THE SONG OF SONGS.
The praise of the virtuous woman, at the close of the Proverbs,
is given a Jahvist turn by verse 30: "Favour is deceitful and beauty
vain; but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised." But the
Solomonists also had their ideas of the virtuous woman, and of beauty,
these being beautifully expressed in a series of dramatic idylls
entitled The Song of Songs. To this latter, in the original title,
is added, "which is Solomon's"; and it confirms what has been said
concerning the superstitious awe of everything proceeding from Solomon,
and the dread of insulting the Holy Spirit of Wisdom supernaturally
lodged in him, that we find in the Bible these passionate love
songs. And indeed Solomon must have been superlatively wise to have
written poems in which his greatness is slightly ridiculed. That of
course would be by no means incredible in a man of genuine wisdom--on
the contrary would be characteristic--if other conditions were met
by the tradition of his authorship.
At the outset, however, we are confronted by the question whether
the Song of Songs has any general coherency or dramatic character
at all. Several modern critics of learning, among them Prof. Karl
Budde and the late Edward Reuss, find the book a collection of
unconnected lyrics, and Professor Cornill of Königsberg has added
the great weight of his name to that opinion (Einleitung in das Alte
Testament. 1891). Unfortunately Professor Cornill's treatment is brief,
and not accompanied by a complete analysis of the book. He favors as
a principle Reuss's division of Canticles into separate idylls, and
thinks most readers import into this collection of songs an imaginary
system and significance. This is certainly true of the "allegorical"
purport, aim, and religious ideas ascribed to the book, but Professor
Cornill's reference to Herder seems to leave the door open for further
treatment of the Song of Songs from a purely literary standpoint. He
praises Herder's discernment in describing the book as a string of
pearls, but passes without criticism or denial Herder's further view
that there are indications of editorial modifications of some of
the lyrics. For what purpose? Herder also pointed out that various
individualities and conditions are represented. This indeed appears
undeniable: here are prince and shepherd, the tender mother, the cruel
brothers, the rough watchman, the dancer, the bride and bridegroom. The
dramatis personæ are certainly present: but is there any drama?
Admitting that there was no ancient Hebrew theatre, the question
remains whether among the later Hellenic Jews the old songs were
not arranged, and new ones added, in some kind of Singspiele or
vaudeville. There seems to be a chorus. It is hardly consistent
with the general artistic quality of the compilation that the lady
should say "I am swarthy but comely," or "I am a lily of the valley"
(a gorgeous flower). Surely the compliments are ejaculations of the
chorus. And may we not ascribe to a chorus the questions, "Who is
this that cometh up out of the wilderness?" etc. (iii. 6-10.) "What
is thy beloved more than another beloved"? (v. 9.) "Who is this that
cometh up from the wilderness leaning on her beloved"? (viii. 5).
As in the modern vaudeville songs are often introduced without
any special relation to the play, so we find in Canticles some
songs that might be transposed from one chapter to another without
marring the work, but is this the case with all of them? The song
in the first chapter, for instance, in which the damsel, brought by
the King into his palace, tells the ladies of the home she left,
and of maltreatment by her brothers, who took her from her own
vineyard and made her work in theirs, where she was sunburnt,--this
could not be placed effectively at the end of the book, nor the
triumphant line, "My vineyard, which is mine own, is before me,"
be set at the beginning. This is but one of several instances that
might be quoted. Even pearls may be strung with definite purpose,
as in a rosary, and how perfectly set is the great rose,--the hymn
to Love in the final chapter! Or to remember Professor Cornill's word
Scenenwechsel, along with his affirmation that the love of human lovers
is the burden of the "unrivalled" book, there are some sequences
and contrasts which do convey an impression of dissolving views,
and occasionally reveal a connexion between separate tableaux. For
example the same words (which I conjecture to be those of a chorus)
are used to introduce Solomon in pompous palanquin with grand escort,
that are presently used to greet the united lovers.
