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Tag Archives: Academics

HDS Admissions Application Now Available

30 Wednesday Sep 2020

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Applying

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Academics, Advice, Applying, ask students, How to Apply, Recommendation Letters

HDS Application Season has officially begun and the application for entrance in Fall 2021 is open! For those of you who have decided to or are considering applying to HDS, we know this can be both an exciting and stressful time. In this post, we will highlight some key information as well as a few tips to make the process run smoother.  

Photo courtesy of Kate Hoeting

If you are considering applying this year, we encourage you to start early! During the process, you’ll find that some parts of the application are out of your control, such as your transcripts or letters of recommendation. Allowing yourself ample time to complete the parts you do have control over will make the process less stressful. Be sure to check out our Suggested Application Timeline blog post and our How To Apply Series that explains each application requirement in greater detail.  

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Meet Our Incoming Students, Part 2

01 Tuesday Sep 2020

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Why I Chose HDS

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Academics, Current students, Disability, Hinduism, MDiv, MTS, Orientation, queer, Student Life, Transitioning

Editor’s Note: This post is part two of our three-part series that showcases incoming students. As we’re posting this article, these incoming students are beginning shopping week, during which students are welcome to drop in to as many classes as they want before they finalize their schedules for the semester. This is part two of a three-part series—you can also check out part one and part three.

Urmila Kutikkad, MTS ‘22 studying grief, body, and trauma within South Asian religious traditions 

At HDS, I am hoping to focus on themes of grief, body, & ritual as they play out in the spheres of gender/sexuality and South Asian studies. Much of this draws on work that I have been doing in the past year for progressive Hindu organizations (Sadhana and Hindus for Human Rights), as well as a prison abolition/restorative justice NGO in Bangalore. Although my relationship with faith growing up was fraught, I’ve gotten space to breathe and explore faith on my own terms in the past few years. Through this process, I have seen some of the most radical and beautiful social justice work being done on the grounds of faith, and my hopes of deepening this sort of work within Hinduism caused me to apply to HDS. 

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Meet Our Incoming Students, Part 1

27 Thursday Aug 2020

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Why I Chose HDS

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Academics, chaplaincy, Current students, MDiv, MTS, Orientation, Student Life, Summer Language Program, Transitioning

Editor’s Note: We had such an impressive collection of applicants this year, so we’re launching a three-part series to introduce you to some members of our incoming class! We’re publishing this post to celebrate student orientation, which is happening online this week. During student orientation—online or in person—students have the opportunity to get to know their fellow classmates, explore student organizations, and meet their faculty advisors. This is part one of a three-part series—you can also check out part two and part three.

Annie Hanock, MDiv ‘23, studying spiritual caregiving and multifaith chaplaincy 

As a nonreligious person, I was originally really drawn to HDS as a nonsectarian divinity school where I would be able to take part in theological study without committing to a specific religion or practice myself. Although I’m not entirely certain what path my studies as a Master of Divinity student will follow, I do hope to become a multifaith chaplain, and I look forward to learning more about spiritual guidance and counseling, liberation theologies, and religious spaces/communities in general as conduits for revolutionary change. Although COVID has made it pretty much impossible to prepare for my first year at HDS as I had originally imagined I would, I have been really lucky to be able to dedicate a lot of time throughout these past couple of months to some hardcore personal/spiritual reflection (usually while sewing potholders or knitting dishtowels in preparation for my move to Cambridge), which I hope will help guide me as I begin my studies. 

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Suggested Application Timeline

07 Tuesday Jul 2020

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Applying

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Academics, Applying, ask students, Decisions, financial aid, HDS People, How to Apply, MDiv, MTS, Recommendation Letters, Statement of Purpose, Summer

Editor’s Note: Kate Hoeting recently finished her first year as a student in the MTS program and as a Graduate Assistant in the HDS Office of Admissions. After a year of guiding prospective students through the application, Kate is sharing her wisdom about how applicants might approach the process.

