TTh4, BIO-205, DC

James T. Johnson

Loree 102, DC; 932-9637; jtj@rci.rutgers.edu

Shape of the course: This course is concerned with how love, as a theological idea and as the source of a religious ethic, has developed in western religious tradition from biblical Israel and classical Greece to the present, with emphasis on Christian thought and western culture as influenced by it. We will examine the ethic and idea of love in five historical periods (Parts I-V below) to try to understand how love was conceived and what influence on conduct this implied in each period.

There will be three tests in the form of what I call "directed papers": writing assignments on the ideas covered in the readings and class lectures. You will get the assignment for the first paper on Tuesday, February 25, write it at home, and turn it in on March 4. The second assignment will be made on April 3 and will be due on April 10. The final paper assignment will be given out the last class day, May 1; it is due on the day the exam for this course is scheduled: Tuesday, May 13, 8-11 AM. These three papers will be weighted equally and will count for 90% of the grade in the course.

In addition, on each day of class after the first day there will be a brief, short-answer quiz on the readings assigned for that day. This will make 24 such quizzes in all. Only the top 20 grades will be counted. These will account for 10% of the final grade for the course.

Office hours: Thursday 9:00 AM-12:00 noon or by arrangement.

Readings for the course: You should buy the following books, which have been ordered at the Douglass-Cook Student Cooperative Bookstore and at the University Bookstore in Ferren Mall:

Bonaventure, The Journey of the Mind to God

Andreas Capellanus, The Art of Courtly Love

In addition, you should buy a coursepak at the DC Co-Op (it is not available at the Ferren mall bookstore) which contains all the selections we will read from Anders Nygren's Agape and Eros plus some other readings, and for the first part of the course you will need access to a Bible (both Old and New Testaments). The rest of the readings for the course (marked R below) are on reserve at the Douglass Library. A copy of the reserve list is attached.

Part I: Love in the Ancient World

1/21: First day of class. Orientation to the course. Forms of love in the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible. Read: Selections as given in class.

1/23: Forms of love in classical Greece. Read: Nygren, Agape and Eros, Part One, Chapter Two.

1/28: Forms of love in the New Testament. Read: Nygren, Part One, Chapter One; NT selections as given in class.

1/30: An application: the development of the Christian idea of the Trinity and God's love. Battenhouse, A Companion to the Study of St. Augustine (R), 235-56.

Part II: Love in the Middle Ages

2/4-2/11: Augustine on the caritas-synthesis. Read: Nygren, Part Two, II, Chapter Two, II-IV; Augustine, On Christian Doctrine (R), Book I. No class Thursday 2/6.

2/13-2/18: The love idea and the mystical tradition. Read: Bernard of Clairvaux, On the Love of God, in Petry (ed.) Late Medieval Mysticism (R) and Bonaventure, The Journey of the Mind to God.

2/20-2/25: Courtly love. Read: Andreas Capellanus, The Art of Courtly Love; D. de Rougemont, Love in the Western World, II, sections 6-14 (R).

First directed paper assigned 2/25, due 3/4. No class Thursday 2/27. Work on your papers.

3/4-3/6: Ethical applications of the love idea.

1) Love and the other virtues in Thomas Aquinas. Read: chart on the virtues to be distributed.

2) Marriage: mutual love as an excuse and remedy for sin.

Read: Ramsey, "Human Sexuality in the History of Redemption" (coursepak)

Part III: Love in the Renaissance-Reformation Era

3/11: Love in Renaissance humanism: the rebirth of eros. Read: Nygren, Part Two, III, Chapter Five, I-III.

3/13--3/25: Luther's rejection of the caritas idea. Read: Nygren, Part Two, III, Chapter Six, I-IV.

There will be no classes on 3/18 and 3/20 due to Spring Break.

No class Thursday 3/27.

4/1-4/3: An ethical application: the changing idea of love in Christian marriage doctrine. Read: Johnson, A Society Ordained by God, Chapter V (R).

Second directed paper assigned 4/3, due 4/10.

Part IV: Love in the Romantic Era

4/8-4/10: Romantic love in literature, politics, and marriage. Read: Rougemont, IV, sections 15-21; V, section 11; VI. (R)

4/15-4/17: The romantic ideal and liberal theology; the romantic Jesus; the Social Gospel. Read: selections from Schleiermacher, Drummond, and Rauschenbusch (coursepak).

Part V: Love in Contemporary Thought

4/22-4/24: Catholic thought: Augustinian and Thomistic influences. Read: Häring, The Law of Christ, vol 2, 83-107 (R).

4/29-5/1: Protestant thought: extending an individual ethic of love to a social ethic. Read: Niebuhr, An Interpretation of Christian Ethics, chapters 2, 4, 5 (R); Ramsey, Basic Christian Ethics, Chapter VII (R); P. N. Williams, "Love and Justice in Martin Luther King, Jr.," The Journal of Religious Ethics 18/2 (Fall 1990), 15-32 (R).

5/1 is the last day of class for this course. The assignment for the final directed paper will be given out then. The paper is due during the final exam period for this course, Tuesday, May 13, 8-11 AM in the Department of Religion office in Loree.