Cultural literacy course focusing on the Qu'ran and/or other non-western sacred texts?

[KarenNC]

I posted earlier looking for information on sacred texts as literature, but have realized (with help from other posters) that I'm really looking for something that approaches the Qu'ran and other non-Western sacred texts from a cultural literacy standpoint. I have found a book that addresses the Tanakh and the Christian Bible in terms of understanding the cultural allusions to it---the text itself plus its influence on art, architecture, literature, etc (The Bible and Its Influence). I'd like to find something similar addressing other sacred texts so that we can become more aware of the allusions to those in world literature/art/etc as we move toward studying these in high school and beyond.

 

Any suggestions? Regardless of one's religious affiliation (or lack thereof), I strongly feel that one must be well-versed in three areas to be truly literate in Western terms---the Bible, Shakespeare, and Classical mythology. Without a reasonable knowledge of all three, much of the meaning and symbolism will simply be missed. We're starting with that as a basis this summer and in the coming year. I'm looking to follow that study up with something that will help at that level with other sacred texts, if that makes sense. My own knowledge of non-Western texts is somewhat limited, which is hampering my attempts to recognize good resources, I'm afraid. This will likely be for 9th grade, with a very strong reader.

[Ummto4]

Do you want a survey-type of course or more in-depth one ? Thing is, non-Western civilization encompasses a lot of civilization - Indian subcontinent, African , middle eastern, oriental (Chinese, Japanese), etc.

 

Also, are you looking for Eastern wisdom/way of thinking kind of course or more of literature course ?

[KarenNC]

Do you want a survey-type of course or more in-depth one ? Thing is, non-Western civilization encompasses a lot of civilization - Indian subcontinent, African , middle eastern, oriental (Chinese, Japanese), etc.

 

Also, are you looking for Eastern wisdom/way of thinking kind of course or more of literature course ?

 

 

See, I'm having trouble pinning down a precise term. It's more of a "spot the sacred reference" type of thing, if that makes any sense. Ultimately, I want my daughter to be able to pick up on allusions to various sacred texts in world art and literature so that she will get more of the message the author or artist intended to convey. I know we won't be able to achieve that fully without being immersed in a particular culture, but some familiarity would be great.

 

I realize that non-Western covers a *lot* of ground and each text crosses multiple cultures. I'm prepared for this to be a multi-year endeavor and to either deal with the religions sequentially or use a survey course as a jumping off point. Right now we are working through Classical mythology with the Vandiver lectures from the Teaching Company (having already established a base of comfort with the myths, I wanted to go deeper), we'll pick up basic general comparative mythology through online material from Georgia Virtual Learning this summer, and then dive deeper into Jewish and Christian texts using "The Bible and Its Influence" (www.bibleliteracy.org), followed up by or concurrent with Windows to the World for beginning literary analysis and a specific focus on Biblical allusions. Since we go year-round, I hope to have all that finished in time to start 9th grade.

 

I would love to focus next (so, probably 9th grade) either on Islam (due to its place on the world stage) or Shinto/Buddhism (due to her fascination with anime and manga). In further searching, I've found Kathleen Kuiper's "Islamic Art, Literature, and Culture (The Islamic World)" that I may be able to combine with "Approaching the Qur'an: the early revelations" by Michael Sells (includes a cd of Qur'anic reciters), which we already have from a brief course I took long ago. I am hoping, however, that there's something out there which does the combining and distilling to a high school level for me ;) in a fashion similar to "The Bible and Its Influence" because I just don't have the background with non-Western religions that I do with Western ones and Classical mythology. We do have some books with background on symbolism in manga and anime, but I'm not sure they approach it precisely as I'd like to do. I'm continuing to search and these discussions are helping me refine my search terms.

[Nicole M]

We're enjoying Huston Smith's Illustrated World Religions book. It's very general, but a good starting point, in the same way that The Bible and It's Influence is a good starting point. Huston Smith also has a world religions book that has a workbook that you can use along with -- not sure whether that interests you. I've also found that the introduction to our older, out of print Islamic Folk Tales book is helpful and interesting, as are the folk tales themselves.

 

I also picked up quite a terrible standard high school world literature text, and while it is, truly, pretty terrible, they did have some good people (if too many) working on that text. So I've found that the excerpts point me to full texts or to poems, novelists, playwrights, essayist, I would not have known about and can look up. Very helpful for general cultural literacy.

