89 courses with the subject RELG, each shown exactly as we captured it from the college's catalog, with every element we hold. Where the wording looks broken, that is our reading of the catalog, not the college's text.
RELG 001Introduction to Religion1
This course introduces the nature of religious worldviews, their cultural manifestations, and their influence on personal and social self-understanding and action. The course explores various themes and structures seminal to the nature of religion and its study: sacred scripture, visions of ultimate reality and their various manifestations, religious experience and its expression in systems of thought, and ritual behavior and moral action. Members of the department will lecture and lead weekly discussion sections. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit.
This course is an introduction to religion in the United States, beginning with Native American religions and European-Indian contact in the colonial era, and moving forward in time to present-day movements and ideas. The course will explore a variety of themes in American religious history, such as slavery and religion, politics and religion, evangelicalism, Judaism and Islam in the United States, “cults” and alternative spiritualities, New Age religions, popular traditions, and religion and film, with an emphasis on the impact of gender, race, and national culture on American spiritual life. Humanities. 1 credit.
This course introduces students to the Hebrew Bible, New Testament, and Qur’an by exploring their similarities and differences through comparative study of shared figures, concepts, themes, and narrative structures. Through close reading of selected passages in translation, students examine how these texts converge and diverge in their understandings of specific figures-such as Abraham, Moses, Sarah, Hagar, Isaac, Ishmael, Jesus, Mary, and God-as well as in their understandings of who constitutes the people of Israel. Students will learn to read the three texts and their interpretations both comparatively and within their own literary and historical contexts. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST, PEAC Fall 2026. Kessler.
RELG 003AHebrew Bible and its Modern Interpreters1
When was the last time you read the most important text in the West? The Hebrew Bible isn’t what it used to be. In the modern period, the scientific study of the Bible opened up new ways of thinking about sacred texts. This is an introduction to the Hebrew Bible as a literary, historical, political, and religious document. We will explore the use and abuse of the Hebrew Bible by Jews and Christians, paying attention to its role in contemporary culture, politics, and ethics. Reading select books of the Bible, we will emphasize issues of gender and race, revolution and Zionism, genocide and slavery, good and evil. Humanities. 1 credit.
RELG 003B Mormon Studies is an introductory course to the field of Latter-day Saint Studies, involving the study of the Latter-day Saint movement, also known as Mormonism. The Latter-day Saint (or LDS) faith, founded in 1830 by Joseph Smith, now counts nearly 18 million adherents and is arguably the first global religion to originate in the United States. Most Latter- day Saints are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, headquartered in Utah. There is substantial debate on whether the LDS movement constitutes a denomination of the Christian faith. The overarching objectives of this course are to (A) understand the fundamental tenets of the Latter-day Saint faith and its placement relative to the religious and cultural milieu, (B) witness the various debates regarding the history and status of the Latter-day Saint movement, and (C) gain familiarity with the field of Latter-day Saint Studies. Programs for Latter-day Saint Studies exist at a number of schools, including the University of Virginia, Claremont Graduate University, and the University of Utah. Example syllabi for similar courses taught at other schools can be found here. RELG 003B Mormon Studies is a student-run course. As such it is subject to especial oversight from the Religion Department. If you have any concerns about the course, please direct them to Professor Emeritus Yvonne Chireau. Humanities .5
(Cross-listed as CLST 004 ) Discussion-and writing-intensive study of classical and contemporary understandings of the figure of Jesus through analytical reading, classroom dialogue, expository writing, and community engagement. It asks the questions, Who was the real historical Jesus? and, What is the relevance of Jesus for today? Introduction to wide understanding of Greco-Roman cultures and ancient texts, biblical and otherwise, including many of the extracanonical scriptures that did not make the final cut for inclusion in the commonly received New Testament. Also introduction to the Greek alphabet, lexicons, and research tools for New Testament study along with rudimentary Greek terms essential to biblical scholarship and commentary. Instruction is intellectually rigorous and responsive both to skeptical and faith-based readings of Jesus’ biography and the Bible. The ground is level in this class: believers and unbelievers, evangelicals and atheists are welcome. No prior background in religious or biblical studies is assumed or required. The class is divided into four three-week sessions with each session devoted to one of the Gospels, and a final week-long session focusing on the Book of Acts. Each session will study the interplay between Christian scriptures along with writings and images about Jesus drawn from the Hebrew Bible, extracanonical writings, film and video, history, theology and fiction. Images of Jesus through time will be tackled: Jewish rabbi, political revolutionary, apocalyptic prophet, queer lover, desert shaman, African messiah, and Native American trickster. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for CLST, ENVS, INTP Spring 2027. Wallace.
Jewish interpretation of scripture is the foundation of Judaism; without the Bible and its interpretation, Judaism would not exist. This class introduces students to the varied ways Jews read, understood, and interpreted the Bible. The course examines premodern Jewish approaches to scripture, which developed during the first centuries of the Common Era as well as those maintained through the 9th to 12th centuries CE. We also consider what elements of premodern biblical interpretation are still in use and what has been added through modern and postmodern Jewish interpretations of the Bible. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for MDST
This introductory course supplies students with the religious literacy skills necessary to think and write critically and comparatively about the world’s religions. It will challenge the “world religion” paradigm in both its form and content while engaging students through the study of diverse traditions. Organized thematically with a focus on “lived religion,” we will explore different topics such as food, architecture, performance, and art through a combination of theoretical pieces and case studies. We will also make use of a variety of media resources including film, podcasts, and music. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GLBL-core
RELG 006Abrahamic Religion/s: Violence and Monotheism1
This course introduces students to the academic study of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam through the figure of Abraham. How have these religions understood Abraham in competing and overlapping ways? In what ways have their respective portrayals of Abraham fostered both unity and discord, peaceful coexistence and religious wars, that persist throughout history and up to current geo-political, religious landscapes (e.g. Hevron/Hebron/al-Khalil)? Broader themes this course addresses through the figure of Abraham are the roles of violence in religion, and gendered and racialized violence and monotheism. Finally, we critically examine the use of the discourse of “Abrahamic Faith/s” in Religious Studies and Inter-religious dialogue. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for PEAC, GSST
RELG 006BThe Talmud: Sex, Gender, & Mental Health in Antiquity1
(Cross-listed as ANCH 006B ) This class explores rabbinic constructions of the body and embodiment, which include constructions of gender, dis\ability, dis-ease, and health. We examine rabbinic traditions about fetal creation and development, nonbinary and “binary” gender, madness, and mental health. We contextualize these traditions in their broader Late Antique Greco-Roman settings in order to compare and contrast ancient historical and contemporary theories about reproduction, wellness, illness, pain, suffering, and trauma on both individual and collective levels. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for CLST, PEAC, GSST Spring 2027. Kessler.
