Engaging the Doctrine of Marriage. Matthew Levering

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СКАЧАТЬ target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="#ulink_4e2e04d8-7694-5356-b7f3-da363e54e301">119. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 20. See also Levenson, The Love of God, 125–42. Levenson points out that within the larger biblical context, “the question of the identity of the speakers takes on greater urgency than when the book is viewed in isolation. Who, in this larger framework, could these two passionate lovers possibly be? Let us put the question in terms of the rest of the Hebrew Bible: Where in that set of books do we find an intense love in which the lovers are separated much of the time, the male of the two is not continuously accessible, the identities of the lovers seem to shift in various situations, powerful external forces oppose and threaten the romance, and the consummation of the relationship seems to be continually, maddeningly postponed? Put that way, the question nearly answers itself: the only such romance is that of God and Israel. To be sure, not every detail matches up, and much imaginative interpretation is necessary to sustain the identification. That very process of imaginative interpretation, though, is highly productive theologically and spiritually” (The Love of God, 132). Levenson differentiates between allegory and midrash, arguing that the latter is in no way arbitrary. He concludes, “Without the application of the Song of Songs to the Torah, the depth and power of their [God and the people Israel] libidinous passion might never have come to expression. And without the application of the Torah to the Song of Songs, the deeper spiritual import of erotic love would surely have gone unnoticed” (The Love of God, 134).

      120. Neusner, Israel’s Love Affair with God, 1.

      121. Neusner, Israel’s Love Affair with God, 3.

      122. Davis, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs, 231; cited in Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 23. See also Levenson, The Love of God, 137–38: “When, at the literal level, Moses was anointing the tabernacle and its accoutrements, transferring them from the realm of the profane to that of the sacred, he was enacting, at the midrashic level, the consecration of Israel to God as his bride—a condition that in the rabbinic mind has survived both the tabernacle and the temple that it foreshadowed, and has defined the Jewish people through all their generations. The tabernacle served as the chuppah, the marriage canopy, for the wedding of God and Israel. . . . This is, of course, a theological ideal and not at all an accurate description of the historical facts, as the prophetic and many other biblical and postbiblical texts painfully attest. But it is an ideal with a potent and enduring capacity to inspire behavior, to provoke repentance—and to ignite the love of God among Jews. Within the marital metaphor as these Talmudic rabbis extended and developed it, the Torah, both as narrative and as law, becomes a site of intense erotic passion. Its narrative tells of God’s and the Jewish people’s falling in love with each other, of his proposing marriage and her accepting the proposal, of the wedding itself and the intimacy and deepening commitment that followed it.”

      123. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 26.

      124. McWhirter, The Bridegroom Messiah. McWhirter argues that the Gospel of John “alludes to four biblical texts about marriage. One involves similarities between Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman in John 4:4–42 and the story about Jacob and Rachel in Gen. 29:1–20. Two others evoke the Song of Songs. Mary of Bethany perfumes the reclining Jesus in a scene reminiscent of Song 1:12, and Mary Magdalene seeks and finds her missing man as does the woman in Song 3:1–4. A fourth allusion is the first to occur in the Gospel narrative. In John 3:29, John the Baptist declares, ‘He who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. . . .’ This saying recalls Jer. 33:10–11: ‘In . . . the towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem . . . there shall once more be heard the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom . . . and the voice of the bride’” (The Bridegroom Messiah, 3–4). In McWhirter’s view, the author of the Gospel of John “considered Jer. 33:10–11, Gen. 29:1–20, and the Song of Songs appropriate for illustrating the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus because of their messianic significance. According to the conventions of first-century exegesis—conventions based on a belief in the theological unity of Scripture—they can be interpreted as messianic prophecies in light of Ps. 45, which celebrates the wedding of God’s anointed king” (The Bridegroom Messiah, 4). See also Cambe, “L’influence du Cantique des Cantiques”; Hengel, “The Interpretation of the Wine Miracle at Cana,” 101–2; Feuillet, Le Mystère de l’amour divin dans la théologie johannique, 231. For approaches similar to McWhirter’s—with the drawback, however, of devoting only a few pages to the topic—see Baril, The Feminine Face of the People of God, 92–97; Schneiders, Written That You May Believe. In her approach to Jesus’ messianic status, McWhirter is particularly indebted to Juel’s Messianic Exegesis.

      125. McWhirter, The Bridegroom Messiah, 4, 11; Baril, The Feminine Face of the People of God, 93.

      126. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 49.

      127. Fitzmyer, The Gospel According to Luke, 1402.

      128. See Chavasse, The Bride of Christ.

      129. See Collins, Mark, 198–99.

      130. Hooker, The Gospel According to Saint Mark, 100.

      131. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 90. Regarding the bride-chamber, Pitre directs attention to Psalm 19:4–5 and Tobit 6:15–17.

      132. Keener, A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, 300; cited in Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 91–92.

      133. Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth, 252; cited in Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 94.

      134. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 103.

      135. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 112.

      136. See Brown, The Gospel According to John, 949–52.

      137. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 113.

      138. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 115.

      139. Pitre, Jesus the Bridegroom, 117.

      140. See Fehribach, The Women in the Life of the Bridegroom. More generally, Fehribach’s feminist perspective differs from Pitre’s.

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