Interpretative Approaches
The Song of Songs has sometimes offended readers by its frank portrayal of erotic love. Even so, it has received a fair bit of attention from interpreters across the centuries who have tried to wrestle with the eroticism of the book and give it a meaning that would make the book acceptable to those who are sensitive to its contents. Various approaches/methods have been used:
Typological (a method that suggested that the poem was founded on the historical instance of Solomon’s marriage to an Egyptian princess and that the marriage is a typological representation of the union of Christ and the Church). Martin Luther dismissed this suggestion “For we shall never agree with those who think it is a love song about the daughter of the Pharaoh beloved by SolomonThird king of Israel who was known for wisdom and building the first Temple.. Nor does it satisfy us to expound it of the union of God and the synagogueA synagogue is a Jewish house of worship. Jesus often taught in synagogues where he sometimes ran afoul of Jewish leaders. In the book of Acts, Paul and others attend synagogues and teach in them. or like the tropologists, of the faithful soul” (LW 15, 194). He believed himself to propose a new approach, by which he got “the simplest sense and the real character of the book” which he thought was Solomon’s praise to God for his divinely established and confirmed kingdom and government (LW, 15, 191). Others too suggested that Solomon is a type of the spiritual DavidSecond king of Israel, David united the northern and southern kingdoms. in his glory, and earthly love a shadow of the heavenly. They saw the Song as part of sacred history, from which can be understood the love of Christ for the church.
Allegorical – Allegorical readings became very attractive to Christian readers throughout history who found in the book an extended metaphor of Christ’s love for the church. Such readings have contributed a fair bit to preserving the sanctity of the book. Sometimes the allegorical reading has suppressed the plain meaning of the text, but it need not do so. The book’s description of romantic, passionate, and erotic love between a young woman and man celebrates and appreciates this aspect of God’s good creation, while the allegorical approach adds its own dimension. Properly understood, this reading does not deny the joys and wonders of human love, but rather incorporates these elements into the human experience of God. Especially in the church’s early and medieval history, mystics and theologians were willing to embrace such notions of the divine-human relationship — one as close as the relation of human lovers. Religious allegorical interpretations (both Jewish and Christian) are authentic, helpful, and true. But it needs to be borne in mind that such interpretations perhaps belong more to theology than to biblical studies.
Objections have been raised against this method on the grounds that Solomon is not a worthy character (1 Kings 11:4), that an allegorical reading undermines and belittles honorable love between human beings. Some others suggest that the Song is not worthy of being part of inspired Scripture; that human sexual love belongs to the realm of the fallen state of humankind. But the rich symbolism has pushed interpreters towards allegorical readings and continues to do so and these allegorical readings are worthy of attention since they have provided meaning to generations of readers.
Literal – Interpreting the song in its literal sense is not too difficult if we are able to accept it as a celebration of human love, and accept that human love was not a consequence of human disobedience, but that instead human love is part of the created order and therefore deserves a place in the scriptural canonA canon is a general law or principle by which something is judged. The body of literature in the Old and New Testaments is accepted by most Christians as being canonical (that is, authentic and authoritative) for them.. By including it in the canon such love between two people is elevated to something to be desired, celebrated, and received as holyHoly is a term that originally meant set apart for the worship or service of God. While the term may refer to people, objects, time, or places, holiness in Judaism and Christianity primarily denotes the realm of the divine. Many choose to read the plain sense of the Song today.
Desire and Devotion
The inclusion of the Song of Songs in the canon of Scripture was a matter of debate among rabbis in the 1st century CE. Some considered it little more than a drinking song. The matter was settled by the great teacher and mystic, Rabbi Akiba, who said, “The whole world is not worth the day on which the Song of Songs was given to Israel, for all the Scriptures are holy, but the Song of Songs is the Holy of HoliesThe holy of holies was, in the Old Testament, the tabernacle's inner sanctuary that housed the ark of the covenant and its mercy seat. The space was separated from the rest of the holy place by a veil and was visited only once a year...” (Mishnah Yadayim 3:5).
Within the Christian church, the Song of Songs has often been read allegorically, on the conviction that its richest and fullest meaning cannot be found in its literal sense. By this reckoning, the book’s value and stature rest upon the fact that it poetically describes and points forward to Christ’s love for the church and for individual Christians. Early Christian writers, especially Origen (about 185-254 C.E.), read the Song in this way. Bernard of Clairvaux (12th century C.E.) composed 86 sermons on the Song of Songs along these lines. The fusing of sexual desire with religious devotion might surprise some readers, but it is, in fact, well known and commonplace in a wide variety of ancient mystical traditions. In many of them the union of the human and the divine is expressed through metaphors of romantic love.
Today, the Song is generally read, as it should be, on its own terms as a beautiful poetic love song; yet, we can also hear in it—properly, no doubt—ancient and medieval overtones of an interpretation of the love relationship between humans and God.
Song of Songs and the Garden of Eden
Biblical scholars have noted connections between the Song of Songs and the story of the Garden of Eden in Genesis 2-3. In particular, the Song seems to address the curses of the Garden of Eden. In a reversal of the punishment of EveThe name of the first woman, wife of Adam. in Genesis 3:16 (“your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you”), the woman in the Song declares, “I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for me” (Song 7:10). This Hebrew word for “desire” occurs only three times in the Old Testament, so the author of the Song is almost certainly referring back to that initial rupture between men and women. The Song, in this reading, reverses the curses of the Garden of Eden, including the rupturing of the relationship between man and woman. That rupture, and the hierarchical relationship that it engenders, seems to be repaired in the Song, which places the lovers back into a place that looks a lotNephew of Abraham and Sarah. like the Garden of Eden. Indeed, the Song is overflowing with images of lush gardens and abundant fruit; no thorns or thistles here. For more on this interpretation, see Phyllis Trible, God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality (Fortress Press, 1978), and Ellen F. Davis, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs (Westminster John Knox, 2000).
