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Course Criteria
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3.00 Credits
Frame. Prerequisite(s): NELC 101 or permission of the instructor. The Assyrians appear as destructive and impious enemies of the Israelites and Judeans in various books of the Bible and this view is reflected in Lord Byron's poem: "The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, / And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold" (Hebrew Melodies. The Destruction of Sennacherib). In the ninth, eighth and seventh centuries BCE, Assyrian armies marched out from their homeland in northern Iraq to Iran in the East, Egypt in the West, the Persian Gulf in the south and central Turkey in the north, and they created the largest empire known up until that time. They built impressive palaces and cities, created great works of art and have left us a vast number of documents preserving ancient literature and scholarly knowledge. In the course we will look at the structure of the Assyrian state, Assyrian culture, the development of the Assyrian empire, and its sudden collapse at the end of the seventh century. While the course will emphasize the use of textual sources, archaeological and iconographic data will also be used to help us arrive at an understanding of the great achievements of the ancient Assyrians.
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3.00 Credits
Tigay. May be repeated for credit. Careful study of a book of the Hebrew Bible (the Old Testament) as a literary and religious work in the light of modern scholarship, ancient Near Eastern documents, comparative literature and religion, and its reverberations in later Judaism, Christianity, and Western (particularly American) Civilization.
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3.00 Credits
Staff. This course is a study of ancient Israel from its pre-nation origins through the early Second Temple period. Topics include: methodological issues for the reconstruction of Israelite history; pre-Israelite Canaan - a bridge between empires; the patriarchal and Exodus traditions; Israelite settlement of Canaan; the rise of the monarchy; the Davidic dynasty; the states of Israel and Judah in the context of the greater ancient Near East; the fall of the Israelite states - the Assyrian and Babylonian exiles - and the return from exile in the Persian period. Special issues include: the development of monotheism; the role of the prophet in Israelite society; and the formation of Biblical corpus. Archaeological evidence from the land of Israel and other Near Eastern States, especially written material, will be utilized to supplement the Biblical sources.
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3.00 Credits
Ben-Amos, Stern. Course topics will vary; they have included The Binding of Isaac, Responses to Catastrophies in Jewish History, and Concepts of Jewishness from Biblical Israel to the Modern State (Stern); Holy Men & Women (Ben-Amos); Rewriting the Bible (Dohrmann)
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3.00 Credits
Staff. This course will survey the archaeological history of the southern Levant (Israel, West Bank and Gaza, Jordan, southern Lebanon and Syria) from the early complex societies of the Chalcolithic through the demise of the biblical states of the Iron Age. It will focus in particular on the changing organization of society through time, using excavated evidence from burials, houses, temples and palaces to track changes in social heterogeneity, hierarchy and identity. In following the general themes of this course, students will have opportunity to familiarize themselves with the geographic features, major sites and important historical events of the southern Levant. Class material will be presented in illustrated and supplemented by the study
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3.00 Credits
Stern. May be repeated for credit. Christianity and Judaism are often called "Biblical religions" because they are believed to be founded upon the Bible. But the truth of the matter is that it was less the Bible itself than the particular ways in which the Bible was read and interpreted by Christians and Jews that shaped the development of these two religions and that also marked the difference between them. So, too, ancient Biblical interpretation --Jewish and Christian-- laid the groundwork for and developed virtually all the techniques and methods that have dominated literary criticism and hermeneutics (the science of interpretation) since then. The purpose of this course is to study some of the more important ways in which the Bible was read and interpreted by Jews and Christians before the modern period, and particularly in the first six centuries in the common era. We will make a concerted effort to view these interpretive approaches not only historically but also through the lens of contemporary critical and hermeneutical theory in order to examine their contemporary relevance to literary interpretation and the use that some modern literary theorists (e.g. Bloom, Kermode, Derrida, Todorov) have made of these ancient exegetes and their methods. All readings are in English translation, and will include selections from Philo of Alexandria, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Rabbinic midrash, the New Testament and early Church Fathers, Gnostic writings, Origen, and Augustine. No previous familiarity with Biblical scholarship is required although some familiarity with the Bible itself would be helpful.
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3.00 Credits
Stern. May be repeated for credit. Readings in Rabbinic literature for students with advanced knowledge of Hebrew.
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3.00 Credits
Wegner. Specific topics will vary from year to year.
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3.00 Credits
Wegner. In depth analysis of specific historical issues and topics. Reading knowledge in French and German is required.
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3.00 Credits
Holod. Iranian art and architecture of the Parthian, Sassanian and Islamic periods, with particular emphasis on regional characteristics in the period. Different themes are explored each time the course is offered. In the past, these have been Ilkhanid and Timurid painting, the city of Isfahan, metropolitan and provincial architecture in the fourteenth century.
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