Fall 2020 Undergraduate Course Descriptions

Description: While there is an enormous literature on attitudes to Jews, especially on antisemitism, much less attention has been devoted to Jewish attitudes to their neighbours. Based on primary and secondary sources, the seminar will address the different attitudes to others that Jews displayed from late antiquity to the present. The focus will be on what these materials can tell us about the formations of Jewish identity in different periods.

Texts: Coursepack (including primary sources) and assigned online readings.

Other readings will be sent out as PDFs in advance

Evaluation:
Attendance and participation in all class meetings.
Completion of required reading assignments on time.
Weekly reports on reading 40%
Research paper proposal 10%
Research Paper 50%

Description: Although the category of guilt as it is experienced today is generally encountered in psychological (guilty conscience) and/or juridical (guilty verdict) contexts, the origins of guilt are deeply religious, rooted in both the Hebrew Bible and New Testament and attending Western religious experience throughout the centuries. Vestiges of this heritage remain in the concepts of “Jewish guilt” or “Catholic guilt,” even though their full significance is rarely recognized. Guilt has remained a significant part of Western thought, as it has been reflected upon by philosophers, psychologists, literary critics, and even contemporary political theorists.

Such a multifaceted topic provides an excellent opportunity to explore the religious origins of “guilt” in antiquity and to trace its cultural impact into the medieval and modern periods. This course focuses on the concept of guilt, as well as the related categories of sin and atonement, as they appear in the Hebrew Bible and the Second Temple period, considering how various groups of ancient Jews understood and processed guilt. The final third of this course considers the reception of these categories in early Christianity, rabbinic Judaism, and medieval and modern contexts. The course places an emphasis on writing, including reflection on the role of guilt in historical and contemporary religion.

Texts:

• Leviticus
• Numbers (selections)
• Temple Scroll (selections)
• Rule of the Community (selections)
• Rabbinic Literature (selections)
• Sefer Hasidim (selections)
• Maimonides, Mishneh Torah (selections)
• Herant Katchadourian, Guilt: The Bite of Conscience
• Gary Anderson, Sin: A History
• Paula Frederickson, Sin: The Early History of an Idea
• Sigmund Freud, Civilization and its Discontents

Other readings will be sent out as PDFs in advance.

Evaluation:
Attendance and participation: 20%,
Five 1 page reflections on reading: 25%
Two 3-5 page short essays: 20%
10 page final essay: 35%

Description: A survey of Yiddish literature and culture with a particular focus on the modern period (the 1860s to the present). As we read major works of Yiddish literature (in English translation), we will discuss the main factors in its development, including its position as a minority literature, Ashkenazi civilization’s religious foundations and multilingualism, the rise of political movements, and the trauma of the Holocaust. We will pay close attention to issues of Jewish identity and the relations between Jews and their Christian neighbors in Poland, Ukraine, Romania, and other regions of Eastern and Central Europe, and will also examine the special place of humor, music (including “klezmer”), and mysticism in Yiddish culture. In his Nobel lecture, Yiddish writer Isaac Bashevis Singer described Yiddish as “the idiom of the frightened and hopeful humanity.” What are the reasons behind and the effects of such universalization of Yiddish language, literature, and culture? In addition to literary works, we will also explore films, music, historical documents, and oral history.

Selected Texts (in the Course Reader):

• The Memoirs of Glikl of Hameln
• Nahman of Bratslav, “The Wise Man and The Simple Man”
• Sholem Aleichem, Railroad Stories and Tevye the Dairyman
• Sholem-Yankev Abramovitch (Mendele Moykher-Sforim), The Travels of Benjamin the Third
• I. L. Peretz, If Not Higher; Bella Chagall, Burning Stars; Isaac Bashevis Singer, In My Father’s Court

Selected Films:

• The Dybbuk (1937)
• Green Fields (1937)
• Tevye the Dairyman (1939)

Evaluation: 
Attendance, Preparation & Participation (25%)
Short Reading Responses (25%)
Midterm Paper/Project (20%)
Final Paper/Project (30%)

Description: This is a survey course that highlights the encounters between Jews and Hellenistic Civilization in late antiquity and Islamic Civilization is the early Middle Ages. The "parting of the ways" between Christianity and Judaism will be an important sub-unit in the course. Because this is a first-year History course, emphasis is placed on introducing students to the modes of inquiry associated with the discipline.

