SCHEDULE OF CLASSES
Rel 122 Religion and the Arts: Fall 2009
Students are strongly recommended NOT to print out this syllabus
as it will continue to develop and change over the course of the semester.
Rel 122 will meet on Tuesday and Thursday from 11:00 to 12:30am in Field House 101.
My Office Hours will be from 9:30 to 10:30 everyday, and by arrangement.
Click the date to see the schedule for that week.
Acknowledgements
Available Articles
Grading
Week 1: Introduction: Religion and Art.
Excerpts from The Hunting of the Snark by Lewis Carroll.
"Just the place for a Snark!" the Bellman cried,
As he landed his crew with care;
Supporting each man on the top of the tide
By a finger entwined in his hair.
"Just the place for a Snark! I have said it twice:
That alone should encourage the crew.
Just the place for a Snark! I have said it thrice:
What I tell you three times is true."
…
The Bellman himself they all praised to the skies--
Such a carriage, such ease and such grace!
Such solemnity, too! One could see he was wise,
The moment one looked in his face!
He had bought a large map representing the sea,
Without the least vestige of land:
And the crew were much pleased when they found it to be
A map they could all understand.
…
"Other maps are such shapes, with their islands and capes!
But we've got our brave Captain to thank:
(So the crew would protest) "that he's bought us the best--
A perfect and absolute blank!"
Week 1.
Tuesday 9/1 Classes Begin: Introduction to the course and the class webpage. Procedures and Outcomes, etc.
The Indeterminacy of Art and Religion.
Introductory reading:"Religion and the Arts" by John Hinnells from The Routledge Companion to the Study of Religion.
Thursday 9/3 Another part of the Problem-the Biblical Injunction against the "graven image":
"Judaism and Art" by David Altshuler and Linda Altshuler in Art, Creativity, and the Sacred edited by Diane Apostolos-Cappadona (hereafter ACS), 155-162.
Read Exodus 20.1-17 and
Deuteronomy 5.6-21.
See these links on the texts of the Hebrew and Christian Bibles and on
Jewish History.
Week 2.
Tuesday 9/8 The attraction of idolatry:
"Strategies for Looking" and
"Art, Religion, and the Elite" by Nicholas Wolterstorff ACS, 262-273.
Thursday 9/10 Art and Religion at work—The Church at Assy:
"Artists and Church Commissions" by John Dillenberger ACS, 193-204.
Your first submission of your
class documentation
is due at the end of this week. It should be submitted as an e-mail attachment by Friday afternoon at 4:30 pm at the very latest (earlier is better!).
Week 3. Prof. Rennie will be off-campus at an international Conference on Religion. This is an opportunity to apply some hybrid/online learning
techniques. See this document for detailed instructions.
Tuesday 9/15 The Subtleties and Complexities of Religious Art: “The Seven Functions of the Hands of Christ” by Leo Steinberg and “In Alia Effigie” by Charles Scribner III ACS 37-79.
Thursday 9/17 The Classical Roots of Religious Art—Orthodox Iconography:
Week 4.
"We have sailed many months, we have sailed many weeks,
(Four weeks to the month you may mark),
But never as yet ('tis your Captain who speaks)
Have we caught the least glimpse of a Snark!
"We have sailed many weeks, we have sailed many days,
(Seven days to the week I allow),
But a Snark, on the which we might lovingly gaze,
We have never beheld till now!
Tuesday 9/22 Mircea Eliade on Art, Religion and the Sacred. Read an excerpt from Bryan Rennie's
“Mircea Eliade: The Perception of the Sacred in the Profane, Intention, Reduction, and
Cognitive Theory.” Temenos: Nordic Journal of Comparative Religion 43/1 (2007).
Thursday 9/24 Art and the Church Reconciled?
"The Aesthetic Dimension in Theology" by Thomas Franklin O’Meara ACS 205-218.
Your second submission of your class documentation is due
at the end of this week. Please turn it in by 4:30 pm Friday afternoon at the latest.
Week 5.
Tuesday 9/29 The Renaissance Perspective: “Painting as Theological Thought: The Issues in Tuscan Theology” by John W. Dixon, Jr. ACS 277-296.
Thursday 10/01 Discussion and attempts to apply these ideas to an understanding or religion and the arts.
See the class R:drive for documents on modern art and the "Death of God."
Week 6.
"Come, listen, my men, while I tell you again"
The five unmistakable marks
By which you may know, wheresoever you go,
The warranted genuine Snarks.
"Let us take them in order. The first is the taste,
Which is meager and hollow, but crisp:
Like a coat that is rather too tight in the waist,
With a flavor of Will-o-the-wisp.
Tuesday 10/06 Some attempts to classify religious art—Tillich and Taylor: “Art and Ultimate Reality” by Paul Tillich and “Theological Expressions Through Visual Art Forms” by Doug Adams ACS 219-235 and 311-318.
Thursday 10/08 But how does it all work? “Concerning the Spiritual in Art” by Wassily Kandinski and “The Art of Deception” by Karen Laub-Novak ACS 3-7 and 12-23.
The operation of visual rhetoric.
Your third submission of your class documentation is due tomorrow.
You must also submit a prospectus for your first short research paper by this date. Include it in your Class Documentation.
Week 7.
Tuesday 10/13 “The Religious Impulse in American Art” by Joshua Taylor and “Can Art Fill the Vacuum” by Langdon B. Gilkey ACS 95-104 and 187-192.
