How Many Lovers Are in the Song of Songs?

A virtual presentation by Rabbi Dr. Devorah Schoenfeld

ABOUT THE EVENT:

The Song of Songs is a collection of poems describing romantic love, and is traditionally read as an allegory for the love between God and God’s people.  Traditional commentaries have tended to read the Song of Songs as one continuous narrative, telling a single love story between two lovers.  But is the Song of Songs one story or many?  And how many lovers are there really?  Using Rashi’s commentary and Midrash Rabbah as well as modern scholarship we will look at different possible answers to these questions, and how they can help us think about what it means to love God in a complicated world.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER:

Rabbi Dr. Devorah Schoenfeld is associate professor of Judaism at Loyola University Chicago.  She received her PhD from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley in 2007 and her rabbinic ordination from Yeshivat Maharat in 2019.  Her research is on biblical interpretation and Jewish-Christian relations.