The Song of Songs: Aesthetics, Ethics, Hermeneutics
Princeton University, March 26-27, 2014
The Song of Songs is only eight chapters long, and yet its exegetical history has been one of the most extensive and tumultuous of all biblical texts. The greatest point of contestation in the Song’s reception revolves around the suitable mode of exegesis. For many centuries the predominant tendency – both in Jewish and Christian commentaries – was to read the Song of Songs as an allegorical poem whose primary objective was to celebrate divine love. A dramatic shift (one of the most dramatic exegetical shifts of all times) took place with the rise of new readings of the Song as an earthly dialogue between human lovers within the intellectual framework of eighteenth-century scholarship. We explored the changing definitions of what counts as allegorical and what counts as literal in a whole array of readings from Origen to Agnon.
Program
Wednesday, March 26, 2014
- 7:30 p.m. Introduction and Welcome
Leora Batnitzky - Princeton University - Keynote Address: Robert Alter - University of California Berkeley
Translating the Song of Songs: English Poetry and Hebrew Sense
Thursday, March 27, 2014
- 9:15 a.m. Welcoming Remarks
Ilana Pardes - Hebrew University of Jerusalem - 9:30-10:30 a.m. Ron Hendel - University of California, Berkeley
The Intricate Evasions of As: The Life of Metaphor in Song of Songs
Respondent: Naphtali Meshel - Princeton University - coffee break
- 10:45- 11:45 a.m. Ilana Pardes - Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Agnon’s Botany of Love: The Song of Song in Israeli Culture
Respondent: Leora Batnitzky - Princeton University - Lunch
- 12:30-1:30 p.m. Yael Sela-Teichler - University of Pennsylvania
From Heavenly Bride to Universal Sympathy: Judaizing the Shulamite in a Cantata In Memoriam Moses Mendelssohn
Respondent: Richard Cohen - Hebrew University of Jerusalem - 1:30-2:30 p.m. Elaine Pagels - Princeton University
The Shape Shifting Bride: Notes on Race and Ethnicity in the Exegesis of the Song
Respondent: Galit Hasan-Rokem - Hebrew University of Jerusalem - coffee break
- 3:00-4:00 p.m. Galit Hasan-Rokem - Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Desire Performed in the Song of Songs: ‘Draw me after you, let us make haste’
Respondent: Alexander Kaye - Princeton University - 4:00-4:30 p.m. Concluding Remarks
Vivian Liska - University of Antwerp
Conference Poster
Click here to download the Song of Songs conference poster.
Keynote poster
Click here to download the Song of Songs keynote lecture poster.