Thursday 10/15 Are we getting anywhere yet? “Reflections on Art and the Spirit” by Diane Apostolos-Cappadona and Stephen de Staebler;
“When is Religion Art? When It’s a Jar” by T. R. Martland and “Berdyaev and Rothko: Transformative Visions” by Roger Wedell ACS 24-33; 250-261 and 304-310.
Your first short research paper is due today. (1,000 words.)
Saturday, October 20 - Tuesday, October 23 Fall Break.
Week 8.
"For, although common Snarks do no manner of harm,
Yet, I feel it my duty to say,
Some are Boojums--" The Bellman broke off in alarm,
For the Baker had fainted away.
…
" 'But oh, beamish nephew, beware of the day,
If your Snark be a Boojum! For then
You will softly and suddenly vanish away,
And never be met with again!'
Thursday 10/22 Further Dimensions—Religion and Politics, Sculpture, and Crafts:
“The Nationalist Garden and the Holy Book” by Barbara Novak, ACS 80-94
“George Segal’s Abraham and Isaac” by Jane Dillenberger, ACS 105-124 and
“Craft: Making and Being” by Cecilia Davis Cunningham ACS 8-11.
Week 9.
"I said it in Hebrew--I said it in Dutch--
I said it in German and Greek:
But I wholly forgot (and it vexes me much)
That English is what you speak!"
Tuesday 10/27. Beyond the Western World—Art and Pluralism:
“Theological Reflections on an Image of Woman: Picasso’s Girl before a Mirror” by Melinda Wortz, ACS 297-303.
Thursday 10/29.
“The Origin and Uses of Images in India” by Ananda K. Coomaraswamy, ACS, 127-137.
A brief consideration of Wen—the Chinese Confucians on Art.
Your fourth submission of your class documentation is due tomorow.
Week 10.
Tuesday 11/03. Other Literature and the limitations of the textual understanding—the example of Jain studies
(John Edward Cort, “Art, Religion and Material Culture,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 64 (1996): 613-632).
See "Cort Commentary.doc" on the R: drive and on the Sakai page resources.
Thursday 11/05. Tibetan Buddhism: Art, Dance, and Song as religious observation. The Tibetan Sand Mandala.
Week 11.
Tuesday 11/10 Islamic Art:
“An Islamic Perspective on Symbolism and the Arts” by Lois Ibsen Al-Faruqi ACS 164-178.
Consider the Alhambra.
See also this website on Islamic Art.
Thursday 11/12 More on Islam—Music and Poetry:
“The Place of Music in Quranic Recitation” by Abdurrahmen Cetin, American Journal of Islamic Social Science
16 (Spring 1999): 111-122.
See also this on-line Qur'an.
Week 12.
Tuesday 11/17 Japan:
“Foundations for a Religio-Aesthetic Tradition in Japan” by Richard B. Pilgrim ACS 138-154.
Thursday 11/19 Religious drama—“All the world’s a stage …” (Is the search for the all in the one characteristic of religious art? Consider, for example,
ACS pp. 9, 138 & 208) and classics of religious literature, for example, St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, The Cloud of Unknowing, Julian of
Norwich. Consider also less obviously religious literature: poetry such as Emerson’s “The Poet,” Whitman’s “Song of Myself,” Shelley’s “In Defense of
Poetry.” T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets, which illustrates the theme of the Quest (v. Laub-Novak, ACS 20).
Do not neglect the poetry of the Qur'an, Sufi poetry, and non-Western classics such as the Tao Te Ching as poetry.
Week 13.
Tuesday 11/24 Discussion of Religion, Drama, and Literature.
Your fifth submission of your class documentation
is due today.
You must also submit a prospectus for your second short research paper by this date. Include it with your Class Documentation.
Thanksgiving Break - Wednesday, November 25 to Sunday, November 29.
Week 14.
"'Tis a pitiful tale," said the Bellman, whose face
Had grown longer at every word:
"But, now that you've stated the whole of your case,
More debate would be simply absurd.
"The rest of my speech" (he explained to his men)
"You shall hear when I've leisure to speak it.
But the Snark is at hand, let me tell you again!
'Tis your glorious duty to seek it!
Tuesday 12/01 Some more theoretical considerations: “The Sacred and the Modern Artist” by Mircea Eliade ACS 179-183 and
“What the Symbols Reveal” by Mircea
Eliade, from The Two and the One, 201-211.
Thursday 12/03 Student Exhibitions.
Your second short research paper is due today. (1,500 words.)
Week 15.
They sought it with thimbles, they sought it with care;
They pursued it with forks and hope;
They threatened its life with a railway-share;
They charmed it with smiles and soap.
Tuesday 12/08 Student Exhibitions.
Thursday 12/10 Last Class!! Student Exhibitions.
Your sixth and last submission of your individual
class documentations is due tomorrow.
The final REsubmission including all of
your documentations is due in by the time of our final examination period (Friday December 18th by 10:30).
"Leave him here to his fate--it is getting so late!"
The Bellman exclaimed in a fright.
"We have lost half the day. Any further delay,
And we sha'nt catch a Snark before night!"
Week 16.
Tuesday, 12/15 is reading day.
Finals period, Wednesday 12/16 to Friday 12/18.
Term ends Saturday December 19th.
"It's a Snark!" was the sound that first came to their ears,
And seemed almost too good to be true.
Then followed a torrent of laughter and cheers:
Then the ominous words "It's a Boo-"
In the midst of the word he was trying to say,
In the midst of his laughter and glee,
He had softly and suddenly vanished away---
For the Snark was a Boojum, you see.
brennie@westminster.edu
