Course Introduction
The Bible has had a
profound influence on Western culture, literature, art, music, and law. In
order to understand much of Western arts and letters, before the mid-twentieth
century, it is necessary to have a rudimentary knowledge of the literature of
the Bible. In this course we will be reading the Bible through the lens of
literary study. Literary study of the Bible grapples with its content through use
of the same techniques we would use to analyze the language and craft of any
other literary work—diction, grammar, voice, perspective, imagery, trope,
characterization, theme, etc. In addition, we will be exploring the various
literary genres the Bible has to offer: e.g. poetry, letters, sermons, parables.
As we look at select texts, we will also be learning about the cultural
contexts from which they emerge.
Course Objectives
- Students will learn close reading techniques in order to become careful readers of the Bible.
- Students will be able identify key terms essential to understanding the Bible as literature: e.g. testament, literature, genre, myth, allusion, epic, plot, character, setting, theme, allegory, simile, metaphor, irony, proverb, prophecy, epistle, parable, sermon, apocalyptic literature, etc.
- Students will be able to identify the primary historical periods and locations that serve as the “setting” of the Bible
- Students will be able to identify languages in which principle Biblical testaments were originally written.
- Students will be able to identify the influence of the Bible in a piece of art, music, literature, of their choosing.
- Students will learn how to structure effective, short, analytic papers
- Students will learn to incorporate secondary sources in analytic papers.
- Students will demonstrate the ability to effectively use the grammatical and stylistic conventions of Dominant Academic/professional Discourse (DAD) in writing.
Required Texts
- New Oxford Annotated Bible With Apocrypha, New Revised Standard Version
- Other materials posted on Moodle (M).
- Teacher: Alma Alvarez