I SLEEP AND MY HEART IS AWAKE
Song of Songs 5:2
How and why did the erotica of the song of songs enter the biblical canon? Is it about human love and lust and/or just about the heart and body’s longing as a metaphor for spiritual yearnings? The song stems from our deepest, oldest embodied, sex-positive and love-driven traditions way before the laws of man took over. The lingering effect of this spiritual-sexual revolution is why this song has mattered for as long as it does and why some sages and rabbis went to bat to make sure it’s not censored or forgotten.
Prof. Ilana Pardes helps to frame the famous teaching that got the song into the canon:
“The primary enigma of the story of the Song’s reception is: why was a daringly sensual poem of love with no reference whatsoever to God or national history included in the Bible? There was apparently a rabbinic dispute regarding the canonicity of the Song. The account of this dispute, however, is sparse and does not spell out the official criteria used to determine canonicity. The one remnant of this debate is Rabbi Akiva’s (50–ca. 135 CE) memorable declaration that the “whole world is not worth the day on which the Song of Songs was given to Israel for all the Writings are holy and the Song of Songs is the Holy of Holies” (Mishnah Yadayim 3.5). In a striking rhetorical move, Rabbi Akiva, one of the founding sages of rabbinic Judaism, draws on the superlative structure of the phrase “Song of Songs” (shir ha-shirim) to turn the text whose holiness was called into question into none other than the “Holy of Holies” (kodesh kodashim).
Rabbi Akiva’s affirmation of the Song’s sanctity played a pivotal role in shaping the allegorical reading of the ancient love poem. For many centuries the predominant tendency in Jewish exegesis was to regard the Song as an allegorical poem whose primary objective was to celebrate divine love.”
Pardes reminds us what this song is really all about - and what’s the invitation.
Every chamber has a threshold, and every song includes its holy core. Within the holy of holies of the ancient temple was intimacy, the superpower of the world, the divine presence that descends when two beings look into each other’s eyes long enough to be each other’s presence.
That was the idea - the image that was known to exist inside the holy of holies, deep within the ancient temple in Jerusalem - two golden Cherubim protecting the ark that contained the original wisdom, their eyes eternally locked. That’s where the divine was dwelling, their eye beams are the throne.
When the temple was no more, their gaze and the yearning for the holy intimate became the song of songs.
When we sing it with intention, set and setting matters, we too can cross the threshold and get on the divine dance floor in full presence.
In this poem of seduction, the spiritual longings for intimacy in all its expressions shine in multiple magnificent images and there are many gems, yet some stand out even more, across the ages.
By the time we get to chapter 5 he and she have loved and longed and shared long looks and rhymes and more with each other.
Yet now it’s night, and she’s inside, and he’s outside, knocking, seducing, his hair wet with dewdrops. By the time her oil-dripping hands open the door he is gone.
Did they miss the moment? Do we? Will there be another moment?
This scene of suspense was captured in a single verse that has been explored by multiple mystics and artists, dancers and dreamers:
אֲנִי יְשֵׁנָה וְלִבִּי עֵר קוֹל דּוֹדִי דוֹפֵק פִּתְחִי־לִי אֲחֹתִי רַעְיָתִי יוֹנָתִי תַמָּתִי שֶׁרֹּאשִׁי נִמְלָא־טָל קְוֻצּוֹתַי רְסִיסֵי לָיְלָה׃
I was asleep,
But my heart was wakeful.
Hark, my beloved knocks!
“Let me in, my own,
My darling, my faultless dove!
For my head is drenched with dew,
My locks with the damp of night.”
Song of Songs 5:2 (JPS 2023)
They both speak in this duet, her heart awake, her body sleeps, and his voice is knocking - open to me.
There’s a way to translate this a little differently - the 'letter ‘vav’ in ‘v’libi’ - ‘but my heart’ could be read as ‘and my heart’ — and there’s a subtle and important difference here in our attitude to both/and living.
The 2023 JPS Translation flattens his four endearments for her. The original Hebrew has: my sister, my friend, my dove, my perfection.
Two other poet-translators offer their own modern versions, exploring more options for what this may mean:
David Rosenberg in A Poet’s Bible:
“I was asleep
But the soul within me
Stayed awake
Like my heart – true to a timeless rhythm
To which I still respond –
Listen – a gentle knocking
Like my heart’s beating –
Open to me, my love, my purest image, sister, dove
All I can imagine – my head is a drenched with dew, all my memories
Melt into you.”
And Marcia Falk's Song of Songs - in the present tense:
I sleep, but my heart stirs,
Restless, and dreams…
My lover’s voice here, at the door-
Open, my love, my sister,
my dove, my perfect one,
for my hair is soaked with the night”
See why Rabbi Akiva insisted that this sacred stuff stays in the book and is open to the public - an invitation to the most private presence of all. Perhaps this verse reminds us that in our ongoing human quest to live better lives of balance between fear and love, the mundane and the holy, we listen to the heart more, and sleepwalk less.
An anonymous contemporary of Rabbi Akiva left us this Midrash - a poetic theological musing on the possible identities the sleeper in this song:
.
“I sleep: This is the world: seemingly asleep, and the sacred Source presses upon the sleeper to wake up.
This is the redemption – similar to the sleeper who is woken up by the Source.
Another reading: The Sacred Source says to Israel: I sleep but my heart is awake.”
Who is the sleeper? Who knocks? Who's singing?
Image: Sophie Calle, The Sleepers Series
(Why Sophie Calle? Ask me about my first Acid trip, her art and this line from the song of songs - on Feb. 25, 5pm ET, our next zoom call - for paid subscribers. Become a Paid Subscriber. Thank you! )
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Having just woken up from a dream and being 80-1 I can tell you categorically that this can be a living person and G-d.
I recently told my Rabbi that I hope not to be alone the rest of my life but from 12-5 am has become ( since my husband died a year ago) has become my time to be with Adonai alone. So for me the daylight hours are for the human dream of love expressed in this poem and I would celebrate with my daughters!!!
This article is beautifully written and reflects on one of the most mystical and poetic chapters in the Holy Scriptures. Yah is love, and He created intimacy to be shared and lavished upon His Son, Yahushua, and all we cherish. Thank you, Rabbi Akiva, for what you have done to make this treasure remain in the most debated book in the world.