Sermon 02/15/09
Song of Songs
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. . . The links between sexuality and spirituality are profound. Because the dualisms have done their
- James B. Nelson Today's scripture was chosen to honor Valentines day which was yesterday. Twenty-five years ago James B. Nelson, a theologian and ethicist who taught at United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities, wrote a book titled, BETWEEN TWO GARDENS, in which he examined the ways our religious experience impacts our views on sexuality and how our sexuality impacts our religious understanding. I am grateful to him for his inspiring work and for the loan of his title for my reflection this morning. The past two weeks I've been reading a new translation of the Song of Songs by Ariel Bloch and Chana Bloch. Ariel Bloch is a professor of Near Eastern studies and an expert on Semitic linguistics. Chana Bloch is a professor of English and a noted poet, translator and scholar. This morning I'd like to share some of their work with you. Introduction The Song of Songs (or the Song of Solomon) is "the only example of secular love poetry from ancient Israel that has survived." (Bloch, THE SONG OF SONGS, p. 29) Robert Alter wrote, "The poetry of the Song of Songs is an exquisite balance of ripe sensuality and delicacy of expression and feeling." (Ibid., p. 119) It is only eight chapters long yet it has inspired volumes of commentary, perhaps more than any other ancient text of comparable size. Probably written in the fourth century BCE, it almost didn't make it into the Biblical canon. It has a long history of being interpreted as an allegory, though nothing within the text itself supports such a view. It is predominately a conversation between two young lovers, though other voices occasionally interrupt. It is dramatic, though there is no plot tying it all together. It is more like a dance that is being improvised merely for the joy of expressing one's passion outside the confines of conventional choreography. The Blocks write; The Song of Songs is a poem about the sexual awakening of a young woman and her lover. In a series of subtly articulated scenes, the two meet in an idealized landscape of fertility and abundance - a kind of Eden - where they discover the pleasures of love. The passage from innocence to experience is a subject of the Eden story, too, but there the loss of innocence is fraught with consequences. The Song looks at the same border-crossing and sees only the joy of discovery. The poem is set in early spring, with its intimations of ripening. The rains of the winter season have just ended, the vines are in blossom, the air is alive with scents and birdsong. Since the poem speaks through metaphor, this setting reveals something essential about the lovers, who live in harmony with the natural world. The images of spring reflect their youth, and the innocent freshness of their passion. (Ibid., p. 3) So we find in the Song of Songs a second Eden, another garden in which the delights of love are still experienced innocently in all their erotic fullness. There is no guilt or shame here, nor any hint at domination, control or exploitation. The Blochs continue; The lovers discover in themselves an Eden, thriving and abundant, a Promised Land of vines and fig trees, pomegranates, wheat, milk and honey. The poet's metaphors keep shifting between the actual landscape, suffused with erotic associations, and the landscape of the body. The Shulamite waits for her lover in a garden, but she herself is a garden; the two of them go out to the fragrant vineyards to make love, but she herself is a vineyard, her breasts like clusters of grapes, and their kisses an intoxicating wine. (Ibid., p. 9) There is a mutuality and reciprocity between the two lovers. Both the woman and the man are tender and strong. Their passion is shared, their power is equal. The blochs remind us that, In the Bible, written for the most part form a male point of view, women are by definition the second sex. History is traced through the line of the fathers, as in the priestly genealogies . . . , and the typical formulas for sexual relations . . . make the woman seem passive and acted upon. But in the Song, where the lovers take turns inviting one another, desire is entirely reciprocal. Both are described in images that suggest tenderness . . . as well as strength and stateliness. In this book of the Bible, the woman is certainly the equal of the man. Indeed, she often seems more than his equal. (Ibid., p. 4) Indeed, in a culture that viewed women as male property the Song of Songs is almost subversive in its celebration of a woman's sexuality completely apart from any concerns about male lineage or control. Another important aspect of this text is the way in which it is suffused with animal imagery, or what poet Denise Levertov calls "animal presence." The Blochs tells us