Cânticos 1

Cânticos 1

Morris - Introduction to Song of Solomon Like the book of Ecclesiastes, the Song of Solomon (also known as “Song of Songs” and “Canticles”) is both fascinating and enigmatic, both providing striking testimonials (as in the book of Proverbs) to the unique, wide-ranging, wisdom of Solomon. Like the other two books, it claims to be from Solomon (Song of Solomon 1:1). Solomon was said to have written over a thousand songs (I Kings 4:32), but this was his “Song of songs!” The book was evidently written early in Solomon’s reign, long before his many wives turned his life away from devotion to his first love. Although there have been a number of interpretations of this book, the most obvious interpretation is no interpretation at all. That is, it is simply what it purports to be—a romantic love poem describing the love of young Solomon and a Shulamite maiden who became his first bride. There is nothing unseemly, of course, about a book of the Bible depicting the beauties of pure courtship and marital love. The union of male and female in holy matrimony is intrinsic to the creation itself (Genesis 2:24-25). In this sense, the narrative of the Song can be considered as an idyllic picture of courtship and marriage that might apply, with varying details, to all true love and marriage as ordained by God. In a secondary sense, the account may also be considered as a type of the love of Christ and His church, the “Bride of Christ” (compare Ephesians 5:22-33; Revelation 21:2; 22:17). This analogy should not be pressed too far, of course, as the book should primarily be studied in accord with its own clear intent, that of describing and honoring the God-ordained union of man and woman in true love and marriage. Dictionary of Biblical Imagery - Song of Songs The most persuasive interpretation of the title Song of Songs, taken from the first two words of the Hebrew text, is that it is the best of all songs. Certainly the book’s pervasive and compelling use of imagery lends credence to this claim. No other book of the Bible is so thick with simile, metaphor and other artful examples of language. The most egregious errors in the interpretation of this book arise because of a failure or unwillingness to recognize its proper poetic quality. The imagery is too often treated as allegory in the negative sense, the characters and the images standing for persons or qualities for which there are no hints in the text itself. Or the literary allusions are turned into real people and events, as happens in the various dramatic interpretations of the Song. But the Song is neither allegory nor drama. There is no plot or narrative, and no historical characters are involved, except by allusion (Song 3:7; 8:10–12). Rather, the Song is composed of loosely connected lyric poetry that expresses an emotion, indeed one of the most powerful of emotions: love. A prose description of love would not be as powerful. The poetic imagery expresses an emotion that transcends simple statement. It preserves a level of mystery and appeals to more than the mind-to the whole person. Nature Imagery. Dominating everything else in the Song is the fact that it is a collection of pastoral love poetry. The conventions of pastoral, one of the most common literary conventions at every stage in the history of literature, are easy to grasp: the setting is rustic, the characters are shepherds and shepherdesses (usually a fictional disguise), and the actions are those customarily done by shepherds and shepherdesses. Pastoral love poetry, specifically, adds wooing and courtship to the activities performed by the characters. In pastoral love poetry, nature supplies most of the images by which the lovers express their romantic passions, including their praise of the beloved. Subtypes of pastoral love poetry include the invitation to love (an invitation to the beloved to stroll in a flowery and fruitful landscape is a metaphoric invitation to marriage and the life of mutual love [Song 2:10–15; 7:10–13]) and the emblematic blazon or waṣf (the beloved is praised by cataloging his or her beautiful features and comparing them to objects in nature [Song 4:1–7; 5:10–16; 6:4–7; 7:1–5]). Nature imagery permeates the Song, and here we will only mention briefly the flowers, fountains, gardens, orchards, vineyards and animals that ornament this passionate love poetry. In the first place, many of the scenes of intimacy take place in natural settings. We read of the lovers’ tryst in a forest bedroom (Song 1:16–17). They find each other in verdant gardens (Song 6:2–3) and meet under an apple tree (Song 8:5). Such peaceful, romantic natural settings are contrasted with the hostile urban settings where the two lovers are separated from one another (Song 5:2–8). The physical beauty of the couple is described using nature imagery. The man is like a gazelle or young stag on spice-laden mountains (Song 8:14). The woman is like a palm tree, her breasts like clusters of the vine (Song 7:7–8). Perhaps most powerful is the description of the woman’s body as a garden or a fountain (Song 4:12–5:1). In this waṣf the climactic focus is on the woman’s vagina, likened to a marvelous and sweet-smelling garden, a well-watered fountain. These are common ancient Near Eastern images of a woman’s vagina. The metaphors of the book consistently draw upon nature, but it is important to realize that the correspondence is not primarily based on visual similarity. The point of the comparisons is instead the value that the speaker finds in his or her beloved. The lovers and their love are compared to the best things in nature. The poetic mode of the Song is not pictorial but emotional and sensuous in nonvisual ways (including tactile and olfactory). More than anything else, images of nature portray the quality of the beloved, and here we can see evidence of the Hebrew fondness for structure and for how things are formed. The comparison of the woman’s teeth to sets of twin shorn sheep fresh from washing (Song 4:2) is a typical specimen, capturing such qualities as whiteness, wetness, symmetry, completeness and flawlessness. A woman’s breasts are not visually like two fawns (Song 4:5), but the imagery captures her modesty (a passerby will not get close to two fawns) and their softness to the touch. Courtly Imagery. One of the paradoxes of pastoral poetry is that it arose only with the rise of cities and civilization. Images of a royal court, with all its wealth and opulence, frequently break through the fictional façade of the Song’s pastoral world. The world of the Song is filled with expensive clothes, perfumes, rich foods, gems and erotic leisure. As early as Song 1:4, the woman addresses her lover as her king; in Song 7:5 the woman’s head is said to “crown” her and her hair is a “royal tapestry.” This language has mistakenly led some to argue that the Song is a story of a royal pair, perhaps Solomon and his Egyptian queen, but the language is love poetry, where the woman is a queen in the eyes of her lover and the man is a king in the eyes of his beloved. The allusion to Solomon and his luxurious carriage in Song 3:6–11 adds to the royal motif. It is unclear whether we are to imagine the woman being carried in the carriage or the man being connected with it, but the point is that the lover and the beloved are associated with this object of royal luxury and leisure. The wealth of the court is reflected in a number of the images in the Song, including those having to do with clothes, perfumes, food, gems and architecture. The veil, except in one instance, probably associates the woman with royalty and marriage (Song 4:1, 3; 6:7). The evidence indicates that Israelite women normally did not wear veils except during marriage ceremonies and among the wealthy and sophisticated classes. The one exception is Song 1:7–8, which is likely a reference to the fact that prostitutes also wore veils. In this instance the woman chides the man, asking him not to make her act like a prostitute as she seeks him out. But in the many other cases where the Song mentions a veil, a royal and perhaps marriage context is evoked. Oils and spices are images of both court and nature. They were expensive and so the property of the rich only. Already in Song 1:2 the woman comments on the enticing fragrance of her lover, and the compliment is returned in Song 4:10. Of course, this image evokes the sense of smell, once again reminding the reader that the emotion of love is a multifaceted sensual experience. The beauty of both the man and the woman is compared to the beauty of precious gems. Looking at Song 5:10–16 alone, we see the man’s head compared to gold, his eyes to jewels, his arms to rods of gold set with chrysolite. His body (the term more likely refers to his phallus) is a tusk of ivory decorated with sapphires, and so on. In a word, his physical beauty is attractive, even stunning, to behold. Finally, the architectural images also partake of a courtly milieu. The woman’s neck, for