Tune My Heart–Women Who Love
Excerpts from Song of Songs 1-8
Introduction
What is your love language? How do you let someone know that they are special to you? How do you express your love for others? Whether we are coupled, or married, or single, or single again, or in close friendships, we can all relate to the human desire to give and receive love, which is part of our God-given nature.
Some of you will be familiar with Gary Chapman’s work on the five love languages. He identifies 5 distinct languages, or ways we express and receive love. They are: words of affirmation, quality time, giving gifts, acts of service, and physical touch (see Gary Chapman, The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love That Lasts). We all have preferred, go-to love language for how we best express and receive love. The secret to love that lasts, Chapman says, is to know the preferred love language of your beloved ones, and to communicate with their primary love language as best you can.
Exploring the Text
Our text today is a form of love language. It is love poetry. Words of affirmation. Tucked into the OT, about two thirds of the way through is this short collection called the Song of Songs (8 chapters) of love poems, written as a dialogue between two lovers, a young man and a young woman–perhaps engaged to be married–as they express their admiration and desire for each other. The language is passionate and personal, erotic and emotional, using all 5 senses to describe the other. We actually left out some of the racier bits!
Song of Songs simply means the ultimate song, like king of kings, or lord of lords would also mean the ultimate one. These lyrical poems are brimming with images from the natural world, loaded with suggestive symbolism and layers of meaning. They highlight the lovers’ desire for intimacy and their anguish when they are apart. The Songs unabashedly affirm and celebrate human sexual attraction and desire as delightful, as good. They marvel at the awesome power of love. They are a veritable “symphony of sensuality” as the late Gary Harder wrote, in a sermon on this text (Gary Harder with Lydia Neufeld Harder, Preaching Sex: on love, intimacy, power, abuse, 49).
Here the wilderness is not a scary place or barren place. Not at all. The gardens, fields, orchards, and hills are a sanctuary, an oasis, a place of beauty and delight, where the lovers can meet. The natural world provides inspiration–image after image for the lovers as they grasp for words to describe each other, and express their almost overwhelming feelings for each other.
So what is this type of poetry doing in our bible?! It seems unusual, maybe even out of place. Back when the books of the bible were being finalized there certainly was debate about whether it belonged in the bible at all. And over the centuries, there has been a range of ways to interpret this text, and its place in the Hebrew scriptures. It is often associated with the wisdom of Solomon, although he is probably not the author. One way to read it is to take the physical and sensual language of the Song of Songs and spiritualize it into allegory. For Jewish readers then it speaks of the love between God and Israel. For later Christian readers it speaks of the love between Jesus and the church or the individual. Another interpretation is to see the pursuit of love in the Songs as a metaphor for the pursuit of divine wisdom. So the Song of Songs can be interpreted on many levels, as some of our hymns this morning suggest.
Sadly, Christianity became an increasingly “sex-negative religion” (Christina Bucher, Believers Church Bible Commentary, Song of Songs, 153), in its first few centuries. Greek philosophy had a great deal of influence in early Christianity. It is a way of thinking that distinguishes between spirit and matter. Spirit was perceived as good, ideal, perfect and holy, while matter (the physical) was considered flawed, imperfect, base or bad. Applied to human bodies, this meant that the physical aspects of ourselves were seen as corrupted compared to our spiritual aspect. Sexuality was seen in a negative light, and because sex, pregnancy and childbirth are associated closely with the bodies of women, they bore the greater stigma of this view.
Writers and leaders such as Augustine, Ambrose and Jerome expressed fear of the power of sexuality, and determined it to be disruptive and sinful. According to Augustine “original sin” was the first act of sexual union between Adam and Eve. That original sin has been passed on generation after generation through sexual intimacy ever since. As a result, “all sexual enjoyment was seen as sinful” (Mary Malone, The Elephant in the Church, 44). Mary Malone, who researched extensively on the history of women in Christianity, describes this as part of “a growing Christian neurosis about the human body and its sexual functioning, which continues…to this day” (Malone, 41). Augustine and others “raised the level of Christian sexual anxiety for centuries” (Malone, 44). Effects from this stigma around sexuality have impacted Christianity ever since.
So with this kind of fixation and anxiety around sexuality, you can see why over the centuries the physical, sensual language of the Song of Songs was uncomfortable for many, even something to fear, or simply ignore or spiritualize. Nadia Bolz -Weber, who was a Lutheran pastor for many years writes, “How bizarre that a religion based on the merging of things human and things divine–a religion based on God choosing to have, of all things, a human body…could develop into such a body–and pleasure-fearing religion” (Nadia Bolz-Weber, Shameless: A Sexual Reformation, 171). She adds, “I find myself outraged at how the erotic nature of Song of Songs has been domesticated, forced into a tame little allegory, and how the anti-body, anti-woman, anti-sex teachings of the church…have hurt me and so many people in my care” (Bolz-Weber, 171).
With all that unhealthy history around sexuality in Christianity it can be a bit of a scary endeavor to explore Song of Songs. Its direct, and semi-erotic language can make us blush! But let’s walk bravely into the wilderness of our discomfort, and see what it might teach us.