RELG 006CFirst Year Seminar: Apocalypse: Hope and Despair in the Last Days1
(Cross-listed as ENVS 006 ) For millennia, speculation about the end of the world has fired the imaginations of western cultures. Today, environmentalists argue we are in the time of the “Sixth Great Extinction,” while religious communities assert we are living into the end of the world based on ancient prophecies. This course will ask how two seemingly unrelated modes of discourse - environmental science and religious studies - converge to shape productive responses to the world’s end; and the power of Earth-based spiritualities (with special reference to Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, and Indigenous worldviews) to give birth to hope and resilience in the face of the coming storm. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ENVS, ESCH Fall 2026. Wallace. Fall 2027 Wallace.
RELG 007BThe Caribbean Carnival: Sacred Myth and Performance1
From saint feast day processions and pilgrimages for Black Christ statues to Carnaval, Crop Over, and other Caribbean harvest festivals, religious holidays in Latin America are occasions for celebration. This course focuses on religious festivals and ritual bodies to reveal the ways these performances form mobile archives of history that yet testify both to the accumulated forces of colonialism, slavery, and capitalism that shaped this region, as well as the power of choreography and other embodied movement as instruments and devices of popular insurgency. Course materials include primary and secondary readings, multimedia sources such as ethnographic videos and audio recordings, material and sartorial culture objects, and in-class lectures and discussions. Potential field trip to Philadelphia’s El Carnaval de Puebla. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, ESCH, LALS
A thematic introduction to the study of religion through an examination of selected precepts and practices of several religious traditions of India, China, and Japan structured as patterns of religious life. Materials taken from the Hindu and Buddhist traditions of India, Confucian and Taoist traditions of China, and from Zen traditions of Japan. Themes we will consider include issues of religious symbols, cosmology, and ritual; the gods, personhood/self, and religious transformation; liberation, gender, and sexuality; philosophy, narrative and popular piety; and the place of the body in meditation, worship and religious experience. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA, GLBL-Paired, ASAM Spring 2027. Hopkins. Spring 2028 Hopkins.
This course will include detailed reading of the Qur’an in English translation. This course conceives of the Qur’ān as a living text in constant flux through interactions with the lived experiences of Muslims and other religious traditions. It focuses on developing an understanding of the Qur’ān’s form, style, and content through a close reading of comparable religious texts. Major topics covered include the Qur’ānic theory of prophecy, its treatment of the Biblical tradition (both that of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Bible), and its perspective on pre-Islamic religion. The central goals of the course include the ability to: (a) analyze primary these religious sources from a critical and literary perspective and (b) construct coherent arguments based on concrete evidence from the textual sources. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for MDST Spring 2027. al-Jamil. Spring 2028 al-Jamil.
This course explores the unity and variety of Buddhist traditions within their historical developments in South, Central, and East Asia, by way of the study of its texts The course will be organized chronologically and geographically, and to a lesser extent thematically, focusing on the formations of early Indian Buddhism (the Nikaya traditions in Påli and Sanskrit), the Theravada in Sri Lanka and Thailand, Mahayana Ch’an/Zen traditions in China and Japan, and Vajrayana (tantra) traditions in Tibet. Themes include narratives of the Buddha and the consecration of Buddha images; gender, power, and religious authority, meditation, liberation, and devotional vision; love, memory, attachment and Buddhist devotion; the body, and the social construction of emotions and asceticism. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA Fall 2026. Hopkins. Fall 2027 Hopkins.
What makes African American religion “African” and “American”? Using texts, films, and music, we will examine the sacred institutions of Americans of African descent. Major themes will include Africanisms in American religion, slavery and religion, gospel music, African American women and religion, black and womanist theology, the civil rights movement, and Islam and urban religions. Field trips include visits to Father Divine’s Peace Mission and the first independent black church in the United States, Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, ESCH, PEAC
RELG 011First-Year Seminar: Religion and the Meaning of Life1
What is the purpose and meaning of life? What constitutes “a life well lived”? Seminar themes include religion and personal and social change; understandings of the sacred; suffering, death, love, justice, healing, fear, and hope. Readings include Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Thomas, Thich Nhat Hanh, Malcolm X, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Bryan Stevenson, Julia Watts Belser, Valerie Kaur. Humanities. 1 credit.
This course is a comprehensive introduction to Islamic doctrines, practices, and religious institutions in a variety of geographic settings from the rise of Islam in the seventh century to the present. Translated source materials from the Qur’an, sayings of Muhammad, legal texts, and “mystical” works will provide an overview of the literary expressions of Islamic religion. Among the topics to be covered are: the Qur’an as scripture and as liturgy; conversion and the spread of Islam; Muhammad in history and in the popular imagination; gender, sexuality, and the body; sectarian developments; transmission of religious knowledge and the development of Islamic institutions; Shi’ism; Sufism; Islam and modernity; and Islam in the United States. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for MDST Fall 2027 al-Jamil.
This course is a comprehensive introduction to Islamic doctrines, practices, and religious institutions in a variety of geographic settings from the rise of Islam in the seventh century to the present. Translated source materials from the Qur’an, sayings of Muhammad, legal texts, and “mystical” works will provide an overview of the literary expressions of Islamic religion. Among the topics to be covered are: the Qur’an as scripture and as liturgy; conversion and the spread of Islam; Muhammad in history and in the popular imagination; gender, sexuality, and the body; sectarian developments; transmission of religious knowledge and the development of Islamic institutions; Shi’ism; Sufism; Islam and modernity; and Islam in the United States. Humanities. 1 credit.
