RLB01 The Banquet with the Dead

Faculty of Arts
Spring 2009
Extent and Intensity
1/1/0. 5 credit(s). Type of Completion: k (colloquium).
Teacher(s)
PhDr. Iva Doležalová (lecturer)
Guaranteed by
prof. PhDr. Dušan Lužný, Dr.
Department for the Study of Religions – Faculty of Arts
Contact Person: Lucie Čelková
Timetable
Wed 11:40–13:15 J21
Course Enrolment Limitations
The course is only offered to the students of the study fields the course is directly associated with.

The capacity limit for the course is 30 student(s).
Current registration and enrolment status: enrolled: 0/30, only registered: 0/30
fields of study / plans the course is directly associated with
Course objectives
The Master's degree optional course of lectures aims at methodological problems connected with interpretation of archeological sources and early Christian literature with regard to social formation and ritualisation within the frame of late Hellenistic period.
The main focus of particular lectures is aimed at visits of burrial places, enjoying fellowship with burried and sharing in a continued conviviality.
The presented approach refuses previous attempts to grasp the feast with dead as a kind of eucharist ritual and stresses its meaning with regard to the stabilisation and self-identification of communities of Early Christians.
At the end of this course, students should be able to interpret archeological data and writen sources from the period of Early Christianity from the point of view of sociology, anthropology and comparative study of religions.
Syllabus
  • 1. Rise of Chritianity and construction of identity
  • 2. Early Christianity from the sociological point of view. Social meal in the ritual practice.
  • 3. Death, the cult of death and burials in Late Antiquity (Ancient Greece,Rome, Judaism): a comparative perspective
  • 4. 1st seminar discussion: constructing indetity of Early Christian communities
  • 5. Writen sources and archeological excavations: challenge for interpretation
  • 6. Catacombs, early Christian art and history of its interpretation
  • 7. 2nd seminar discussion: Early Christian architecture and its social context
  • 8. Archeological excavations of the burial places
  • 9. Early Christianity and its relation towards dead members of their communities, concept of death. Refrigerium – a survey of traditional interpretations. San Sebastiano and its graffitti
  • 10. Martyrs as special deads, martyrdom as a "nobel death". Cult of martyrs and saints.
  • 11. Early Christian communities and the concept of family, family terminology within the context of rising Christianity: problem of a fictive relationship
  • 12. 3rd seminar discussion: The banquet with deads and its meaning in the process of social formation of Early Christian communities
Literature
  • Snyder, Graydon F., Inculturation of the Jesus Tradition. The Impact of Jesus on Jewish and Roman Cultures, Harrisburg, Trinity Press International 1999.
  • Jastrzebowska, Elisabeth, Untersuchungen zum christlichen Totenmahl aufgrund der Monumente des 3. und 4. Jahrhunderts unter der Basilika des Hl. Sebastian in Rom, [Europäische Hochschulschriften: Reihe 38, Archäologie; Bd. 2], Frankfurt am Main 1981.
  • Stiuber, Alfred, Refrigerium interim. Die Vorstellungen vom Zwischenzustand und die frhchristliche Grabeskunst, [Theofaneia, Beiträge zur Religions- und Kirchengeschichte des Altertums, 11], Bonn, Beter Hanstein Verlag G.M.B.H. 1957.
  • Smith, Jonathan Z., Drudgery Divine. On Comparison of Early Christianity and the Religions of Late Antiquity, London, School of Oriental Studies 1990.
  • Volp, Ulrich, Tod und Ritual in den christlichen Gemeiden der Antike, Leiden, Brill 2002.
  • Klauser, Theodor, Das Altchristliche Totemahl nach dem Heutigen Stande der Forschung, in: Dassmann, Ernest (ed.), Gesammelte Arbeiten zur Liturgiegeschichte, Kirchengeschichte und Christlichen Archäologie, Jahrbuch fűr Antike und Christentum 3/1 1974.
  • Smith, Jonathan Z., Religion Up and Down, Out and In, in: Gittlen, Barry (ed.), Sacred Time, Sacred place: Archeology and the Religion of Israel, Eisenbrauns 2001, 3-10.
Assessment methods
Teaching consists of lestures and seminars.
Colloqium demands:
1. participation in lessons
2. active participation in three seminar discussions based upon reading of given texts and subnission of three prepared comments of those texts
3. elaboration and presentation of the paper on particualr topic discussed with teacher. The presentation take place within the frame of defensive discussion.
Language of instruction
Czech
Further comments (probably available only in Czech)
Study Materials
The course is taught once in two years.
Information on course enrolment limitations: Zápis mimo religionistiku je podmíněn souhlasem vyučující.
The course is also listed under the following terms Spring 2006, Spring 2012.
  • Enrolment Statistics (Spring 2009, recent)
  • Permalink: https://is.muni.cz/course/phil/spring2009/RLB01