"...for your love is more delightful than wine "

How did medieval Christians use the Bible differently from the way we do?

First, in the way they read Scripture, their hermeneutic. Given their focus on Scripture as written not just by human authors, but by the divine author, they were much more likely than us to interpret using allegory.

Second, in what they read. For instance, did you know that the Song of Songs [SoS] was “the most frequently interpreted book of medieval Christianity” [1]? Bernard of Clairvaux, in the 11th century, wrote no fewer than sixty-eight sermons on just the first two chapters and three verses. The Patrologia Latina, a collection of writings of the Fathers, “lists thirty-two Latin commentaries on the Song of Songs written from the time of Jerome and Ambrose to Peter Damián in the eleventh century. By comparison, …Galatians comes under study only six times, …Romans only nine.” [2] So popular was this book that the SoS was second only to the Psalms in the number of times it was set to music by Renaissance composers [3].

This book makes no mention of God, and by all appearances is simply erotic poetry. Yet the face-value meaning of the text, is certainly the minority one for pre-modern readers. It has been seen as an allegory for God and Israel (the traditional Jewish interpretation), God and the Church (the traditional Christian view), God and the believer (also popular historically) and even God and Mary.

Despite the difficulty SoS had making it into the Jewish canon, and further challenges to it by Christians in the 4th and 16th centuries, some have owned it proudly. As Rabbi Akiba said at the council of Jamnia in 90, “All the ages are not worth the day on which the Song of Songs was given to Israel. For all the writings are holy, but the Song of Songs is the Holy of Holies.” [3]

As you can imagine, the allegorical method can be nowhere as stretched as when applied to erotic poetry. So for Origen, the breasts, hair, lips, neck, etc. are the “powers” of the soul. According to Ambrose (4th cent. bishop of Milan), “What are the breasts of the church except the sacrament of baptism?” For Gregory the Great, the fawns feeding among the lilies are saints who “are unto God a sweet savor of Christ” (quoting 2 Cor 2:15). Again from Ambrose, on the SoS 7:2: “Small, too, are the navel and belly of the soul that ascends to Christ.” [4]

A medieval Jewish interpreter, Saadia, said the Song is like a book for which the key has been lost [5]. Indeed, it seems no interpretation is without its problems. The love-song reading appears to revel in loving but premarital sex. The poem is more a collection of poems, and the narrative at times unclear. At the same time, it has such detail that any allegory either ignores those details or contorts to fit them.

Still, similar allegory is not without precedent; both Hosea and in Ezek 16 draw a line between God’s love for his people and a suitor for his love. Even Jesus refers to himself as the “bridegroom.” But these passages are clearly figurative, whereas SoS gives no hint it wants to be read this way. Indeed, allegory limits what one can learn from the text. Where it agrees with the rest of Scripture, we affirm the allegory; where it doesn’t, we reject it. Thus, we cannot learn anything new from the SoS.

Well, not quite. Even if it says nothing new doctrinally, SoS may say it with greater depth and feeling. I had a friend in college, Amy, who was a very trusting and spiritual Christian. I remember very clearly her telling the rest of us in a prayer meeting of how she’d wandered Tappan Square in prayer, as if wandering with her boyfriend lost in conversation. You could see from her eyes that her passion for Jesus was deeper than many married couples have for one another.

Many of us will find it awkward thinking of Jesus as husband. But I have never forgotten Amy’s intense desire for intimacy with God.

So it is with curiosity that I have begun to explore some of the vast literature on the SoS. John of the Cross, for instance, while imprisoned for his support of Teresa of Avila, wrote his own Spiritual Canticle [6]. His poem is essentially a rewriting of SoS in a form more amenable to the allegory of the soul pursuing intimacy with God. Here is an excerpt:

We shall go at once

To the deep caverns of the rock

Which are all secret,

There we shall enter in

And taste of the new wine of the pomegranate.

There you will show me

That which my soul desired;

And there You will give at once,

O You, my life!

That which You gave me the other day.

The breathing of the air,

The song of the sweet nightingale,

The grove and its beauty

In the serene night,

With the flame that consumes, and gives no pains.

The nuns of John’s day prevailed upon him to write a commentary on his poem, but even without it we see a clear and eloquent description of the pursuit of a soul for and by God’s Spirit. John sharpens the God-soul allegory while retaining the eloquence of the Song.

Rabbi Shalom Carmy wrote, “Holiness is synonymous with intimacy; that is what the Song of Songs tells us, in a way unique among the books of Jewish Scripture” [7]. Perhaps it is hard to read SoS as pure allegory, and certainly it is a waste to disregard its beauty as romantic poetry. But it can be more than just advice to young lovers. Its history challenges us to set aside modern exegetical inhibitions, to read SoS with Christians through the centuries, and to learn of a passion for Christ which is as strong as death itself (8:6).