"Who is this that cometh up from the wilderness like pillars of
smoke?" (iii. 6.)
"Who is this that cometh up from the wilderness
Leaning on her beloved?" (viii. 5.)
These are five chapters apart, yet surely they may be supposed
connected without Hineininterpretation. Any single contrast of this
kind might be supposed a mere coincidence, but there are two others
drawn between the swarthy maiden and the monarch. The tableau of
Solomon in his splendor dissolves into another of his Queen Mother
crowning him on the day of his espousal: that of Shulamith leaning on
her beloved dissolves into another of her mother pledging her to her
lover in espousals under an apple tree. And then we find (viii. 11,
12) Solomon's distant vineyards tended by many hirelings contrasted
with Shulamith's own little vineyard tended by herself.
The theory that the book is a collection of bridal songs, and that
the mention of Solomon is due to an eastern custom of designating
the bridegroom and bride as Solomon and Queen Shulamith, during
their honeymoon, does not seem consistent with the fact that in
several allusions to Solomon his royal state is slighted, whereas only
compliments would be paid to a bridegroom. Moreover the two--Shulamith
and Solomon--are not as persons named together. It will, I think,
appear as we proceed that the Shelomoh (Solomon) of Canticles
represents a conventionalisation of the monarch, with some traits
not found in any other book in the Bible. A verse near the close,
presently considered, suggests that the bride and bridegroom are at
that one point metaphorically pictured as a Solomon and Solomona,
indicating one feature of the Wise Man's conventionalization.
Renan assigned Canticles the date B. C. 992-952, mainly because in
it Tirza is coupled with Jerusalem. Tirza was a capital only during
those years, and at any later period was too insignificant a town to
be spoken of as in the Song vi. 4:
"Thou art beautiful, O my love, as Tirzah,
Comely as Jerusalem,
Dazzling as bannered ranks."
But the late Russell Martineau, a thorough and unbiassed scholar,
points out in the work phrases from Greek authors of the third
century B. C., and assigns a date not earlier than 247-222. [19]
But may it not be that the Alexandrian of the third century built on
some earlier foundation, as Shakespeare adapted the "Pound of Flesh"
and the "Three Caskets" (Merchant of Venice) from tales traceable as
far back as early Buddhist literature? or as Marlowe and Goethe used
the mediæval legend of Faustus?
The several songs can hardly be assigned to one and the same
century. The coupling of Tirza and Jerusalem points to a remote past
for that particular lyric, and is it credible that any Jew after
Josiah's time could have written the figleafless songs so minutely
descriptive of Shulamith's physical charms? Could any Jewish writer of
the third century before our era have written iv. 1-7 or vii. 1-9,
regarding no name or place as too sacred to be pressed into his
hyperboles of rapture at every detail of the maiden's form, and
have done this in perfect innocency, without a blush? Or if such a
poet could have existed in the later Jahvist times, would his songs
have found their place in the Jewish canon? As it was the book was
admitted only with a provision that no Jew under thirty years of age
should read it. That it was included at all was due to the occult
pious meanings read into it by rabbins, while it is tolerably certain
that the realistic flesh-painting would have been expunged but for
sanctions of antiquity similar to those which now protect so many
old classics from expurgation by the Vice Societies. These songs,
sensuous without sensuality, with their Oriental accent, seem ancient
enough to have been brought by Solomon from Ophir.
On the other hand a critical reader can hardly ascribe the whole book
to the Solomonic period. The exquisite exaltation of Love, as a human
passion (viii. 6, 7), brings us into the refined atmosphere amid which
Eros was developed, and it is immediately followed by a song that
hardly rises above doggerel (viii. 8, 9). This is an interruption
of the poem that looks as if suggested by the line that follows it
(first line of verse 10) and meant to be comic. It impresses me as
a very late interpolation, and by a hand inferior to the Alexandrian
artist who in style has so well matched the more ancient pieces in his
literary mosaic. Herder finds the collection as a whole Solomonic,
and makes the striking suggestion that its author at a more mature
age would take the tone of Ecclesiasticus.
