Transregionale Religionsgeschichte (Prof. Dr. Laura Lieber)

From the birth of Abrahamic religions to the present day, the figure of the charismatic holy man has stood at the center of cultural, social, and political imagination. In this block course we will explore how such figures, who are often associated with miracles, ascetic practices, and claims of divine authority, were represented in Jewish, Christian, and later Islamic traditions. While our focus is both historical and literary, we will pay particular attention to the ways stories about holy men function simultaneously as religious texts, as literature, and as folklore moving across cultural boundaries.

Alongside questions of theology and religious history, the course will introduce students to methods from literary studies and folklore research. We will practice close reading, discourse analysis, and comparative approaches, examining how motifs, symbols, and narrative structures give meaning to these traditions. By the end of the course, students will have gained not only a deeper understanding of the holy man archetype, but also critical skills for analyzing religious traditions as part of wider literary and cultural systems.

This course will take students into the long and complex history of Jews in Regensburg, from the first settlements in the 10^th century, through the period of the Crusades, the rise of the famous Pietists of Ashkenaz (whose poetry is still a part of the modern Jewish prayerbook), to the destruction of the community in 1519, its reemergence in the early modern period, the horrors of the 20^th century, and the renewal of the 21^st century.  We will consider a full range of sources but focus particularly on the materials visible “on the ground,” using the city of Regensburg as our primary text.

Although
the Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament are mainly characterised by male
protagonists, there are also a number of central female figures and characters
who decisively determine and drive the plot: they appear as matriarchs (Sarah,
Rebecca, Rachel), wives (Michal, Abigail, Bathsheba), judges (Deborah) and
rebels (Judith).

During the
seminar, the characters will be analysed in terms of their representation and
function in the text. This serves as a starting point for their visualisation
strategies in Jewish and Christian art (history): Where and for what purpose
are these female protagonists depicted? How does their ‘image’ change across
epochs? And: What role do they play within iconography in comparison to their
male counterparts?