RELG 012The History, Religion, and Culture of India I: From the Indus Valley to the Hindu Saints1
A study of the religious history of India from the ancient Indo-Aryan civilization of the north to the establishment of Islam under Moghul rule. Topics include the ritual system of the Vedas, the philosophy of the Upanishads, the rise of Buddhist and Jain communities, and the development of classical Hindu society. Focal themes are hierarchy, caste and class, purity and pollution, gender, untouchability, world renunciation, and the construction of a religiously defined social order. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA
RELG 012BHindu Traditions of India: Power, Love, and Knowledge1
This course is an introduction to the religious and cultural history of Hindu traditions of India from the prehistoric Indus Valley in the northwest to the medieval period in the southeast, and major points and periods in between, with a look also at formative points of the early modern period. Our focus will be on the interactions between Vedic, Buddhist, brahmanical, popular/ritual, and Jain religious traditions in the development, and formation of Hindu religious streams, along with major ritual and ascetic practices, hagiographies, and myths, hymns and poetry, and art and images associated with Hindu identities and sectarian formations, pre-modern and modern. In addition to providing students with a grasp of the basic doctrines, practices, and beings (human, superhuman, and divine) associated with various Hindu traditions, the course also seeks to equip them with the ability to analyze primary and secondary sources. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA
RELG 013The History, Religion, and Culture of India II: Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, and Dalit in North India1
After a survey of premodern Hindu traditions, the course tracks the sources of Indo-Muslim culture in North India, including the development of Sufi mysticism; Sindhi, Urdu, and Tamil poetry in honor of the Prophet Muhammad; syncretism under Mughal emperor Akbar; and the consolidation of orthodoxy with Armad Sirhindi and his school in the 16th to 17th century. We then trace the rise of the Sikh tradition in the milieu of the Mughals, northern Hindu Sants and mendicant Sufis, popular goddess worship and village piety, focusing on several issues of religious experience. We then turn to the colonial and post-colonial period through the lenses of the Hindu saints, artists, and reformers (the “nationalist elite”) of the Bengali Renaissance, and the political and religious thought of Mohandas Gandhi and Dalit reformer Ambedkar. We will use perspectives of various theorists and social historians, from Ashis Nandy, Partha Chatterjee, Peter van der Veer, to Veena Das and Gail Omvedt. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA
What is a person? Do we have souls? What is the nature of ultimate reality, and how can we come to know it? What accounts for the inequities of human existence? What constitutes ethical behavior? This course explores these and other questions as they are addressed by Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain philosophical traditions. While our emphasis will be on selected Indian schools of thought in their classical formulations (from 700 B.C.E. to the 14 th century), the course will conclude with examples of more recent developments and interpretations by modern Indian thinkers. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA
Is the Bible racist? Sexist? Homophobic? This course introduces students to the academic study of the Bible and critical theories about gender, race, sexuality, and ethnicity. How is it that the Bible has been mobilized to support racist, homophobic, and misogynist ideologies and that the same Bible has been used to subvert, undermine, and ultimately try to eradicate these same ideologies? Course readings focus on black feminist, womanist, African American, Asian American, and Latinx biblical interpretations. Humanities. 1 credit.
RELG 015First-Year Seminar: Religion and Literature: Blood and Spirit1
A seminar-style introduction to study the relation of religious ideas to visionary literature, including novels, stories, sacred texts, and films. A variety of critical theories are deployed to underand (or construct) the meaning of different imaginative variations on reality. Academic and creative writers include many or all of the following: Sophocles, Augustine, Joyce, Morrison, O’Connor, Updike, Dostoevsky, Crace, Lewis, Weil, Scorsese, Kazantzakis, Snyder, Abbey, and Camus. Humanities. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as PHIL 016 ) Searching for wisdom about the meaning of existence? Wondering about the nature of the good life? Curious as to whether there is a God? Think of “Philosophy of Religion” as your guide to the universe. Students write spiritual autobiographies as the course’s culminating exercise. Likely topics include proofs for the existence of God, the new atheism, the problem of evil, Indigenous spiritualities, queer religion, and Buddhist-Christian dialogue. Probable thinkers include Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Kant, Wittgenstein, Abe and Kimmerer. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for INTP Spring 2027. Wallace.
What role does the Bible play in contemporary political debates? How do the Bible-and religion-shape American politics, political movements, and the law? This course explores the intersections among the Bible, Religion, and Politics. It critically examines categories often taken as self-evident and distinct-such as “the religious” and “the political”-and demonstrates how they work together in ways that continue to impact individual and collective identities in the United States. We begin by reading the Bible - in itself both a political act and an act steeped in politics. From “the politics of interpretation,” we then move on to explore the ways in which religion and biblical interpretations are called upon, both explicitly and implicitly, in modern and current debates about gender, sexuality, race, science, ethics, and Constitutional Law. We explore issues such as abortion, gay marriage, euthanasia, creationism, incarceration, and capital punishment. Students will be introduced to a range of methods and theories in the academic study of Religion and related critical theories. Through seminar discussion and written assignments, students will develop skills that are crucial to engaged, nuanced, critical discourses in the academy and beyond. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST
This course examines the multiple, sometimes dissonant, connections between animals and religion. Do animals have religion? Why have some religions venerated animals as divine beings while others claim to be against such “strange worship”? What are the religious ethics of sacrificing-or eating-animals? How does grappling with questions about personhood, the soul, and emotions help us better understand the relationship between animality and humanity? By critically examining the range of connections between animals and religion, this class introduces students to far larger questions about what it means to be human and what differentiates-yet binds together-human and non-human animals. Humanities. 1 credit.
This course explores Christian beliefs and practices in a global context. We consider Christian worldviews, their cultural expressions, history, and influence upon personal and social self-understanding and action. Examples will be drawn from Christian communities in Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America, and the United States. Themes include images of the sacred and of Jesus and Mary, mother of Jesus; pilgrimage and festivals; saints; gender; power; and religious authority; politics, conflict, and social transformation; and healing traditions. Humanities. 1 credit.
Is modern reason compatible with biblical revelation? Beginning with the heretic Spinoza, we’ll examine the giants of Jewish thought- religious reformers, philosophers, and theologians wrestling with the challenge of modernity, politics, and multiculturalism. Topics will include: the essence of Judaism, the nature of law, religion and state, God and evil, the status of women and non- Jews, the legacy of the Holocaust. Readings from: Martin Buber, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Judith Plaskow, Emmanuel Levinas, and others. Humanities. 1 credit.
Why do some people eat the body of their deity? Are pigs clean or unclean? Are mushrooms sacred beings? What is Soul food? Which is better, to feast or to fast? All of these questions are tied together by a common theme: they frame the relationship between food and the religious experiences of human beings. RELG 19 is an introduction to the Humanities via the academic study of global religions. The course centers around food as a point of entry to examine Christianity, Islam, Native American, Judaism, African, and Eastern traditions. We will discuss topics such as sacrifice, diet, fasting and spirituality, sacred vegetarian practices, and edible plants/spirits with class projects that include preparing and serving relevant food items and creating food-related forms. Field research trips and activities are included. This is a Speaking Associates Program (SPA) course. Humanities. 1 credit.
Focusing on themes of religion and transformation and prison as a literal and metaphorical space, this course explores themes of life and death, oppression and freedom, isolation and community, agency, and identity. Drawing primarily on Christian sources, readings move from the New Testament through Martin Luther King, Jr., to the contemporary U.S. context where nearly 2 million people are incarcerated today. Humanities. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as ENVS 040 ) Is the environmental crisis a scientific or spiritual problem? Is the crisis a matter of the head or the heart? Can spiritual worldviews - Deep Ecology, Green Christianity, Indigenous Animism, Earth-based Judaism, Eco-Buddhism, etc. - aid the development of Earth-centered philosophies of life? Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ESCH, ENVS, PEAC, GLBL-Core Fall 2026. Wallace.