Post by Kate Hoeting, MTS ‘21 and Admissions Graduate Assistant

Kate Hoeting (MTS ‘21) at work in the HDS Admissions Office // 
photo courtesy of Kate Hoeting 

I love a good plan, and if you clicked on this article, it seems likely that you love a good plan too. When you’re facing something that seems as daunting as applying to graduate school, it can be helpful to break the process down into manageable steps. But first, a word of warning: everyone’s journey to divinity school is different, and this timeline shouldn’t be one size fits all. Do not panic if you’re reading this post in October and thinking, “I’m already too late!” Conversely, if you are already working on your Statement of Purpose, that is fantastic! Please customize the timeline to your particular situation. I personally did not follow this timeline when I applied to HDS—it’s just a set of guidelines for those of you who love a good plan.  

July: Decide if you want to apply to graduate school 

Going to graduate school is a serious commitment of time and resources, so it will be helpful to take some time to sort out if and why you want to apply. This process of discernment can also be helpful in writing a strong Statement of Purpose later down the line. This is a good time to do some journaling, reflecting, and ritualizing. Be in your communities—even if it’s on Zoom—and connect with mentors who can help you decide whether to apply. It can also be helpful to check out our website and sign up for one of our HDS information session webinars. 

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Freedom School

29 Tuesday Oct 2019

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Academics

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Academics, Classes, Community Organizing, Social Justice

Post by: Najha Zigbi-Johnson, MTS ‘20, African and African American Studies Concentrator, Freedom School Founder and Leader 

Editor’s Note: For the first time, students at HDS have gathered to create the collaborative, student-led seminar “Freedom School,” which encourages students to bring Black studies into social justice issues in the community. In this blog post, HDS student and Freedom School founder Najha Zigbi-Johnson discusses the goals and pedagogy of Freedom School. 

Freedom School community members 
Photo Courtesy of NAJHA ZIGBI-JOHNSON, MTS ‘20 

Last spring, I had the opportunity to learn alongside a group of incredibly talented and action-oriented students in the seminar, Faith in the Fire: Religious Public Intellectuals, led by Professor Cornel West. Each week, students prepared engaging presentations, and guided our class through animated conversation. I found myself wrestling with the notion of public intellectualism and also the moral responsibility of progressive thinkers to engage in work fundamentally rooted in political activism and cultural change. It was the brilliance of my peers who continue to be engaged in justice-oriented work, the legacy of radical public intellectuals like Pauli Murray and Professor West, and the urgent necessity to involve myself fully in movement building that fueled the creation of Freedom School. In partnership with the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, I was able to bring this course to fruition in my desire to engage contemporary Black studies with projects committed to systems-change and equity work.

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Traveling Beyond the Classroom: J-Term Excursion to Tunisia

09 Thursday Feb 2017

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Experiential Learning

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Academics, Harvard, Islam, Travel

Post by: Brittany Landorf, Graduate Assistant (GA)

Hello there! I am a current GA in the Office of Admissions at Harvard Divinity School. When I’m not working in the Office of Admissions, I am pursuing a Masters of Theological Studies degree focusing on Women, Gender, and Sexuality in Islam at HDS. Now that the semester is in swing and the air outside is a little chilly, I have been reflecting on my time spent in the (significantly warmer) city of Tunis located in Tunisia over J-Term and wanted to share my experience. This post is particularly helpful for considering the vast array of resources presented by studying at Harvard University and how to continue learning beyond the classroom.  

One of the wonderful advantages of studying at Harvard Divinity School are the myriad opportunities offered throughout Harvard University. As a HDS student, not only can you take classes at other graduate schools at Harvard and in the Boston area, but you can participate in organizations, journals, and school sponsored initiatives and programs. This past January, I, along with two other Harvard Divinity School students Abdul Rahman Latif (MTS ‘18)  and Lillian McCabe (MTS’18), had the opportunity to partake in a three week long excursion to Tunisia arranged by the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard. The trip offered a broad cultural, religious, social, historical, and political introduction to Tunisia for graduate students interested in conducting research in the country or Maghreb region.

