SOURCE: "Love's Lyrics Redeemed," in God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality, Fortress Press, 1978, pp. 144-65.

In the following essay, Trible explores thematic and structural links between the Song of Songs and the book of Genesis.

Love is bone of bone and flesh of flesh. Thus, I hear the Song of Songs. It speaks from lover to lover with whispers of intimacy, shouts of ecstasy, and silences of consummation. At the same time, its unnamed voices reach out to include the world in their symphony of eroticism. This movement between the private and the public invites all companions to enter a garden of delight.

Genesis 2-3 is the hermeneutical key with which I unlock this garden. That narrative began with the development of Eros in four episodes: the forming of the earth creature, the planting of a garden, the making of animals, and the creation of sexuality. Alas, however...