that in the Song When lovers are compared to animals, it is in tribute to their beauty and undomesticated freedom. Both lovers have dovelike eyes, and both are associated with deer and gazelles. At moments they seem almost transformed into those graceful creatures. The Shulamite, hiding behind a wall, is a rock dove in the craggy ravines (2:14); the young man bounding over the mountains is a gazelle, a stage (2:9). When she asks him to "be like a gazelle, a wild stag" (2:17, 8:14), she is sweeping aside the biblical hierarchies, and we are reminded that animals were once venerated for their power and beauty. It is not by chance that the Shulamite asks her friends to swear "by the gazelles, by the deer in the field." In an oath, precisely where we might expect to find the name of God, we find instead the names of two animals that are frequently associated with the lovers. This oath makes plain the secular boundaries of the lovers' world. Divinity lives within them and their landscape; the earth is all of paradise they need to know. (Ibid., p. 9f) In this garden humanity and nature are not at odds with one another, they are a part of each other. Rather than dominating, as was humanity's role in Genesis, these lovers participate passionately, freely and harmoniously with nature. There is no enmity or opposition in this garden. So why is all this important? Is this just a frivolous romp in the woods? We are, and have been for a long time, between two gardens. One, the garden of Eden, is: Shame in nakedness Work is cursed Natural birth is associated with alienating pain Fall and redemption story Humanity is isolated and separated from God, self, other, nature, etc.. Spiritual dualism reigns The other, the garden of delight found in the Song, is: Joyfully erotic Delights in sensuality and physicality Connected with and participates in natural world Imaginative and creative Woman and man are equal Relationship is mutual and reciprocal Creation-centered spirituality Incarnational The garden of Eden begins with original innocence and wholeness but ends with alienation, separation, and brokenness. The Song of Songs invites us into a garden that has not yet fallen, that is still whole and blameless, that exists as a possibility within us and our most intimate relationships. The Blochs write; In some respects, the Song seems very accessible to readers now, more so than it has been for some two thousand years. The Shulamite, with her veil off, is a figure all of us recognize, and we find the frankness about erotic love more natural than did earlier audiences. In our day it is the innocence of the Song, its delicacy, that has the power to surprise. Perhaps that very innocence is one source of the poems continuing attractiveness. To read the Song is to recover, through the power of art, a freshness of spirit that is now all but lost to us. The Eden story preserves a memory of wholeness and abundance from the beginning of time; the prophets look forward to a peaceable kingdom at the End of Days. The Song locates that kingdom in human love, in the habitable present, and for the space of our attention, allow us to enter it. (Ibid., p. 35) The question that keeps confronting us is, which garden will we live in? Which one will become more true, more real, for us? They are both mythic. They are both powerful. Will it be our alienation and isolation that defines us, or the possibility for connection and wholeness? The Song of Songs ends in a gloriously unfinished moment that invites our participation in the incarnational wholeness the Song envisions. The young man says: O woman in the garden, All our friends listen for your voice. Let me hear it now. And the young woman replies; Hurry, my love! Run away, My gazelle, my wild stag On the hills of cinnamon.
Song of Songs (excerpts from the first two chapters) [A young woman speaks to her lover] Kiss me, make me drunk with your kisses! Your sweet loving is better than wine. You are fragrant , You are myrrh and aloes. All the young women want you. Take me by the hand, let us run together! My lover, my king, has brought me into his chambers. We will laugh, you and I, and count Each kiss, better than wine. Every one of them wants you. I am the rose of Sharon, The wild lily of the valleys. [Her lover replies] Like a lily in a field of thistles, Such is my love among the young women. [The woman responds] And my beloved among the young men Is a branching apricot tree in the wood. In that shade I have often lingered, tasting the fruit. Now he has brought me to the house of wine And his flag over me is love. Let me lie among vine blossoms, In a bed of apricots! I am in the fever of love. His left hand beneath my head, His right arm holding me close. Daughters of Jerusalem, swear to me By the gazelles, by the deer in the field, That you will never awaken love until it is ripe. |
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