A Lecture by Professor Thomas Michael, Boston University On March 23, the Program for Scripture and the Arts will present a lecture by Professor Thomas Michael: Ge Hong’s (283- 343) Shenxian Zhuan stands out as one of the most powerfully innovative and influential texts of the entire Daoist religion. This work successfully established the image […]
A Lecture by Professor Beat Brenk, University of Rome Join world-reknowned scholar Dr. Beat Brenk as he considers the meaning and use of spiritual architectural space in Sicily’s twelfth century Capella Palatina, looking at the development of this sacred building and its dialogue with the temporal and political concerns of the day. The Capella reflects […]
A Lecture by Professor Christopher I. Lehrich Mozart’s last opera is a bizarre fairytale filled with monsters, a dark Queen, a sorcerous brotherhood, bird people, and a prince rescuing a princess. Only genius could spin musical gold from such a tangle of straw. But is there a deeper meaning there? Why does Die Zauberfote still […]
Department of Religion 14th Annual Lecture The Program for Scripture & the Arts is pleased to be a co-sponsor for How Odd was God to Choose the Jews?: The History of Early Christian “Flesh”, a lecture by Boston University’s Aurelio Professor of the Appreciation of Scripture, Paula Fredriksen and Scripps College Professor Andrew Jacobs. They […]
Rabbi Kevin Hale Rabbi Kevin Hale, a traditionally trained sofer stam (torah scribe) will discuss the mitzvah, or sacred obligation, to write a torah scroll as well as the tools, materials, rituals and techniques that go into their writing and restoration. Rabbi Hale is an ordained Reconstructionist Rabbi, who trained as a sofer stam under […]
Avi When writing historical fiction the writer almost inevitably deals with religion. Readers read such work in a variety of ways—joy, shock, confusion—but mostly in the context of their own religious experience. Is there a message in the text? Is the text the message? Is there any message? Whose is it, anyway? Does it matter […]
Mohamed Zakariya is an Islamic calligrapher, artist, and maker of custom instruments from the history of science. Born in Ventura, California, in 1942, he began his study of Islamic calligraphy in 1961. After continuing his studies in Tangier, Morocco, and at the British Museum, he was invited in 1984 to study at the Research Center […]
A Lecture by Professor Qianshen Bai, Boston University Department of Art History The lecture will explore the roles played by calligraphy in Chinese society, including both religious and secular uses. The linguistic foundation and aesthetic of calligraphy will also be discussed. Following the lecture, there will be a demonstration of Chinese calligraphy. An art historian […]
Sassan Tabatabai, Boston University, The Core Curriculum Dr. Tabatabai read from and discussed the poetry of Rudaki, the tenth-century poet often called “the father of Persian poetry,” whose writings he translated and published in Father of Songs: Rudaki and His Poetry (Purdue University Press, 2008). Discussion touched on the presence of Islam and the older […]
Christopher Ricks, Boston University, The Editorial Institute Work in progress on Eliot’s poems (towards a full critical edition), as well as on the publication of his letters and on the gathering of all his prose, provides an opportunity to re-consider the relations of his art to his religious beliefs – even perhaps the relations of […]