Saints And Sinners In Jewish Literature

Catalog description

In this class we will spend time considering modern Jewish fiction through highly specialized lenses. "Saints and Sinners" as categories could apply to the characters in our novels and stories this semester, suggesting people who do right or wrong, either to the world around them or to themselves. We might open our categories to include notions of the "saintly," the good, the perfect, and notions of the "sinful," the wrong-headed, the evil, as they apply to world events, world views, worldly pursuits. We will discuss the specific ways Jewishness informs our perception of the good and the evil, especially with respect to Biblical precedent, Jewish law, and a contemporary ethical sensibility.