Erotic Words, Sacred Landscapes, Ideal Bodies: Love and Death in the Song of Songs

Abstract

The Song of Songs, composed probably in the third century bce , is one of the most influential poems in the Western erotic and mystical traditions, by virtue of its appearing in the Bible. It is a dialogue between two lovers in an idyllic pastoral landscape, seemingly without relation to the rest of the sacred text. It is, however, a critique of the biblical tradition, whose implicit question is: what was it all worth? For the Song, the answer is that love alone guarantees an ambiguous immortality. It is thus a tacit counter to Ecclesiastes' refrain that everything is illusory. I discuss the instability of gender in the Song and its questioning of patriarchy, to create a vulnerable maternal space for lovers' intimacy. This space is that of the poetic imagination, which is more real than the everyday world. The metaphors coalescence with the sound patterns of the Song to generate a synthesis of the body, the landscape, history, and the fauna and flora of ancient Israel.

Similes of Woman and Man in the Book of Song of Songs

“…Hunt (2008) underscored that it was very scant in the Bible that physical beauty was lauded as something eternal through extravagant similes. The findings of this study also corroborated the study of Landy (2020) that woman in the Song was described as more active and dynamic than man. She further evidenced that the woman is the center of the poetry and the more commanding character.…”

“…Moreover, Gault (2019), analyzing the Song of Songs' body metaphors, concluded that the metaphors portrayed the forms and functions of the lovers' bodies as well as the beauty concept in ancient Israel. Landy (2020) unearthed The authors of the present study found that the investigations applying Conceptual Metaphor Theory that focus on the similes of man and woman in the whole Songs of Songs are still scant. The previous studies on the Song of Songs have discussed the metaphors and similes in terms of other themes, like body imagery (Gault, 2019), sacred landscapes (Landy, 2020), of certain verses, like Songs 4,4 (Verde, 2016(Verde, , 2018, or of its functions, like to display motif of virility (Hunt, 2008).…”

“…Landy (2020) unearthed The authors of the present study found that the investigations applying Conceptual Metaphor Theory that focus on the similes of man and woman in the whole Songs of Songs are still scant. The previous studies on the Song of Songs have discussed the metaphors and similes in terms of other themes, like body imagery (Gault, 2019), sacred landscapes (Landy, 2020), of certain verses, like Songs 4,4 (Verde, 2016(Verde, , 2018, or of its functions, like to display motif of virility (Hunt, 2008). The authors opted to explore deeply the similes of woman and man in the Song of Songs, as (Watson, 1994) pinpointed that similes represent most of the figurative language in Hebrew literature.…”

“…The illustration of this mapping displayed in Figure 1 below. There is a body of research on the similes in the Song of songs (Gault, 2019;Hunt, 2008;James, 2017;Landy, 2020;Verde, 2018). Hunt (2008) underlined that the function of the similes in the Song of Songs is non-structural, which means that they were not intended to provide an opening or closing to poetry parts.…”

Benarkah Cinta Kuat Seperti Maut? Eksegesis Kidung Agung 8:6-7 dan Relevansinya

“…Landy mendiskusikan ketidakstabilan gender dalam kitab Kidung Agung dan ia mempertanyakan budaya patriarki untuk menciptakan ruang maternal yang rentan bagi keintiman kekasih. Ruang tersebut disebutnya sebagai ruang imajinasi puitis yang lebih nyata daripada dunia sehari-hari (Landy, 2019). Sedangkan menurut Darmaraj, kitab Kidung Agung meninggalkan, bahkan menolak, budaya yang diakomodasi oleh teks Perjanjian Lama lainnya yang menciptakan hak prerogatif pria dari kecemburuan dalam cinta romantik (Dharamraj, 2018).…”