With just one core module you'll choose subjects that build on material studied in year one or discover new areas.
Year three optional theology modules are also available to choose in year two.
You can develop your knowledge of biblical languages to enable you to read texts in their original form. If you have no existing knowledge of biblical Greek you may be able to take an introductory level module outside your year group. If this interests you please contact us to discuss.
You must pass year two which counts approximately one third towards your final degree classification.
The Philosophy of Religion
In this module you’ll explore significant problems in the philosophy of religion, such as the credibility of the existence of God, the relation between religion and science, the relation between religion and morality, the problem of evil, and the possibility of an after-life. There will also be discussion of significant themes, such as the nature of being, of faith, of religious experience, of religious language, and of religious love. This module is taught through four hours of lecture and an hour-long seminar weekly.
Watch Dr Conor Cunningham give an overview of this video in just over 60 seconds.
Islamic Theology and Philosophy
This module examines how Muslims have addressed fundamental theological and philosophical questions relating to their faith. These questions concern the foundations of religious knowledge and authority, God's unity and attributes, God's relationship to the world, divine determinism and human freedom, prophecy, and eschatology. Key figures will include the rationalist Mu'tazili and Ash'ari theologians, the philosophers Ibn Sina (Avicenna) and Ibn Rushd (Averroes), and the influential medieval intellectuals al-Ghazali, Ibn al-'Arabi, and Ibn Taymiyya. Selections from primary sources will be read in translation, and special attention will be given to the integration of late antique philosophical traditions into Islamic theology.
Watch Dr Jon Hoover give an overview of this module in just 60 seconds.
Women and Warfare in the Hebrew Bible
Explore a range of historical, ethical, and theological issues relating to women and warfare in the Hebrew Bible and ancient Israel.
You'll start by looking at the Hebrew Bible's portrayals of women and the feminine, including:
- goddesses
- biblical queens
- the role of women in the community.
Next, you'll move on to warfare, considering, for example:
- the relationship between military victory and righteousness in the Bible
- the theological implications of YHWH being a god who fights in battle
- how Judah's greatest ever military defeat became the defining point of its theology.
Watch Dr Cat Quine give and overview of this module in less than 100 seconds.
Virtue Ethics and Literature
Virtue ethics is an ancient form of moral practice, which has also come back into prominence in recent years. It believes that ethics belongs to the lived experience of a tradition and is therefore narrative in character, offering itself naturally to literary embodiment. We shall study key ancient Greek texts, such as Aristotle's Nichomachaen Ethics and Theophrastus' work on character, as well as Cicero, Aquinas and contemporary reconsturals of the virtue tradition by Alasdair MacIntyre and Stanley Hauerwas. Virtue ethics will then be analysed in literary texts, such as Homer's Iliad, the medieval poem, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Jane Austen's Mansfield Park and Graham Green's Brighton Rock. Students will also do a short presentation, applying virtue ethics to a particular moral problem or specific form of activity, e.g nursing, war, or teaching.
Watch Professor Alison Milbank give an overview of this module in less than 80 seconds.
Jewish Theology and Philosophy from Philo to Kabbalah
The module provides an overview of the most important theological and philosophical ideas, theories and arguments that Jewish thought developed from the Hellenistic period of Philo of Alexandria to the postmodern times of Emmanuel Levinas. The method of instruction will combine historical and speculative approaches, using the perspective of the 'history of ideas'.
The Theology of Paul
Explore the theology of Paul as found in the seven letters that are generally considered to be written by him (Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, Philemon).
The major themes explored are:
- law
- reconciliation
- justification
- grace
- faith
- sacrifice
- word of God
- Christology
- Israel
- the church
- ethics
- the ‘last things’.
Watch Professor Richard Bell give an overview of this module in less than 60 seconds.
Intermediate Biblical Hebrew
This module builds on Level 1 introductory Hebrew language modules in developing the ability to handle the text of the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (BHS), an edition of the Hebrew Masoretic Text with its own invaluable contribution, the critical apparatus. This apparatus has a system of sigla (symbols and abbreviations) that, when learned, enable the Hebrew student to quickly compare variations of the text through the course of written history. The ability to navigate the BHS is key for examining some of the most mysterious and debated concepts in the Hebrew Bible. The basis of the module is the study and translation of individual texts (which will vary from year to year) with analysis of vocabulary, grammar, and style.
Introduction to Biblical Greek A
Introduction to the grammar, syntax and vocabulary of the Greek language, as found in the New Testament; no previous knowledge of the language is assumed.