example, is compared to David’s tower, in all likelihood to emphasize its grace and dignity (Song 4:4). Family Imagery. Munro rightly identifies a series of metaphors in the Song which arise from the family. Interestingly, there is little marital imagery as such-no references to husband and wife (except perhaps when the man refers to the woman as his “bride” [Song 4:8–12; 5:1]), but there are significant references to mothers and siblings. The mothers of the woman and the man support the relationship (Song 6:9; 8:5). The home of the former is a secure place for intimacy (Song 3:4; 8:2). Interestingly, the fathers are never mentioned in the Song; the woman’s brothers seem to take the place of her father. As opposed to her mother, the brothers are an obstacle to love’s intimacy, and she struggles to be free of their influence (Song 1:5–7; 8:8–12). At one point the woman declares her wish that her lover were her brother, so that she might be intimate with him publicly as well as privately (Song 8:1). On the other hand, the man will often endearingly refer to his beloved as “his sister” (Song 4:9–10, 12; 5:1–2). Summary. The world of the Song is a world of heightened emotion. Its genius is that it enables us to view the world as experienced by people intoxicated with love (cf. the references to love as being better than wine [Song 1:2; 4:10], meaning more emotionally intoxicating than wine is physically intoxicating). The imagery of the Song is pastoral, passionate, erotic, sensuous, hyperbolic, metaphoric and affective. The style aims at an association of feelings and values rather than visual correspondence, and the imagery is symbolic rather than pictorial, figurative rather than literal. Douglas Sean O’Donnell has written a helpful article entitled "The Earth Is Crammed with Heaven: Four Guideposts to Reading and Teaching the Song of Songs" in Themelios 37, April, 2012. Refer to this article for more detailed discussion of the 4 "Guideposts" summarized below... 1. Guidepost One: This Is a Song - We start with the first guidepost: This is a song. Our text begins, “The Song” (Song 1:1a).6 The significance of this simple observation is that it identifies the genre. This is not a letter, gospel, law book, prophecy, or an apocalyptic revelation. This is a song. And a song (this is what I’ve learned after many years of study) is written to be sung. (Aren’t you glad I’m your guide?) Perhaps this Song was originally written to be sung during the seven-day marriage festival.7 We know that Israelite wedding celebrations lasted this long from Gen 29:27, Jdg 14:12, and extra-biblical Jewish history. And we know from Jer 7:34 that singing was part of these festivities: “the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.”8....The Song is a song. Thus each time you read and teach a poetic section, you should ask yourself, “What is the poetry doing?” You should try to feel the poetry before you act upon its message.12 You should, in a sense (and with your senses), smell the myrrh, frankincense, and aloes, touch the polished ivory, taste the wine and apples, hear the flowing streams, see the gazelles leaping over the mountains … yes feel the flashes of fire, the very flame of the LORD. That is the first guidepost: This is a song. 2. Guidepost Two: About Human Love - Here is the second guidepost: This is a song about human love set in the context of marriage. We will deal with the second part of that sentence first. We have already noted that this is a wedding song. Let me now defend that claim. We know it is a wedding song from the cultural context. (The sexual revolution of the 1960’s hadn’t yet reached Jerusalem in 960 B.C.) In that place and time, there were only two kinds of love: “free love” between a man and a woman in marriage, and sexual slavery, which is found in adultery and fornication.13 So we know that this is a wedding song from the cultural context (i.e., in Israel only sex within marriage was celebrated), but also from the language of the Song itself.14 After the word “wedding” is used in 3:11 (as the wedding day of Solomon is used as a foil), the word “bride” is used of the young woman six times in the next seventeen verses (chs. 4–5). This is the heart of the Song, the section that undoubtedly describes sexual relations. Further support for this marriage-song thesis is found in the language of a permanent pledge, such as “set me as a seal upon your heart” (8:6) or “my beloved is mine, and I am his” (2:16a; cf. 7:5; 8:4).15....It