Song of Songs 1:1—Text and Paratext

Abstract

The argument draws upon literary theory to revisit the two clauses that, traditionally, make up Song 1:1. (1) The title evaluates the work as the song-most of songs. I argue that the evaluation refers to the work’s manifold form of simulation—a literary work representing the speech of a dreamer, who speaks from both inside and outside the dream. (2) The scoring in MT, the rubric in LXX (Sinaiticus, Alexandrinus), ancient interpreters and modern all take the first words of the Song of Songs to be a heading, comprising title (שִׁיר הַשִּׁירִים) and attribution (אֲשֶׁר לִשְׁלֹמֹה). I argue that the clause marked and understood as an attribution may be the beginning of the character’s speech.