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Exposition on the Song of Songs

Exposition on the Song of Songs

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Paperback / softback

£15.99

Publisher: Liturgical Press
ISBN: 9780879073473
Number of Pages: 169
Published: 01/11/1970
Width: 14 cm
Height: 21.6 cm

Perhaps no book was more central to medieval spirituality and mysticism," writes Bernard McGinn, "or more problematic to contemporary readers, than the Song of Songs. . . Lingering Victorian attitudes towards the opposition between sex and religion find the Song's frank erotic language embarrassing and even distasteful." But in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, the Song of Songs was a favorite book of Cistercian monks. Bernard of Clairvaux, Gilbert of Hoyland, and John of Ford, as well as William of Saint Thierry, read it as a dialogue between Christ the Bridegroom and the human soul, the Bride.

William of Saint Thierry began composing his commentary soon after entering the Cistercian abbey of Signy in 1135. Having left behind a busy life as a Benedictine abbot and author of theological treatises, he turned to writing meditations on Scripture as the means of listening to the voice of the Beloved. It is therefore ironic that he broke off his commentary on the Song, never to return to it, to alert the Church in France to the teaching of Peter Abelard and then to compose two treatises correcting what he deeply believed were Abelard's theological errors.

"
Contents
Introduction by J.-M. Déchanet   vii
Preface by William of Saint Thierry   3
FIRST SONG
Prelude or Argument   21
Stanza 1:  Let him kiss me with the kiss of his mouth   25
     Song 1:1–3a
Stanza 2:  The King has brought me into his storeroom   35
     Song 1:3b
Stanza 3:  I am blank but beautiful   38
     Song 1:4–5
Stanza 4:  Show me, O you whom my soul love   43
     Song 1:6
Stanza 5:  If you know not yourself   50
     Song 1:7
Stanza 6:  To my company of horsemen   56
     Song 1:8–10
Stanza 7:  While the King was at his repose   62
     Song 1:11–13
Stanza 8:  Behold you are fair, O my Love   72
     Song 1:14–16
Stanza 9:  I am the Flower of the field   86
     Song 2:1–3
Stanza 10:  The King brought me into the cellar of wine   92
     Song 2:4–5
Stanza 11:  His left hand is under my head   106
    Song 2:6
Finale:  I have entreated you, ye daughters of Jerusalem   111
     Song 2:7–8a
SECOND SONG
Prelude or Argument   117
Stanza 1:  The voice of my Beloved!   120
     Song 2:8b–10a
Stanza 2:  Arise, make haste, my love, my dove   131
     Song 2:10b–13a
Stanza 3:  Arise, make haste, my love, my Bride   134
     Song 2:13b–14
Stanza 4:  Catch us the little foxes   137
     Song 2:15–17a
Stanza 5:  Return, my Beloved!   146
     Song 2:17b
Stanza 6:  In my little bed by night   151
     Song 3:1–2a
Stanza 7:  I sought him, and I found him not   159
     Song 3:2b–4
Analytic Index   165

William of Saint-Thierry, M. Columba Hart, OSB

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