Speaking of the Other: Emotional Competencies in Song 5:2-8
Though various postmodern schools have exposed the limitations of the dichotomous mental frame, people still heavily rely on it to advance their goals at the price of infantile behaviors in the public domain. In an age of Instagram, thinking is minimally processed, and thoughts are often swung to the polar extremes by raw emotions. While the problem of the former, the ability of thinking being democratized rather than cultivated, deserves a separate treatment, this paper will focus on the latter, how The Song can help to cultivate emotional competencies. Emotional competencies are rooted in love or charity for the other, and expressed most clearly in relationships troubled by wounds. For example, the frequently assumed moral high ground in the American public domain is a victim mentality, a sort of righteous sufferer or underdog fighting back against those who are established or privileged. For real or rhetorical wounds people feel they have earned the right to speak; when they do, it is for themselves—in the name of justice or truth. It seems too utopian to say that love is the answer. Yet The Song suggests so, without becoming plastic or frivolous. More specifically, the troubling poem in 5:2-8 demonstrates, through one lover’s speaking of the other, how love transforms oneself because of the wounds left by the other. This paper will compare two modes of speech embedded in the lover’s pseudo-narrative voice before and after the wounding. This transpiration shows how her ethical outlook morphs from for-one-self to for-the-other. Along this line, emotional competencies such as patience, self-awareness and relationship management are not only exemplified but also effectuated in the process of lyrical reception.
Sarah Zhang is Associate Professor at GETS Theological Seminary in Los Angeles, California. She was born in China and had education both in China and in the United States. She grew up with a love for literature and thirst for metaphysical questions. She started cultivating an interdisciplinary approach to biblical poetry—Lyrical Ethics as inspired by Emmanuel Levinas—when she was preparing for her dissertation on The Song of Songs at the Princeton Theological Seminary.