One of the
Berkeley lecture series on podcast I have been listening into is
Introductory Topics in Religious Studies (
audio feed) by Niklaus Largier.
This series as my impression is after the first four lectures, looks very much like an introduction into Christianity in a historic theological way. The lecturer Niklaus Largier has a rather strong German accent in his English, which takes some getting used to, but is no hurdle after all. I am not sure if I can keep up until the end, but we will see.
The reason I highlight the course today, is because the first four have St. Augustine feature centrally. I knew very little of Augustine, neither of his history, nor of his theology. This course gives some connection and shows how he marks a historic change in the Church, transforming it from a early religious movement into a full fledged tradition with a theology. In this theology he was influenced by Plato. In the next review I'll point to the next mile stone in Church theology, Thomas Aquinas, who took in Aristotle.
More Berkeley:
UC Berkeley webcasts Fall 2009,
Biological Anthropology,
History of Europe from the renaissance until today,
Economics,
Cyber Culture.
The meaning of Thomas is that he took the theology of the Church further from St. Augustine (see previous review) and succeeded in incorporating Aristotelian philosophy and world view into the dogmas of Christianity.