Considered simply as a literary production, the composition makes
on my own mind the impression of a romance conveyed in idylls, each
presenting a picturesque situation or a scene, the general theme and
motif being that of the great Solomonic Psalm.
This psalm (xlv.), quoted and discussed in chapter III., brings
before us a beautiful maiden brought from a distant region to
the court, but not quite happy: she is entreated to forget her
people and enjoy the dignities and luxuries offered by her lord,
the King. This psalm is remarkable in its intimations of a freedom
of sentiment accorded to the ladies wooed by Solomon, and the same
spirit pervades Canticles. Its chief refrain is that love must not be
coerced or awakened until it please. This magnanimity might naturally
connect the name of Solomon with old songs of love and courtship such
as those utilised and multiplied in this book, whose composition might
be naturally entitled "A Song (made) of Songs which are Solomon's."
The heroine, whose name is Shulamith,--(feminine of Shelomoh,
Solomon) [20]--is an only daughter, cherished by her apparently
widowed mother but maltreated by her brothers. Incensed against her,
they compel Shulamith to keep their vineyards to the neglect of her
own. She becomes sunburnt, "swarthy," but is very "attractive," and
is brought by Solomon to his palace, where she delights the ladies
by her beauty and dances. In what I suppose to be one of the ancient
Solomonic Songs embodied in the work it is said:
"There are threescore queens, and fourscore concubines,
And maidens without number:
Beyond compare is my dove, my unsoiled;
She is the only one of her mother,
The cherished one of her that bare her:
The daughters saw her and called her blessed,
Yea, the queens and the concubines, and they praised her." [21]
Thus far the motif seems to be that of a Cinderella oppressed by
brothers but exalted by the most magnificent of princes. But here
the plot changes. The magnificence of Solomon cannot allure from her
shepherd lover this "lily of the valley." Her lover visits her in
the palace, where her now relenting brothers (vi. 12) seem to appear
(though this is doubtful) and witness her triumphs; and all are in
raptures at her dancing and her amply displayed charms--all unless
one (perhaps the lover) who, according to a doubtful interpretation,
complains that they should gaze at her as at dancers in the camps
(vi. 13). [22]
Although Russell Martineau maintained, against most other commentators,
that Solomon is only a part of the scene, and not among the dramatis
personæ, the King certainly seems to be occasionally present, as in
the following dialogue, where I give the probable, though of course
conjectural, names. The dancer has approached the King while at table.
Solomon--
"I have compared thee, O my love,
To my steed in Pharaoh's chariot.
Thy cheeks are comely with plaits of hair,
Thy neck with strings of jewels.
We will make thee plaits of gold
With studs of silver."
Shulamith, who, on leaving the King, meets her jealous lover--
"While the King sat at his table
My spikenard sent forth its odor.
My beloved is unto me as a bag of myrrh
That lieth between my breasts,
My beloved is unto me as a cluster of henna-flowers
In the vineyards of En-gedi."
Shepherd Lover--
"Behold thou art fair, my love, behold thou art fair;
Thine eyes are as doves,
Behold thou art fair, my beloved, yea pleasant:
Also our couch is green.
The beams of our house are of cedar,
And our rafters are of fir."
Shulamith--
"I am a (mere) crocus of the plain."
Chorus, or perhaps the Lover--
"A lily of the valleys."
Shepherd Lover--
"As a lily among thorns
So is my love among the daughters."
Shulamith--
"As the apple tree among forest trees
So is my beloved among the sons.
I sat down under his shadow with great delight,
And his fruit was sweet to my taste."