Texts: John Efron, Steven Weitzman, Matthias Lehmann, Joshua Holo, The Jews: A History, Pearson-Prentice-Hall,3rd ed. 2018.
Coursepack and assigned online readings.

Evaluation:
Attendance and participation in all class meetings.
Completion of required reading assignments on time.
Short Paper 10%
Class Tests 50%
Term Paper 40%

Description: This course is an introduction to the history and literature of the biblical period, the earliest era of Jewish Studies. Its primary goal is to familiarize the student with the text of the Hebrew Bible, the historical context in which it came it be and the academic disciplines that contribute to its analysis, such as linguistics, archaeology, comparative literature and comparative religions. All texts will be examined in translation, and no prior knowledge of the Bible or its languages is required.

Texts: Hebrew Bible in English translation. Other primary texts and secondary readings will be available on MyCourses or on reserve in the library.

Evaluation: Grades will be based on two short written assignments, a mid-term exam and final “take-home” essay questions, as well as regular readings for each class from the Bible itself, attendance and participation.

Description: The objective is to master basic communication in Modern Hebrew language. Students will develop the four language skills of understanding, speaking, reading and writing through the acquisition of basic structures of the language, i.e., grammar, syntax, vocabulary, as well as idiomatic expressions, in order to be able to communicate in Modern Hebrew orally and in writing. Communicative activities, oral practice, written exercises and compositions will be assigned regularly, in order to help integrate skills and reinforce learning. In addition, because the acquisition of a modern language also entails awareness of the culture of its linguistic community, the students will become aware of cultural elements associated with the language. 

Texts: Shlomit Chayat et al. Hebrew from Scratch, Part I + CD

Evaluation: 
48% - 4  Class Tests (6%, 10%, 14%, 18%)
12% - Quizzes
12% - 2 In-Class Essays 
14% - Compositions 
10% - Oral Presentation
4% - Class Participation 

Description: The Nazi assault, organized robbery of rights and possessions, and eventual genocide of European Jewry is one of the most consequential events in both Jewish and world history. This course will provide an overview of the context, crimes of the perpetrators, and nightmarish experiences of the millions that fell victim to this Khurbn (Yiddish, “catastrophe”). Starting with the early 1930s, we will analyze how it was possible for the Nazis to come to power, what the first policies of persecuting Jews in Germany were, and how those policies escalated to expulsion, ghettoization, and mass murder across Europe. Towards the end of the semester, drawing on examples from Europe, Israel, Canada, and the United States, we will discuss contemporary cultural representations and the often-intricate politics of Holocaust memory.

Texts: 

• Doris Bergen, War and Genocide: A Concise History of the Holocaust, Third Edition 
• Emanuel Ringelblum, Notes from the Warsaw Ghetto
• Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz
• Course Reader

Evaluation:
Attendance and participation: 15%
Primary Source Analysis (3-4 pg.): 25%
Midterm: 30%
Final Exam: 30%

Description: Until the early modern period, most of the world’s Jews spoke Arabic and called the Islamic world home. This course explores the Jewish experience among Muslims from the seventh century until the present. Through close readings of primary sources and historical scholarship, students will learn how Jews under Islam shaped modern Judaism, how engagement with Arabic in Islamic Spain led to the revival of Hebrew, and how the Jewish-Muslim relationship fared in the twentieth century. The course also probes themes of history and memory in light of the departure of Jews from the Islamic world in the 1950s and 1960s.

