This course will examine the fundamentals, history, and development of the Jewish faith and way of life. The relationship between Jewish historical experience and the evolving theological responses to that experience will be traced. Primary texts consisting of selections from the Bible, Talmud, Midrash, medieval Bible commentaries and philosophy, Jewish mystical literature, Hasidism and the prayer book will be examined as illuminations of this relationship. The vocabulary of Jewish theological expression will be explored as it relates to the history of Jewish philosophical inquiry. Explores ways of rationally evaluating classical and contemporary arguments supporting different positions on those issues.
Students learn to develop and defend their own views on the issues.
This course provides students with a comprehensive, interdisciplinary, introduction to the subject of human rights. We will begin with a review of the historical development of the idea of human rights by looking at its sources in some of the world s major philosophical and political traditions. We then will concentrate on the development of the human rights movement in the 19 th and 20 th centuries, culminating in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, and looking closely at the anti-slavery movement, the humanitarian movement, and the women s suffrage movement. A special focus of this course will be on the phenomenon of torture and the campaign for its eradication. Students in the course will present seminar papers, take part in research projects, and submit a term paper on a topic related to human rights.