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View of the port of Bizerte in Tunisia. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf

Abdul Rahman, Lillian, and I all focus on Islamic Studies at HDS, yet have differing interests within the field. While traveling in Tunisia, it was exciting to see how we were all drawn to different aspects of the country while sharing the same exhilaration of learning through lived experience. Abdul Rahman noted that being in Tunisia helped him move past more restrictive area studies paradigms. His firsthand experiences enabled him to transcend academic barriers to expand the purview of his work on Ottoman history and Islamic practices. Lillian, who specializes in North African medieval Islamic literature, was struck by how Tunisians learn the history of their country in school and in the country. In speaking with me, she reflected:

The trip reminded me why I love what I study so much, and I returned to campus this semester with renewed energy and new curiosity. Sometimes our classrooms can feel so far away from what we are studying (literally and figuratively); I think that immersive learning experiences like this are invaluable.

Like Lillian, the trip reaffirmed my passion for what I study. Being able to practice my Arabic and learn first-hand about the expansion of contemporary social movements since the revolution was instrumental for my research. Speaking with Tunisian youth who have been turning to new expressions of identity-making through artistic practices and participate in cultural events has led me to a deeper understanding for my own research.

Besides being introduced to the research offerings of the National Archives and National Library—which boast an impressive collection of Ottoman, French, and Tunisian documents–we loved being able to travel throughout the country. Tunisia is incredibly diverse in terms of geography, culture, history, and architecture. Roman and Byzantine mosaics and ruins abound, interweaving with exquisite examples of North African Islamic architecture. French colonial influence is also evident in the new city of Tunis extending outside the medina walls. Some of our favorite places were the Great Mosque of al-Qayrawan (also known as the Mosque of Uqba) in Qayrawan and the Berber town of Takrouna in southern Tunisia.

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Inside the courtyard of Al-Qayrawan, which is one of the few mosques in North Africa open to tourists. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf

Three hours south of Tunis, Al-Qayrawan (670 AD) is considered one of the holiest mosques in the Islamic world and is one of the oldest in North Africa, serving as an architectural model for subsequent mosques. Built during the Muslim expansion into North Africa in the year 50 of the hijra, Al-Qayrawan is both a sacred place as well as an emblem of Islamic architecture and art. In addition to visiting the mosque, we wandered through the Al-Qayrawan medina which is famous for both sweets called makroudh and Berber carpets.

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This photo was taken from the village of Takrouna overlooking Berber homes that have since been abandoned. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf

A little over an hour to the southeast of the capital, Takrouna is a Berber village believed to have been founded by a group of Berbers and Moors who had immigrated to Andalusia in the 8th century and returned after being expelled in the early 17th century. The village rests upon a large hill overlooking an arid valley dotted with olive trees. While many of the houses below the cliff are abandoned, the ones leading up the road and atop are still inhabited. The Andalusian influence is evident in the open architectural style of the houses. We spent our morning walking through the old village, drinking espresso, Turkish coffee, and traditional mint tea, and eating warm bread made in a cast iron pot. From our seats outside of the café, we could catch a glimpse of the still mostly intact Roman aqueduct that runs 132 km from its source in the town of Zaghouan to Tunis, making it one of the longest Roman aqueducts.

In addition to our introduction to the classical and medieval history in the region, we were able to partake in, and gain a greater understanding, of the lasting effects of French colonial influence and the Tunisian revolution in 2011. We attended several lectures discussing the impact of the Tunisian revolution and witnessed the growing culture and artistic movements in the country. It was especially interesting to hear how education and knowledge surrounding the Ottoman rule and early modern history of Tunisia has changed following the revolution. Now, there is a renewed interested and openness of speech about the early modern history of Tunisia, represented in a new art exhibit of the last Ottoman Beys at the Qasr Al-Said Palace affiliated with the Bardo Museum. There has also been an explosion of culture and investment in Tunisian society. When visiting the medina of Tunis, we met several different organizations that are working to preserve the cultural heritage of Tunisia, including showcasing the former Jewish quarter of the medina called ‘El Hara.’