Texts:

• Adina Hoffman and Peter Cole, Sacred Trash: the Lost and Found World of the Cairo Geniza, Schocken Books, 2011
• Vitalis Danon, Ninette of Sin Street; edited with an introduction and notes by Lia Brozgal and Sarah Abrevaya Stein; translated by Jane Kuntz; Stanford University Press, 2017

Evaluation: Midterm, paper, and final exam.

Description: “What hath Athens to do with Jerusalem?” the great church father Tertullian exclaimed. This question of the relationship, whether harmonious or discordant, between “Jerusalem” and “Athens,” that is, between revelation and reason or between religion and philosophy, is the key issue of religious philosophy in the middle Ages. While this issue is common to the three revealed religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, each religion approached this issue in its own way. We may say that, generally speaking, Christianity focuses more on the relationship between faith and reason or theology and philosophy, while Islam and Judaism focus more on the relationship between philosophy and the Divine Law. In this course, we will first examine the attempt to bring Judaism and philosophy together, beginning with Philo of Alexandria in late Antiquity, and reaching its culmination in the High middle Ages in the writings of Saadya Gaon, Bahya ibn Pakudah, Judah Halevi, and, above all, the towering philosopher and jurist, Moses Maimonides. We will conclude with the writings of Benedict Spinoza, the great philosopher and fierce opponent of Judaism, who seeks to prise Judaism, and more generally revealed religion, and philosophy apart and thereby bring to an end the grand, centuries-old attempt at harmonizing them.

Texts: 

• Selections from: Philo of Alexandria: The Creation of the Cosmos according to Moses
• Saadya Gaon: Book of Beliefs and Opinions
• Bahya ibn Pakudah: Duties of the Heart
• Judah Halevi: Kuzari; Book of Knowledge of the Mishneh Torah, the Eight Chapters, and Guide of the Perplexed
• Spinoza, Theological-Political Treatise

Evaluation: 
Attendance and participation: 10%
In Class Mid-Term: 20%
Take Home Final: 35%
Paper: 35%

Description: An introduction to Yiddish, the millennium-old language of Ashkenazic Jews. This course will cover the fundamentals of Yiddish grammar and vocabulary and will include practice in speaking, reading, and writing. The course materials draw on Yiddish literature, songs, and films, allowing students to combine the acquisition of practical language skills with an exploration of Yiddish culture—from its beginnings in medieval Germany through its past and present in Central and Eastern Europe, the Americas, Israel, and all over the world. An important component of the course is the opportunity students will have to pursue Yiddish-related artistic or research projects (individually or in small groups), combining exploration of Yiddish with creative writing, translation, acting, filmmaking, religion, anthropology, history, painting, and journalism, to name just some of the options.

Texts: Course Pack; online resources.

Evaluation: 
Attendance and Homework (40%)
In-Class Quizzes (20%)
Final Project (20%)
Final Exam (20%)

Format: Language Course

Description: This seminar re-examines modern North African Jewish history in light of the most recent historical scholarship. Special emphasis will be placed on daily life, culture, and the Jewish-Muslim relationship.

Texts:

• Ethan B. Katz, The Burdens of Brotherhood: Jews and Muslims from North Africa to France, Harvard University Press, 2016
• Jessica Marglin, Across Legal Lines: Jews and Muslims in Modern Morocco, Yale University Press, 2016
• Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Saharan Jews and the Fate of French Algeria, Chicago University Press, 2014

Evaluation: Attendance and participation; ongoing assignments and research paper.  

Description: This course surveys the main religious streams in North American Judaism (Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, Ultra-Orthodox, Sephardi, Reconstructionism, Renewal). Emphasis is placed on the ideological positions of the movements, the main challenges facing each movement, and on the religious as well as the cultural practices and beliefs of their members.

Texts:

• Excerpts from Sylvia Barack Fishman, The Way into the Varieties of Jewishness
• Jack Wertheimer, The New American Judaism; Ira Robinson, Canada’s Jews: In Time, Space and Spirit.

