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Between Babel and Beast
(America and Empires in Biblical Perspective)
The Glory of Kings: A Festschrift for James B. Jordan
Fyodor Dostoevsky
(Christian Encounters Series)
Athanasius
(Foundations of Theological Exegesis and Christian Spirituality)
The Four: A Survey of the Gospels
Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom
From Behind the Veil: The Epistles of John
Deep Exegesis:The Mystery of Reading Scripture
1 & 2 Kings
Brazos Theological Commentary
The Promise Of His Appearing: An Exposition Of Second Peter
A Great Mystery: Fourteen Wedding Sermons
Deep Comedy: Trinity, Tragedy, And Hope In Western Literature
Miniatures & Morals: The Christian Novels of Jane Austen
The Priesthood of the Plebs: A Theology of Baptism
A Son To Me: An Exposition of 1 & 2 Samuel
From Silence to Song: The Davidic Liturgical Revolution
Ascent to Love: A Guide to Dante's Divine Comedy
Blessed Are the Hungry: Meditations on the Lord's Supper
A House For My Name: A Survey of the Old Testament
Heroes of the City of Man: A Christian Guide to Select Ancient Literature
Brightest Heaven of Invention: A Christian Guide To Six Shakespeare Plays
Wise Words: Family Stories That Bring the Proverbs to Life
The Kingdom and the Power: Rediscovering the Centrality of the Church
In a 1973 article comparing the Song of Songs to Tamil poetry, Chaim Rabin points to evidence of contacts between the Indus Valley and lower Mesopotamia during the time of Solomon. On the spices listed in Song 4:12-14, he writes that these verses evoke the “atmosphere of a period when Indian goods like spikenard, curcuma, and cinnamon, as well as South Arabian goods like incense and myrrh, passed through Judaea in a steady flow of trade. This can hardly related to the Hellenistic period, when Indian goods were carried by ship and did not pass through Palestine: it sets the Song of Songs squarely in the First Temple period.”
Supposed Hellenistic loan-words (appiryon in 3:9 and talpiyyot in 4:4) don’t disprove this earlier dating: “The phonetic similarities between the Greek and Hebrew words is somewhat vague [the Greek source words are phoreion and telopia], and this writer considers both attributions to be unlikely, but even acceptance of these words as Greek does not necessitate a late dating for the Song of Songs, since Mycenaean Greek antedates the Exodus.” He admits that if pardes (garden, Paradise) in 4:13 is Persian, then “it would necessitate post-exilic dating,” but he thinks it more likely that both the Hebrew words and the Greek paradeisos have a “different origin.”
What Rabin does not say, of course, is that a linguistic parallel cannot by itself tell us the direction of influence. Is it impossible that the Greeks and Persians borrowed words from Hebrew?
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 11:19 am
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