The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1874-06-09
The Song Of solomon.

The reign of Solomon, says the Westmin-
ster Reuietu, is the Hebrew ideal of the pro-
fame or purely secular lie. His alliances
made without any regard for religious dis
tinctions, his splendid barem, the order and
magnificence OF his palace, the indus
trial and commercial prosperity of bis
reign, the writings attributed TO him, and,
above all, the silence imposed On those for
inidable agitators, tine ''nabi,> or prophets,
all point to an interval of careless aud joyt us
festivity. Whatever the influence OF Moses
once was, it was lost now. Ewald indeed
has shown in the most conclu;ive manner
that the fame of Moses underwent long
eclipse after his death that his name was
almost unknown under the judges and dur
ing the eaIly ages of the monarchy, and that
il was not until within two centuries of the
fall of she kingdom of Judah that he attained
his subsequent grandeur. Thus there was
kind of liberation OF foreign cults, induced by
intercourse with other nations, and sup
ported by the influence of Egyptian, Ph9ni-
clan, or Moabite women. 1t was an interval
in the sacred career OF Israel-a liberal and
latitudinarian age, in which the conscious
ness of an all-absorbing destiny was as yet
unfelt Under such conditions as these the
drama we are considering was produced
For it is drama. The widest opinions, it is
true, have been held on this point. 1t has
been regarded on the one hand as poem
properly so called, with both unity aud pro-
cress of events, and on the other as a mere
collection of love-songs, bound together only
by the analogy of their nature. But Nj. Re
nan, by an exhaustive examination OF the
work itself, considered verse by verse, has
shown in the clearest manner that II is
pastoral drama. The characters are dis
tinct and well defined, and it is sufficient TO
say that, whoever was its author, certainly
Solomon was not. The part he PLAYS is but
a poor one, and indeed an ill-dsguised hos
tiltty to his reign and his memory pervades
the whole composition. The free tribes of
the North preserved to the last more of the
Semitic spirit and nomadic impatience of or
ganzed control, and, as we shall have occa-
sion to show, the Song was undoubtedly
Northern composition. Briefly described,
the dramatis PERSONA ars as follows: The
Sulamite, young girl of the tribe oJ
Issachar, carried off from her native viii
lage of Sulem by the servants of Solomon,
and brought into the harem at Jerusalem.
Her lover,a young man OF the same village fol.
lows her, and with whom, after several in
terviews she at last escapes. Solomon, who
is displayed as the powerful but unsuccessful
sntor and various choruses of men and
women of Jerusalem, odalisques and ladies
Of the seraglio, and at the close of the drama
the brothers of the Sulamite. The conciud-
ing verses form moral drawn from the events
of the play, and were doubtless placed in the
mouth of sage or elder. The Song of
Songs, then, is a composition occupying a
middle position between the regular drama
and the eclogue or pastoral dialogue. Regu-
lar drama, indeed, in our sense of the word,
did not exist among the Jews. The idea as
well as the practice was entirely opposed to
their habits of thought, and in late- times
they regarded it with the strongest aversion.
The High Priest, Jason. was execrated for
hav vipO aSt tahlisbQ6 q aSiIIm