Course Introduction

Class Meetings:
Class Time: M 2:10-4 pm
Class location:
513 Fayerweather

Comp. Lit. & Society G9020y
Job and Other Arguments with the Lord in Jewish Literature and Tradition

The challenge of human suffering to divine justice is expressed in Jewish literature from the Bible to Franz Kafka, including Talmud and Midrash, medieval Hebrew poetry and exegesis, Hassidic parable, modern Yiddish and Hebrew Literature. Toward the end, and against this background, an attempt at a fresh understanding of certain aspects of Kafka's The Trial.

Note:

a) In order to be considered for this seminar students must complete a form available in 511 Fayerweather Hall (Ms. Gold ext. 42581). The forms must be returned by December 10, 2001. Though this is a graduate seminar, highly qualified undergraduates may be considered for admission.

b) With regard to Kafka, you are requested to confront his texts directly and, though you may be sorely tempted, to abstain from reading any secondary literature about his writings. In the final session you will be given a selected bibliography of Kafka criticism, relevant to the work we have done, which you may then pursue at your leisure.

c) Please begin immediately to read Kafka's The Trial so that you will have completed it, preferably more than once, before the April 15 session.

Course requirements: One oral report. Term paper (due Mon., April 22)

Required Textbooks (to be bought at Labyrinth)

Tanakh: The Holy Scriptures (New JPS Translation), Jewish Publication Society

Spiegel, Shalom, The Last Trial: On the Legends and Lore of the Command to Abraham to Offer Isaac as a Sacrifice, NY (Jewish Lights Classic Reprint)

Kierkegaard, Soren, Fear and Trembling, tr. A. Hannay  (Viking Penguin)

Scholem, Gershom (ed.), The Correspondence of Walter Benjamin and Gershom Scholem  (Harvard)

Kafka, Franz, The Complete Stories, ed. Nahum Glatzer,  NY (Schocken)

_________, Diaries,  NY (Schocken)

_________, The Sons, int. Mark Anderson,  NY (Schocken)

_________, The Trial: A New Translation (tr. Breon Mitchell), NY (Schocken)

Recommended Textbooks:

Benjamin,Walter, Illuminations, NY (Schocken)

Jonas, Hans, The Gnostic Religion: The Message of the Alien God, Boston (Beacon)     [cont.]

Scholem, Gershom, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism, NY (Schocken)

Note: The collection of xeroxed "Supplementary Texts" can be acquired at Village Copier