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One of the exquisite examples of the ornate patterns and blue hues decorating the medina doors. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf

For Abdul Rahman, Lillian, and I, the trip reaffirmed our passion for what we study and exposed us to new directions of thought and research. I hope to return to Tunisia in the summer to pursue research that explores how Tunisian youth are expressing identity and negotiating their relationship with Islam in new ways, looking particularly at conversations surrounding art, music, and queer movements. Furthermore, I intend to continue pursuing this research in a doctoral program after concluding my studies at MTS degree. Lillian is also hoping to return to Tunisia and thinks that taking advantage of Center for Middle Eastern Studies’ Office in Tunis will be particularly helpful for her work. This semester, she plans on learning more about the Shi’i history of Tunisia under the Fatimid Empire and how memories of the past are intentionally constructed and selectively included or removed from national history. Abdul Rahman plans to combine his study of Ottoman Turkish language and history with research about Ottoman rule in Tunisia. Traveling to and study in Tunisia has directly impacted and enriched our studies at HDS, helping connect our academic courses and theories with lived experience.

Lillian McCabe, Brittany Landorf, and Abdul Rahman Latif and fellow Harvard students at the opening of the Tunisian office for the Center for Middle Eastern Studies. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf
Lillian McCabe, Brittany Landorf, and Abdul Rahman Latif and fellow Harvard students at the opening of the Tunisian office for the Center for Middle Eastern Studies. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf
Our group poses for a picture with the trip leaders, the Director for the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Professor William Granara, and head of the CMES's Tunisian office, Sihem Lamine. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf
Our group poses for a picture with the trip leaders, the Director for the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Professor William Granara, and head of the CMES’s Tunisian office, Sihem Lamine. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf
Drinking mint tea, espresso, and Turkish coffee in the Berber village of Takrouna. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf
Drinking mint tea, espresso, and Turkish coffee in the Berber village of Takrouna. Photo Credit: Brittany Landorf

A Year Ago Today…

18 Friday Mar 2016

Posted by David Waters in Waiting to Hear

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Academics, Classes, Classmates, Community, Faculty, Noon Service

 

Admit pack photo 1

It’s hard to believe that exactly a year ago I was sitting on the couch in my parent’s living room, having refreshed my application status page for the only the first time that morning, with my cursor hovering over the “Status update” link. When I finally worked up the nerve to click on the link, the letter waiting for me was exactly the one I was hoping for. One year later, I’m halfway through my second semester at HDS and it’s been an amazing journey.

It didn’t take me long to decide that I wanted to come to HDS, but even then, there were many things that I couldn’t have anticipated in my excitement.

We gather as friends and fellow travelers and we find ourselves enriched and sustained by the journey.

I knew that HDS was a place where many people of diverse backgrounds and religious traditions gathered to study and learn together, but only after I arrived did I discover just how warm and intentional this community really is. I went to my first Wednesday Noon IMG_4524Service after I’d already started working in the Admissions Office. I thought I’d just get a taste of the Service in order to tell prospective students about it. Instead, it became a part of my weekly practice. From fall semester’s Unitarian Universalist, Muslim, and Buddhist services to this semester’s Jewish, Religious None’s, and Catholic services, Wednesday Noon Services have been a fantastic opportunity for HDS students across religious traditions to gather and participate in the faith traditions of others, and others of non-religious traditions. We gather as friends and fellow travelers and we find ourselves enriched and sustained by the journey.

. . . the excitement has come not only from learning from excellent professors, but from being in the classroom with colleagues who are fired by the same curiosity and commitment that I am.

I knew HDS was a place of academic rigor, but only after I arrived did I discover just how amazing the opportunities to study with world-class faculty would be. Last semester, I had the chance to study with Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza and Albert Raboteau, pioneers in feminist theology and African American religion, respectively. This semester, I’m taking a course with Homi Bhabha that explores genealogies of global imagination, learning from Toni Morrison who is offering a series of Norton Lectures on the literature of belonging, and exploring Caribbean literature, religion, and culture with Mayra Rivera Rivera. In all of these experiences, the excitement has come not only from learning from excellent professors, but from being in the classroom with colleagues who are fired by the same curiosity and commitment that I am.