Thus we find the damsel anointing the king with her spikenard, but
for her the precious fragrance is her shepherd. Against the plaits of
gold and studs of silver offered in the palace (i. 2) her lover can
only point to his cottage of cedar and fir, and a couch of grass. She
is content to be only a flower of the plain and valley, not for the
seraglio. Nevertheless she remains to dance in the palace; a sufficient
time there is needed by the poet to illustrate the impregnability of
true love against all other splendors and attractions, even those of
the Flower of Kings. He however puts no constraint on her, one song,
thrice repeated, saying to the ladies of the harem--
"I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
By the (free) gazelles, by the hinds in the field,
That ye stir not up, nor awaken love,
Until it please."
This refrain is repeated the second time just before a picture of
Solomon's glory, shaded by a suggestion that all is not brightness even
around this Prince of Peace. The ladies of the seraglio are summoned
to look out and see the passing of the King in state, seated on his
palanquin of purple and gold, but escorted by armed men "because of
fear in the night." In immediate contrast with that scene, we see
Shulamith going off with her humble lover, now his bride, to his field
and to her vineyard, and singing a beautiful song of love, strong as
death, flame-tipped arrow of a god, unquenchable, unpurchaseable.
Though according to the revised version of vi. 12 her relatives are
princely, and it may be they who invite her to return (vi. 13), she
says, "I am my beloved's." With him she will go into the field and
lodge in the village (vii. 10, 11). She finds her own little garden
and does not envy Solomon.
"Solomon hath a vineyard at Baalhamon;
He hath let out the vineyard to keepers;
Each for the fruit thereof was to bring a thousand pieces of
silver:
My vineyard, which is mine, is before me:
Thou, O Solomon, shall have the thousand,
And those that keep the fruit thereof two hundred."
There was, as we see in Koheleth, a prevailing tradition that Solomon
felt the hollowness of his palatial life. "See life with a woman thou
lovest." The wife is the fountain:
"Bethink thee of thy fountain
In the days of thy youth."
This perhaps gave rise to a theory that the shepherd lover was Solomon
himself in disguise, like the god Krishna among the cow-maidens. It
does not appear probable that any thought of that kind was in
the writer of this Song. Certainly there appears not to be any
purpose of lowering Solomon personally in enthroning Love above
him. There is no hint of any religious or moral objection to him,
and indeed throughout the work Solomon appears in a favourable
light personally,--he is beloved by the daughters of Jerusalem
(v. 10)--though his royal estate is, as we have seen, shown in a light
not altogether enviable. Threescore mighty men guard him: "every man
hath his sword upon his thigh because of fear in the night," and the
day of his heart's gladness was the day of his espousals (iii. 8, 11).
It is not improbable that there is an allusion to Solomon's magic seal
in the first lines of the hymn to Love (viii. 6). The legend of the
Ring must have been long in growing to the form in which it is found in
the Talmud, where it is said that Solomon's "fear in the night" arose
from his apprehension that the Devil might again get hold of his Ring,
with which he (Aschmedai) once wrought much mischief. (Gittin. Vol. 68,
col. 1, 2). The hymn strikes me as late Alexandrian:
"Wear me as a seal on thy breast
As a seal-ring on thine arm:
For love is strong as death,
Its passion unappeasable as the grave;
Its shafts are arrows of fire,
The lightnings of a god. [Jah.]
Many waters cannot quench love,
Deluges cannot overwhelm it.
Should a noble offer all the wealth of his house for love
It would be utterly spurned."
Excluding the interrupting verses 8 and 9, the hymn is followed by a
song about Solomon's vineyard, preceded by two lines which appear to
me to possess a significance overlooked by commentators. Shulamith
(evidently) speaks:
"I was a wall, my breasts like its towers:
Thus have I been in his eyes as one finding peace.
Solomon hath a vineyard," etc. [as above.]
The word "peace" is Shalôm; it is immediately followed by Shelomoh
(Solomon, "peaceful"); and Shulamith (also meaning "peaceful"), thus
brings together the fortress of her lover's peace, her own breast,
and the fortifications built by the peaceful King (who never attacked
but was always prepared for defence). Here surely, at the close of
Canticles, is a sort of tableau: Shalôm, Shulamith, Shelomoh: Peace,
the prince of Peace, the queen of Peace. If this were the only lyric
one would surely infer that these were the bride and bridegroom, under
the benediction of Peace. It is not improbable that at this climax of
the poem Shulamith means that in her lover she has found her Solomon,
and he found in her his Solomona,--their reciprocal strongholds of
Shalôm or Peace.
