DESCRIPTION:

The course focuses on the Pentateuch (Genesis--Deuteronomy) and its interpretation in the context of the Church in mission. This focus entails attention to the content of the Pentateuch itself, its historical-cultural context, questions of interpretive method, and questions of contemporary application. The course is designed to help students acquire tools necessary for an ongoing disciplined reading of the Pentateuch: an understanding of and commitment to this reading, an awareness of fundamental issues in the Pentateuch, a sense of the contributions and limitations of various critical methods, and of the challenge of reading and application in pre-modern, modern, and post-modern contexts.

Our ministries both feed off and reveal who we believe God and human beings are, what we believe a good church or a good society might look like, etc. Scripture takes these beliefs to be at best a first approximation: we see through a glass, darkly. The Chilean Segundo Galilea puts it this way: "Knowledge of and conversion to the God of the Gospels is a lifelong task, for everyone. Spirituality is the gradual conversion to the God of Jesus." A disciplined reading of Scripture in the context of ministry is a part of this process of conversion.

The course will meet twice weekly for two-hour sessions for lecture and discussion.

Briend, Jacques. El Pentateuco. Cuadernos bíblicos 13. Estella (Navarra): Editorial Verbo Divino, 1983.

DeWit, Hans. En la dispersión el texto es patria. San José: Universidad Bíblica Latinoamericana, 2002.

LaSor, W. S., , D. A. Hubbard, and F. W. Bush. Panorama del Antiguo Testamento. Grand Rapids: Libros Desafío, 1996.

Pritchard, J. B. The Ancient Near East: An Anthology of Texts and Pictures. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1958.

Rad, Gerhard von. Teología del Antiguo Testamento, I: Teología de la tradiciones históricas de Israel. Biblioteca de estudios bíblicos 11. Salamanca: Ediciones Sígueme, 1969.

Blenkinsopp, Joseph. El Pentateuco. Estella (Navarra): Editorial Verbo Divino, 1999.

Fewell, D. N. and D. M. Gunn. Gender, Power, and Promise: The Subject of the Bible's First Story. Nashville: Abingdon, 1993.

Lohfink , Norbert F. Option for the Poor: The Basic Principle of Liberation Theology in the Light of the Bible. Berkeley Lecture Series 1. 2nd ed. D & F Scott Pub., 1996.

Mann, Thomas. The Book of the Torah: The Narrative Integrity of the Pentateuch. Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1988.

The assignments for the course include (1) reading the Pentateuch and the other required reading (5%); (2) participation in class discussion (15%); (3) a final exam (40%); (4) a 20-page paper (40%).

Spanish.

Meets M.Div. core requirement in Old Testament "a" (OTA).