(Cross-listed as PEAC 024 ) This course explores the religious beliefs, social teachings, and impact of Quakers in North America from the 1650s to the present. Topics include Quaker beliefs about God and the light within; Quakers and social reform including anti-slavery work, women’s rights advocacy, Native American rights, and peace work; contemporary Quakers and social justice (including the work of Earth Quaker Action Team [EQAT] and the American Friends Service Committee). While focusing on Quakers and social change, this course includes discussion of specific concerns and methods in the study of Religion and of Peace and Conflict Studies. Students will have the opportunity to work with the resources of Swarthmore College’s Friends Historical Library and Peace Collection. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for PEAC
RELG 024From Vodun to Voodoo: African Religions in the Old and New Worlds1
Is there a kindred spirituality expressed within the ceremonies, beliefs, music and movement of African religions? This course explores the dynamics of African religions throughout the diaspora and the Atlantic world. Using text, art, film, and music, we will look at the interaction of society and religion in the black world, beginning with traditional religions in west and central Africa, examining the impact of slavery and migration, and the dispersal of African religions throughout the Western Hemisphere. The course will focus on the varieties of religious experiences in Africa and their transformations in the Caribbean, Brazil and North America in the religions of Candomblé, Santeria, Conjure, and other New World traditions. At the end of the term, in consultation with the professor, students will create a web-based project in lieu of a final paper. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, ESCH, GLBL-core
This course is an exploration of the spiritual lives of African American women. We will hear black women’s voices in history and in literature, in film, in performance and music, and within diverse periods and contexts, and reflect upon the multidimensionality of religious experience in African American women’s lives. We will also examine the ways that religion has served to empower black women in their personal and collective attempts at the realization of a sacred self. Topics include: African women’s religious worlds; women in the black diaspora; African American women in Islam, Christianity, and New World traditions; womanist and feminist thought; and sexuality and spirituality. Readings include works by: Alice Walker; Audre Lorde; bell hooks; Zora Neale Hurston; Patricia Williams, and others. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, GSST
RELG 027Christian Nationalism, White Supremacy, and Antisemitism1
This course works its way backward in time to situate Christian Nationalism in the U.S. as an outgrowth of historical and political manifestations of Christian hegemony and conquest in other parts of the modern and premodern world. We focus on the ways Christianity, Whiteness, patriarchy, anti-Blackness, anti-Islam, and anti-Jewness both intersect and are mutually constituting in different historical periods and geopolitical eras, traversing our way through contemporary, early modern, and premodern empires across Europe and West Asia. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST, PEAC, GLBL-core Spring 2027. Kessler.
This course explores personal narratives about the Christian life from the time of Jesus to the present. Themes include understandings of the Sacred, the self, and the world; suffering and loss, brokenness and alienation, oppression and subjugation, healing and liberation, identity and agency, love and justice, solidarity and community, and individual and social transformation. Readings may include: Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Thomas, Augustine of Hippo, Brendan of Clonfert, Hildegard of Bingen, Margery Kempe, John Woolman, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King, Jr., James Cone, Kwok Pui-lan, Lara Medina, Shane Claiborne, Traci West, Kings Bay Plowshares 7. Humanities. 1 credit.
How have the inhabitants of West Asia and Africa conceived of social and religious difference? This course will explore both past and present the social, cultural and political contingencies that gave rise to ethnic and racial identities within and beyond Muslim societies. How did these identities and categories change over time and in which ways were they impacted by slave trades, local, social and political factors, European colonialism and decolonization in the twentieth century? What are the terms and meanings attached to skin color, racial phenotype, and social difference in the Arabic, Persian, Urdu, Berber, Swahili, Songhai, Amharic, or Turkish speaking worlds? How are these meanings constructed and controlled? Who gave these categories meaning and why? What are the obstacles to discussing and identifying race particular to the histories of these regions, and their peoples? In order to answer these questions, the course will draw extensively on primary sources, historical research, as well as theoretical writings on race and ethnicity. Particular attention will be given to theories, and the social and cultural practices that have been used to justify racial domination and anti-blackness. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST Fall 2026. al-Jamil.
RELG 030The Power of Images: Icons and Iconoclasts1
This course is a cross-cultural, comparative study of the use and critique of sacred images in biblical Judaism; Eastern Christianity; and the Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain traditions of India. Students will explore differing attitudes toward the physical embodiment of divinity, including issues of divine “presence” and “absence”; icons, aniconism, and “idolatry”; and distinctions drawn in some traditions between different types of images and different devotional attitudes toward sacred images, from Yahweh’s back and bleeding icons to Jain worship of “absent” saints. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA, MDST
Social justice rhetoric and activism are often framed around the theme of a fight or a struggle – however noble – against the forces and powers of oppression. This course takes a different tack and approaches social justice via perspectives of healing, wellness, and critical care practices. This course places an emphasis upon praxis, and as such will center healing and social justice practitioners and their methodologies as our primary curricular materials (via in-class visits and their social media footprints) to accompany more traditional classroom readings and multimedia assignments. What happens to our notions of social justice if we view current-day global oppression chiefly as a problem of colonial dis/ease – a restless sickness wracking the social and political body, the encrusted layers of generational trauma and violence catalyzed by the on-going and open-ended histories of slavery, colonialism, and capitalism? Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, ENVS, ESCH, LALS, PEAC, GLBL-paired
RELG 032Queering God: Feminist and Queer Theology1
The God of the Bible and later Jewish and Christian literature is distinctively masculine, definitely male. Or is He? If we can point out places in traditional writings where God is nurturing, forgiving, and loving, does that mean that God is feminine, or female? This course examines feminist and queer writings about God, explores the tensions between feminist and queer theology, and seeks to stretch the limits of gendering-and sexing-the divine. Key themes include: gender; embodiment; masculinity; liberation; sexuality; feminist and queer theory. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST, INTP
This course surveys queer and trans readings of biblical texts. It introduces students to the complexity of constructions of sex, gender, and identity in one of the most influential literary works produced in ancient times. By reading the Bible with the methods of queer and trans theoretical approaches, this class destabilizes long held assumptions about what the bible–and religion–says about gender and sexuality. Humanities 1 credit. Eligible for GSST
RELG 034Partitions: Religions, Politics, and Gender in South Asia Through the Novel1
This discussion-focused, seminar-style course will focus on a close reading of modern and contemporary South Asian novels and short stories structured around the theme of “partition(s),” not only the historical events of the partition of Bengal (East Pakistan, eventually Bangladesh), India’s Partition in 1947, or the social catastrophe of Indira Gandhi’s Emergency in the 1970’s, but the long shadows of these events right up to the (social, political) present. We will focus on many “figures of partition,” personal, religious, and political, in Bengali, Malayalam, Tamil, Urdu, and English prose literatures of India and Pakistan. Themes will range from religion and politics, gender/power; sexuality; love within and outside of the family; women, honor, and seclusion; asceticism and eroticism; caste, class, ethnicity, and race; children and their social and political vulnerabilities; and love, politics, and inter-caste marriage in Hindu, Parsee, Sikh, Muslim, and Christian settings in South Asia. Humanities 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA, GLBL-Paired, PEAC, ASAM
This .5 credit course offers students an opportunity for hands-on, experiential, and experimental learning of the Talmud and related Jewish texts. The Talmud is comprised of 5,422 pages; it is a massive collection of laws, myths, stories, and biblical exegesis that sheds light on its creators’ politics, philosophies, and cosmologies. We will learn Talmud from its smallest, atomized units while holding in sight how its whole might still exceed the sum of its parts. This “Lab” setting allows students to engage and experiment with the Talmud, Jewish text study, and the varieties of Jewish identities as we experience the Talmud and related topics through critical inquiry comprised of intuition, emotion, investigation, testing, and refinement. This course may be taken more than one time for credit. Humanities. 0.5 credit.
