volume 8, issue 1, 2016, pages 32-46

DOI: https://doi.org/10.64438/sbsEYFE8503
Published online: 2016-06-01
Published in print: 2016-06-30

Abstract: The motif of “the city” in the Song of Songs is marginal. However, it should be noted, that the phenomenon of urbanization characterized the historical transformation of the ancient society of Israel, and the term h’yr “the city” as a toponym for Jerusalem – gained a significant place in Hebrew epic and also is present in poetry. Taking into consideration the context and the way in which the image of the City emerges in the two poetic episodes of the Song of Songs (Song 3 and 5) it has to be noticed that: the way of treatment of the wandering woman by the guards of the city in the second poem recalls the Assyrian customs, but in the first fragment seems to illustrate much earlier period; the intentional use only of the unbound form of the noun “the City” without any complements, in place of the toponym for Jerusalem is characteristic for the First Temple period. These facts indicate the late preexilic period and the territory of the Kingdom of Judah as the editorial time and environment for at least part of the songs contained in the Song of Songs.