Shopping Period

Photo by Chris Alburger

I knew HDS was filled with impressive people, but only after I arrived did I discover that not only are my fellow students impressive, they’re also a true pleasure to be around. So often, over the past two semesters, I’ve had stimulating conversations with my fellow students in class, only to continue that conversation in ways unexpected and fruitful after class concludes. At gatherings like Tuesday afternoon Community Tea and in the various groups and organizations, people gather to talk and pass the time—to simply be in each others’ presence and enjoy the pleasures of community. As my friend Nestor says, “When people ask how you’re doing, it’s not just to acknowledge your presence—they really want to know how you are.”

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These are a few of the discoveries I’ve made about HDS in the year since I received my acceptance letter. It’s such a pleasure to congratulate you on your acceptance letter—I hope you’ll join us in April for a chance to experience HDS firsthand!

Where the Classroom Meets the World: Discovering Vocation in Field Education

21 Thursday Jan 2016

Posted by smejiahds in Experiential Learning

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Academics, Classes, Field Ed, MDiv, Social Justice, UU

As I prepare to begin my last semester of the Master of Divinity Program at HDS I can’t help but think back to what has made the last two and a half years so significant. My time at HDS has been truly transformative. Although it has been special because of professors, courses, and other students, the part that has been most important for my vocation have been my field education experiences. A major component of the MDiv program is completing at least two field education placements in non-profits, hospitals, churches, community organizations, government agencies—or anywhere where ministry happens. Through field education placements and other volunteer experiences I have been able to discover my passion for prison ministry and particularly for teaching in prisons. I first began to think seriously about prison ministry through a course called “Ethics, Punishment and Race,” taught by Professor Kaia Stern. This course allowed to me discover the ways society has deemed a caste of people guilty and punishable and that justice in this country does not look the same for everyone. As Lawyer Bryan Stevenson says, “in too many places, the opposite of poverty is justice.” After that course, I realized that incarcerated people had been invisible to me—not only because prisons and people who are incarcerated are made invisible, but also because I had not considered their suffering and experiences worthy of empathy.

Through field education placements and other volunteer experiences I have been able to discover my passion for prison ministry and particularly for teaching in prisons.

After that semester, I decided to work with people who had been incarcerated and were transitioning out of incarceration. My first field education experience was during the summer of 2014 at Span, Inc., a Boston-based non-profit organization founded in 1976. Span works with returning citizens to provide them with assistance finding housing, employment and provides them with counseling and support. I collaborated with the Director of Operations in projects of data and planning in preparation for grants.  I also worked with their Training to Work program where I taught two cycles of an intensive computer skills class. My experiences at Span, envision myself working in the non-profit sector in the future. I gained skills in both direct-service work and the management side of non-profit work.

The following academic year I decided to work with Renewal House, a shelter for survivors of domestic violence. As part of the Unitarian Universalist Urban Ministry this shelter engages residents in restorative justice circles, art therapy groups and other innovative work, which was incredibly formative for my work. During my time at Renewal House I worked teaching an English as a Learning Language class and collaborated with the leadership of Renewal House to design and facilitate domestic violence training for clergy and faith leaders. We facilitated one of these trainings at HDS in March 2015 and received positive feedback from students. The connection between domestic violence and the American punishment system motivated me to do this placement. Nearly all women who end up incarcerated have been survivors of domestic violence. Interrupting this cycle of abuse in shelters may keep many people from incarceration and further traumatization.

Divinity Hall Sign

Photo by Caroline Matas

During the Fall of 2014, I had the opportunity to co-teach an English course in a Massachusetts prison through the Boston University Prison Education Program. It was a rewarding experience and taught me about the challenges of teaching in a carceral environment and whether my ministry should be more focused on people currently incarcerated or returning citizens as they resettle back into their lives.

I am grateful for the opportunities I have had during my time at HDS. My vocation as I see it now will be to continue this work.  How can those outside of prison work for people to recognize the dignity and humanity of those in prison?  I hope to work in collaboration with community organizations, especially those that are faith-based, in order to change perspectives and advocate for prison reform, to make liberation a reality.

