Centre for the Study of Jewish-Christian Relations, Cambridge
MSt in The Study of Jewish-Christian Relations
Sample Syllabus: Foundations module (Michaelmas term)
Weekly topics:
Week 1: (When) did the ways part?
Week 2: Antisemitism
Week 3: The Orthodox Churches
Week 4: Religion and Society
Week 5: Traditional Jewish Approaches to the Land of Israel
and Christian Zionism
Week 6 (i): Judaism and Hellenism
Week 6 (ii) Biblical Criticism and Jewish-Christian Relations
Week 7: Language – Translation – Interpretation
Week 8: Grappling with the Shoah
Centre for the Study of
Jewish-Christian Relations
Week 1: (When) did the ways part?
Set reading
Annette Yoshiko Reed and Adam H. Becker, ‘Introduction: Traditional Models and New Directions,’
in eidem, eds., The Ways That Never Parted (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007): 1–33.
Daniel Boyarin, Border Lines (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004): 1–33.
Idem. ‘Border Correction,’ in Jewish Quarterly Review 99, 1 (2009): 33–36.
James Carleton-Paget, [Review of The Ways That Never Parted]
in Journal of Ecclesiastical History 55, 3 (2004): 560–562.
Graham N. Stanton, ‘Justin Martyr’s Dialogue with Trypho: group boundaries, “proselytes”
and “God-fearers”,’ in idem, Guy G. Stroumsa, eds., Tolerance and Intolerance in Early Judaism
and Christianity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998): 263–278.
Isabella Sandwell, Religious Identity in Late Antiquity
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007): 63–90.
Additional introductory reading
Judith Lieu, ‘“The Parting of the Ways”: Theological Construct or Historical Reality?’
in Journal for the Study of the New Testament 56 (1994): 101–119.
Eadem, ‘Accusations of Jewish persecution in early Christian sources, with particular reference
to Justin Martyr,’ in Graham N. Stanton, Guy G. Stroumsa, eds., Tolerance and Intolerance in
Early Judaism and Christianity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998): 279–295.
Tessa Rajak, ‘Talking at Trypho: Christian Apologetic as Anti-Judaism in Justin’s
“Dialogue With Trypho the Jews”,’ in M. Edwards, M. Goodman and S. Price, eds.,
Apologetics in the Roman Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999)” 511–533.
David Rokeah, Justin Martyr and the Jews (Leiden, Boston, Cologne: Brill, 2002): 1–19.
Miroslav Marcovich, ed., Iuistini Martyris Dialogus cum Tryphone
(Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1997): 23–61.
Adolf M. Ritter, ‘John Chrysostom and the Jews – A Reconsideration,’ in Tamila Mgaloblishvili, ed.,
Ancient Christianity in the Caucasus (Richmond: Curzon Press, 1998): 141–154.
Christine Shepardson, ‘Controlling Places: John Chrysostom’s “Adversus Iudaeos”
Homilies and the Spatial Politics of Religious Controversy,’
in Journal of Early Christian Studies 15, 4 (2007): 483–516.
Wolfram Kinzig, ‘“Non-Separation”: Closeness and Co-operation Between Jews
and Christian in the Fourth Century,’ in Vigiliae Christianae 45 (1991): 27–53.
Week 2: Antisemitism
Set reading
Amos Funkenstein, ‘Anti-Jewish Propaganda: Pagan, Christian and Modern,’
in Jerusalem Quarterly No. 19 (1981): 56–72.
Lars Fischer, [Review article on antisemitism and modernity]
in East European Jewish Affairs 37, 2 (2007): 249–255.
Idem, The Socialist Response to Antisemitism in Imperial Germany
(New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007): 6–19.
Idem, [Review article] in East European Jewish Affairs 38, 2 (2008): 231–234.
Anders Gerdmar, Roots of Theological Anti-Semitism (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2009): 1–20.
Shmuel Almog, ‘What’s in a Hyphen?’ [at http://sicsa.huji.ac.il/hyphen.htm]
Additional introductory reading
Moishe Postone, ‘Anti-Semitism and National Socialism,’ in Anson Rabinbach, Jack Zipes, eds.,
Germans and Jews Since the Holocaust (New York, London: Holmes & Meier, 1986): 302–314.
Zygmunt Bauman, ‘Allosemitism: Premodern, Modern, Postmodern,’ in Bryan Cheyette,
Laura Marcus, eds., Modernity, Culture and “the Jews” (Cambridge: Polity, 1998): 143–156.
