Religious Studies 3MM3 (Fall 2002): Skepticism, Atheism, and Religious Faith (Hollander)

SYLLABUS-IN-PROGRESS

Religious Studies 3MM3 (Fall 2002)

Skepticism, Atheism, and Religious Faith

Final Exam Preparation Sheet has been posted. Final Exam/Review Session scheduling information below.

updated November 27, 2002

Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834)

This on-line syllabus is posted at http://socserv.mcmaster.ca/danahol/3mm3 and can also be accessed by way of my home page http://univmail.cis.mcmaster.ca/~danahol. (You can also reach these pages by way of the Religious Studies Department website.) It will be updated periodically (check the date above). Please be sure to consult it regularly during the semester, as it will be subject to change from week to week.

CLASS MEETINGS: Wednesday and Friday, 12:30-1:20 p.m., CNH 102

Tutorial T01 (Neufeld): Friday 10:30-11:20 a.m., JHE 329

Tutorial T02 (Hollander): Wednesday 3:30-4:20 p.m., GS 219

INSTRUCTOR:

Dana Hollander
Department of Religious Studies
University Hall 109
(905) 525-9140, ext. 24759*
danahol@mcmaster.ca*

*in your phone and e-mail messages, please let me know how I can reach you by phone

http://univmail.cis.mcmaster.ca/~danahol/

Office Hours: Monday, 2-3 p.m., or e-mail for an appointment

TEACHING ASSISTANT:

Justin Neufeld
Department of Religious Studies
University Hall 104
neufelja@mcmaster.ca

Office Hours/Location: Wednesday 1:30-2:30 p.m., University Hall B127

Course Description / Course Requirements

SCHEDULE: September / October / November

Course Description

This course traces a trajectory through the history of modern thought of different conceptions of God and religion. We begin with two early modern philosophers (Descartes, Hume) for whom the project of thinking about God is directly related to questions concerning the nature of knowledge, and to confronting the challenge of skepticism; and then look at some decisive breaks with that tradition: the binding of religion to moral questions (Kant) and the determination of religion apart from knowledge of God or moral knowledge as "feeling" (Schleiermacher). The course concludes with two 20th-century thinkers who regard religion as an experience wholly unlike knowledge, and instead as a kind of relation (Buber) or as connected to ethics in a new (non-Kantian) sense (Levinas).

Course Readings

You can generally obtain these in a number of ways - see details for each title on the syllabus.

Books for this course have been ordered with Titles (visit the "Tank": TSH B203)
All the readings are also on reserve at Mills Library. Check on the status of a title via the MORRIS online catalogue, or look up the reserve list for the class at one of the MORRIS stations in the library.
A coursepack containing the Kant readings, two essays by Buber, and all the Levinas readings is available at Titles. Note: Since it is much cheaper to make personal copies of these readings from the books on reserve than to buy the coursepack (whose price includes a hefty copyright fee that the bookstore is obliged to pay), only a limited number of coursepacks has been ordered in advance; if they are no longer in stock, you can order one on a "raincheck" basis.

At times you may be asked to consult or make your own copy from a book on reserve.

You must have your own copy of all the texts to be discussed, whether in book or xeroxed form, and be prepared to refer to them in class.

Course Requirements

Take-Home Quizzes on the reading will be assigned more or less every week and must be handed in at the end of the class session (no late submissions will be accepted). Their purpose is to encourage you to read carefully and reflect on issues that come up in the reading, so that you are in a position to participate knowledgeably and actively in class. These assignments are ungraded; a certain number will be selected at random each week to receive detailed feedback. You can expect to receive feedback on at least two quizzes in the course of the semester. Your overall grade for the quizzes will be based on whether you completed all of them and on the quality of the two that have been selected to read. Please keep all the quizzes that are returned to you--with or without comments--for your reference and in case we ask to see them again later in the term.

In preparing this and other written assignments, you are encouraged to use the resources of the Writing Clinic on campus.

Attendance and Participation. Participation includes: reading the material carefully and raising questions about it in class, taking part in in-class group assignments, communicating with us outside of class, etc. (If you need to be absent from a class session, please notify your tutorial leader, preferably by e-mail, and be sure to ask one of your classmates to fill you in on what you missed.)

Midterm Exam

Final Exam

Grades are based on Take-Home Quizzes (25%), Participation (15%), Midterm Exam (25%), Final Exam (35%).

McMaster University has a strict policy concerning Academic Dishonesty. Please familiarize yourself with the Statement on Academic Ethics and the Senate Resolutions on Academic Dishonesty.

You are advised to retain copies of any written work you submit for this class, and all your research notes, until you have received an official grade.