* * *

[1] E. Ann Matter, "The Voice of My Beloved: The Song of Songs in Western Medieval Christianity" (1990), 6; quoted in Thomas F. Ryan, “Sex, Spirituality and Pre-modern Readings of the Song of Songs,” Horizons, 28/1 (2001), 81-104.

[2] Endel Kallas, “Martin Luther as Expositor of the Song of Songs,” Lutheran Quarterly, 2 (1988), 323-341.

[3] http://www.npr.org/2011/07/13/137800097/stile-antico-asks-a-different-kind-of-love

[4] Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, OT vol. IX.

[5] J. Paul Tanner, “The history of interpretation of the Song of Songs,” Biblioteca Sacra 154 (1997), 23-46.

[6] You can read it online at http://www.ccel.org.

[7] “Perfect Harmony,” First Things, Dec 2010, p. 33.

Figures:

Figure 1: Bede, Super cantica canticorum, England, St Albans, first quarter of the twelfth century; from St Albans Abbey, where this copy of Bede’s commentary on the Song of Songs was made. Illuminated by an itinerant professional, the Alexis Master (act. c.1100-1130). The initial to the first book shows the intimate embrace of bride and groom, interpreted as the mystical union of the Church and Christ. [http://www.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/gallery/cambridgeilluminations/themes/2.html]

Figure 2: Capital from the Song of Solomon in Winchester Cathedral. Author unknown, date 1100s, source http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~jtreat/song/270.html

Divinity school

One of the most breathtaking passages in the NT, and one which gets little air time, is 2 Peter 1:3-11, which begins

His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Thus he has given us, through these things, his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust, and may become participants in the divine nature.

Consider what the "promises" give us: participation in the "divine nature." The idea that this might be open to us seems incredible.

But what does it mean? The word "participants" is the Greek koinonoi, meaning companions, partners, sharers, so we are given the chance to be partners in God's nature. It's a tough concept to wrap one's head around for several reasons. First, there aren't many parallel concepts; one never speaks of sharing in the angelic nature, or even the canine nature, much less the divine. Second, sharing in the divine nature means that humans are somehow capable of achieving such a lofty height. Third, it also means that God is not altogether "other." Surely God is so great, dwelling in the inscrutable heights of heaven, that we cannot hope to pin down his nature, much less share in it? According to 2 Peter we can.

So what is God's nature--at least, the aspect of it we can participate in? When we think of the divine nature the "omnis" come to mind: omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent. Yet none of these is promised to us, either in this life or the next.

It turns out that this phrase and concept were well known in ancient times. The dualistic Greek world view associated permanence and immortality with the divine nature and transience and mortality with the creation. And there were various theories of how the divine nature was achieved [1]; through ritual (the mystery religions); through philosophical contemplation and detachment (Platonism); through the secret knowledge (Hermetic literature), in the afterlife, or through mystical ecstasy (Philo).

For Peter, as in Hellenistic thinking, the divine nature allowed escape from corruption (v. 4). But for Peter, it comes first through knowledge (v. 3), not through any of the above avenues. And while in the culture of the day corruption was in the very nature of the physical world, for Christians and Jews alike, the corruption was due to sin, which entered the world through Adam. To escape sin is to escape the death that reigns in this fallen world. Believers will be granted new life in the resurrection of the dead, and freedom from sin.

But there is another related element of participation in the divine nature which happens now. As it says in Jn 1:18,

No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.

Our understanding of the divine nature comes through Jesus. We believe that in living among us Jesus set aside his "omnis," but not his divine nature. This is described in Philippians 2:5-7:

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

who, though he was in the form of God,

did not regard equality with God

as something to be exploited,

but emptied himself,

taking the form of a slave,

being born in human likeness.

The central aspect of Jesus' ministry, the greatest way in which Jesus reflected the divine nature, was in his dying for us, his self-sacrificial love, a perfect reflection of his humility.

We may look forward to the next life, but not at the expense of this life. As Fred Craddock puts it,

...the conversion from this life to the next is not achieved simply by dying and therefore passing from mortality to immortality. Rather the change is moral and ethical. [2]

The divine nature is characterized by humble, Christ-like, self-giving love. Turning aside from the lusts of this corrupt world, fueled by knowledge of Christ's sacrifice, and following in Jesus' footsteps, we share in the very nature of the transcendent God.

