ENG
450 Fall 2003
Thursday 5:30-8:20 STV 214
Monotheism
§ Midrash § Masochism
Diocrès Expounding the Scriptures
Limbourg Brothers
1408-09
illuminated manuscript,
Metropolitan Museum of Art at New York
LINKS:
webboard
public
domain files
Bible Gateway
Three
Translations of the Qur'an
Another Translation of the Qur'an
Audio Qur'an
Course
Description
We’ll study and apply radical Rabbinical methods of thought, connect them with
Deleuze’s & Guattari’s “stoned” schizo-analysis* and read the three
authorizing text-fields of Monotheism and beyond with an eye toward the masochistic underpinnings of what Kenneth Burke calls the “sacrificial
principle” and toward formulating alternative,
non-exchangist forms of being. (Individual
hermeneutic results may vary.)
Schedule
| 1-August 21 Course Introduction/The Song of Deborah/Alter |
2-August
28
|
| 3-September
4 Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy Phyllis Trible/”Sacrifice of Sarah”-Tiritilli |
| 4-September
11- Judges, Ruth Introduction to Rabbinic Literature. Jacob Neusner. Anchor Bible Reference Library 1999  Midrash & Literature: Introduction; Hartman's "The Struggle for the Text," Kugel's "Two Introductions to Midrash" Kenneth Burke/Rhetoric of Religion-Aljenfawi |
| 5-September
18 Esther, Job Moses and Monotheism. Sigmund Freud. Random House  "Esther Passes: Chiasm, Lex Talio and Money in the Book of Esther" |
| 6-September
25 Psalms Carnal Israel: Reading Sex in Talmudic Culture (New Historicism-Studies in Cultural Poetics , No 25.) Daniel Boyarin, 1995.  |
| 7-October
2 Midterm Midrash Essays Symposium |
| 8-October
9 Matthew, Mark, Luke, John Auerbach-"Figura," " Figura Preserves: History (in) Ajar" |
| 9-October
16 Acts, Paul's Epistles The Undoubted Letters of Paul by date of Composition: First Thessalonians (ca. 51) Galatians (54) First Corinthians (ca. 56) Second Corinthians (ca. 56) Romans (ca. 57) Philipians ca. 62? 56?) Philemon ca. 62? 56?) Works of the Pauline School Second Thessalonians (ca. 51) Colossians (62?) Ephesians (?) The Pastoral Letters (ca. 125?): First Timothy, Second Timothy, Titus The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies. Marcel Mauss, W. D. Halls (Translator), Mary Douglas W.W. Norton & Company; (August 2000) 
|
| 10-October
23 Revelation The Gift of Death (Religion and Postmodernism) Jacques Derrida, David Wills (Translator). University of Chicago Press; (June 1995)  |
| 11-October
30 Venus and Furs. Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. With Coldness and Cruety/Gilles Deleuze. Zone, 1991. 
Titian and Raphael paintings referenced in Venus in Furs.
|
| 12
November 6 Last Temptation of Christ. Nikos Kazantzakis. [1960] Translated from the Greek by P. A. Bien. Touchstone Books; Reprint edition (March 1998) L  ast Temptation of Christ (Scorsese 1988) |
| 13
November 13 Thesis Statement Presentations |
| 14
November 20 Approaching the Qur'an: The Early Revelations Michael Sells. White Cloud Press, 1999) 
|
| 15 November 27 Thanksgiving-no class |
| 16
December 4 The Qur'an |
No complete Bible will be ordered at the bookstores, rather we’ll rely on the techno- midrashic miracle of biblegateway.com where all of the following translations are but a mouse-click away: New International, New American Standard, Amplified Bible, New Living Translation, King James, New King James, 21st Century King James, English Standard, Contemporary English, American Standard, Worldwide English (New Testament) Young's Literal, Darby, Wycliffe New Testament, New International-UK--nor has any hard copy of the Qur'an been ordered--rather we'll employ several on-line versions.
Selected
essays, chapters, excerpts from among:
Course
Requirements
Please
have (freshly) read (over the Summer) the Pentateuch (Genesis, Exodus,
Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy), Judges, Ruth, Esther, Job, Psalms, and the
Books of the New Testament. No other first-hand familiarity with the Bible
or Qu'ran will
be required or assumed.
Format
of Course
Seminar/discussion.
Students will:
1) post 500 word minimum weekly responses to readings/lectures/discussion
via WeBoard;
(please post by Wednesday 8 pm)
2) write an 8-10 page midterm essay engaging some aspect of midrash and Biblical
Hermeneutics;
3) give in class a (twenty-minute maximum) critical presentation on a critical
text from the list below;
4) write a 18-25 page publishable paper
related to this course work.
LINKS:
Bible Gateway
Three
Translations of the Qur'an
Another Translation of The Qur'an
Audio Qur'an
Merriam-Webster
Dictionary/Thesaurus
the Gutenberg
Project
Bill
McBride/STV 336
OFFICE HOURS/Fall
2003 R 2:30-4:30p
Voice: 309 438 7998
E-mail
I reserve the right to amend this syllabus.
* "A schizoanalysis schizophrenizes in order to break holds of power and
institute research into a new collective subjectivity and a revolutionary
healing of mankind, For we are sick, so sick, of our selves!
It is actually not accurate to say that Deleuze and Guattari
develop the schizoanalytic approach, for as they show, it has always been at
work in writers like [Henry] Miller or Nietzsche or Artaud. Stoned
thinking based on intensely lived experience: Pop Philosophy."
Mark Seem's "Introduction" to Anti-Oedipus. Capitalism and Schizophrenia [1977], Deleuze and Guattari, Minnesota, 1983, p. xxi.
Critical Presentations Schedule
9/4 Phyllis Trible/”Sacrifice of Sarah” from Not In Heaven: Coherence and Complexity in Biblical Narrative-Tiritilli
9/11 Kenneth Burke/Rhetoric of Religion-Aljenfawi
10/16
Harold
Bloom/Book of J
Georges Bataille/Erotism: Death & Sensuality-Szymanski
Friedrich Nietzsche/Genealogy of Morals-Ramseyer
John D. Caputo :"The Time of Giving, the Time of Forgiving" from Wyschogrod, Goux, Boynton (Editors) The Enigma of Gift and Sacrifice Klassen
Robert Alter/Art of Biblical Poetry
A.J.
Arberry/The Koran Interpreted
Augustine/Confessions
Walter Benjamin/”On Language as Such and on the Language of Man”
Hans-Georg
Gadamer/Truth and Method
Soren
Kierkegaard/Fear and Trembling
Emmanuel
Levinas/Totality and Infinity
Theodor
Reik/Masochism and Modern Man
Max
Weber/The Sociology of Religion
Rene Girard/The Scapegoat
Susan L. Mizruchi/The Science of Sacrifice
William James/Varieties of Religious Experience