September 6

INTRODUCTION

September 11-20

DESCARTES: Skepticism and the Existence of God I

SEPTEMBER 11

René Descartes, Discourse on Method (1637) parts 1-4; Meditations on First Philosophy (1641) 1-2 [book available for purchase/on reserve]

SEPTEMBER 13

Discourse; Meditations 1-2, cont'd

Take-Home Quiz 1 due in class.

SEPTEMBER 18

Meditations 1-2, cont'd

SEPTEMBER 20

Meditations 2-3

SEPTEMBER 25

Meditation 3

Take-Home Quiz 2 due in class.

SEPTEMBER 27

Meditation 5

Supplementary: Bernard Williams, chap. 5 ("God") of Descartes: The Project of Pure Enquiry (1978) [book on reserve]

October 2-18

HUME: Skepticism and the Existence of God II

OCTOBER 2-9

David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (1779) [book available for purchase/on reserve], "Pamphilus to Hermippus"; Parts I and II

Take-Home Quiz 3 due in class

OCTOBER 11-18

Hume, Dialogues, Parts III-V

NOTE: Tutorials on October 9 and 11 are cancelled.

October 23-25

KANT: Religion and Morality

Immanuel Kant, selection from Critique of Practical Reason (1788), trans. Mary Gregor [included in coursepack; or copy from Practical Philosophy on reserve: pp. 236-55]. See German edition here.

Removed from schedule: Kant, "The End of All Things" (1794) [in coursepack; or read in Kant, Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason and Other Writings [book available for purchase/on reserve]. See facsimile of German original edition here.

Supplementary: Emil Fackenheim, "Kant's Philosophy of Religion" (1985) in The God Within [book on reserve]

OCTOBER 23

read closely Part III ("On the Primacy of Pure Practical Reason") and Part IV ("The Immortality of the Soul as a Postulate of Pure Practical Reason"); begin reading Part V ("The Existence of God as a Postulate of Pure Practical Reason")

October 24 - Midterm Exam Preparation Sheet posted here.

OCTOBER 25

read closely Part V

Take-Home Quiz 4 due in class today.

MIDTERM EXAM

OCTOBER 30 - In-Class Midterm Exam, Part I (Short Answer, 30 min.)

Remainder of class period may be used as optional drop-in review session for Part II of the exam.

NOVEMBER 1 - In-Class Midterm Exam, Part II (Essay, 50 min.)

November 6-13

SCHLEIERMACHER: Religion as "Feeling"

NOVEMBER 6

Friedrich Schleiermacher, On Religion. Speeches to its Cultured Despisers (first edition, 1799), trans. Richard Crouter [book available for purchase/on reserve; or access image/PDF file here]: First Speech, Second Speech to p. 23.

Take-Home Quiz 5 due November 6 or November 8.

Supplementary:

Richard Crouter, "Introduction" to Schleiermacher, On Religion [book available for purchase/on reserve; or access image/PDF file here]
Rudolf Otto, "Introduction" (1899) to Schleiermacher, On Religion, trans. John Oman [book to be placed on reserve]

NOVEMBER 8

Schleiermacher, Second Speech, cont'd

NOVEMBER 13

Schleiermacher, Second Speech, cont'd, and Fourth Speech, pp. 72-79 top.

NOVEMBER 15-29

BUBER: Religion and Dialogue

NOVEMBER 15

finish discussion of Schleiermacher, Fourth Speech, pp. 72-79 top.

Martin Buber, I and Thou (1923) [book available for purchase/on reserve]: First Part: all (but skim 67-73); Second Part, pp. 100-110

Supplementary: Tamra Wright, "Buber, Martin." Article in Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (1998) [online edition available as a Citrix database to library patrons; also in the Reference Section of Mills Library]

NOVEMBER 20

I and Thou, First Part: all (but skim 67-73); Second Part, pp. 100-110; Third Part: all (but skim 131-43)

Take-Home Quiz 6 (revised 11/16) due November 20 or November 22.

NOVEMBER 22-27

I and Thou, Third Part, cont'd

November 27 - Final Exam Preparation Sheet posted here.

NOVEMBER 29

"Religion and Philosophy" from Eclipse of God (1952) [book available for purchase/on reserve/essay in coursepack]

see also my list of Errata for this translation

Removed from Schedule: LEVINAS: Ethics of Alterity

Emmanuel Levinas, "Philosophy and the Idea of the Infinite" (1957), in Adriaan Peperzak, To the Other [book available for purchase/on reserve/essay in coursepack]; "Revelation in the Jewish Tradition" (1977) in Beyond the Verse [book on reserve/essay in coursepack]

Supplementary: Levinas essays on Buber (TBA)