Loading...In a previous post I discussed what it’s like to teach undergraduates at a research university. Now I discuss teaching PhD seminars. Again, these posts are from some years ago; some details are different now, but the essence is, not eternal, but at least, till now, pretty much the same.
******************************
In addition to my undergraduate classes, I teach one PhD seminar each semester. We have a small but terrific graduate program in the Department of Religious Studies. Students admitted each year are the cream of the crop. Most of them come to us already with both an undergraduate and master’s degree, and we admit students (maybe 7-10 a year) in a range of fields: Islamic studies, Religion in the Americas, Asian Religions, Religion and Culture, Medieval and Early Modern Studies, and Ancient Mediterranean Religions.
My area is Ancient Mediterranean Religions, which comprises religions of the Ancient Near East, Hebrew Bible, Graeco-Roman Religions (i.e., “pagan” religions), ancient Judaism, and early Christianity (which includes the New Testament). We have probably 35 or so applicants a year who want to study early Christianity with me and my brilliant colleague Zlatko Plese (who specializes in Hellenistic and Roman philosophy, Gnosticism, Coptic, and lots of other things). Normally we can admit one or maybe two of these students. So, as with all good graduate programs, competition to get in is fierce.
To be admitted students have to have substantial background in the field already, (normally) two of the ancient languages (Greek, Hebrew, Latin, Coptic, or Syriac, usually), and hopefully one of the modern research languages (German or French). They will pick up other languages while in the program.
My PhD seminars are all in the field of New Testament and early Christianity, and they cover a range of topics. This past semester my seminar has been on New Testament Textual Criticism, which is the study of the surviving manuscripts of the New Testament (Greek, but also those in other ancient languages) with a view to (a) seeing if we can reconstruct what the authors of the New Testament originally wrote (since we don’t have any of their original writings, but only copies made, in most cases centuries later, all of which have mistakes in them) and (b) determining how and why the text was altered over the years in the course of its transmission.
This is one of the most
Get access to Dr. Ehrman's library of 4,000+ articles plus five new articles per week about the New Testament and early Christianity. It costs as little as $2.99/mth and every cent goes to charity!
Unlock 4,000+ Articles Like This!
In my class students learn to read ancient manuscripts (i.e., hand-written copies; the students can already read Greek, but learning how to master handwriting is not easy at first) and how to compare manuscripts carefully against one another (called collating). They learn the history of the discipline of textual criticism; the canons of criticism and methods used to establish the oldest surviving form of the text; and a large range of technical aspects of the discipline. It’s a demanding and rigorous course, which students tend to appreciate having taken when it is over, even if they don’t look forward to its famous rigors in advance.
I teach a range of other seminars as well, alternating them so that students can get a number of them in during the two or three years in which they are required to take seminars before preparing for their PhD exams (which often require a year of preparation) and then writing their dissertations (which typically take two or more years to complete). Over the years, these have included the following:
- The Use of Literary Forgery in the Early Christian Tradition. Here we explore the existence, motivation, and intentions of writings that were written by unknown Christian authors who were falsely (and knowingly) claiming to be a famous Christian leader (such as Peter, Paul, or John). We look at instances of such “forgeries” (and we consider whether this is too loaded a term or not) (it is not) starting with some of the writings of the New Testament and moving into Christian writings of the second, third, and fourth centuries.
- The Apostolic Fathers. In this seminar we read the ten authors known as the Apostolic Fathers who produced such books as the letters of Ignatius, the Didache, the letter of Barnabas, and the Martyrdom of Polycarp. These authors were writing for the most part in the early second century, after the New Testament. All of them wrote in Greek, and their books provide interesting and important insights into the development of Christianity in the early years of the movement.
- Early Christian Apocrypha. For this course we read and analyze a number of the books that did not come to be included in the New Testament, but that are of the same genres of books that did – non-canonical Gospels, Acts, Epistles, and Apocalypses, most of which are pseudepigraphic (i.e. forgeries in the names of the apostles – such as the Gospel of Peter, the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, the letter of Paul to the Laodiceans, the Apocalypse of Peter, etc.)
- The Rise of Anti-Judaism. Here we study the relationship and tensions between early Christianity and Judaism from the New Testament period up to the time of Constantine, focusing attention on how Christianity eventually separated itself off from its Jewish matrix and in the process of so-doing became (sometimes virulently) anti-Jewish.
- Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity. In this seminar we study the various forms of Christianity in the second and third centuries, focusing on certain known groups such as Sethian Gnostics, Valentinians, Marcionites, and Ebionites, and on certain theological tendencies such as adoptionism (the view that Jesus was “adopted” to be the son of God, but was not himself divine) and Docetism (the view that Jesus was so much divine that he was not actually human, but only appeared to be).
- “Gateway” to New Testament Studies. This course is designed for beginning graduate students in early Christianity and for graduate students in other fields of study in the department. It is meant to cover the major historical and critical issues in the study of the new Testament, and the history of the discipline starting with the Enlightenment, with a pedagogical component – meaning that part of the course is set up to teach these students how they themselves might teach an undergraduate survey course in the field.
These graduate seminars tend to be small – say 5-8 students on average. We are lucky at UNC that Duke University is nearby. My UNC students take PhD seminars at Duke with the outstanding faculty there in New Testament and early Christianity, and the Duke students take seminars with me, providing a kind of richness to the program that many other graduate degrees around the country simply cannot match.
