ONLINE: At its core, this course is an exercise in exegesis — learning how to read texts rather than extract doctrine from them. Too often, readers of the Hebrew and Christian Bibles are seeking confirmation of belief instead of attending to a text’s multiple voices. Our aim is to listen to what the text says, not what we expect to hear. Why, for instance, is Yeshua so often depicted in early art with a magician’s wand? And why have most religious traditions forgotten the ancient intertwined histories of natural philosophy and magick — the lineage that gave us the Magi themselves? This course unfolds in five sessions, tracing the spiritual power and political danger surrounding Yeshua of Nazareth. Sessions will cover: 1) Words of Magic; 2-3) Signs, Silence and Sorcery; 4) Orthodoxy and Forgetting; and 5) Seeing With New Eyes. | Lecture + Q&A.
Max enrollment: 50.