David Engel, ‘The Concept of Antisemitism in the Historical Scholarship of Amos
Funkenstein,’ in Jewish Social Studies NSer. 6, 1 (1999): 111–129.
Jacob Katz, ‘Misreadings of Anti-Semitism,’ in Commentary 76, 1 (1983): 39–44.
Shulamit Volkov, ‘The Written Matter and the Spoken Word. On the Gap Between pre-1914 and Nazi
Anti-Semitism,’ in François Furet, ed., Unanswered Questions. Nazi Germany and the Genocide
of the Jews (New York: Schocken, 2nd ed. 1989): 33–53.
Week 3: The Orthodox Churches (Sasha Anisimova)
Set reading
Irina Levinskaya, ‘Jewish-Russian Orthodox Christian Dialogue,’
in James K. Aitken and Ed Kessler, eds., Challenges in Jewish-Christian Relations
(New York: Paulist Press, 2006): 63–68.
Mary B. Cunningham and Elizabeth Theokritoff, ‘Who are the Orthodox Christians? A historical
introduction,’ in eaedem, eds., The Cambridge Companion to Orthodox Christian Theology
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008): 1–18.
‘The final declaration by the Christian Round Table of Eastern Orthodox priests and cultural
representatives from Greece, Georgia, Italy, Russia, and Ukraine visiting Jerusalem, April 2—24,
2007’ – http://www.jcrelations.net/en/?item=2840
‘Russian Orthodox voice against anti-Semitism dies’ – http://www.jcrelations.net/en/?item=3032
Week 4: Religion and Society
Set reading
Mark Chaves, ‘Secularization as Declining Religious Authority,’
in Social Forces 72, 3 (1994): 749–774.
Clifford Geertz, ‘Religion As a Cultural System’ (first published in 1966) in The Interpretation
of Cultures (London: Fontana, 1993): 87–125.
Alexandra Walsham, ‘The Reformation and “The Disenchantment of the World”
Reassessed,’ in Historical Journal 51, 2 (2008): 497–528.
David Gross, The Past in Ruins (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1992): 3–19, 131–135.
2
Additional introductory reading
Sara Lipton, ‘Images in the World: Reading the Crucifixion,’ in Miri Rubin, ed., Medieval Christianity
in Practice (Princeton, Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2009): 173–185.
Natalie Zemon Davis, ‘A Reminiscence. Remembering Clifford Geertz,’
History Workshop Journal No. 65 (2008): 189–194.
Jeff Astley, ‘In Defence of “Ordinary Theology”,’
in British Journal of Theological Education 13, 1 (2002): 21–35.
Dipesh Chakrabarty, ‘The Modern and the Secular in the West: An Outsider’s
View,’ in Journal of the American Academy of Religion 77, 2 (2009): 393–403.
Jerry Wallulis, ‘“A Secular Age” by Charles Taylor,’
in Philosophy and Rhetoric 42, 3 (2009): 302–312.
David Yamane, ‘Secularization on Trial: In Defense of a Neosecularization Paradigm,’
in Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 36, 1 (1997): 109–122.
C. John Sommerville, ‘Secular Society/Religious Population: Our Tacit Rules for Using the Term
“Secularization”,’ in Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 37, 2 (1998): 249–253.
Mary Douglas, ‘The Effects of Modernization on Religious Change,’
in Daedalus 111, 1 (1982): 1–19.
Grace Davie, ‘Is Europe an Exceptional Case?’ in Hedgehog Review 8, 1-2 (2006): 23–34.
Kevin M. Schultz, ‘Secularization: A Bibliographic Essay,’
in Hedgehog Review 8, 1-2 (2006): 170–177.
Week 5: Traditional Jewish Approaches to the Land of Israel and Christian Zionism (Daniel
Weiss and Beth Phillips)
Set reading
William D Davies, The Territorial Dimension of Judaism (Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University
of California Press, 1982), 1–52.
Elizabeth Phillips, ‘A Brief History of Dispensationalist Christian Zionism,’
Ch. 2 of her thesis: Apocalyptic Theopolitics. Dispensationalism, Israel/Palestine and
Ecclesial Enactments of Eschatology, 14–51.
Additional introductory reading
Michael S Berger, ‘Taming the Beast: Rabbinic Pacification of Second-Century Jewish Nationalism,’
in James K Wellman, Jr., ed. Belief and Bloodshed. Religion and Violence across Time and
Tradition (Lanham et al.: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 47–61.