This course is a thematic introduction to Christianity. Beginning with early Christian writings and moving historically up through the contemporary period, we will explore a wide variety of ideas about God, self, and nature. Readings will focus on scientific and natural history treatises in dialogue with theological texts. We will explore the writings of Christian naturalists to study the linking of science and religion, and we will investigate a multiplicity of views about Christian understandings of the relationship between the human and non-human world. This class includes a community-based learning component: Students will participate in designing and teaching a mini-course on “Nature and Chester” to students in the nearby community of Chester. Readings include Aristotle (critical for understanding science in the later Middle Ages), Hildegard of Bingen, Roger Bacon, Galileo Galilei, Charles Darwin, Herman Melville, Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Muir, Graceanna Lewis, Thomas Berry, Nalini Nadkarni, and Terry Tempest Williams. Humanities. 1 credit.
The first two chapters of the biblical book of Genesis offer two very different ancient accounts of the creation of humanity and the construction of gender. The rest of the book of Genesis offers a unique portrayal of family dynamics, drama and dysfunction, full of complex and compelling narratives where gender is constantly negotiated and renegotiated. In this class, we will engage in close readings of primary biblical sources and contemporary feminist and queer scholarship about these texts, as we explore what the first book of the Bible says about God, gender, power, sexuality, and “family values.” Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST, INTP, MDST
An introductory course that uses popular film as a primary text/medium to explore fundamental questions in the academic study of religion. In particular, we will be concerned with the ways that religion and religious experience are constituted and defined on film as well as through film viewing. In discussing films from across a range of subjects and genres, we will engage in the work of mythical, theological and ideological criticism, while examining the nature, function, and value of religion and religious experience. We will also consider some of the most significant writers and traditions in the field of Religion and develop the analytical and interpretive skills of the discipline. Scheduled films include The Seventh Seal, The Matrix, Breaking the Waves, Contact, Jacob’s Ladder, The Passion of the Christ, The Rapture, The Apostle, as well as additional student selections. Weekly readings, writing assignments, and evening screening sessions are required. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit.
“Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?” This class surveys antisemitism from antiquity to the present day. It historicizes “religious” and “political” Jew-hatred, considering their differences as well as continuity over time. Since antisemitism intersects with racism, misogyny, homophobia, gender-nonconformity, and economics, considerable attention is placed on constructions of race, gender, sexuality, and class. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST, PEAC
RELG 040Rape, Slavery, and Genocide in Bible and Culture1
This course examines biblical “texts of terror.” It explores the functions of violence in religious writings as well as their influence and impact on current cultural issues. What are the biblical contributions to or roots of current societal crises about gender, race, and war? What are the limits and limitations placed on rape, slavery, and genocide in the Bible that are obscured in current (mis)uses of biblical precedents in support of such modern day atrocities? Without collapsing the distinctions between or simply blaming the Bible for current manifestations of extreme violence, this class aims to bring these “texts of terror” into the open to help facilitate critical discussion about, and critique of, violence then and now. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST
RELG 041BReligion and Nature in the African Diaspora: Wonders, Signs, & Portents1
(Cross-listed as ENVS 059A ) Wonder is the province of the wide-eyed child in the woods, and the wild-eyed scientist in the lab. Wonder at the world is prompted by the odd and uncanny, the strange and novel, the transcendent and sublime, as well as encounters with the monstrous and horrific. This course centers the experience of natural wonder and awe as a primary religious impulse of the African Diaspora. Through an affect theory frame that approaches religious experience through embodied emotions, this course chronicles several spectacular cosmic-planetary events across the African Diaspora that so overwhelmed their observers they formed the basis for religious expression. Additionally, students will contextualize these events and interpret their religious expressions as an ecocritical commentary upon the Black Diasporic experience. Topics covered include: Annular Solar Eclipse of 1831, Meteor Storm of 1833, the Great Comet of 1910, the 2010 Haitian earthquake, Atlantic basin hurricanes, etc. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ENVS
RELG 043BDecolonizing Afro-Latin American Religion1
Is scientific knowledge superior to ancestral wisdom or spirit revelation in its ability to apprehend and describe reality? This course interrogates the problem of coloniality as an imposition of power-knowledge that occurred as Iberians and their state-church institutions conquered indigenous Americans and enslaved indigenous Africans. We will free the subjugated knowledges of “Latin” America by encountering alternative narratives of history and sacred memory embedded within mythology and ritual. We will approach various streams of indigenous wisdom to discover philosophical-ethical outlooks on justice, reciprocity, and right living. Students will develop an account of how Euro-America’s scientific-rational knowledge has appropriated the ethnobotanical and other ecological perspectives of Africans and Native Americans contained within healing/wellness traditions. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST
This course focuses on how notions of Religion and the Sacred arise in comics and graphic novel texts. Drawing upon world religious traditions, the course will explore how comics use both text and image to frame spiritual identity, sacred practice, and religious experience. Using comics as primary sources, the class will engage the expression, imagination, and critical interpretation of religion through close readings of comics as texts, with analysis of their visual forms. Coursework includes weekly lab meetings within a digital media maker’s space. The course will culminate with the production of student-created comics, which will be developed over the semester and supervised by an artist-in-residence. Humanities. 1 credit.
