Song of Songs: An Introduction and Study Guide: The Bible’s Only Love Poem (T&T Clark’s Study Guides to the Old Testament)

by J. Cheryl Exum

Publisher:

T&T Clark

, 2022

Overview

The Song of Songs, also known as the Song of Solomon, is an unusual book to find in the Bible. As the Bible’s only love poem, the Song offers a unique picture of relations between the sexes in biblical times. Unlike other biblical books, it consists entirely of dialogue. It looks at love from both a woman’s and a man’s point of view, and shows the reader what love is like exclusively through what lovers say about it. There are few issues in Song of Songs interpretation that are not open to debate, which makes it a fascinating book to study. In this Guide, Cheryl Exum provides a concise survey of the principal questions encountered in Song of Songs scholarship. She also takes the discussion beyond the traditional research questions to introduce readers to new and ongoing areas in Song of Songs research. Bibliographies and suggestions for further reading at the end of each chapter provide additional resources for readers interested in pursuing specific topics and exploring new directions in the study of the Song of Songs.

Key Features

• Provides a concise survey of the principal questions encountered in Song of Songs scholarship
• Introduces readers to new and ongoing areas in Song of Songs research
• Provide additional resources for readers interested in pursuing specific topics

Contents

• Reading the Song of Songs
• Major Questions in Song of Songs Research
• Historical-Cultural Context
• Varieties of Interpretation
• Current Issues in Song of Songs Research

Product Details

• Title: Song of Songs: The Bible’s Only Love Poem: An Introduction and Study Guide
• Author: J. Cheryl Exum
• Series: T&T Clark Study Guides to the Old Testament
• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Print Publication Date: 2022
• Logos Release Date: 2025
• Pages: 118
• Era: era:contemporary
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
• Subjects: Bible. O.T. Song of Solomon › Study and teaching; Bible. O.T. Song of Solomon › Criticism, interpretation, etc
• ISBNs: 9780567693754, 9780567674715, 0567693759, 0567674711
• Resource ID: LLS:SNGSNGSNNTRSTGD
• Resource Type: text.monograph.study-guide
• Metadata Last Updated: 2025-09-03T15:10:14Z

About J. Cheryl Exum

J. Cheryl Exum (Ph.D.) is professor of biblical studies at the University of Sheffield. She received her BA, summa cum laude, from Wake Forest University in North Carolina, and her MA and PhD, with distinction, from Columbia University in New York. As a doctoral student, she spent a year studying theology and German literature at the University of Göttingen. Before her appointment to a personal chair in Biblical Studies at the University of Sheffield in 1993, she taught at Yale University (1975-77) and Boston College (1977-1993). She has done research in Israel (first as a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow at the Albright Institute of Archaeological Research and later as a Visiting Research Associate at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem) and in Germany (as an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow in Göttingen and in Heidelberg).

From 2003 to 2005 she was Director of the University of Sheffield’s Centre for the Study of the Bible in the Modern World. In 2004, with two Sheffield colleagues, David J.A. Clines and Keith W. Whitelam, she founded Sheffield Phoenix Press, now a leading publisher in the field of Biblical Studies.The author of numerous scholarly works on the Hebrew Bible, her books include Tragedy and Biblical Narrative, Fragmented Women: Feminist (Sub)versions of Biblical Narratives as well as Fragmented Women: Feminist (Sub)versions of Biblical Narratives. She is executive editor of the journal Biblical Interpretation and a director of Sheffield Phoenix Press.