* * *

Why the Pelican Art? In the middle ages, it was believed that pelicans pierced their own breasts in order to feed their young. This became a symbol for Christ's life-giving sacrifice: "O loving pelican, O Jesu Lord, unclean am I but cleanse me in thy blood" (Thomas Aquinas, Adoro Te Devote). The reference can also be found in Dante's Paradiso (25:113) and Act IV, scene V of Hamlet, where Laertes says to the king, "To his good friends thus wide I'll open my arms; and like the life-rendering pelican, repast them with my blood."

The first image is from: The Cloisters Collection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; John Stewart Kennedy Fund, 1922, reproduced in The Medieval Menagerie - Animals in the Art of the Middle Ages by Janetta Rebold Benton, Abbeville Press Publishers, New York, (1922), pg 22 [http://donna.hrynkiw.net/sca/pelican/index.html].

The second image is from The Hague, Museum Meermanno, MMW, 10 B 25, ca. 1450 [http://physiologus.proab.info/?re=524].

[1] Richard J. Bauckham, Jude, 2 Peter, Word Biblical Commentary (1983), p. 180.

[2] First and Second Peter and Jude, Westminster Bible Companion (1995), p. 98.

it's all about the data

When discussing science & religion, there are two types of people: those for whom historical and anecdotal data can be relevant, and those for whom scientific data are the only data.

Perusing old issues of the American Journal of Physics I ran across some letters to the editor concerning a book review of Ian Barbour's Religion in an Age of Science. First, one physicist complains,

...it seems to me that the basic underpinning of most modern religions is unquestioning acceptance of life-after-death as an absolute truth. But this is in direct conflict with the scientific fact that there is no life after death. (One such proof: human memory is stored in the circuitry of the brain and after death this circuitry completed decomposes.) I fault the reviewer for not telling us how Barbour resolves this fundamental conflict between science and Religion.

Another physicist replies,

Professor [so-and-so] makes a number of mistaken claims. The proposition that the human soul is immortal has been subject to rational demonstration since the time of the ancient Greeks--hardly unquestioning acceptance! Instead, he presents his unquestioning acceptance that human memory is limited to the brain, as a fact. How does he know this? It is his materialistic belief that excludes the possibility of a soul. He eliminates a priori any possibility that his assertions can be tested and so renders any claim to the mantle of "scientific" for his position empty.

One test for his assertion would be: have people come back to life from death? The scriptures contain numerous accounts, even of one after being 4 days dead. Of course these depend on the evidence of witnesses, but so much in life depends on such evidence, even the credibility of physicists themselves.

(The Greeks subjected resurrection to rational demonstration? How did they do that?)

These letters point to two fundamental roadblocks:

First, the materialist discounts anecdotal and historical evidence (i.e., Scriptures) as unscientific and certainly not strong enough to support the existence of resurrection. (Note the common, Bayseyan assumption that the grander the claim, the greater the evidence needed.) Here the second writer shoots himself in the foot by allowing in all anecdotal evidence. Now he's carrying around Joseph Smith's golden tablets. Yet somewhere in there is a valid point: Not all data are scientific data, nor are historical and anecdotal evidence without merit. Those in the humanities can be just as interested in truth and evidence. In fact, the historian of science must sift evidence and is capable of drawing conclusions just as the scientist is.

A good example is the discovery of solitons by naval engineer John Scott Russel in 1834. He observed a wave travel at high speed down a channel for well over a mile without diminishing. This didn't fit the current theories of wave motion, and giants of the day such as George Stokes denied its very existence. Now solitons are established in theory and experiment and may be found many places in nature and engineering, but for long time their basis was only anecdotal. Not all things which exist fit our current theories, or readily admit to observation and measurement.

Second, the materialist would likely reject the idea that he had made any assumption at all in his materialist beliefs, appealing to that great obfuscator, Occam's Razor, by which one counts (weighs?) assumptions when deciding propositions. The materialist might well reply, "I suppose I did make the assumption that the soul doesn't exist. I also assume fairy dust doesn't exist, but you don't fault me for that."

Yet we need not, and should not, feel compelled to throw out scriptural evidence. Rather we have the harder task of sorting and weighing it. The fairy-dust response is only valid if there exists no evidence for God, the resurrection, etc. There does, just not scientific evidence. (See the first point.)

The debate continues for a few years past those letters. A conservative Christian quotes Ezekiel's dry bones passage as if it were God announcing by megaphone that he does engage in resurrection. (Exillic literary context and imagery be damned!) A setback for the non-materialists, unfortunately. The ensuing discussion includes many old saws, the persecution of Galileo by the Catholic Church and the non-overlapping magisteria. And quite a number of letters cheering for materialist reductionism.

Is it possible for these sides to talk to, and not past, one another?