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Course Criteria
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4.00 Credits
This course introduces students to the emergence of a diverse social movement now termed "Christianity"within the political, economic, historical and cultural worlds of the ancient Mediterranean (i.e. the Roman Empire) We will examine the formation of early Christian identity during the first four centuries of the common era. We will explore multifaceted forms of religious practice, resistance to and adaptations of institutional and social power, relations between Christians and non-Christians, and rhetorical strategies used in articulating Christian identity. Offered every other year alternating with New Testament (Religious Studies 121). (4 credits)
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3.00 Credits
This course introduces students to Christian practice, doctrine, faith, and social organization by examining various historical controversies and the roles they have played in the formation and alteration of the traditions from Christian origins to the present. Specific controversies will be selected from historical events and movements, beginning with the earliest struggles over the significance of the person and nature of Jesus of Nazareth, the ethos and institutional structure of the early communities, and the canonization of scripture. The course will conclude with a brief discussion of contemporary disputes over internal ethical and denominational pluralism and relationships between Christianity and the State. This course is strongly recommended in preparation for Religion 346: Dissent, Reform, and Expansion in Sixteenth Century Europe and for Religion 348: Contemporary Christian Thought. No prerequisite. Offered 2008-2009. (4 credits)
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4.00 Credits
An introduction to the study of Asian religious traditions in South and East Asia (India, China and Japan). Open to everyone but especially appropriate for first and second year students. Every year. (4 credits)
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4.00 Credits
This course explores possible relations between love and death in human life, illustrated in theory, fiction, and film. We shall raise such questions as: How does love differ according to the kind of relationship in which it finds expression (for example, parental love, friendship, sexual intimacy, love for strangers and enemies, neighborly love, self-love, love for learning, love for justice, and devotion to a transcendent reality) What does love require in regard to how owe live and die How does our awareness that death is inevitable inform our views and experiences of love What role does love play in the significance we attribute to death As we raise all of these questions we will repeatedly ask: What difference do racial, gender, class, age, sexual, and religious differences make in how we love and how we die. Not offered 2008-2009. (4 credits)
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4.00 Credits
The social and intellectual history of religion in the United States through the year 1900, with an emphasis on popular religious movements. The social and economic correlates of religious developments will be analyzed as well as the impact of Christian values on American institutions. Alternate years. (4 credits)
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3.00 Credits
An introductory level course on the popular, classical and contemporary religious traditions of South Asia. Topics include Advaita Vedanta and yoga, popular devotionalism, monastic and lay life in Theravada Buddhism, the caste system, Gandhi and modern India. Prerequisite: Religious Studies 124 or permission of instructor. Alternate years. (4 credits)
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4.00 Credits
Understanding religion as the quest for ultimate orientation, this course will examine several expressions of African American religiosity. Students will explore the origin, development, belief structure, and practice of traditions such as Black Christianity, the Nation of Islam, Vodun (Voodoo), Santeria, Spiritual Churches, and Black Humanism. The goal of this course is to acquaint students with the complex nature of African American religious expression. Offered alternate years; not offered 2008-2009. (4 credits)
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3.00 Credits
An introductory level course on popular, classical and contemporary religious traditions of China and Japan. Topics include Confucian thought, Taoist classics, sectarian Buddhism, popular religion, and Zen. No prerequisite. Alternate years. (4 credits)
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4.00 Credits
This course will introduce students to the study of folklore, belief and religious folklife. We will consider examples of folktales, myths, foodways, material arts, paranormal experience narratives, magic, healing, and other traditions as they relate to religion. By examining folklore that emerges within, between, and in reaction to religious traditions, students will be challenged to move beyond simple notions of culture, religious authority, and doctrine. Participants in the course should be prepared for a heavy but exciting reading load. Alternate years. (4 credits)
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4.00 Credits
This course is taught jointly between the department of religious studies and the department of classics, by a specialist in the Roman East and a specialist in classical India. We will start on either side of this world, with Alexander the Great and Ashoka, exploring the relationship between empire and religion from Rome to India in the world's crossroads for the thousand years between Alexander and the rise of Islam. Alternate years. (4 credits)
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