Evaluation: Short responses to assigned readings, book review (1800 words), web-sourced research paper (1200 words).

Description: This course will seek to analyze how traditional Jewish Law approaches the issue of legal responsibility for one’s actions by focusing on the Talmudic law regarding damages by fire. In this connection, the course’s main readings will consist of selections from Tractate Bava Kamma, Chapter 2 (“Keitzad ha-Regel”), from the Babylonian Talmud. Students should acquire the Art Scroll Bava Kamma, vol.1 (*), covering Bava Kamma, chapters 1-3. Students should have some background either in Talmud or in Law. A reading knowledge of Hebrew is a plus, although it is NOT a requirement.

We will study the text in the original together with the Art Scroll translation and commentary. Depending on the background and textual skills of the students, I hope to cover as well the commentary of Rashi and selections from other classic medieval and modern commentaries. We will read the text closely; paying equal attention to the Talmudic method of argumentation and dialectic and to the legal and ethical concepts presented and discussed or alluded to in the text. The course will also introduce critical methodology and comparative Jurisprudence where deemed appropriate. At the course’s end, I hope that the students will have developed a “feel” for the Talmud and an appreciation regarding how it fuses together technical argumentation and broad considerations of value.

Texts:

• Art Scroll Bava Kamma, vol.1 (*)
• Barry Scott Wimpfheimer, The Talmud: An Autobiography
• Chaim Saiman, Halakhah; the Rabbinic Idea of Law

Evaluation: 
Class Participation 20%: Attendance and preparation is mandatory
In Class Mid-Term 30%
Take Home Final 50%

Description: An exploration of moral dilemma in Environmental Studies as reflected in literature from the Bible to the present.

Texts: Apart from the Hebrew Bible, readings from the late 18^th century to the present, from Goethe to Coetzee, concerning the environment and moral issues.

Evaluation: Four in-class exams, each consisting of an essay and commentaries on class texts, and a long essay relating to course texts.

Description: The objective is to master communication in Modern Hebrew language.

Students will develop the four language skills of understanding, speaking, reading and writing through the acquisition of basic structures of the language, i.e., grammar, syntax, vocabulary, as well as idiomatic expressions, in order to be able to communicate in Modern Hebrew orally and in writing. Communicative activities, oral practice, written exercises and article analysis will be assigned in order to help integrate skills and reinforce learning. In addition, because the acquisition of a modern language also entails awareness of the culture of its linguistic community, the students will become aware of cultural elements associated with the language and the diversity of the Israeli society.

Texts: Shlomit Chayat et al. Hebrew from Scratch, Part I + CD

Evaluation: 
48% - 4 Class Tests (6%, 10%, 14%, 18%)
12% - Quizzes
12% - 2 In-Class Essays
10% - Compositions
10% - Oral Presentation
​8% - Class Participation

Description: The objective is to communicate on familiar topics in Modern Hebrew language. Students will develop the four language skills of understanding, speaking, reading and writing through the acquisition of the advanced structures of the language, i.e., grammar, syntax, vocabulary, as well as idiomatic expressions, in order to be able to communicate in Modern Hebrew orally and in writing. Communicative activities, oral practice, written exercises and compositions will be assigned regularly, in order to help integrate skills and reinforce learning. In addition, because the acquisition of a modern language also entails awareness of the culture of its linguistic community, the students will become aware of cultural elements associated with the language.

Texts: Edna Amir Coffin. Lessons in Modern Hebrew: Level II (2) Publisher: University of Michigan Press 

Recommended Text: Hebrew Dictionary (Oxford, Eng-Heb, Heb-Eng Dictionary, Kernerman – Lonnie Kahn)

Evaluation: 
48% - 4 Class Tests (6%, 10%, 14%, 18%)
12% - Quizzes
12% - 2 In-Class Essays
14% - Compositions 
10% - Oral Presentation
4% - Class Participation 

Description: A commemoration of the 100^th anniversary of the first performance of Ansky’s Yiddish play, The Dybbuk, exploring the religious and literary background, the play’s social and historical setting, and its place both in modern Yiddish and Hebrew literature.