[Ummto4]

Mahabarata, Ramayana, and Bhagavadgita (part of Mahabarata) are what I suggest your children to be sort of familiar with. Lots of symbolism and eastern wisdom there, and they're v. famous - even outside the Indian subcontinent. Lots of Indian merchants interacted with Indo-Malaysian/South East Asian people and brought HIndu and Buddhist influence there. I am not Indian (am from Indonesia) , but was brought up with these stories and talked about them like the western children talk about Greek/Roman mythology and the Bible. YOu can even watch the series in youtube.

 

Also, all muslim children would be familiar with the biography of prophet Muhammad, his companions (males and females), and some prominent muslims of later time.

 

Other work you want to cover are Arabian night stories and some poetry from the middle east - Rumi, or Khalil Gibran. If you manage to get the work of some middle eastern muslim authors from the golden age of Islam (circa 800-1400) - not necessarily literatures per se, but could be history a philosophy book,s you'll find that they refer to muslim tradition and Quran, like: books by Averoes/ibn Rushdi (philosopher), Ibn Khaldun (historian/sociolgist), and Ghazali (philosopher, a sufi). Muh. Ghazali, in particular, is v. influential.

 

This is from: http://plato.stanfor...ies/al-ghazali/

 

"Al-Ghazâlî (c.1055–1111) was one of the most prominent and influential philosophers, theologians, jurists, and mystics of Sunni Islam. He was active at a time when Sunni theology had just passed through its consolidation and entered a period of intense challenges from Shiite Ismâ’îlite theology and the Arabic tradition of Aristotelian philosophy (falsafa). Al-Ghazâlî understood the importance of falsafa and developed a complex response that rejected and condemned some of its teachings, while it also allowed him to accept and apply others. Al-Ghazâlî's critique of twenty positions of falsafa in his Incoherence of the Philosophers (Tahâfut al-falâsifa) is a significant landmark in the history of philosophy as it advances the nominalist critique of Aristotelian science developed later in 14th century Europe. On the Arabic and Muslim side al-Ghazâlî's acceptance of demonstration (apodeixis) led to a much more refined and precise discourse on epistemology and a flowering of Aristotelian logics and metaphysics. With al-Ghazâlî begins the successful introduction of Aristotelianism or rather Avicennism into Muslim theology. After a period of appropriation of the Greek sciences in the translation movement from Greek into Arabic and the writings of the falâsifa up to Avicenna (Ibn Sînâ, c.980–1037), philosophy and the Greek sciences were “naturalized†into the discourse of kalâm and Muslim theology (Sabra 1987). Al-Ghazâlî's approach to resolving apparent contradictions between reason and revelation was accepted by almost all later Muslim theologians and had, via the works of Averroes (Ibn Rushd, 1126–98) and Jewish authors a significant influence on Latin medieval thinking."

 

FOr Quran translation and explanation, I love Yahiya Emerick's work. He has one complete Quran translation and explanation for children, and a couple for adults. Just type in his name in amazon.

 

HTH.

[Ummto4]

 

I would love to focus next (so, probably 9th grade) either on Islam (due to its place on the world stage) or Shinto/Buddhism (due to her fascination with anime and manga). In further searching, I've found Kathleen Kuiper's "Islamic Art, Literature, and Culture (The Islamic World)" that I may be able to combine with "Approaching the Qur'an: the early revelations" by Michael Sells (includes a cd of Qur'anic reciters), which we already have from a brief course I took long ago. I am hoping, however, that there's something out there which does the combining and distilling to a high school level for me ;) in a fashion similar to "The Bible and Its Influence" because I just don't have the background with non-Western religions that I do with Western ones and Classical mythology. We do have some books with background on symbolism in manga and anime, but I'm not sure they approach it precisely as I'd like to do. I'm continuing to search and these discussions are helping me refine my search terms.

 

 

RE: Islamic art.

At some point, you'll encounter sufi aft/drawing which looks pretty different from other kind of Islamic art because the sufis incorporate animal/human in their drawing, whereas other classical Islamic arts avoid humans/animals and focus on geometry. At this point, you can enrich the lesson by studying what sufism/Islamic mystic is.

[KarenNC]

We're enjoying Huston Smith's Illustrated World Religions book. It's very general, but a good starting point, in the same way that The Bible and It's Influence is a good starting point. Huston Smith also has a world religions book that has a workbook that you can use along with -- not sure whether that interests you. I've also found that the introduction to our older, out of print Islamic Folk Tales book is helpful and interesting, as are the folk tales themselves.