On Discovering a Hermeneutic of Generosity

17 Thursday Dec 2015

Posted by Keith Esposito in Academics

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Academics, Christianity, Classes, Faculty, Growth, Harvard

440px-Friedrich_Daniel_Ernst_SchleiermacherThree months ago: It’s my first semester at HDS and I’m completing an assignment for Theories and Methods in the Study of Religion, the one required class for all incoming HDS students. Each week before lecture we have to submit an online response to that week’s reading, which for this week is Friedrich Schleiermacher’s On Religion. Schleiermacher was an 18th century theologian sometimes seen as the father of liberal Protestant Christianity. On Religion is his apology for religion, which he seeks to dissociate from doctrine, ritual, practice, traditions or mythology. For Schleiermacher, religion is defined in experiential terms, as something that a believer feels or “intuits.” I thought this was a bunch of baloney. Here’s an excerpt from my online response:

My main issue with Schleiermacher is that his first two chapters are mostly vague, repetitive and rambling descriptions of his amorphous concept of religion, but as soon as he tries to ground his perspective in a particular example–for example when he says that Judaism is defunct and Christianity’s original intuition is “more glorious, more sublime…and extending farther over the whole universe” (113)–he reveals his giant bias: that his own, liberal, protestant Christianity is conveniently the best for intuiting religion. His arguments then lose all credit as any kind of lens for understanding religion from anything but a Christian, liberal, European perspective.

I had completely written off Schleiermacher. What was there to learn from someone with such a blatant, self-serving bias? And that was the day Professor Amy Hollywood introduced the hermeneutic of suspicion and the hermeneutic of generosity.

By the time I got to lecture the next day, I had completely written off Schleiermacher. What was there to learn from someone with such a blatant, self-serving bias? And that was the day Professor Amy Hollywood introduced the hermeneutic of suspicion and the hermeneutic of generosity.

In a nutshell, the hermeneutic of suspicion calls scholars to interrogate the authors and texts they encounter. Questioning an author’s bias, historical time period, cultural background, or the validity of their arguments all fall into this category. It’s an important paradigm and one that I was fully entrenched in during my undergraduate years. In fact, my undergraduate studies were conducted almost entirely through this critical prism. I was trained to think that my job as a scholar was to deconstruct every text presented to me. My work was done only after I had determined the author’s agenda, come up with counter examples–no matter how obscure–disproving their points, and deconstructed their points to pieces. I could then dismiss the entirety of their work as merely their personal bias.

 

schleiermacher10

But Professor Hollywood insisted that in addition to being critical, we also need to employ the hermeneutic of generosity; instead of only reading against the author, we also need to read alongside them. As the term implies, we ought to be charitable with the text we read, try as best we can to embody the author’s place, and occasionally look past certain biases, or at least temporarily sideline them, in order to fully grasp the arguments in play. Often it’s only from this generous standpoint that we’re able to fully appreciate what a text or author has to offer.

Deconstructing a text with the hermeneutic of suspicion is a critical component of a scholar’s work. But as I realized that day in Hollywood’s class, employing it without tempering it with generosity is ultimately futile. First, despite the insistence by some that true scholarship is objective, everyone has a bias. If we were to dismiss every biased work, there would be nothing to read. But more importantly, if scholarship is solely about deconstructing a text, then we never truly appreciate what a particular author has to offer, the implications of their arguments, or how their theories map onto our own experiences of the world.

Professor Hollywood insisted that in addition to being critical, we also need to employ the hermeneutic of generosity; instead of only reading against the author, we also need to read alongside them.

When it came to Schleiermacher, my eagerness to pinpoint his bias and then dismiss him meant that I didn’t give his theories any credence. I soon realized my folly during Professor Hollywood’s lecture. She pointed out that not only is Schleiermacher’s work critical in understanding the development of liberal Christianity in Europe and the US, but, even more importantly, it is readily applicable to our contemporary world. In the modern West, many people call themselves “spiritual, but not religious,” meaning they maintain some personal, typically felt, experience of the divine, but don’t subscribe to particular rituals, doctrines, hierarchies, texts, or other structures that the modern West associates with religion. Few realize that, far from a modern take on spirituality, this thread has been running through Protestant Christianity for centuries, and that way back in 1799 Schleiermacher was already making this distinction and prioritizing one’s personal, felt, divine encounters as the really real. I was ready to throw Schleiermacher away without realizing that his work offers an important critique of how religion and spirituality are understood in the contemporary world.