Of course my interpretations of the Song of Songs are largely
conjectural, as all other interpretations necessarily are. The songs
are there to be somehow explained, and it is of importance that every
unbiassed student of the book should state his conjectures, these
being based on the contents of the book, and not on the dogmatic
theories which have been projected into it. I have been compelled,
under the necessary limitations of an essay like the present, to omit
interesting details in the work, but have endeavoured to convey the
impression left on my own mind by a totally unprejudiced study. The
conviction has grown upon me with every step that, even at the lowest
date ever assigned it, the work represents the earliest full expression
of romantic love known in any language. It is so entirely free from
fabulous, supernatural, or even pious incidents and accents, so human
and realistic, that its having escaped the modern playwright can only
be attributed to the superstitious encrustations by which its beauty
has been concealed for many centuries.
This process of perversion was begun by Jewish Jahvists, but they have
been far surpassed by our A. S. version, whose solemn nonsense at
most of the chapter heads in the Bible here reached its climax. It
is a remarkable illustration of the depths of fatuity to which
clerical minds may be brought by prepossession, that the closing
chapter of Canticles, with its beautiful exaltation of romantic love,
could be headed: "The love of the Church to Christ. The vehemency of
Love. The calling of the Gentiles. The Church Prayeth for Christ's
coming." The "Higher Criticism" is now turning the headings into
comedy, but they have done--nay, are continuing--their very serious
work of misdirection.
It has already been noted that the Jewish doctors exalted Bathsheba,
adulteress as she was, into a blessed woman, probably because of the
allusion to her in the Song (iii. 2) as having crowned her royal Son,
who had become mystical; and it can only be ascribed to Protestantism
that, instead of the Queen-Mother Mary, the Church becomes Bathsheba's
successor in our version: "The Church glorieth in Christ." And of
course the shepherd lover's feeding (his flock) among the lilies
becomes "Christ's care of the Church."
But for such fantasies the beautiful Song of Songs might indeed never
have been preserved at all, yet is it a scandal that Bibles containing
chapter-headings known by all educated Christians to be falsifications,
should be circulated in every part of the world, and chiefly among
ignorant and easily misled minds. These simple people, reading the
anathemas pronounced in their Bibles on those who add anything to the
book given them as the "Word of God" (Deuteronomy iv. 2, xii. 32,
Proverbs xxx. 6, Revelation xxii. 18), cannot imagine that these
chapter-headings are not in the original books, but forged. And what
can be more brazenly fraudulent than the chapter-heading to one of
these very passages (Revelation xxii. 18, 19), where nothing is said
of the "Word of God," but over which is printed: "18. Nothing may be
added to the word of God, nor taken therefrom." But even the learned
cannot quite escape the effect of these perversions. How far they reach
is illustrated in the fate of Mary Magdalen, a perfectly innocent woman
according to the New Testament, yet by a single chapter-heading in Luke
branded for all time as the "sinner" who anointed Jesus,--"Magdalen"
being now in our dictionaries as a repentant prostitute. Yet there are
hundreds of additions to the Bible more harmful than this,--additions
which, whether honestly made or not originally, are now notoriously
fraudulent. It is especially necessary in the interest of the Solomonic
and secular literature in the Bible that Truth shall be liberated from
the malarious well--Jahvist and ecclesiastical--in which she has long
been sunk by mistranslation, interpolation, and chapter-headings. The
Christian churches are to be credited with having produced critics
brave enough to expose most of these impositions, and it is now the
manifest duty of all public teachers and literary leaders to uphold
those scholars, to protest against the continuance of the propaganda
of pious frauds, and to insist upon the supremacy of truth.