is dangerous when Christian commentators, theologians, and pastors think there is a radical dichotomy between the sacred and the secular—praying is sacred; kissing is secular....Don’t get me wrong here. The lyrics here about seeing, touching, and tasting are “candid but not crude.”28 They are not prudish, but neither are they immodest. They are far removed from the sexual anarchy and idiocy of our Top 40 music, as well as the crass love poetry of the ancient Near East. The Song has a beautiful balance: it has adult content, but it is adolescent-appropriate. It is not X-rated, but rated PG: parental (and pastoral) guidance recommended. This Song guides us to see with scriptural sensibilities that the earth is crammed with heaven,29 that the way of a man with a woman is “too wonderful” (Prov 30:18–19), and that marriage is not simply a concession to the necessity of procreation, but an affirmation of the beauty, chastity, and sacredness of human love. This is a song about human love set in the context of marriage. I hope I have pounded that second (sadly necessary) guidepost soundly into place. 3. Guidepost Three: Found in the Bible - With our second guidepost in place, let me quickly add the third lest we get off course. Just because the Song is about human love does not mean that we must think a-theologically about it, namely, that it has nothing to say about God’s love for us or our love for God. .....So here is the third guidepost: this is a song about human love set in the context of marriage that is found in the Bible. The Song of Songs cannot be read properly if it is read outside of its canonical context.30 We must read its positive marriage imagery in contrast to Israel’s unfaithfulness as depicted in the prophets....The Song is a song about human love set in the context of marriage, which is found in the Bible, and the Bible’s ultimate reference point is Jesus: his birth, life, teachings, miracles, sufferings, death, resurrection, ascension, mediation, and return.....Therefore, with this third guidepost in place, throughout our reading and teaching of the Song, we should seek, without exaggerating analogies, to be exegetically accurate, thoroughly canonical, and thus “boldly Christological.”34 4. Guidepost Four: Written to Give Us Wisdom - Our fourth and final guidepost is about wisdom. This is a song (guidepost one) about human love (guidepost two) found in the Bible (guidepost three) written to give us wisdom (guidepost four)..... The four guideposts presented in this article—this is a song (guidepost one) about human love (guidepost two) found in the Bible (guidepost three) written to give us wisdom (guidepost four)—cannot explain every image or solve every philological, grammatical, and structural riddle, but hopefully they can give us greater confidence to read and teach this holy book that is wholly applicable today. QUESTION - What is wrong with the allegorical interpretation method? GOTQUESTIONS.ORG ANSWER - The allegorical (or spiritualizing) method of interpretation was prominent in the church for about 1,000 years until it was displaced during the Reformation (ED: UNFORTUNATELY THEY DID NOT DISPLACE ALLEGORICAL INTERPRETATION ENTIRELY. WHEN THEY CAME TO CLEARLY ESCHATOLOGICAL OR APOCALYPTIC PASSAGES, MOST OF THE REFORMERS JETTISONED THE SAFE BOUNDS OF LITERAL INTERPRETATION AND WENT OUT OF BOUNDS SPIRITUALIZING MANY OF THE ESCHATOLOGICAL PASSAGES, ESPECIALLY THOSE RELATED TO THE FUTURE OF THE NATION OF ISRAEL - SEE REPLACEMENT THEOLOGY WHICH IS BASED ON A NON-LITERAL APPROACH!). The Reformers sought the “plain meaning” of Scripture. Allegorical interpretation looks for a deeper, spiritual meaning within the text. While not necessarily denying that the text has a literal meaning or that the historical incidents reported are true, allegorical interpreters will look for a deeper symbolic meaning. Some examples may be helpful: The Song of Solomon is often interpreted allegorically as referring to the love that Christ has for the church. In the Scofield Reference Bible, C. I. Scofield interprets Genesis 1:16 allegorically. While not denying the plain meaning of the verse regarding creation, he finds a deeper spiritual (he calls it typological) meaning. The greater light/sun is Christ, and the lesser light/moon is the church, reflecting the light of Christ, and the stars are individual believers. (ED: NOTICE HOW EASY IT IS TO VEER AWAY FROM THE LITERAL INTERPRETATION OF THE BIBLE!) In his Portraits of Christ in Genesis, M. R.