This has been perhaps the greatest lesson from my first semester at HDS because it has changed how I read texts in all of my classes. Now I try to keep a balance between these two hermeneutics, always challenging myself to not only read against but with an author. In this way I’m already getting more out of these amazing texts than I ever did before.

Getting to Know HDS: New Friends and In-Between Spaces

05 Monday Oct 2015

Posted by Keith Esposito in Transitioning to HDS

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Academics, Adjusting, Christianity, Classmates, Friends, Interfaith, Student Life, Workload

Recently, as a graduate assistant in the Office of Admissions, I was fielding questions in a virtual chatroom from prospective HDS applicants. Most of the questions were the typical ones you’d expect: What degrees are offered at HDS? Is HDS affiliated with a particular denomination? How does financial aid work? Some were a little more specific: What’s field education and why is it required for all MDivs? Can you tell me more about the Boston Theological Institute? What’s campus life like at HDS?

But there was one question I hadn’t been expecting: Keith, could you tell us what you like the most about HDS?

For context, I am a first year MDiv, this was only my second week of class, and my time at HDS thus far had been a blur. My days consisted of rushing out the door each day for morning prayer at Memorial Church, followed by an advanced Spanish course I was cross-registered in at the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, and then off to my other classes on Religious Pluralism or Ministry Studies or Theories and Methods in the Study of Religion, followed by discussion sections, my Hear and Now interfaith group, late nights in the comfy chairs on the second floor of Andover-Harvard Library chipping away at my mountain of reading, and finally my bike ride home, where I would collapse in an exhausted, but happy, heap on my bed, wake up the next morning, and do it all over again.

I loved my classes, the worship services, my readings—all of it. But I hadn’t had much time yet to process it all. And upon reflection I realized that my favorite part of HDS thus far was the in-between time, the few gaps in my schedule, because it was during those times that I had started to build friendships with my classmates. During a break, I’d mosey outside to the quad, inevitably bump into someone, and strike up a conversation: about Boston, or our classes, or specific readings. Just the night before, I had ended up sitting in the grass with two classmates completely geeking out over some obscure philosophy text.  On another occasion, a conversation about various Christian practices led to a group of us attending a local church service that weekend.

My classmates fascinate me. They come from all walks of life, from all over the US and the world, from an array of religious traditions, all with deep-seated convictions. From them I’ve already learned about Zen Buddhist monasticism, interpretative approaches to Nietzsche, Latin American Liberation Theology, and Greek Orthodox contemplative practices, not to mention the best bars in the Cambridge, books that change lives, and life hacks for poor graduate students (tip #1: shop at market basket). I’ve quickly realized that though HDS offers leading scholars, top-notch academics, unimaginable opportunities, and access to University-wide resources, its greatest resource may be the students who study here. I look forward to learning from as many as I can, one impromptu conversation at a time.

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  • Amazing piece by @HarvardRPL's @LaurenRKerby on the Capitol insurrection. A must read for the moment!! @TheAtlantic twitter.com/LaurenRKerby/s… 16 hours ago
  • “I see design as a way to connect with people and give them tools to accomplish their goals. That’s very much in li… twitter.com/i/web/status/1… 1 day ago
  • RT @JadeSylvan: We don't know when we'll be able to do in-person shows again, but the darkened stages have given me time to reflect on the… 3 days ago
  • RT @uua_lgbtq: Former Clara Barton Fellow J. Sylvan has a piece in the current issue of the @HarvardDivinity Bulletin about their thesis pr… 3 days ago
  • .@JadeSylvan, MDiv ‘20, adapted the biblical story of David into a #queer #bible #musical, Beloved King. The show w… twitter.com/i/web/status/1… 3 days ago

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Header image photo: Tony Rinaldo

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