Jerusalem and Athens Forum

Your One-Year Experience

Fall Semester: "Tradition"
Classical antiquity through the Reformation era

• The purpose of liberal learning
• The nature of virtue and vice; the problem of evil; friendship, love, and charity; monasticism and the contemplative life
• The role of Scripture and tradition in Christian thought; wisdom and the well-ordered life;
• The relationship between faith and learning; Christianity and political authority; the significance of the Protestant Reformation, and more

Spring Semester: "Modernity"
Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment to the present

• What is modernity anyway?
• How does it relate to plurality?
• What does it mean to live out a faithful Christian vocation in...
  • A pluralistic democratic society?
  • A Western/American culture?
  • A free market economic system?
  • An era of rapid scientific and technological advancement?

Highlights

• Year-long intentional learning cohort
• Fall retreat
• Cultural activities in Boston and New England
• Interaction with visiting scholars and Gordon faculty
• Gordon STILLPOINT essay contest
• Spring debate

Qualifications

• Anticipate at least sophomore status at the beginning of the program
• Must have a 3.0 GPA or higher
• Students considering post-baccalaureate education (whether seminary, graduate school, law, medicine, etc.) are especially encouraged to apply; however, all applicants are considered equally.

Why the name Jerusalem and Athens Forum?

The second-century church father Tertullian famously asked:

"What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?"
"What has the Academy to do with the Church?"

These questions have resonated over Christian learning for centuries, focusing the mind on the relationship between faith and intellect, piety and thought. More broadly, they prompt the reflective Christian to consider what it means to be faithful in the realms of culture, society, science, and politics.

The Jerusalem and Athens Forum is designed to allow promising students to explore these questions in the context of a great books honors program in the history of Christian thought and literature. The two-semester program is founded on the premise that the present and future suffer when the wisdom of the past is neglected.

Course Curriculum

The Jerusalem and Athens Forum is a two-semester program.

Fall Semester: JAF 301 Tradition: From Antiquity to the Enlightenment (6 credits)
Readings during the fall semester begin with the foundations of Western literature, and include early church fathers, medieval, Renaissance and Reformation thinkers.

• A Student's Guide to Liberal Learning by James V Schall
• Leisure, the Basis of Culture by Josef Pieper
• Gorgias by Plato
• Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle
• Confessions by Saint Augustine of Hippo
• The Rule of St. Benedict by Saint Benedict of Nursia  
• Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan
• Paradise Lost by John Milton
• The Protestant Reformation by Hans Hillerbrand
• Hildegard of Bingen, Selected Readings by Hildegard
• The  Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri

Spring Semester: JAF 302 Modernity: From the Enlightenment to the Present (6 credits)
Readings during the spring semester continue from modernity to the present day, and emphasize Christian trans-Atlantic migration, bioethics and the state of Evangelical Christianity in the present American context.

• Pensées by Blaise Pascal
• The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith
• Democracy in America
• by Alexi de Tocqueville
• Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
• Rerum Novarum by Leo XIII
• Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot
• Kafka, The Judgment and other Stories by Kafka
• The Day the Revolution Began by N.T. Wright
• The Complete Short Stories by Flannery O'Connor

Fall Retreat

At the beginning of the academic year, the Jerusalem and Athens Forum sponsors a weekend retreat. The two-day retreat includes a Friday afternoon discussion with an invited speaker and an evening worship gathering. On Saturday, students enter group discussions and spend an afternoon enjoying various outdoor activities on the North Shore.

Cultural Activities

The Jerusalem Athens Forum serves as a bridge between Gordon and the cultural opportunities afforded by Gordon's location. Over the years, JAF participants have visited places such as the Museum of Fine Arts, the Peabody Essex Museum and the Boston Opera House.

Outings in Boston and across New England include:

• Actors' Shakespeare Project
• Boston Lyric Opera
• Boston Ballet
• Boston Opera House
• BU Huntington Theater
• Carmelite Convent
• Christ the Redeemer Anglican Church
• Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
• Islamic Society of Boston
• Museum of Russian Icons
• NorthShore Music Theater
• Peabody Essex Museum
• St. Mary Star of the Sea Catholic Church
• The Orthodox Church of St. John the Russian 

Annual Debate

Each spring semester students participate in an Oxford-style public debate. The debate is a venerable institution in Western higher education dating from medieval universities. While largely an exercise in public oratory, the JAF annual debate is also a time for members of the Gordon community to engage in the cumulative work of collaborating students.

Vocational Mentoring

The Jerusalem and Athens Forum has helped launch students into some of the most prestigious and competitive graduate programs at universities including Yale, Princeton, Notre Dame, Boston College, Boston University, Duke, University of Edinburgh, Oxford, Rutgers, University of Pennsylvania and Brandeis. Program alumni have interned at the White House, The National Endowment for the Arts, The Wall Street Journal and the Consortium of Christian Colleges and University. The directors provide guidance with preparation for post-baccalaureate education and work choices

Guest Speakers 

The Jerusalem and Athens Forum offers opportunities to hear and interact closely with both Visiting Scholars and Gordon Faculty. JAF provides the opportunity for small group discussion and Q&A with scholars such as N.T. Wright, Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity from the University of St. Andrews, Dr. Ken Bishop, Oncologist/Hematologist at Sturdy Memorial Hospital and Dr. Nancy Hill, Charles Bigelow Professor of Education at Harvard.  

Gordon faculty such as Dr. Puffert, Associate Professor of Economics, Dr. Sheratt, Professor of Political Science and Dr. Bruce Herman, Lothlorien Distinguished Chair of Fine Arts provide expert perspectives across the disciplines.

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