Week 8 lecture notes

Week 8

Midterm Test

Marriage and faithfulness in Proverbs

• The teaching on marriage and adultery (chapter 7) is in a section about competing discourses.
• Choosing one’s life path (choosing wisdom or folly) is compared to choosing one’s life mate.
• Wisdom is living life in a way that corresponds with to the way things actually are, recognizing one’s place: we are not the creators of our world or of the rules under which it operates.
• Likewise, a wise relationship is one where you recognize your place and do not try to pretend you are an exception to the rule. Just as there is appropriate behaviour, there is appropriate sexual activity. Inappropriate activity will only end up hurting yourself. It goes against the way things are.

Reading Song of Songs
As we read the text, what questions arise?
What do you wonder about?
Song of Songs: Date, Authorship: Solomon or later?
"The Song of Songs which is to Solomon": By? For? About?
The author is not Solomon:
1. Solomon never speaks; he is only spoken about.
2. The references to Solomon are mostly negative (more on this later).
3. Solomon's relationships with women are the opposite of what the Song teaches (more on this later).
4. The Hebrew is late, with Persian loanwords, so probably from after the Babylonian exile, like Ecclesiastes.
Interpretation: Literal or Allegorical?
1. Literal: it is about human love and sexual intimacy
2. Allegorical: it uses the language of human love and intimacy to speak of something else (e.g., the relationship of God and the Church)
· Both interpretations go back to the 200's AD or earlier; the oldest evidence we have is from people objecting to a literal interpretation.
· the Council of Constantinople (550 AD) outlawed the literal reading of the Song.
Is the Song obscene if interpreted literally?
· Many have thought the Song would be obscene if interpreted literally.
· Why should a description of human love and sexuality be a problem?
o In Greek thinking, one's physical nature must be overcome by the mind/spirit.
o The church developed in this Greco-Roman culture assuming a world view influenced by Plato, with his idea that mind is superior to matter; that one's physical nature must be overcome by the mind and spirit.
o The church did not question this view of the physical nature, so celibacy was thought to be spiritual.
· But the view of the Bible is that creation is good, and sexuality is one aspect of that goodness (Genesis 1). (for example, resurrection is always resurrection of the body.)
What was the intention of the original author?
· Early Jews and Christians alike (from the second century AD on) interpreted it allegorically; they only disagreed about what the allegory represented.
· If allegory was intended, we have no evidence in the Song itself, and so much would be inexplicable. (E.g., the woman (=the people of God) takes the initiative in "rousing" the man (=God).)
· The author did not think erotic love was a problem.
For Next Week:
· Read Song 1–2
· Read Provan 263–296
Not to be handed in; simply recommended for a good paper:
· Review a book or article that is important for your paper.