Preceptorial

I’ve signed myself up for a new extracurricular preceptorial this semester. Last year I took that Non-fiction Creative Writing class on personal essay. It was a bit more work than I anticipated. This preceptorial is only about four classes though with spring break in between. It should be good. I don’t know if I’m in yet, however, because they draw a lottery if more than eight students sign up for it. Most of these classes are open to about eight from the community and eight from the college. (If I don’t make it in I have a painting class as my second choice.) This one sounds very interesting, but it could be awkwardly academic. It’s called “Philosophy and Revelation.” Here’s the description:

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are religions “of the book”, a book believed to contain the word of God. Of what sort is this word of God? Does it speak to the philosophic search for wisdom? Can a philosophic account be given of it? Should one be? These questions as taken up by an Islamic, a Jewish, and a Christian author in the Middle Ages are the subject of four seminars: (1) Averroes, The Decisive Treatise Determining the Nature of the Connection Between Religion and Philosophy; (2) Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed, Introduction and chapters 50-59 (On attaining to a higher state, that of reflection…) ; (3) Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, Book 1, Chapters 1-9 (On attaining to wisdom) and Summa Theologiae, Prima pars, question 1, On Sacred Theology; (4) Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Prima pars, question 13, On Names for God.

For one of our pre-lecture seminars I read through a few of Thomas Aquinas’s apologetic questions. He was very Aristotelian about his theology, but very interesting. This class will at least give me a perspective into Judaism and Islam that I didn’t have before, though I’d much rather do a small study on the “holy books” themselves than the mediæval commentators.
I have a good chunk of work to do this weekend. Greek reading. Part of Plato’s Parmenides. Two small papers for maths. And I want to try to read Genesis next week. We’ll see how that goes.

Toodles. God bless y’all.