Isaiah M Gafni, Land, Center and Diaspora. Jewish Constructs in Late Antiquity (Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press, 1997), 58–78.
Daniel Langton, Children of Zion (Cambridge: Woolf Institute, 2008).
Amy-Jill Levine, ‘Old Habits Die Hard. A Critique of Recent Christian Statements on Israel’
(CJCR Lecture, 2 May 2011).
Elizabeth Phillips, ‘“We’ve Read the End of the Book”: An Engagement with Contemporary Zionism
Through the Eschatology of John Howard Yoder,’ in Studies in Christian Ethics 21, 3 (2008),
342–361.
Peter Walker, ‘Pilgrimage in the Early Church,’ in Craig Bartholomew and Fred Hughes, eds.,
Explorations in a Christian Theology of Pilgrimage (Aldershot and Burlington, Ashagate,
2004), 73–91.
Additional resources
Stephen Sizer on Christian Zionism – http://www.stephensizer.com/books/christian-zionism/
John Hagee’s website – http://www.jhm.org/Home/About/WhySupportIsrael
3
Week 6 (i): Judaism and Hellenism
Set reading
Jim Aitken, ‘Hellenism,’ in Edward Kessler, Neil Wenborn, eds., A Dictionary
of Jewish-Christian Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005): 182–183.
Tessa Rajak, ‘Judaism and Hellenism Revisited,’ in The Jewish Dialogue With
Greece and Rome (Boston, Leiden: Brill, 2002): 3–10.
Philip Alexander, ‘Hellenism and Hellenization as Problematic Historiographical
Categories,’ in Troels Engberg-Pedersen, ed., Paul Beyond the Judaism/Hellenism Divide
(Louisville, London, Leiden: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001): 63–80.
Jim Aitken, [review of Hengel’s Judaism and Hellenism]
in Journal of Biblical Literature 123, 2 (2004): 331–341.
Jacob Taubes, ‘Introduction,’ in The Political Theology of Paul
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004): 1–11.
Martin Hengel, ‘Judaism and Hellenism Revisited,’ in John J. Collins and Gregory E. Sterling, eds.,
Hellenism in the Land of Israel (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2001): 6–37.
Additional introductory reading
Tessa Rajak, ‘Jews and Greeks: The Invention and Exploitation of Polarities
in the Nineteenth Century,’ (first published in 1999) in The Jewish Dialogue With
Greece and Rome (Boston, Leiden: Brill, 2002): 535–557.
Daniel Boyarin , ‘Hellenism in Jewish Babylonia,’ in Charlotte Elisheva Fonrobert
and Martin S. Jaffee, ed., The Cambridge Companion to the Talmud and Rabbinic Literature
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007): 336–363.
Seth Schwartz, ‘The Hellenization of Jerusalem and Shechem,’ in Martin Goodman, ed.,
Jews in a Graeco-Roman World (Oxford: Clarendon, 1998): 37–45.
Dale B. Martin, ‘Paul and the Judaism/Hellenism Dichotomy: Toward a Social History of the
Question,’ in Troels Engberg-Pedersen, ed., Paul Beyond the Judaism/Hellenism Divide
(Louisville, London, Leiden: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001): 29–61.
Daniel Langton, ‘The Myth of the “Traditional View of Paul” and the Role
of the Apostle in Modern Jewish-Christian Polemics,’
in Journal for the Study of the New Testament 28, 1 (2005): 69–104.
Andrew S. Jacobs, ‘A Jew’s Jew: Paul and the Early Christian Problem of Jewish
Origins,’ in Journal of Religion 86, 2 (2006): 258–286.
Daniel Boyarin, ‘Introduction,’ in A Radical Jew. Paul and the Politics of Identity
(Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1994): 1–12.
Alan F. Segal, ‘Paul’s Jewish presuppositions,’ in James D. G. Dunn, ed., The Cambridge Companion
to St Paul (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003): 159–172.
Fergus Millar, ‘Transformations of Judaism under Graeco-Roman Rule: Responses to Seth Schwartz’s
“Imperialism and Jewish Society”,’ in Journal of Jewish Studies 57, 1 (2006): 139–158.
Seth Schwartz, ‘Sunt Lachrymae Rerum,’ in Jewish Quarterly Review 99, 1 (2009): 56–64.
Stuart S. Miller, ‘Roman Imperialism, Jewish Self-Definition, and Rabbinic Society,’
in AJS Review 31, 2 (2007): 329–362.