All of my seminars involve extensive reading in the subjects, hard-core research, sustained weekly discussions (the seminars meet once a week for three hours), and, usually, a final research paper, normally 15-18 pages in length. It is not unusual for advanced students to re-work a paper after a seminar is over and publish it in an academic journal. The seminars, then, are training grounds, as we prepare scholar-teachers who will be the next generation of research professors in the field.
Sounds pretty amazing, and the need for extensive training is obvious. The only second language I ever learned was mathematics.
What is your sense about the earliest followers of Jesus either having aversion and disgust regarding the cross or embracing it as an iconic symbol of Christianity? Or did they view it neutrally? Is there any evidence they looked at the cross with revulsion before it became the symbol of Christianity?
The only ones that mentoin it (so far as I recall off the top of my head) more or less take Paul’s line, that it is completely contrary to human expectation: the cross is, by normal standards, folly, weak, and foolish. Only later did the “cross conquer”
I don’t understand how an evangelical institution can teach ” textual criticism”. How ” critical” are they in a position to be?
I find it almost amusing that many students wouldn’t want to study with you. I can’t say that I wonder why, but hope they can find the same quality of instruction elsewhere.
I can do Hebrew, Latin, French and read Dead Sea scrolls,Torah scrolls and the scroll of Esther.Had I not chosen music – embarking on the road not taken- my dream was to study comparative religions. Many times I was tempted to take time off and do just that. But….. couldn’t afford it.
Ah, textual criticism is a technical term that does not refer to establishing the literary or historical “truth” of a text, but involves the fairly complicated task of determining what an author originally wrote, given the different versions of his work. It happens in every literary field, from Homer, to Shakespeare, to Wordsworth, etc. The “critical” part of it does not involve for the most part a skeptical analysis of the content, but rather figuring out what the words actually were. I assume there’s a lot of that for your favorite composers too? E.g., different scores for major works that are not the original (the autograph), when we don’t have the autograph?
Fascinating. And complex. There is such detective work in classical music. The major development in the past few decades has been the ” Urtext” editions. The word says it, getting to the origin of the work. That entails cleaning up all the additions and changes that became the ” tradition”. Sort of scribes messing things up. BUT: The funny side of it is that over the ages many of these changes were beneficial! So when the Urtext editors “cleaned up”, they also eliminated the valuable corrections made in the many readings since inception, and they entered ALL the mistakes again (!).
In general, there are many famous historical rivalries between conductors, particularly since the the ” historical” movement, claiming faithfulness to original instruments from hundreds of years ago, challenging tempi,and numerous other scholarly information.
One of the most famous areas of contention are Beethoven’s metronome marks. At what tempi should the works be played? These are ferociously debated, with a plethora of issues such as the deficient metronomes of Beethoven’s time ( just been invented), Beethoven’s deafness, obvious ( or not?) errors, different editions, testimonies of those who heard the works for the first time, students of Beethoven….. it’s wild.
Ah, very interesting. Thanks. I suppose all of us have preferences for the tempi (I do!) (especially for Symphony 7 and the second movement of Sonata 15) (both get played too damn fast sometimes, for me) (BTW: I am NOT well versed in music, as you know! I just happen to love both of these). I didn’t realize that the changes involve actual notations.
You have great taste! Did you mean Sonata 14 ( quite an esoteric choice) or #15,”Moonlight”?
Here’s the thing with its beloved 2nd movement: it can be played at various speeds convincingly. It’s a ” Beethoven thing”, namely, most of his music is indestructible.
In this case, it cannot be too slow, though, as the melodic line is in the ominous left hand at first and soon enough in the right hand, widely spaced. It can become unintelligible if stretched too slow.There are no metronome marks, and the tempo is ” Adagio Sostenuto”, which spells a quite slow tempo already.
Wagner called Beethoven’s 7th Symph. – particularly the last movement- “the Apotheosis of the Dance”. That last movement is possessed by a spirit of madness and excess, much like Beethoven himself.
The second movement must be inexorable as it advances obstinately from the depths of the orchestra to a majestic , tragic climax, always playing the same motif.It is an Allegretto, quite lively. And: there are metronome marks, which actually work
( almost) quite well.
If you listen to ” historic” , period instruments recordings, the tempi will most likely sound too fast.
I thought 14 was Moonlight? But yes, I mean 15, not widely known but that second movement is a killer. And that fourth movement of the 7th, I know. Unbelievable. Probably my favorite movement of any of, well, any symphony!
Sorry, I mixed up the numbers. Moonlight is 14. Sonata 15 in D is not well known.
Ah, right. But I’m such a hack I couldn’t have told you it was in D if my life depended on it….
This sounds awesome. How long does a typical PhD take in the US? Over here in the UK we get 3 years, sometimes 4 if we apply for an extension. While we are able to “audit” a class that is meant for undergraduates or Masters students, we are not offered any PhD seminars the way you do. I get the sense that the US system may be better than the UK system. We’re just left to fend for ourselves for 3 years, turn in an 80’000 word thesis and then defend it for a couple of hours.
It depends onthe field. Ancient Mediterranean takes longer htan most, because of all the languages. Most students come into our program after doing a three-year Master’s degree, and most students take 6-7 years on top of that then for the PhD. I think in my 34 years here I have maybe had two students finish it in 4. Students receive PhD funding for 5.