#105 The Hebrew Bible: Exodus and Deuteronomy

Enlightening moments from last class:

• “I thought that Chase’s point about discipline is really important to how Stoicism works because you have to use discipline to train yourself to think that way.”
• “Loup said it was surprising to see that Epicurus says that you should only think of special people as replaceable objects, since I never thought of the special people as 'objects'.”
• “Paige - Emptiness from the loss of something precious emotionally can make you lose discipline.”
• “I found Sungbu's opinion interesting. I have watched some Korean dramas before and I found them extremely emotional. Sungbu says that Epictetus would find those characters "stupid" because of the way they react towards loved ones. It's not that you can't love someone, it's just that don't dread yourself because you lose them. The characters are being overreactive towards love and emotions.”

Remember we can contribute in meaningful ways, and we should make space for everyone to do so. 

• Who else has something enlightening to be recognized? Let’s keep an ear out for Caleb, Celina, Nathaniel, Nithya, and Tomo.
• How can we be sure to recognize something they’ve shared by this time next week?​

Hebrew Bible

• Drawn from an adjacent but culturally unique part of the world: the Semetic world or what we might today call the Middle East.
• How did you find the difficulty level? Was it easier to understand? More difficult? Why?
• Format is different than Epicurius, Aristotle, and the Stoics. How so?
• One way the text has been read traditionally: Hebrew chanting of Exodus 20 (YouTube).​

Two modes of engaging the texts:

• To celebrate or affirm tradition.
• To understand the text and what it tells us about the context it was written in.

We’ll be focusing more on the second. What might that mean for us? 

Let’s begin that conversation now: what do you think the text tells us about the people who created and valued this text?

CIQ