 

I also picked up quite a terrible standard high school world literature text, and while it is, truly, pretty terrible, they did have some good people (if too many) working on that text. So I've found that the excerpts point me to full texts or to poems, novelists, playwrights, essayist, I would not have known about and can look up. Very helpful for general cultural literacy.

 

Thanks, I'll check it out. It looks like the Bedford Anthology of World Literature may also give me a jumping off point for some areas. It may be harder to find exactly what I'm looking for in Shinto, Buddhism, etc since they don't have specific sacred texts considered orthodox, as I understand it.

 

I may have found a resource for Islam, though not a full course--"The Story of the Qur'an: its history and place in Muslim life" by Ingrid Matteson. The 2013 edition (came out in February) is supposed to have a website with student resources, but I'm having trouble finding the additional resources. It's possible they don't have it fully running yet.

 

For Shinto/Buddhist references in anime, it looks like The Anime Companion and The Anime Companion 2 may be a decent resource and a jumping off point to look for other resources. A new book, "Drawing on Tradition: Manga, Anime and Religion in Contemporary Japan" by Thomas http://www.uhpress.hawaii.edu/p-8763-9780824836542.aspx also looks interesting as a resource. I'd love to get a look at the syllabus for the following course at Harvard Divinity School http://www.hds.harvard.edu/academics/courses/course-detail.cfm?CrsNumber=3226&section=01&term=Fall&year=2012 . My minister is an alumna, maybe she can get me a look at it :001_smile: . I'd really like to see the sources they are using.

[KarenNC]

Mahabarata, Ramayana, and Bhagavadgita (part of Mahabarata) are what I suggest your children to be sort of familiar with. Lots of symbolism and eastern wisdom there, and they're v. famous - even outside the Indian subcontinent. Lots of Indian merchants interacted with Indo-Malaysian/South East Asian people and brought HIndu and Buddhist influence there. I am not Indian (am from Indonesia) , but was brought up with these stories and talked about them like the western children talk about Greek/Roman mythology and the Bible. YOu can even watch the series in youtube.

 

Also, all muslim children would be familiar with the biography of prophet Muhammad, his companions (males and females), and some prominent muslims of later time.

 

Other work you want to cover are Arabian night stories and some poetry from the middle east - Rumi, or Khalil Gibran. If you manage to get the work of some middle eastern muslim authors from the golden age of Islam (circa 800-1400) - not necessarily literatures per se, but could be history a philosophy book,s you'll find that they refer to muslim tradition and Quran, like: books by Averoes/ibn Rushdi (philosopher), Ibn Khaldun (historian/sociolgist), and Ghazali (philosopher, a sufi). Muh. Ghazali, in particular, is v. influential.

 

This is from: http://plato.stanfor...ies/al-ghazali/

 

"Al-Ghazâlî (c.1055–1111) was one of the most prominent and influential philosophers, theologians, jurists, and mystics of Sunni Islam. He was active at a time when Sunni theology had just passed through its consolidation and entered a period of intense challenges from Shiite Ismâ’îlite theology and the Arabic tradition of Aristotelian philosophy (falsafa). Al-Ghazâlî understood the importance of falsafa and developed a complex response that rejected and condemned some of its teachings, while it also allowed him to accept and apply others. Al-Ghazâlî's critique of twenty positions of falsafa in his Incoherence of the Philosophers (Tahâfut al-falâsifa) is a significant landmark in the history of philosophy as it advances the nominalist critique of Aristotelian science developed later in 14th century Europe. On the Arabic and Muslim side al-Ghazâlî's acceptance of demonstration (apodeixis) led to a much more refined and precise discourse on epistemology and a flowering of Aristotelian logics and metaphysics. With al-Ghazâlî begins the successful introduction of Aristotelianism or rather Avicennism into Muslim theology. After a period of appropriation of the Greek sciences in the translation movement from Greek into Arabic and the writings of the falâsifa up to Avicenna (Ibn Sînâ, c.980–1037), philosophy and the Greek sciences were “naturalized†into the discourse of kalâm and Muslim theology (Sabra 1987). Al-Ghazâlî's approach to resolving apparent contradictions between reason and revelation was accepted by almost all later Muslim theologians and had, via the works of Averroes (Ibn Rushd, 1126–98) and Jewish authors a significant influence on Latin medieval thinking."

 

FOr Quran translation and explanation, I love Yahiya Emerick's work. He has one complete Quran translation and explanation for children, and a couple for adults. Just type in his name in amazon.

