UMS : Unit: BA9049P

Content

This course explores the relationship between issues of gender, justice and empire in Old Testament interpretation. Through a study of a number of Old Testament texts, particularly those which narrate the experience of women within the wider social and imperial contexts, we will consider how these themes are configured and related within biblical traditions. We will engage in a close reading of a range of primary Old Testament texts and contemporary feminist/womanist and other (culturally diverse) scholarship about these texts and will also examine how these hermeneutical perspectives engage and critique traditional exegetical approaches. The approach will be interdisciplinary and will provide students opportunity to study these texts alongside contemporary women’s experiences and portrayals of women in other media such as art, film, poetry and law.

Unit code: BA9049P

Unit status: Approved (Major revision)

Points: 24.0

Unit level: Postgraduate Elective

Unit discipline: Old Testament

Delivery Mode: Online

Proposing College: Pilgrim Theological College

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Learning outcomes

1.	Demonstrate indepth familiarity with the Old Testament narratives of Biblical women and knowledge of relevant issues of gender, justice and empire in relation to these texts and the Old Testament overall
2.	Articulate the liberational and the oppressive potential of biblical stories arising out of and in relation to hermeneutical approaches and polyvalence of meaning.
3.	Engage critically with the feminist/liberational/postcolonial critique of traditional fields of knowledge, biblical methodology and hermeneutics and integrate these methodological perspectives into creative thinking and study of the Old Testament.
4.	Interpret Biblical texts with attention to the Australian Context
5.	Develop a comparative and global framework in the study of the Old Testament and to foster appreciation and respect for other/diverse perspectives

Unit sequence

15 points in Old Testament studies

Pedagogy

Lectures and Tutorials – Intensive Mode over 5 days - 7.5 hours a day – 36 hours

Indicative Bibliography

Bird, Jennifer Grace Permission Granted: Take the Bible into your Own Hands. Louisville, Kentucky: WJKP, 2015.
Davies, Eryl W. The Dissenting Reader: Feminist Approaches to the Hebrew Bible, England: Ashgate, 2003.
Day, Linda and Pressler, Carolyn (eds). Engaging the Bible in a Gendered World: An Introduction to Feminist Biblical Interpretation in Honor of Katherine Doob Sakenfeld. Louisville/London: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006
Fewell, Danna N., and Gunn, David M. Gender, Power and Promise: The Subject of the Bible’s First Story. Nashville: Abingdon, 1993. (Recomended for purchase)
Junior, Nyasha. An Introduction to Womanist Biblical Interpretation (Louisville/London: Westminster John Knox Press, 2015
Newsome, Carol A. and Sharon H. Ringe, (eds.), The Women’s Bible Commentary (Expanded), London/Louisville: SPCK/Westminster John Knox, 1998.
Scholz, Susanne (ed.), Feminist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Retrospect: Volume II: Social Locations. Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2014.
Schussler-Fiorenza Elisabeth. Wisdom Ways: Introducing Feminist Biblical Interpretation. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2001.

Assessment

Type	Description	Word count	Weight (%)
Exegetical Essay	Exegetical Essay 3000 words	3000	40.0
Essay	Essay 3000 words	3000	40.0
Essay	Short Essay on Reading Material – 1000 words	1000	20.0

Approvals

Unit approved for the University of Divinity by John Capper on 26 Sep, 2019

Unit record last updated: 2021-06-07 08:43:50 +1000