Josep Montserrat-Torrents - Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

The course proposes an intercultural trajectory through some of the great creations of human spirit in ancient civilisations still influential in our days. Jasper’s notions of “axial epoch” and “axial men” will be conveniently adduced. The key questions dealt with will be world, human person and society. Religion will be considered only as context.
Intercultural studies are not aimed at providing a hybrid soup of ideas, beliefs and tastes, but at examining and analysing each cultural product in its singularity, as it has historically appeared and as it eventually comes forth at present.
Method will be strictly academic, far from the “intercultural dialogues” at fashion. The aim is knowledge, not attitudes. The procedure therefore consists in the lecture, commentary and questioning of significant texts. Each set of texts will be historically contextualized and subsequently contrasted with parallels from other cultures.

Topics
1) The ancient Indian wisdom. The Vedas . The Upanishads. Man and the Absolute. Transmigration. Social differentiation: the caste system. A great master: Shankara.
2) Buddhism. The Buddha. The social context of Buddhist revolution. The great Truths. The problem of reality. Buddhism, not a religion. The Middle Way of Nagarjuna.
3) Plato. The Greek city. Plato’s two faces: a) the Deceiver: the totalitarian republic; b) the Forerunner: the foundations of scientific knowledge.
4) Philo the Jew. The Hebrew Bible and the Greek Bible. The melting pot of Alexandria. The Bible for the Greeks. Moses and Plato. The failure: the first pogrom.
5) Jeshua of Nazareth. The good Jew. The warrior. The prophet. The teacher. The Messiah.
6) Hermes Trismegist. The wisdom of Ancient Egypt. The Corpus Hermeticum. The Poimandres. The heritage of the old religion. Hermetism in Modern Europe.
7) Marcus Aurelius. The king philosopher. Natural wisdom. Free will in a harmonic universe. Human time.
8) Plotinus. The transformations of Platonism. The inverted metaphysics. The longing for the Absolute: back to the Upanishads. An ensouled universe. A window to beauty. Neoplatonism in Modern Europe

Students are expected to participate in the form of short communications about subjects of their choice. When written, such papers will account for grading. Otherwise the grading system will consist in a formulary of questions appealing to understanding, rather than to memory.

Required reading
One Upanishad. Plato’s Republic II-III and VII. One Gospel. Poimandres. Marcus Aurelius, Meditations. Plotinus, Ennead III 8.

Bibliography
Karl Jaspers, The Origin and Goal of History, 1949.
Lewis Mumford, The transformations of man, Princeton,
Raymond Panikkar, The Vedic Experience, Darton, Longman and Todd, London, 1977 (with texts).
The Vedanta Sutra, with Shankara’s Commentary, transl. G. Thibaut, Dover, Oxford, 1980 and 1986.
Buddhist Texts through the Ages, Oxford, 1954.
J. Montserrat, Platón. De la perplejidad al sistema, Ariel, Barcelona, 1995.
Cornelia J. De Vogel, Rethinking Plato and Platonism, Brill, Leiden, 1986.
Philo Judaeus, works in English: Loeb Classical Library, 10 vols., 1929 ss.
G. Vermes, Jesus the Jew, W. Colins, London, 1973.
J. Montserrat, La sinagoga cristiana, Muchnik, Barcelona, 1989.
W. Scott, Hermetica, Vol. I, Oxford, 1924.
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, transl. A.S.L. Farquharson , 1952.
Plotinus, Enneads, English transl., Loeb C. L. 1962.

Biography
Doctor in Theology (Gregoriana, Rome) and in Philosophy (Barcelona). Full Professor (catedràtic) of Philosophy at UAB. Taught at VIU in the Undergraduate Program of Fall 2000. Author of various books, including: Filó d’Alexandria. La creació del Món i altres escrits, Laia, Barcelona, 1983; Las transformaciones del platonismo, Publicacions de la Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 1987; El desafio cristiano. Las razones del perseguidor, Anaya y Mario Muchnik, Madrid, 1992; Platón: de la perpejidad al sistema, Anthropos, Barcelona, 1995; Textos gnósticos. Biblioteca de Nag Hammadi, (with A. Piñero and F. García Bazán), 3 vols., Trotta, Madrid, 1997-99. Publications in English include: “Methodius of Olympus, Symposium III 4-8: an interpretation”, in Studia Patristica XIII, ed. Elisabeth Livingstone, Akademie Verlag, Berlin, 1975, pp. 239-243; “Some epistemological notes on greek cosmologies”, in Foundations of Big Bang Cosmology, ed. W. Meyerstein, World Scientific, Singapore, 1989, pp. 5-8; “Plato’s Philosophy of Science and Trinitarian Theology”, in Studia Patristica XX, Peeters, Lovaina, 1989, pp. 102-118; “The Social and Cultural Setting of the Coptic Gnostic Library”, in Studia Patristica XXXI, Peeters, Leuven, 1997, pp. 464-481.