By the reactionary allegorists, of whom Rosenmfil- ler may be considered the representative, the Song of Solomon has either been made absolutdy continuous, or has been divided with reference to its spiritual meaning rather than its external form (e. g. Heng- stenberg and Prof. Burrowes).
The supposition that the Cantides supplied a modd to Theocritus seems based on merely verbal coind- denoes, such as could soarcdy foil to occur between two writers of patktral poetry (comp. Cant, i, 9; vi, 10, with Theocr. xviii, 80, 86; Cant iv, 11, with Theocr. xx, 26, 27; Cant viii, 6, 7, with Theocr. xxiii, 28-26 ; see other passages in Pol. i^n. ; Lowth, PrceL ; Gray's Key), In the essential matters of form and of ethical teaching the resemblance does not exist
ni. Meammg, — ^The schools of interpretation may be divided into three ; the mystical, or typical f the ci- lefforicaly and the UteraL
1. The mystical interpretation is properly an ofifishoot of the aHeyoricalf and probably owes its origin to the
CANTICLES
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CANTICLES
necessity which was felt of supplying a Uteral basis for the speculations of the allegorists. This basis is either the marriage of Solomon with Pharaoh's daugh- ter, or his marriage with an Israelitish woman, the Shnlamite. The former (taken together with Har- mer's variation) was the fsvorite opinion of the mysti- cal interpreters to the end of the 18th century : the latter has obtained since its introduction by Good (1808). The mystical interpretation makes its first appearance in Origen, who wrote a voluminous com- mentary upon the Canticles. Its literal basis, minus the mystical application, is condemned by Theodoret (A.D. 420). It reappears in Abulpharagius (1226> 1286), and was received by Grotius. As involving a literal basis, it was vehemently objected to by Sano- tius, Durham, and Calovius, but approved of and sys- tematized by Bossuet, indorsed by Lowth, and used for the purpose of translation by Percy and Williams, The arguments of Calovius prevented its taking root in Germany ; and the substitution by Good of an Is- raelitish for an Egyptian bride has not saved the gen- eral theory from ^e neglect which was inevitable after the reactionary movement of the 19th-century allegor- ists.
2. iifli^onoa/.— Notwithstanding the attempts which have been made to discover this principle of interpre- tation in the Sept. (Cant, iv, 8); Jesus Sirach (xlvii, 14-17) ; Wisd. (viii, 2), and Josephus (c. Apion, i, § 8), it is impossible to trace it, with any certainty, fiirther back than the Talmud (see Ginsburg, IfUrwL), Ac- cording to the Talmud, the beloved is taken to be God ; the Uwed one, or bride, is the congregation of ItraeL This general relation Is expanded into more particular detail by the Targum, or Chaldee Paraphrase, which treats the Song of Songs as an allegorical history of the Jewish people from the -exodus to the coming of the Messiah and the building of the third temple. In order to make out the parallel, recourse was had to the most extraordinary devices : e. g. the reduction of words to their numerical value, and the free inter- changing of words similar to each other in sound. Elaborate as it was, the interpretation of the Targum was still forther developed by the medisBval Jews, but generally constructed upon the same allegorical hjrpothesis. It was introduced into their liturgical services ; and during the persecutions of the Middle Ages its consoling appeal to the past and fytan ^o* ries of Israel maintained it as the popular exposition of a national poem. It would be strange if so univer- sal an influence as that of the scholastic philosophy had not obtained an expression in the interpretation of the Canticles. Such an expression we find in the theory of Ibn Caspe (1200-1250), which considers the book as representing the union between the octtM m»- Utteci (intellectus agens), and the reeeptitfe or matericU mtelkd (intellectus materialis). A new school of Jewish interpretation was originated by Mendelssohn (1729-1786), which, without actually denying the ex- istence of an allegorical meaning, determined to keep it in abejrance, and meanwhile to devote itself to the literal interpretation. At present the most learned rabbis, following LOwesohn, have abandoned the alle- gorical interpretation altogether (Hexheimer, 1848; Philipp8on,1854).
In Uie Christian Church, the Talmudical interpreta- tion, imported by Origen, was all but universally re- ceived. It was impugned by Theodore of Mopsuestia (860-429), but continued to h<dd its ground as the or- thodox theoiy till the revival of letters, when it was called in question by Erasmus and Grotius, and was gradually superseded by the typical theory of Grotius, Bossuet, Lowth, etc. This, however, was not eff^ected without a severe struggle, in which Sanctius, Dur- ham, and Calovius were the champions of the aUegori' col against the tyjiiccd theory. The latter seems to have been mainly identified with Grotius (Pol. Syn.\ vid was stigmatized by Calovius as the heresy of The-
odore Mopsuestia, condonned at the second conncfl of Constantinople, and revived by the Anabaptists. In the 18th centuiy the allegorical theory was reasserted, and reconstructed by PuffaBdorf (1776) and the reac- tionary allegorists, the majority of whom, however, with BosenmQller, return to the system of the Chaldee Paraphrase.
Some of the more remarkable variatians of the alle- gorical school are : (a.) The extension of the Chaldee allegoiy to the Christian Church, originally projected by Aponios (7th century), and more frilly wrought out by De Lyra (1270-1840), Brightman (1600), and Coo- ceius (1608-1699). According to De Lyra, chape. B- vii describe the history of the Israelites ftt>m the exo- dus to the birth of Christ; chap, vii ad fin. the histofy <A the Christian Church to Constantine. Brightman divides the Canticles into a histoiy of the Legal and a history of the Evangelical Church : his detail is highly elaborate ; e. g. in Cant, v, 8, he discoven an allusioa to Peter Waldo (1160), and in verse 18 to Robert Trench (1290). (6.) Luther*s theory limits the alle- gorical meaning to the contemporaneous history of tlw Jewish people under Solomon, (c.) According to Ghislerius and Com. a Lapide, the bride is the Yiigin Mary, (d) Pnfi^sndorf refen the spiritual sense to the circumstance of our Saviour's death and buriaL