‘Introduction’ (Glenn Bugh) and ‘Recent Trends and New Directions’ (Graham Shipley)
in Glenn R. Bugh, ed., The Cambridge Companion to the Hellenistic World
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006): 1–8, 315–326.
Week 6 (ii): Biblical Criticism and Jewish-Christian Relations
Set reading
Susannah Heschel, ‘The Image of Judaism in Nineteenth-Century Christian New Testament
Scholarship in Germany,’ in Marvin Perry and Frederick M. Schweitzer, eds., Jewish-Christian
Encounters Over the Centuries (New York, Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang, 1994): 215–240.
John Barton, ‘The “Historical-Critical Method”,’ in The Nature of Biblical Criticism
(Louisville, London: Westminster John Knox Press, 2007): 31–68.
4
Amy-Jill Levine, ‘Lilies of the Field and Wandering Jews: Biblical Scholarship, Women’s Roles,
and Social Location,’ in Ingrid Rosa Kitzberger, ed., Transformative Encounters. Jesus & Women
Reviewed (Leiden, Boston, Cologne: Brill, 2000): 329–352.
Additional introductory reading
Stefan C. Reif, ‘Aspects of the Jewish contribution to biblical interpretation,’
in John Barton, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Biblical Interpretation
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998): 143–159.
Susannah Heschel, ‘Revolt of the Colonized: Abraham Geiger’s Wissenschaft
des Judentums as a Challenge to Christian Hegemony in the Academy,’
in New German Critique No. 77 (1999): 61–85.
Karl-Fritz Daiber, Ingrid Lukatis, Wolfgang Lukatis, ‘The Bible in Protestant Religious Life
in Germany’ in Journal of Empirical Theology 6, 2 (1993): 32–60.
Richard H. Popkin, ‘Cartesianism and Biblical Criticism,’
in Thomas M. Lennon, John M. Nichols, John W. Davis, eds., Problems of Cartesianism
(Kingston, Ont.: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1982): 61–81.
Additional resource
John P. Meier, Burke Lecture 2002: Jesus the Jew – But What sort of Jew?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxeKunPwmp4
Week 7: Language – Translation – Interpretation
Set reading
Isaac Meyers and Daniel Stein Kokin, ‘From Septuagint to Singer: Translation as Legend
and Politics,’ in Prooftexts 28 (2008): 363–382.
Hinde Ena Burstin, ‘Finding my Vey: Dilemmas of a Feminist Yiddishist Translator,’
in Bridges 14, 2 (2009): 44–55.
Naomi Seidman, ‘Introduction,’ in Faithful Renderings. Jewish-Christian Difference and the Politics
of Translations (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2006): 1–35.
reviews of Seidman’s book:
Todd Samuel Presner in AJS Review 33, 1 (2009): 195–198.
Emily Wittman in Shofar 27, 1 (2008): 157–159.
Laura Levitt in Bridges 14, 1 (2009): 171–174.
Additional resource
Tessa Rajak’s lecture on the Septuagint – http://frontrow.bc.edu/program/rajak/
Week 8: Grappling with the Shoah
Set reading
Amos Funkenstein, ‘Theological Responses to the Holocaust,’ in Perceptions of Jewish History
(Berkeley, Los Angeles, Oxford: University of California Press, 1993): 306–337.
Naomi Seidman, ‘The Holocaust in Every Tongue,’ in Faithful Renderings
(Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2006): 199–242.
Lars Fischer, ‘Contextualizing Fred Wander’s “The Seventh Well”,’
in East European Jewish Affairs 39, 1 (2009): 107–119.
Additional introductory reading
Isabel Wollaston, ‘“Telling the Tale”: The Self-Representation and Reception of Elie Wiesel,’
5
in Ed Kessler and Melanie J. Wright, eds., Themes in Jewish-Christian Relations (Cambridge:
Orchard Academic, 2005): 151–169.
Susan Rubin Suleiman, ‘Do Facts Matter in Holocaust Memoirs?’ in Crises of Memory and the
Second World War (Cambridge, MA, London: Harvard University Press, 2006): 159–177.
Johann-Baptist Metz, ‘Facing the Jews. Christian Theology after Auschwitz,’
in Elisabeth Schuessler Fiorenza and David Tracy, eds., The Holocaust as Interruption
(Edinburgh: T. &. T. Clark, 1984): 26–33.
Fredrick C. Holmgren, ‘Jews and Christians in Germany: A New But Still Troubled Relationship,’
in Journal of Ecumenical Studies 38, 2–3 (2001): 298–316.
6