Farewell to Shulamit. Spatial and Social Diversity in the Song of Songs

The Song of Songs, a lyric cycle of love scenes without a narrative plot, has often been considered as the Bible’s most beautiful and enigmatic book. The present study questions the still dominant exegetical convention that merges all of the Song’s voices into the dialogue of a single couple, its co...

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Hoofdauteur: Wilke, Carsten L.
Formaat: Online
Taal:Engels
Gepubliceerd in: De Gruyter 2021
Onderwerpen:
Online toegang:23499
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author Wilke, Carsten L.
author_browse Wilke, Carsten L.
author_facet Wilke, Carsten L.
author_sort Wilke, Carsten L.
collection Directory of Open Access Books
description The Song of Songs, a lyric cycle of love scenes without a narrative plot, has often been considered as the Bible’s most beautiful and enigmatic book. The present study questions the still dominant exegetical convention that merges all of the Song’s voices into the dialogue of a single couple, its composite heroine Shulamit being a projection screen for norms of womanhood. An alternative socio-spatial reading, starting with the Hebrew text’s strophic patterns and its references to historical realia, explores the poem’s artful alternation between courtly, urban, rural, and pastoral scenes with their distinct characters. The literary construction of social difference juxtaposes class-specific patterns of consumption, mobility, emotion, power structures, and gender relations. This new image of the cycle as a detailed poetic frieze of ancient society eventually leads to a precise hypothesis concerning its literary and religious context in the Hellenistic age, as well as its geographical origins in the multiethnic borderland east of the Jordan. In a Jewish echo of anthropological skepticism, the poem emphasizes the plurality and relativity of the human condition while praising the communicative powers of pleasure, fantasy, and multifarious Eros.
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spelling doab-20.500.12854ir-474242024-04-08T20:10:06Z Farewell to Shulamit. Spatial and Social Diversity in the Song of Songs Wilke, Carsten L. BM1-990 BS1-2970 Dionysus Amman Hellenistic Judaism Song of Songs bic Book Industry Communication::H Humanities::HR Religion & beliefs::HRJ Judaism thema EDItEUR::Q Philosophy and Religion::QR Religion and beliefs::QRJ Judaism The Song of Songs, a lyric cycle of love scenes without a narrative plot, has often been considered as the Bible’s most beautiful and enigmatic book. The present study questions the still dominant exegetical convention that merges all of the Song’s voices into the dialogue of a single couple, its composite heroine Shulamit being a projection screen for norms of womanhood. An alternative socio-spatial reading, starting with the Hebrew text’s strophic patterns and its references to historical realia, explores the poem’s artful alternation between courtly, urban, rural, and pastoral scenes with their distinct characters. The literary construction of social difference juxtaposes class-specific patterns of consumption, mobility, emotion, power structures, and gender relations. This new image of the cycle as a detailed poetic frieze of ancient society eventually leads to a precise hypothesis concerning its literary and religious context in the Hellenistic age, as well as its geographical origins in the multiethnic borderland east of the Jordan. In a Jewish echo of anthropological skepticism, the poem emphasizes the plurality and relativity of the human condition while praising the communicative powers of pleasure, fantasy, and multifarious Eros. 2021-02-11T13:29:41Z 2021-02-11T13:29:41Z 2017-08-28 16:06:59 2017 book 23499 2509-7431 9783110500882 9783110498875 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/47424 eng Jewish Thought, Philosophy, and Religion image/jpeg Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110500882 De Gruyter 10.1515/9783110500882 10.1515/9783110500882 af2fbfcc-ee87-43d8-a035-afb9d7eef6a5 9783110500882 9783110498875 viii, 170 open access
spellingShingle BM1-990
BS1-2970
Dionysus
Amman
Hellenistic Judaism
Song of Songs
bic Book Industry Communication::H Humanities::HR Religion & beliefs::HRJ Judaism
thema EDItEUR::Q Philosophy and Religion::QR Religion and beliefs::QRJ Judaism
Wilke, Carsten L.
Farewell to Shulamit. Spatial and Social Diversity in the Song of Songs
title Farewell to Shulamit. Spatial and Social Diversity in the Song of Songs
title_full Farewell to Shulamit. Spatial and Social Diversity in the Song of Songs
title_fullStr Farewell to Shulamit. Spatial and Social Diversity in the Song of Songs
title_full_unstemmed Farewell to Shulamit. Spatial and Social Diversity in the Song of Songs
title_short Farewell to Shulamit. Spatial and Social Diversity in the Song of Songs
title_sort farewell to shulamit spatial and social diversity in the song of songs
topic BM1-990
BS1-2970
Dionysus
Amman
Hellenistic Judaism
Song of Songs
bic Book Industry Communication::H Humanities::HR Religion & beliefs::HRJ Judaism
thema EDItEUR::Q Philosophy and Religion::QR Religion and beliefs::QRJ Judaism
topic_facet BM1-990
BS1-2970
Dionysus
Amman
Hellenistic Judaism
Song of Songs
bic Book Industry Communication::H Humanities::HR Religion & beliefs::HRJ Judaism
thema EDItEUR::Q Philosophy and Religion::QR Religion and beliefs::QRJ Judaism
url 23499
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