Teaching

Plato, The Republic; Hobbes, Leviathan; Locke, Second Treatise; Rousseau, The Social Contract; Tocqueville, Democracy in America; Marx and Engels, The German Ideology.

Plato, The Apology of Socrates, Meno, The Parable of the Cave (Republic, Book VII)

Aristotle, The Nichomacean Ethics

Is liberalism in crisis? Over the past decade, the liberal consensus has been challenged by populists, socialists, religious traditionalists, and other radicals. Were these revolts mere setbacks on the long ‘arc of history’? Or were they, rather, a reflection of a deep philosophic unease with the very premises of modernity? Is this the end of the liberal world order? What will replace it? And what is the role of religion in the contemporary political imagination? This class will combine readings in political theory, international relations, the philosophy of history, and current events, to gain perspective on our present discontents. (Syllabus)

Classics of Social and Political Thought invites students to participate in a year-long conversation about human flourishing. We will consider what it means to live a good and distinctively human life, and we will explore how we might pursue such a life. What role do our fellow human beings play in its attainment? How can our social and political arrangements support and hinder this pursuit? We will begin in the Autumn Quarter by investigating the nature and purpose of political life. Why do humans form political communities? What qualifies someone for citizenship in them and who should rule? What roles do justice, virtue, and law play in our political communities? Is it ever acceptable to violate the laws that govern us? We will examine how these questions were answered by Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, and Machiavelli. In addition to studying the substance of their political theories, we will analyze the principles and assumptions that animate them. We will pay especially close attention to how these theorists’ accounts of human nature informed their ideas about political life. (Syllabus - Autumn 2022)

Classics of Social and Political Thought invites students to participate in a year-long conversation about human flourishing. We will consider what it means to live a good and distinctively human life, and we will explore how we might pursue such a life. What role do our fellow human beings play in its attainment? How can our social and political arrangements support or hinder this pursuit? In the Spring Quarter, we will focus on texts by nineteenth- and twentieth-century writers who developed critiques of existing social and political conditions. As you will see, during these two centuries, social thought changed dramatically, from thinking in terms of abstractions to what the legal and political theorist Carl Schmitt called “critique of the age.” The texts that you will read will therefore concentrate primarily on how the individual is shaped and restricted by the conditions into which he is born. Some of the themes we will explore include: equality, modernity, freedom, the relationship between politics and economics, nihilism, atheism, race, and gender. (Syllabus)

This is a survey course of Jewish history and thought between the first millennium BCE and the middle of the second millennium CE. Each week we will focus on a particular era or episode in Jewish history and read some representative writings from the period. It is hoped that by the end of the class, you will therefore have had the opportunity to both learn about the trajectory and development of Jewish history during this period, as well as gain basic skills in Jewish literacy. (Syllabus - Autumn 2022)

This is a survey course of Jewish history and thought from Early Modernity to the Present. Each week we will focus on a particular era or episode in Jewish history and read some representative writings from the period. This course is a sequel to Jewish Civilization I and is in many ways based on the texts studied in the first quarter. At the same time, however, it comprises a new set of texts, problems and dilemmas that pertain specifically to the modern period. By the end of the quarter, it is hoped that you will come to understand better the contours of Jewish Civilization in the modern period, and be able to reflect better on some of the issues at the heart of contemporary Jewish debates. (Syllabus)