RELG 045Bob Marley’s Setlist: Vibrations of a Rastafari Worldview and Ethos1
On July 21, 1979, Bob Marley & the Wailers performed at Boston’s Harvard Stadium as part of the Amandla Festival of Unity held in support of the liberation of South Africa. Their 90-minute reggae music concert featured a sonic-rhythmic-choreographic kaleidoscope looping the audience through 400 years of Rastafari mythic history and prophetic visions: although Africans were taken captive to Babylon (the American wilderness of racial capitalism), Jah Rasatafi had prepared a homeland in Ethiopia for the return of all Jah people, if only they chant down Babylon’s destruction by preaching one love, good vibrations, and unity in I-and-I . This class holds reggae music as a preeminent liturgical corpus of the Rastafari tradition, and investigates the Rasta worldview as performed by Bob Marley & the Wailers during their legendary Amandla set. Through a combination of concert video footage and a set of secondary source materials, students will place each Marley & the Wailers reggae anthem within its mystic Rastafari theological, aesthetic, and historic contexts. Topics include Diasporic Ethiopianism, Black Diaspora-Jewish Diaspora typology, Afro-Jamaican spirit-ecstatic musical traditions (myal, obeah, kumina, and burru), Rasta womanhood/gender, Caribbean resistance to slavery via marronage and fugitivity (Tacky’s Rebellion), pan-Africanism (Marcus Garvey’s UNIA “Back to Africa” Movement). Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, LALS
What do Bob Dylan, Pulp Fiction , and Superman have in common? This course will focus on the interpretation of the Bible in pop culture. We will explore the use of the Bible as inspiration and content in many genres of music, films, and visual arts. The arts have always looked to the Bible as a source for its plots, themes and symbols, both overtly and covertly. We will consider how the Bible is used and the effect it has on the interpretation of the Bible itself and the development of our popular culture. No previous knowledge of the Bible or pop culture required. Humanities. 1 credit.
RELG 047Afro-Futurism: Astral Mythologies of Creation and the Afterlife1
(Cross-listed as ENVS 057 ) In his 1974 film Space is the Place , avant-garde jazz musician Sun Ra announced his mission to rescue Black earthlings and shuttle them in his spaceship to the safety of a newly-discovered planet: “I come to you as a myth. Because that’s what black people are, myths. I come to you from a dream that the black man dreamed long ago.” In many ways, Sun Ra’s prophecy parallels variants of the Dogon creation myth of Mali, West Africa (recorded in the 1940s) that details the fateful voyage of the Nommos demiurge deities, who traveled to Earth in a sky vessel from a planetary point of origin some observers speculate may orbit the Sirius star system. Through primary and secondary readings, interactive classroom activities, and multimedia sources – including a bevy of music and film recordings – this course investigates Afrofuturism as a radical imaginary within the broader corpus of Black Astral Mythologies. By tracing a throughline between topics such as 16th-century astronomical observations at the University of Timbuktu, U.S. Underground Railroad fugitive navigations according to the ‘North Star,’ and recent cosmogonic speculation by quantum physicists into the elusive nature of Dark Matter, students will consider this premise: when the safe harbor of the earth no longer offers itself as habitation, Blackened celestial futures constellate the cosmic horizons. Possible field trip to the House of Future Sciences, headquarters of the Philadelphia collective AfroFuturist Affair. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, ENVS
RELG 049Yoga and Meditation: From India to the West1
In the West today, yoga usually refers to a system of bodily postures, while meditation is often understood as a stress-management tool. However, mastery of one’s body and mind constitutes only one aspect of much broader practice systems and worldviews that have developed into distinct traditions. We will survey these traditions and explore how these disciplines have changed through their encounter with Western culture, first in colonial India and then in the contemporary world. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA
RELG 050Sacred Plants, Holy Fungi, and Religious Experience1
(Cross listed as ENVS 055 ) This course investigates the sacred meaningfulness and practical utility humans have discovered in plants and fungi. From pharmacopeia and herbalism employed to cure ailments and relieve pain, to psychedelic and entheogenic rituals that modulate the sensorium of one’s consciousness to “reveal the God within,” the intimate relationships worked out between humans, plants, and fungi reveal the human in all of its evolutionary-biological, mythic, poetic, and religious dimensions. Through primary and secondary scholarly readings, multimedia sources, and case studies highlighting the cultural histories of the African Diasporic and Indigenous Mesoamerican communities, students will encounter various healing rituals, wisdom traditions, and emerging scientific paradigms that place plants and fungus at the center of human health and wellness. Topics include: mystical and visionary circuits of consciousness; Cannabis sativa and the Transatlantic Slave Trade; Inquisition witchcraft trials and “witches’ ointment;” Mexican-Oaxacan psilocybin shamans and the 1960s Hippie Movement; and a potential fieldsite visit to the Johns Hopkins University Center for Psychedelic & Consciousness Research. This course does not advocate the casual use of psychedelics or other substances. Humanities 1 credit. Eligible for ENVS.
Taking a hemispheric approach, this course will examine the histories, communities, and religious practices of Asians in South, Central, and North America and the Caribbean. We will learn about the indentured labor trade that brought Indian and Chinese laborers to the Americas in the 19th-20th centuries, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the case of Bhagat Singh Thind, and Japanese internment camps during WWII, in addition to other examples of racism and resistance that Asians faced migrating across the Americas. Our focus will be on how Asians have sacralized the local landscape and maintained and/or altered their religious practices, as well as how Asians have penetrated the culture of the Americas, looking at topics like food, architecture (temples and religious institutions), music, and pop culture. As part of the emphasis on culture, we will also explore the impact of Asian religions on American culture from the early transcendentalists to the Rajneesh movement and more, exploring the ways in which Asians have transformed the cultures of the Americas as much as their communities have been transformed by their new homelands. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA, PEAC
What is a good life? What is the good life? This course applies multi-disciplinary and cross-cultural approaches to explore the answers to these questions. As part of the course, we will discuss the characteristics of a good life by analyzing how various people and religious cultures have defined “the good life,” and exploring how people have chosen to live as members of both local and global communities. Throughout the semester, we will examine the construction and cost of living a “good life” and the concepts and expressions of beauty, power, love, health, and justice. Humanities. 1 credit.
RELG 053Gender, Sexuality, and the Body in Islamic Discourses1
An exploration of sexuality, gender roles, and notions of the body within the Islamic tradition from the formative period of Islam to the present. This course will examine the historical development of gendered and patriarchal readings of Islamic legal, historical, and scriptural texts. Particular attention will be given to both the premodern and modern strategies employed by women to subvert these exclusionary forms of interpretation and to ensure more egalitarian outcomes for themselves in the public sphere. Topics discussed include female piety, marriage and divorce, motherhood, polygamy, sex and desire, honor and shame, same-sex sexuality, and the role of women in the transmission of knowledge. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ESCH, GSST, MDST Fall 2026. al-Jamil. Fall 2027 al-Jamil.
This course examines the Western reception, experience, and interpretation of Asian religions, and the Asian responses to encounters with the West. We will critique the category of “Asian religion” and discuss the methodological approaches to this category within the study of religion. There are no formal prerequisites and no knowledge of any Asian language is required. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA
This interdisciplinary course analyzes the relationship between Black and Asian communities in the Americas, highlighting moments of solidarity and unity and areas of divergence and conflict. Moving from slavery to indentureship to U.S. immigration, particularly post 1960s, students will examine the rhetoric of the “yellow peril,” the myth of the model minority, the rise of Black Power movements, orientalist stereotypes, and anti-blackness within the Asian (inclusive of South Asian and Indo-Caribbean) community. Humanities 1 credit.
