Winter 2020/Online
HT500
Song
HT500: THE CHURCH’S UNDERSTANDING OF GOD AND CHRIST IN ITS HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT (4 Units: 160 hours). Inseo Song.
DESCRIPTION: HT500 is a survey of patristic theology and early church history that focuses especially on the doctrine of God, including the Christian church’s development of trinitarian and christological theology and creeds in its dialogue with its opponents and with its multiple cultural contexts, including the empires, languages, religions, and philosophies of the ancient Asian, African and European regions. Related topics and themes to be addressed may include the role of the apostolic fathers and apologists, the controversy with Gnosticism, tensions between Eastern and Western forms of Christianity, and selected doctrinal developments that extend through the Protestant Reformation to today.
LEARNING OUTCOMES: Students who complete HT500 will demonstrate: (1) a basic historical and theological knowledge of the doctrines of God and Christ as those and other selected doctrines emerged in the early church and developed to this day; (2) a basic competence in interpreting this history and theology and an ability to evaluate these theological issues and their historical development; and (3) a critical and sympathetic appreciation for the breadth, unity, and diversity of the Christian church.
RELATIONSHIP TO PROGRAM LEARNING OUTCOMES: HT500 introduces students to a basic historical and theological knowledge of the doctrines of God and Christ (inter alia) as these doctrines and associated practices developed especially in the early church, with an eye to developing skills in interpretation and critical appreciation; it thereby seeks to implement the SOT PLO, “Students will have demonstrated capacities for historically informed theological and ethical reflection.”
COURSE FORMAT: This course will be conducted online on a ten-week schedule aligned with Fuller’s academic calendar for a total of 40 instructional hours. Students are required to interact with the material, with each other, and with the instructor regularly through online discussions, reading, and other assignments that promote active learning.
REQUIRED READING: 1300total number of pages required.
Norris, R. A., ed. The Christological Controversy. Fortress Press, 1980. ISBN: 978-0800614119, Pub. Price $24.00. Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [140 pp. assigned].
González, Justo L. The Story of Christianity, vol. 1: The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation, 2nd. Ed. Harper One, 2010. ISBN: 978-0061855887, Pub. Price $27.99 [220 pp. assigned].
Gonzalez, Justo. L. A History of Christian Thought, vol. 1: From the Beginnings to the Council of Chalcedon, revised edition. Abingdon Press, 1987. ISBN: 978-0687171828, Pub. Price $34.99. Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [380 pp. assigned].
Richardson, Cyril C., ed. Early Christian Fathers. Touchstone/Simon & Schuster, 1995. ISBN: 978-0684829517, Pub. Price $18.00 or free PDF at https://archive.org/details/LCC1_ECF [164 pp. assigned].
Elizabeth A. Clark., ed. Women in the Early Church. The Liturgical Press, 1983. ISBN: 978-0814653326, Pub. Price $29.95 [100 pp. assigned].
Available on Canvas or eReserves: [app. 300 pp.].
“The Hymn of the Pearl,” from the (Gnostic) Acts of Thomas, in Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles, ed. William Wright, (London, 1871) [pp. 238-45].
“The Apocalypse of Peter,” in The Nag Hammadi Library, ed. James M. Robinson (Harper & Row, 1988) [372-78].
Various excerpts from Arius et al., in Christology of the Later Fathers, ed. Edward R. Hardy (Westminster, 1954) [329-54, 375-85].
Athanasius, “On the Incarnation of the Word” §§1-25 & 41-57, in NPNF2 [4:36-50, 58-67].
Theodore of Mopsuestia, “Fifth Lecture on the Nicene Creed,” in The Commentary of Theodore of Mopsuestia on the Nicene Creed, ed. A. Mingana (Cambridge: W. Heffer & Sons, 1932), 54-61.
Gregory of Nazianzus, “Third Theological Oration: On the Son” and “Epistle 101, To Cledonius Against Apollinaris,” in NPNF2 [7:301-9, 439-43].
Gregory of Nyssa, “To Ablabius, on Not Three Gods,” in NPNF2 [5:331-36].
