HIST105 - Jewish Tradition, Its Texts and Contexts

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Academic Year 2005/2006

Jewish Tradition, Its Texts and Contexts
HIST 105 FA

This course will explore the historical development of "Jewish tradition" through its texts and contexts, theory and practice. What is this tradition based on? How has it been shaped? We will examine the values it represents and the mechanisms of transmitting these values from generation to generation. Is it permissible to touch a menstruating woman? Or eat with gentiles? Who is allowed to study the Torah? Why does the morning prayer Jewish men say in the morning include negative definition of their identity when they thank God for not making them a woman, or a gentile, or a slave? The above questions are questions hotly debated by rabbis. Reading major sources on which the Jewish tradition is based: The Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, Rabbinic responsa, Jewish chronicles will help us to explore questions of identity, religious and gender, questions of boundaries, and of role of history and memory in fashioning collective identities. Reading these texts we will also explore their historical context in which they emerged and how this historical context shaped them, and how the subsequent generations had to wrestle with these established traditions to understand them in their own contexts.

MAJOR READINGS

HarperCollins Study Bible
Selections from The Mishnah, trans. Jacob Neusner (Yale University Press)
Selections from The Babylonian Talmud
A Maimonides Reader, ed. Isadore Twersky (Berman House)
Selections from Rashi's commentaries on the Torah
Jews and the Crusaders: The Hebrew Chronicles of the First and Second Crusades, ed. Shlomo Eidelberg

EXAMINATIONS AND ASSIGNMENTS

Regular response papers, due before each class. Two 6-8 pp. papers based on the sources read in class.

ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS and/or COMMENTS

Class participation

COURSE FORMAT: Seminar

REGISTRATION INFORMATION

Level: UGRD Credit: 1 Gen Ed Area Dept: SBS HIST Grading Mode: Graded

Prerequisites: NONE

SECTION 01

Instructor(s): Teter,Magda

Times: ..T.... 07:00PM-09:50PM; Location: PAC422;

Reserved Seats: (Total Limit: 19)

SR. major: X Jr. major: X

SR. non-major: X Jr. non-major: X SO: X FR: 19

Special Attributes:

Curricular Renewal: Ethical Reasoning, Writing, Focused Inquiry Course

FYI: FYI Seminar

Links to Web Resources For This Course.

Last Updated on MAR-30-2006