RELG 058‘Tis the Season: Festivals of Solstice, Yule, and Christmas1
(Cross-listed as ENVS 045 ) What is time and temporality? What makes festival and holiday time different from other seasons of the year? This course investigates the complex of ritual traditions known today as the Winter Solstice, Yuletide, and Christmas. Through a combination of primary and secondary textual and multimedia sources, students will consider what these holiday traditions reveal about the ways in which humans make the experience of time meaningful. Students will encounter the long history of Christianization in Europe and its global spread via economies of colonialism during the Modern Period, and will analyze the ways in which Christian religious authorities and institutions negotiate(d) with indigenous, land/nature-based spiritualities. From conifer trees to flying reindeer and the cryptozoological legends of Krampus, students will consider December holiday rituals and lore as a special form of ecological knowledge that holds potential to relate humans to the earth, animals, plants, and the seasonal passage of time in more intimate and expansive ways. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ENVS.
RELG 060Varieties of Zionist Thought: Judaism, Nationalism, Antisemitism, and the Jewish Question1
(Cross-listed as HIST 034 ) This course focuses on political expressions of Jewish identity since the late nineteenth century through an exploration of the central texts of Zionist thought. It integrates biblical, rabbinic, and medieval Jewish texts about Jerusalem, the idea of Zion, and the centrality of the Land of Israel to provide historical context and background. We ask: what are the ways select Jewish sources from antiquity to modernity have grappled with varied attitudes toward land, political sovereignty, and national identity in the Diaspora. Humanities. 1 credit.
Historian Owen Davies defines Magic as “the everyday employment of Religion for reasons other than spiritual enlightenment or salvation.” In this course we examine the history, theory, and meaning of Magic as a category of belief and practice intersecting with religious forms, institutions, and material cultures. Focusing on the arts of American Magic - what we will call Conjure Americana , we will look at the rise of Magic in the early modern era, from its initial formations in post Reformation European popular religion, to its expressions in English Christianity, Puritanism and in colonial encounters with indigenous religions. This seminar centers on theoretical literature and secondary sources about Anglo-American, Native American, and African American Magic, with an emphasis on local occult traditions such as Pennsylvania Dutch and German healing arts, Pow-wows, charms, and sigil architecture. Humanities. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as GLBL 065 ) This course explores how Jews and Jewish communities have confronted, negotiated, and reshaped their traditions from the eighteenth century to the present day. Students are introduced both to what Jews do (Jewish rituals and holidays) and why they do them (or why not). The course also considers that “Judaism” is itself a modern category-reimagined through encounters with Enlightenment thought, nationalism, colonialism, racism, antisemitism, secularism, feminism, and contemporary debates about statehood and diaspora. By the end of the course, students will understand modern Judaism not as a single, static “religion,” but as a thriving field of debate that takes place within a minority culture that spans the globe. Key areas of these debates revolve around notions of race, nation, peoplehood, politics, religion, gender, sexuality, and embodiment, as Jews and Jewish communities participate in ongoing negotiations between the past and present to imagine Jewish futures. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST, GLBL-core, PEAC Fall 2026. Kessler.
What is Judaism? Who are the Jews? And who gets to define these terms? How have the people of Israel understood their history, beliefs, bodies and practices on their own terms and how have non-Jewish authors constructed “the Jew(s),” their beliefs, bodies and practices? This course delves into these questions by juxtaposing literary sources composed by Jews and those written by non-Jews, spanning premodern Christian and Muslim law and literature to modern European philosophy and history. It also considers what we mean when we use the terms Religion, Race, Ethnicity, Antisemitism and Nation(-state) and how these concepts have developed over time. The course pays close attention to language and power, constructions of identity by self and other, and what gets lost and gained in the translation of cultures. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for MDST
The history of Hindu traditions in America can be divided into two groups. First, there are movements, such as transcendentalism, which are “Eastern-inspired” and borrow “Hindu” and “Buddhist” concepts, although participants generally refrained from using these terms or explicitly connecting themselves with either Hinduism or Buddhism. Secondly, the arrival of Indian immigrants, many of them post-1965, although a few earlier, built temples and attempted to reconstruct their religion in a variety of ways. In-between these two groups is a third ambiguous group. Are guru movements such as Sai Baba and Osho “Hindu-inspired” or “Hindu?” How is ISKCON articulating itself to be both part of and not part of “Hinduism?” And what about the practice of yoga? Is yoga always related to “Hinduism” or can it be extracted completely from Indian culture and “Hinduism?” This class will flesh out these categories to determine what exactly is meant by the terms “Hindu” and “Hinduism” in the American context. As part of our discussion, we will also address the topics of Hindu nationalism, caste, anti-blackness, Islamophobia, Orientalism, and the politics of brown mutuality. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA.
RELG 075Holy War, Martyrdom, and Suicide in Christianity, Judaism and Islam1
An examination of the concepts of martyrdom, holy war, and suicide in Islam, Christianity, and Judaism. How are “just” war, suicide, martyrdom presented in the sacred texts of these three traditions? How are the different perspectives related to conceptions of death and the afterlife within each tradition? Historically, how have these three traditions idealized and/or valorized the martyr and/or the “just” warrior? In what ways have modern post-colonial political groups and nationalist movements appropriated martyrdom and holy war in our time? Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for MDST, PEAC Spring 2027. al-Jamil.
What is Religion? How is Religion constructed as an academic discipline? Religion 095 is a weekly café for reading and discussion of selected texts for senior majors and strongly recommended for minors. It highlights works that have influenced theoretical and philosophical assumptions in the field of Religion, including case studies and multidisciplinary writings. The course will examine a number of approaches to Religious Studies, including post-structuralism, gender studies, critical race theory, queer theory, cognitive science, phenomenology, ethics, Indigenous studies, and critical animal theory, along with occasional works by Religion Department faculty members. Humanities. 1 credit. Fall 2027 Staff.
A survey of the history of Islamic law and its developments, with particular attention to the ways Islamic legal principles were formed, organized, operated in practice, and changed over time. It will focus on issues in Islamic legal theory, methodology, constitutional law, personal law, and family law that have had the greatest relevance to our contemporary world. This course functions as a basic introduction to the Islamic legal system in its pre-modern and contemporary forms. The course will also provide comparative discussion of the contrasts between Islamic legal theory and positive law and European and American legal and constitutional thought. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for MDST Spring 2028 al-Jamil.
