading such works, the course will explore the place of India in the European and American literary and cultural imagination.

This course involves the close reading of selected passages of the Hindu Epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. Students will read the primary sources in translation (from one or both epics), along with relevant secondary scholarly works. An advanced knowledge of Indian religions and/or Hinduism is presumed of students wishing to enroll in this course.

This course offers an advanced survey of the "six schools" of Indian philosophy. The purpose of the course is to develop a strong familiarity with the major schools of Hindu thought and the major philosophical concerns they addressed, and students will be asked to develop an historical understanding of the relevant authors and traditions. We will read primary texts in translation, along with selected secondary sources.

As yoga has risen to global prominence, the scholarly study of yoga has flourished. This course offers an introduction to this scholarship, as well as an overview of the theory and practice of yoga from its ancient past to the present day. The course will focus primarily on historically Hindu traditions, though some attention will devoted to parallel traditions from Buddhism and Jainism.

This course examines Hindu-Muslim interactions in South Asia, bridging the long-standing gap between Hindu and Islamic studies while introducing critical issues currently facing the historiography of Hindu-Muslim relations. Special topics within the ambit of Hindu-Muslim encounters will be explored in depth, with a particular emphasis on intellectual interactions between traditions of Hindu and Islamic philosophy.

This course examines philosophical debates of Hindu and Buddhist authors from the time of the founding of Buddhism to the medieval period. Primary sources in translation and secondary, scholarly sources are examined in this course. Prerequisite: Significant prior exposure to Hinduism and/or Buddhism.

The purpose of this course is to provide a comprehensive introduction to Indian tantric Saivism, beginning with the proto-tantric traditions of the "Outer Way" (atiarga) and including the increasingly goddess orientated and increasingly non-dualistic developments evidenced by the myriad traditions of the "Way of Mantras" (mantramarga). Students who wish to take this course are expected to have a deep familiarity with Hindu traditions.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Hinduism.

This course will explore the intellectual and social history of Vedanta, one of the most influential schools of Indian philosophy. We will trace its rise to prominence from the early classical period, when it was one of several competing schools, to the colonial period, when it came to be identified by many as the essence of Hinduism.

This course offers a comprehensive introduction to the system of the great Sanskrit grammarian, Panini. The purpose of the course is to cultivate familiarity and facility with Panini's generative grammar. Students will learn the principles of the grammar and how to apply them in addressing a range of technical and grammatical issues. Key commentators on the grammar will also be read, as will relevant secondary sources.

This tutorial constitutes a reading course in Sanskrit, the classical language of India. Students will read the original texts and translate them into English, analyzing and interpreting the materials in light of the Indian tradition of commentary and exegesis and in light of contemporary scholarly and other analyses of the relevant subject matter: aesthetics, or the alamkarasastra.

This tutorial constitutes a reading course in Sanskrit, the classical language of India. Students will read the original texts and translate them into English, analyzing and interpreting the materials in light of the Indian tradition of commentary and exegesis and in light of contemporary scholarly and other analyses of the relevant subject matter: the stotra genre or that of Indian devotional poetry.

This tutorial constitutes a reading course in Sanskrit, the classical language of India. Students will read the original texts and translate them into English, analyzing and interpreting the materials in light of the Indian tradition of commentary and exegesis and in light of contemporary scholarly and other analyses of the relevant subject matter: philosophical literature.

Tutorial constitutes a reading course in Sanskrit, the classical language of India.  Students will read the original texts and translate them into English, analyzing and interpreting the materials in light of the Indian tradition of commentary and exegesis and in light of contemporary scholarly and other analyses of the relevant subject matter: Saiva Religion.

Jewish and Muslim communities share a complex history of interaction, spanning from seventh-century Arabia to the present day, and including instances of collaboration as well as moments of violence. Our course examines this dynamic relationship through documentary and literary sources. We focus on points of contact between Muslims and Jews in contexts ranging from battlefields to universities, from religious discourse to international politics.

Studies the Irano-Semitic background, Arabia, Muhammad and the Qur'an, the Hadith, law and theology, duties and devotional practices, sectarian developments, and Sufism.

Global Islam traces the development of political Islamic thought from Napoleons invasion of Egypt in 1798 to the Arab Spring in 2010 and its aftermath in the Middle East.

Surveys Islamic history from the "age of the great empires" (Ottoman, Safavid, Mughal) to the colonial period and up to the present day, including Islam in America. Islamic life and thought will be examined from multiple angles -- including popular piety and spirituality, philosophy and theology, law, gender, art, architecture, and literature -- with particular attention paid to the rise of modern Islamic "fundamentalist" movements.

This course provides the opportunity to offer a new course in the subject of Islam

Systematic reading of the Qur'an in English, with an examination of the prophet's life and work.

This course will be a historical and topical survey of the development of Sufism from the classical Islamic period through the modern age, paying special attention to the interaction of ideas and the social and political contexts surrounding them.

Islam began strange and will return to strange as it began. So blessings to the strange ones! So goes a famous saying of the Prophet Muhammad, celebrating the virtue of truth over conformity. This course examines Islamic movements that have sought to push back against religious and political norms of their times. Along the way, we read debates about orthodoxy: what are the limits of the Muslim community and how are such limits contested?

Prophecy provides the theme for our comparative inquiry into two sacred scriptures (the Qur'an and the Hebrew Bible) alongside the rich traditions of Muslim and Jewish interpretive literature. We will consider narratives about specific prophets, medieval debates between and within Muslim and Jewish communities about the status and function of prophecy within their traditions, and modern theoretical approaches to prophecy