Echoes of Genesis
One thing we can’t help but notice when we read this text is all the references, all the echoes, all the “hyperlinks” as one person calls them, to the Garden of Eden, and the stories of Adam and Eve from Genesis 1-3. For starters most of the metaphors the lovers use to describe one another come from the natural world–they sound idyllic, beautiful and perfect. In Genesis 1 and 2 we have creation stories that emphasize the beauty, diversity and goodness of all creation. In the Song of Songs the lovers also express delight and celebrate their physical intimacy, imagined or experienced, with unabashed openness, with the natural world as the sanctuary for their meetings. Similarly the relationship of Adam and Eve appears to be mutual, open and vulnerable, with each other, with the natural world, and with God, the Creator, who is described as “walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze” to connect with the humans (Gen 3:8).
But of course that image of beauty and harmony doesn’t last. In Genesis 3 the humans eat of the forbidden fruit. With that the story changes. Blame and shame enter their world. Doubt and mistrust too. There is a long list of consequences for the snake, the woman, the man, and the earth. For the man and the woman, their relationship is no longer mutual, but marred by a power imbalance.Three levels of human relationships are damaged: with the natural world, with each other, and with God (see Genesis 3:14-19). They are exiled from the Garden, they hide their bodies from each other, and they hide themselves from God.
These stories are timeless and enduring. For we, today, are so aware of the brokenness in gendered relationships. Any news feed will contain something of the messy, often ugly, even violent relationship between the sexes. Pornography, often degrading and dehumanizing in nature, is ubiquitous. We have provinces and municipalities declaring intimate partner violence to be an epidemic. Many people don’t feel safe to express and live their gender identity. I found the recent trial of 5 young men–promising young hockey stars–on trial for sexual assault to be a troubling story on so many levels. While I won’t delve too deeply into it, there are so many issues around trust, believability, consent, the effects of trauma on behaviour, that need to be addressed by our culture. I could go on. Suffice it to say, there is much that is damaged, broken and troubling in our gendered relationships.
Reversal of Genesis 3
So does the Song of Songs have anything to say to that? Ellen Davis, (referenced here in a Podcast from The Bible Project, entitled “Song of Songs: Semi-Erotic Love Poetry, The Bible Project Podcast ) teaches that the Song of Songs is actually a reversal of Genesis 3. She suggests that the language of intimacy and tenderness in the Song of Songs invokes a vision for healing the rift between men and women from Genesis 3.
Let’s take a closer look. The Song of Songs reverses the brokenness of Gen 3 and brings a vision of healing in at least 3 ways. First its poetry honours the belovedness of the other. Its words are overflowing with beautiful, affirming, tender and loving images. They describe the other as delightful and worthy of adoration and love. Both are as much beloved, made in the very image and likeness of God, animated by the Spirit of God, as the other. They are equally good: a gift and a blessing to the other. Their desires and their sexual expression are equally powerful and valid. They are equally deserving of affection and attention. They treat each other with respect and dignity. They are equally worthy of experiencing love. This is a reminder that our belovedness encompasses all that we are: mind, heart and body, including our sexuality.
Second, the poetry of the Song of Songs reverses the brokenness of Gen 3 and offers a vision of healing because it is mutual. Both lovers speak. It is stunning, in the OT, to hear this much from a woman’s perspective. She speaks and acts with equal agency, honesty, and dignity as he does. She speaks equally of her desire, of the beauty of the other, the delight of their mutual affection and intimacy. She expresses no body shame, no cultural shame. She expresses no fear. She has agency over what she does with her body. And the same can be said for her partner. He approaches her as his equal. He delights in her, as she is. He is open, honest and vulnerable with her, as she is with him, because they are safe for each other. Neither of their bodies is diminished, commodified, managed, ruled or manipulated for the pleasure of the other. Their relationship is mutually desired, mutually expressed, mutually enjoyed.
Third, the Song of Songs reversed the brokenness of Gen 3 because it is vulnerable. The poetry offers a healing vision for our intimate relationships because it is so direct, honest, open and real. It is honest about our longing as human beings to be fully known and fully loved, and our joy and delight at experiencing that union. We all need to be loved. We long to connect in all our relationships. But so often, this is scary for us. Our fears and our wounds can get in the way, often in unhealthy ways.
How stunningly counter-cultural to honour and respect the image of God in ourselves and each other; to commit to relationships that are truly mutual; and to be safely vulnerable with one another. This is indeed a healing image, and one we can intentionally teach to the next generations.
The Song of Songs reminds us of the goodness and gift of our humanness, our bodies, our physical nature, including our sexuality and our sexual expression. And here I think the lines between physical and spiritual can get blurred. The Songs also remind us of the power of divine love that seeks us, looks for us, calls out after us, and wants to walk with us in the garden. “As Christians who believe in the incarnation–God become flesh–we cannot separate ourselves into distinct categories of spirit and body” (Joanna Harader, Prone to Wander: A Lenten Journey with Women in the Wilderness, 114). The fullness of love touches our minds, our hearts (spirits) and our bodies.
So what is said about our physical relationships can also be said for our relationship with God. We long to experience intimacy and union with God, to be fully known yet we are afraid to be that honest and vulnerable. We long to be embraced by God but we fear that we are not worthy of God’s love. Sadly, afraid of that level of intimacy, we back away, we hide, we are afraid that if God knows us fully, God will not be able to love us.
The honesty of the Song of Songs invites us to open our whole selves, body, mind and spirit, to another, to trust in the awesome power of love, both human and divine, and to delight in the joy and wonder of being fully known, and fully loved.