RELG 100Holy War, Martyrdom, and Suicide in Christianity, Judaism and Islam2
An examination of the concepts of martyrdom, holy war, and suicide in Islam, Christianity, and Judaism. How are “just” war, suicide, martyrdom presented in the sacred texts of these three traditions? How are the different perspectives related to conceptions of death and the afterlife within each tradition? Historically, how have these three traditions idealized and/or valorized the martyr and/or the “just” warrior? In what ways have modern post-colonial political groups and nationalist movements appropriated martyrdom and holy war in our time? Humanities. 2 credits. Eligible for MDST, PEAC
RELG 101Jesus in History, Literature, and Theology2
This seminar explores depictions of Jesus in narrative, history, theology, and popular culture. We consider Jesus as historical figure, trickster, mother, healer, suffering savior, visionary, embodiment of the Divine, lover, victorious warrior, political liberator, and prophet. Humanities. 2 credits. Eligible for MDST
Double-graded seminar, BOTH sections required. It has been said that “millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep” (Milton). In dialogue with Indigenous and western religions of the book, who are these creatures that live among us? In ancient texts and contemporary art, film, fiction and theology, skeptics and believers bear witness to divine beings - in human, animal and plant forms – that provide protection and offer advice about how to navigate relations between “this world” and the “other world.” With reference to antiquity, this seminar will study the Books of Genesis, Enoch, and Revelation, the Gospels of Luke and John, and Quaranic Surahs. In the modern period, we will investigate epic poems by Milton, Paradise Lost , and Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell ; Stebbins’s Central Park sculpture, “Angel of the Water”; Indigenous books by Leslie Marmon Silko, Ceremony, and Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass ; Walter Benjamin’s gloss on Paul Klee’s painting Angelus Novus; and C.S. Lewis’s novel The Great Divorce , Tony Kushner’s play Angels in America , and Wim Wenders’s film “Wings of Desire.” Humanities. 2 credits. Fall 2027 Wallace.
RELG 108Poets, Saints, and Storytellers: The Poetry and Poetics of Devotion in South Asian Religions2
A study of the major forms of Hindu religious culture through the lenses of its varied regional and pan-regional literatures, with a focus on the literature of devotion ( bhakti ), including comparative readings from Buddhist and Islamic traditions of India. The course will focus on both primary texts in translation (religious poetry and prose narratives in epic and medieval Sanskrit, Tamil, Kannada, Bengali, Hindi, Pali, Sinhala, Sindhi, and Urdu) as well as pertinent secondary literature on the poetry and poetics of religious devotion. We will also pay close attention to specific literary forms, genres, and regional styles, as well as the performance (music and dance) and hagiographical traditions that frame the poems of Hindu saint-poets, Buddhist monks, and Muslim mystics. Along with a chronological and geographical focus, the seminar will be organized around major themes such as popular/vernacular and “elite” traditions; the performance and ritual contexts of religious poetry; the place of the body in religious emotion; love, karma, caste, and family identity; asceticism and eroticism; gender and power; renunciation and family obligations. Humanities. 2 credits. Eligible for ASIA, MDST Fall 2027 Hopkins.
This course investigates the Afro-Atlantic trope of spirit possession. The notion of “possession” contains a double meaning, referring in one register to phenomena of trance, ecstasy, and other embodied engagements with Spirit(s), historically identified by religious studies scholars as hallmarks of African Diasporic ritual traditions. In yet another register, the notion of “possession” chains Black religion to the history of the Transatlantic Slave Trade and its logic of racial capital that sold Black bodies as commodities to be possessed by a master. By way of ethnographic field reports, videos, films, and readings in critical race theory, kinesthetics, and phenomenology, students will untangle these tropes of Black spirit and possession to discover what their alternative, Africanist perspectives might teach us about the nature of Being, consciousness, materiality, and how to live well in ancestral community. Humanities. 2 credits. Eligible for BLST, LALS
Today we are facing the four horsemen of the apocalypse: climate catastrophe, white nationalism, global poverty, and a raging pandemic. In confronting these dire threats, what is the role of religion? This seminar explores new models for understanding religion – Indigenous studies, liberation theology, critical plant studies, queer theory – and a variety of thinkers – Kierkegaard, Buber, Bonhoeffer, Derrida, Mbembe, Tinker, Kimmerer – to enable resiliency, even joy, in the face of the coming storm. Humanities. 2 credits. Eligible for INTP
Double-graded seminar, BOTH sections required. A comparative 2 credit seminar that deals with ancient Greek, early and medieval Christian, medieval Jewish, “secular” troubadour, Hindu, South Asian and East Asian (Japanese) Buddhist traditions on the transformations of “love” in religious devotional literatures. We focus on themes of erotic and parental love; gender, sexuality, and the body; the emotions as ethical appraisal; individual love, loss, lament, and “ennobling virtue;” and the enduring tensions between the particular and “universal” in discourses of and about love, the passions and their vicissitudes in the histories of religion. Primary texts will range from Plato’s Symposium , Gregory of Nyssa’s Greek commentaries on the Song of Songs and his Bios makrinou ; the Occitan poetry of female Provençal troubadours, Dante’s Vita nuova, selections from the Commedia , Angela di Foligno’s Libello ; to early Buddhist women in the poetry and narratives of the Pāli Therīgāthā , the Sinhala narratives of the Buddha’s wife Yasodharā and the Buddha’s two mothers, Bengali poetry to the Hindu goddess Kālī and to the divine lovers Krishna and Rādhā; Heian-period Japanese love poems of Izumi Shikibu, and Arundhati Roy’s God of Small Things . Humanities. 2 credits. Eligible for ASIA, GSST, MDST Fall 2026. Hopkins.
RELG 126The Poetry and Prophesies of William Blake2
This course focuses on the lyric poems, extended epic cycles, and illuminated books of one of the most unique poets in English literature, William Blake (1757-1827). We will do a close reading of the poetry and images of the major works of Blake, with the help of text-critical, theoretical and historical perspectives, views of the body, innocence, experience, sexuality, the “margins” of literature; selfhood, self-giving, and “the gift of death” in the late prophetic books. Along with published books of the designs and extended commentaries on the illuminated books by David Erdman, images, bibliographies, and other resources from the online “Blake Archive” of Eaves and Viscomi will be used for “close reading” of Blake’s illuminated books and visionary designs. Humanities. 2 credits.
This seminar will explore religious literature, bodily practices, and social behaviors associated with the performance of secrecy in various geographical, historical, and political contexts. Religious communities have often employed secrecy as a strategy for the maintenance of group solidarity and religious identity when faced with allegations of heresy. Secrecy functions not only as a means to subvert and undermine the marginalization of religious minorities but as a powerful tool for the creation of more egalitarian possibilities through preservation of privileged knowledge and the presence of internally shared though externally undisclosed social and religious connections. What kinds of religious secrets are meant to be safeguarded? What set of behaviors and strategies are required to keep these “secrets” or sustain adopted personas? Is religious secrecy merely a tactic for ensuring survival in the context of social marginalization and political persecution? What is the relationship between secrecy and suspicion? Is it necessary that what one wishes to conceal is inherently negative, pernicious or even heretical? Humanities. 2 credits. Eligible for MDST
