Jewish Studies
Introduction to Jewish Studies (JWST 330)
(Cross-listed with Political Science 493 and JWST 330H)
Time and Room: 12:00-1:15 TTh, WTHR 104
Instructor of Record: Professor Sandor Goodhart
Office: HEAV 438
Office Hours: TTh 2:00-3:00 p.m. and by appt.
Phone: 494-7965
E-mail: goodhart@purdue.edu
Teaching Assistant: Michelle Carreon
Office: TBA
Office Hours: TBA
Phone: TBA
E-mail: mcarreon@purdue.edu
Teaching Assistant: Rocky Clancy
Office: TBA
Office Hours: TBA
Phone: TBA
E-mail: rclancy@purdue.edu
This course is a survey that introduces students to the culture, literature, history, philosophy, and religious customs of the Jewish people from antiquity to the present. We will see how over the centuries, indeed millennia, Jews have successively understood what it is that defines them as a people: a book, interpretations of a book, a promise, a land, a legal code, hatred of Jews by others, etc. The course will provide an historical overview of the long history of the Jews and their wanderings, driven often by what non-Jews imagined Jews to be and to be practicing.
The readings and class discussions will divide into three parts covering the ancient, medieval, and modern periods, though the student will quickly learn that when applied to Jewish history these historical designations do not easily map on to the customary ones. Jewish modernity had to wait for 'modern' Europe to live up to its universalist, Enlightenment ideals, while medieval Europe had to play catch-up to the Islamic and Jewish world that had discovered the brilliance of Greek philosophy and science long before it. We will read Genesis and the Book of Job from the Hebrew Bible, and we will discuss the theological issues contained therein, the creation of the world, the development of monotheism, and the meaning and origins of human suffering. We will read selections from Maimonides' Guide of the Perplexed, the most important Jewish philosophical work, and will attempt to understand how, and why, one might wish to understand a religious way of life in philosophical terms, and then we will turn to Spinoza, whose Tractatus Theologico-Politicus is the most radical critique ever of the religion of the rabbis and of Maimonides in particular. For Spinoza, the Bible is not amenable to philosophical interpretation, but is a simple book for simple minds. With Spinoza and his critique of traditional Judaism, we reach modernity, and the successive attempts by Jews to enter modern life.
Modernity demanded that Jews leave their ages-old traditions and customs at the door, if ever they were to become full-fledged citizens of modern, secular states. And so they did for the most part, little realizing that the invitation was less than heartfelt, given the centuries of antipathy toward Jews and their ways. Jews became Germans and Frenchmen, but neither German nor French. And finally, they were slaughtered in numbers hard to comprehend. Rather than dwelling on the unimaginable, we shall read a novel by Aharon Appelfeld, Badenheim 1939, which gives a good sense of the optimism and despair of the final days of Jewry in Europe. In this way, we will come to appreciate better the stranglehold that history has over our cultural ideals. Our final text will be Chaim Potok's The Chosen, a novel, set in America, which paints a vivid picture of the struggle of successive generations living between tradition and modernity.
The course will proceed by lecture and discussion, and we will welcome frequent guest lecturers, whose expertise will be helpful to us. Three (3) in-class essay examinations will determine the grade in the course. JWST 330 has an enrollment limit of 120 and fulfills the Liberal Arts Racial and Ethnic Diversity Core Requirement.
Required texts:
1. N. Solomon, Judaism: A Very Short Introduction
2. R. Scheindlin, A Short History of the Jewish People
3. Tanakh: A New Translation of the Holy Scriptures
4. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed (abridged)
5. E. Curley (ed. and trans.), A Spinoza Reader
6. A. Appelfeld, Badenheim 1939
7. C. Potok, The Chosen