RELG 341 Israelite Wisdom Literature
Professor: Carl Evans
tel: 777-4522
email: evans-carl@sc.edu
Rutledge 327
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Summer I
MTWT
HU 314 .
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Course description
This course is designed to acquaint the student with the wisdom literature found in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament and the Apocrypha. Primary emphasis will be given to Job and Qoheleth (Ecclesiastes). Aspects of Proverbs, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), and the Wisdom of Solomon will also be studied. Attention will be given to the theological significance of these wisdom texts and their relationship to analogous works in the ancient Near Eastern world.
The course will explore the problems which preoccupied the sages who created this literature: what it means to be wise, the enigma of undeserved suffering, the inequities of life, the finality of death, etc. The course will demonstrate that the thought world of the sages, as reflected in their views on these problems, was often at variance with what can be found elsewhere in the Bible. Thus, a further concern of the course is to locate the wisdom tradition within the intellectual currents of ancient Israelite thought.
Course requirements: Five page papers on Job and one of the other wisdom books (30 % each); a final essay exam (30%); and class participation (10%).
Textbooks:
Perdue, Leo G. Wisdom Literature: A Theological Survey. Louisville, Ky: Westminster John Knox, 2007.
A good study Bible that includes the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical books. The following is recommended: The HarperCollins Study Bible, Revised Edition (New Revised Standard Version; New York: HarperCollins, 2006)
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