Texts: Apart from the text of the play, a selection of historical and literary texts elucidating Ansky’s immersion in Jewish religious-cultural history and folklore, his socialism and Zionism.

Evaluation: Four in-class exams, each consisting of an essay and commentaries on class texts, and a long essay relating to course texts.

Description: In this course we will discuss happiness and virtue, two concepts at the core of ancient and medieval ethics. We will first examine the Greek philosopher Aristotle (384-322 BCE) and then turn to Maimonides (1138-1204), Aristotle's most famous medieval Jewish student.

For Aristotle, the best human life is both a virtuous life and a happy and flourishing one. Indeed, he takes virtue to be the most important ingredient of happiness (eudaimonia in Greek, translated as sa'ada into Arabic and haslahah into Hebrew). We will look at the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle's best-known contribution to moral theory, in which he not only offers a philosophical interpretation of virtue and happiness, but also gives concrete advise for how to lead a virtuous and happy life.

Maimonides adopts much of Aristotle's moral theory but incorporates it into a Jewish ethics. He, too, argues that the best life is one that is both virtuous and happy. But the best guide to such a life, according to Maimonides, is the Torah, the Law of Moses, whose prescriptions embody the practical wisdom we need to live good lives. Contemplation, the theoretical grasp of the natural order, which Aristotle and Maimonides take to be the pinnacle of virtue and happiness, is for Maimonides at the same time the fulfillment of the commandment to love God.

At the end of the class we will have familiarized ourselves with Aristotle's and Maimonides' understanding of virtue and happiness and with what they think we must do in order to live virtuous and happy lives.

Besides Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics we will read Maimonides' Eight Chapters, some of his shorter writings on ethics, as well as parts of his main philosophical-theological work, the Guide of the Perplexed.

Texts: 

• Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics
• Maimonides, Eight Chapters
• Maimonides, Ethical Writings of Maimonides
• Maimonides, Guide of the Perplexed (excerpts)

Evaluation: 
Active course participation: 20%
One presentation: 20%
Short paper: 20%
Final comparative paper on a theme in Aristotle and Maimonides: 40%

 Description: The aim of this course is to expose students to the various aspects of contemporary Israeli society and culture through films, music and other media, as well as academic, journalistic, literary, art historical and dramatic texts (all texts are in Hebrew). 

Texts: TBA

Evaluation: 

40%    -        Essay (1500 words min.)
30%    -        2 In-Class Essays 
15%    -        2 quizzes
10%    -        Text Preparation Assignments (to be marked at random)
  5%    -        Class Participation and presentation 

Description: This course is designed for students who have taken Introductory Yiddish 1 and 2, or have a comparable command of Yiddish from elsewhere, and wish to improve their knowledge of the language and to further explore the culture behind it. Further development of speaking, reading, writing, and listening skills, with a particular emphasis on expanding vocabulary and mastering grammar. Drawing inspiration from Yiddish writer Isaac Bashevis Singer, who in his Nobel Lecture described Yiddish as "the wise and humble language of us all, the idiom of frightened and hopeful humanity [which possesses] treasures that have not been revealed to the eyes of the world,” this course introduces students to selections from Yiddish literature, songs, and films of Jewish life past and present. An important component of this course is the opportunity students will have to pursue Yiddish-related artistic or research projects (individually or in small groups), combining exploration of Yiddish with creative writing, translation, acting, filmmaking, religion, anthropology, history, painting, and journalism, to name just some of the options. With questions about the expected prior knowledge, please email the instructor.

Texts: Course Pack; online resources.

Evaluation: 
Attendance and Homework (40%)
In-Class Quizzes (20%)
Final Project (20%)
Final Exam (20%)