 

HTH.

 

 

 

Thanks! We have two translations currently---one by Maulana Wahiduddin Khan and one side by side English and Arabic by M. H. Shakir. I'll look for Emerick.

[Candid]

This might be what you want:

http://www.amazon.com/Approaching-Quran-The-Early-Revelations/dp/1883991692/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1363529957&sr=8-1&keywords=approaching+the+quran

 

UNC-CH used it freshman read and it is fairly short. But I do not know enough about it to tell you much more.

 

Here's an interesting quote from a Amazon reviewer:

He included so much context and history to which I was oblivious. Things that I took for granted in Arabic has become so clear and gained deeper meaning with Sells' translation.

[Candid]

Mahabarata, Ramayana, and Bhagavadgita (part of Mahabarata) are what I suggest your children to be sort of familiar with. Lots of symbolism and eastern wisdom there, and they're v. famous - even outside the Indian subcontinent. Lots of Indian merchants interacted with Indo-Malaysian/South East Asian people and brought HIndu and Buddhist influence there. I am not Indian (am from Indonesia) , but was brought up with these stories and talked about them like the western children talk about Greek/Roman mythology and the Bible. YOu can even watch the series in youtube.

 

Also, all muslim children would be familiar with the biography of prophet Muhammad, his companions (males and females), and some prominent muslims of later time.

 

Other work you want to cover are Arabian night stories and some poetry from the middle east - Rumi, or Khalil Gibran. If you manage to get the work of some middle eastern muslim authors from the golden age of Islam (circa 800-1400) - not necessarily literatures per se, but could be history a philosophy book,s you'll find that they refer to muslim tradition and Quran, like: books by Averoes/ibn Rushdi (philosopher), Ibn Khaldun (historian/sociolgist), and Ghazali (philosopher, a sufi). Muh. Ghazali, in particular, is v. influential.

 

This is from: http://plato.stanfor...ies/al-ghazali/

 

"Al-Ghazâlî (c.1055–1111) was one of the most prominent and influential philosophers, theologians, jurists, and mystics of Sunni Islam. He was active at a time when Sunni theology had just passed through its consolidation and entered a period of intense challenges from Shiite Ismâ’îlite theology and the Arabic tradition of Aristotelian philosophy (falsafa). Al-Ghazâlî understood the importance of falsafa and developed a complex response that rejected and condemned some of its teachings, while it also allowed him to accept and apply others. Al-Ghazâlî's critique of twenty positions of falsafa in his Incoherence of the Philosophers (Tahâfut al-falâsifa) is a significant landmark in the history of philosophy as it advances the nominalist critique of Aristotelian science developed later in 14th century Europe. On the Arabic and Muslim side al-Ghazâlî's acceptance of demonstration (apodeixis) led to a much more refined and precise discourse on epistemology and a flowering of Aristotelian logics and metaphysics. With al-Ghazâlî begins the successful introduction of Aristotelianism or rather Avicennism into Muslim theology. After a period of appropriation of the Greek sciences in the translation movement from Greek into Arabic and the writings of the falâsifa up to Avicenna (Ibn Sînâ, c.980–1037), philosophy and the Greek sciences were “naturalized†into the discourse of kalâm and Muslim theology (Sabra 1987). Al-Ghazâlî's approach to resolving apparent contradictions between reason and revelation was accepted by almost all later Muslim theologians and had, via the works of Averroes (Ibn Rushd, 1126–98) and Jewish authors a significant influence on Latin medieval thinking."

 

FOr Quran translation and explanation, I love Yahiya Emerick's work. He has one complete Quran translation and explanation for children, and a couple for adults. Just type in his name in amazon.

 

HTH.

 

It took me two reads of Bhagavadgita before I even began to get a handle on it at all. Do you have suggestions on a commentary or other analysis that would aid in that for not just it but the other works you mention?

[KarenNC]

This might be what you want:

http://www.amazon.co...ching the quran

 

UNC-CH used it freshman read and it is fairly short. But I do not know enough about it to tell you much more.

 

Thanks! It turned out we actually already own a copy of this from a course my husband and I took a number of years ago at our UU church. I had forgotten all about it until I mentioned my search to him and he pulled this off a shelf. I found a syllabus from a course using both the Sells and the Matteson books which looks promising as a jumping off point http://www.academia.edu/2083327/Syllabus_Quran_undergraduate_