John of Damascus, On Holy Images, trans. Mary H. Allies (London: Thomas Baker, 1898) [87-115].
Scott W. Sunquist, “Ancient and Eastern Christianity: Syria, Persia, Central Asia, and India,” in The Blackwell Companion to World Christianity, ed. Lamin Sanneh (Blackwell, forthcoming) [1-19].
Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen, “Is the Spirit Still the Dividing Line Between the Christian East and West?” in Perichoresis: The Theological Journal of Emanuel University of Oradea 9/2 (2011) [125-42].
Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen, “The Chalcedonian Tradition,” “Atonement Traditions” and “Violence, Cross, and Atonement,” in Christ and Reconciliation (Eerdmans, 2013) [106-18, 294-314, 315-23].
Introduction to Anselm, Introduction to Theologians of the Twelfth Century, and Abelard on Rom.3: 19-26; in A Scholastic Miscellany: Anselm to Ockham, ed. Eugene R. Fairweather (Westminster John Knox, 1956) [47-62, 219-32, 276-87].
Anselm, “Cur Deus Homo,” in Complete Philosophical and Theological Treatises of Anselm of Canterbury, trans. Jasper Hopkins and Herbert Richardson (Minneapolis: The Arthur J. Banning Press, 2000) [296-389]. Free PDF may be downloaded at http://www.jasper-hopkins.info/CurDeusI.pdf and http://www.jasper-hopkins.info/CurDeusII.pdf
Joel B. Green, ed., “No Cross, No Christianity,” Fuller: Theology, News & Notes 59/2 (Fall 2012): 3-29; available online at http://cms.fuller.edu/TNN/Issues/Fall_2012/Fall_2012/ (the six featured articles)
Fred Sanders, “What Trinitarian Theology Is For: Placing the Doctrine of the Trinity in Christian Theology and Life,” in Advancing Trinitarian Theology: Explorations in Constructive Dogmatics, ed. Oliver D. Crisp and Fred Sanders (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2014) [21-41].
RECOMMENDED READING:
Cross, F. L. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Third Edition. Oxford University Press, 2005. ISBN: 978-0192802903, Pub. Price $215.00.
Di Berardino, Angelo. Encyclopedia of the Early Church. 2 vols. Oxford University Press, 1992. ISBN: 978-0195208924, Out of Print.
González, Justo L. A History of Christian Thought. Abingdon, 2014. ISBN: 978-1426757778, Pub. Price $49.99.
Kelly, J. N. D. Early Christian Doctrines. HarperOne, 1978. ISBN: 978-0060643348, Pub. Price $17.99.
Muller, Richard A. Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms. Baker Book House, 2006. ISBN: 978-0801020643, Pub. Price $32.00.
Pelikan, J. The Christian Tradition, Vol. 1: Emergence of Catholic Tradition (100-600). University of Chicago Press, 1975. ISBN: 978-0226653716, Pub. Price $25.00.
Placher, William C. A History of Christian Theology. 2nd ed. Westminster John Knox Press, 2013. ISBN: 978-0664239350, Pub. Price $35.00.
Seeberg, Reinhold. The History of Doctrines. TheClassics.us, 2013. ISBN: 978-1230466910, Out of Print, available at http://archive.org/details/cu31924029300064
Young, Frances M. From Nicaea to Chalcedon. 2nd edition. Baker Academic, 2010. ISBN: 978-0801039157, Pub. Price $40.00.
ASSIGNMENTS AND ASSESSMENT
PREREQUISITES: None.
RELATIONSHIP TO CURRICULUM: Option to meet the TH1 or TH4 requirement in the 120 MDiv and 80 MAT Programs (Fall 2015). Option to meet the TH1 requirement in the 80 MATM and 80 MAICS Programs (Fall 2015). Meets the CHA requirement in the 144 MDiv program.
FINAL EXAMINATION: Yes.
NOTE: This ECD is a reliable guide to the course design but is subject to modification. Textbook prices are set by publishers and are subject to change. Copyright 2019 Fuller Theological Seminary.