This course examines texts in Ancient Greek philosophy, the Bible, and modern European thought in order to assess the fruitfulness of viewing modern self-consciousness in terms of the relationship of faith and reason. RELIGIOUS TRADITION(S) COVERED: Multiple
Nietzsche’s famous, prophetic claim that “God is dead” is often taken as describing the declining significance of God within modernity. Adopting neither a pro- nor anti- theistic stance, this course critically examines the relationship between atheism and modernity in Western thought and culture by drawing upon religious, philosophical, scientific, literary, historical, sociological, artistic, and cinematic […]
The meeting between Jews and Arabs in the context of the Arab-Israeli conflict is famous. Less familiar is the encounter between Muslims and Jews in Muslim lands. This course explores Jewish life under Islam from the rise of Islam until modern times, with a special focus on Sephardi Jews. Setting the stage is an overview […]
This course develops an understanding of contemporary North American Jewry using findings of social science. Social, cultural, political, and religious issues of concern to Jewish communities are analyzed, such as assimilation, intermarriage, Jewish identity, etc. The course focuses on the Canadian Jewish experience and where relevant compares this to the United States. It also offers […]
This course surveys the material culture of the land known variously as Canaan, Israel, Judah, Judea, Palestine, and the Holy Land, from the Neolithic or "New Stone" Age (as of ca. 8500 BCE) until the Persian Period (539-330 BCE). RELIGIOUS TRADITION(S) COVERED: Judaism
This course explores responses to the Holocaust in imaginative texts - fiction, poetry and film - alongside autobiographical, historical and philosophical accounts. Works by survivors and others enable us to examine forms of Holocaust memory, and their concomitant implications. RELIGIOUS TRADITION(S) COVERED: Judaism
The attempt of the Nazis to annihilate world Jewry was in many ways unprecedented in human annals. It was a turning-point in history, the way for which was prepared by revolutionary political, social, technological, and philosophical developments. In other ways, however, it was a not unpredictable outgrowth of the past. Although analysis may be difficult […]
Since antiquity, Jerusalem has been a focal point for both spiritual transcendence and earthly strife. This course explores the history of a city holy to three major Western religions. It focuses on the political and religious factors that have shaped its changing meaning for Jews, Christians, and Muslims and the controversies that surround it to […]
This course examines contemporary manifestations of antisemitism and islamophobia in Canada. It begins by providing a brief historical review of Christian anti-Jewish thought and theology as put forward by the early Church fathers, Augustine and the subsequent papal bulls. The significance of the role of the Jew as moneylender in medieval feudal Europe will be […]
This course examines the evolution of anti-Jewish thought and behaviour as a response to the crisis of modernity. It examines the role of antisemitism in 19th- and 20th-century European ideological, political and socio-economic developments and the Jewish responses to antisemitism. RELIGIOUS TRADITION(S) COVERED: Judaism