“A garden enclosed, a fountain sealed”: The Song of Songs and its Ecclesiastical Significance in Seventeenth-century Ukraine

Keywords: The Song of Songs, seventeenth-century Ukraine, ecclesiological exegesis, Lazar Baranovych, Ioanykii Galiatovs’kyi, Stefan Iavors’kyi

Abstract

This article addresses an aspect of the seventeenth-century milieu that has not received the scholarly attention it deserves: how Ukrainian Orthodox literati received, adapted, and transformed the Song of Songs and its bridal imagery. At the crossroads between the Catholic West and the Byzantine East, seventeenth-century Ukraine is a fascinating case study of the shifts of meaning and intended audience of the particular biblical book and its exegetical tradition. In particular, I examine how some of the most influential early modern Ukrainian writers (Lazar Baranovych, Ioanikii Galiatovs’kyi, Stefan Iavors’kyi, and Dymytrii Tuptalo) used the Song as a template for meditating on the nature of the Church as they envisioned it – as an instrument for thinking about a “collective” institution. I argue that these authors brought their involvement with ecclesiastical politics and pastoral responsibility to the exegesis of this book, using the Song, often in combination with imagery from the Apocalypse, to articulate and define the boundaries of the Kyiv Church during a time of crisis.

Author Biography

Maria Grazia Bartolini, University of Milan

An Associate Professor of Medieval Slavic Culture at the University of Milan. Her research focuses on the intersection of preaching and visual arts in seventeenth-century Ukraine, and she has published various articles on the religious culture of early modern Ukraine. Bartolini is the author of Piznai samoho sebe (Kyiv, 2017), a monograph on Hryhorii Skovoroda and Christian Neoplatonism which was awarded the 2019 Ivan Franko International Prize.

References

Âvorskij, S. – Яворский, С. (1698). Виноградъ Христовъ. Київ: Друкарня Лаври.

Âvorskij, S. – Яворский, С. (1696). Pretiosissimus Thesaurae in agro absconditus Regnum Dei… Российский Государственный Исторический Архив, f. 834, op. 2, d. 1592, 1029–1037.

Baranovič, L. – Баранович, Л. (1666). Мечъ духовный. Київ: Друкарня Лаври.

Galâtovs’kij, I. – Галятовський, I. (1659). Ключъ Разумѣнія. Київ: Друкарня Лаври.

Galatowski, J. (1678). Stary Kościół Zachodni nowemu Kościołowi Rzymskiemu pochodzenie Ducha S. od Oyca samego nie od Syna pokazuje. Nowogrodek Siewierski: Z Typographiey Archiepiskopskiey.

Paterik – Патерик или Отечник (1661). Печерскій. Київ: Друкарня Лаври.

Patrologia latina (1841–1855). 217 vols. Paris: avec Jacques-Paul Migne. Rostovskii, D. – Ростовский, Д. (1894). Слово на день памяти св. Великомученика Георгія Побѣдоносца. Странник, 4, 629–637.

Alekseev, A. – Алексеев, А. (2002). Песнь песней в славяно-русской письменности. Санкт-Петербург: Дмитрий Буланин.

Astell, A. (1990). The Song of Songs in the Middle Ages. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Clark, E. (1986). Uses of the Song of Songs: Origen and the later Latin fathers. In: Ascetic Piety and Women’s Faith: Essays on Late Ancient Christianity. Lewiston/Queenston: Edwin Mellen, 386–427.

Clarke, E. (2011). Politics, religion, and the Song of Songs in seventeenth-century England. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Dolbeau, F. (2011). L’association du Cantique des Cantiques et de L’Apocalypse, en Occident, dans les inventaires et manuscrits médiévaux. In: R. Guglielmetti (ed.), L’Apocalisse nel Medioevo. Florence: Sismel, 361–402.

Flinker, N. (2000). The Song of Songs in English Renaissance literature. Cambridge: Boydell & Brewer.

Kendrick, R.L. (1994). ‘Sonet vox tua in auribus meis’: Song of Songs exegesis and the seventeenth-century motet. Schütz Jahrbuch, 16, 87–98.

King, C.J. (2005). Origen on the Song of Songs as the spirit of Scripture: The bridegroom’s perfect marriage-song. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Kryžanovskij, E.M. – Крыжановский, E.M. (1890). Собрание сочинений. Киев: Типография Т.В. Кульженко, vol. 2.

Longfellow, E. (2004). Women and religious writing in early modern England. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Maksimčuk, O. – Максимчук, О. (2013a). Дві маріологічні інтерпретації образу замкненого саду в українській бароковій літературі. Наукові праці. Серія Філологія. Літературознаство, 222, 26–30.

Maksimčuk, O. – Максимчук, О. (2013b). Мотив пошуку коханого у проповідях Антонія Радивиловського і діалогах Григорія Сковороди. Переяславські Сковородинівські Студії, 2, 66–71.

Maksimčuk, O. – Максимчук, О. (2013c). Образ Христа-нареченого у «Розмишляні» Йоаникія Волковича. Львівська Медієвістика, 86–96. Maksimčuk, O. – Максимчук, О. (2015). Пісня пісень у літературі українського Бароко: автореферат дисертації на здобуття наукового ступеня кандидата філологічних наук, unpublished doctoral dissertation

Matis, H.W. (2019). The Song of Songs in the Early Middle Ages. Leiden: Brill Matter, E.A. (1990). The voice of my beloved: The Song of Songs in western mediaeval Christianity. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Matter, E.A. (1992). The Apocalypse in early medieval exegesis. In: R.K. Emmerson & B. McGinn (eds.), The Apocalypse in the Middle Ages. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Norris, R.A. Jr. (2012). Gregory of Nyssa: Homilies on the Song of Songs. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature.

Ohly, F. (1958). Hohelied-Studien: Grundzüge einer Geschichte der Hoheliedauslegung des Abendlandes bis um 1200. Wiesbaden: F. Steiner.

Petrov, N. – Петров, Н. (1904). Описание рукописных собраний, находящися в городе Киева. Москва: Университетская Библиотека.

Quivy P. & Thiron, J. (1967). Robert de Tombelaine et son commentaire sur le Cantique des Cantiques. In: R. Foreville (ed.), Millenaire monastique de Mont-Saint-Michel, vol. 2, Vie montoise et rayonnement intellectuel. Paris: Lethielleux.

Šerech, Ju. (1951). Stefan Yavorsky and the conflict of ideologies in the age of Peter I. Slavonic and East European Review, 30, 40–62.

Shuve, K. The Song of Songs and the fashioning of identity in early Latin Christianity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Temčinas, S. (2016). Il Commentarius in Cantica Canticorum dello Pseudo-Gregorio Magno (Robertus de Tumbalena) nella versione manoscritta slava ecclesiastica del 1672. In: M. Di Salvo & G. Ziffer (eds.), Traduzioni e rapporti culturali degli slavi con il mondo circostante. Rome: Bulzoni, 43–52.

Thomson, F.J. (1993). Peter Mogila’s ecclesiastical reforms and the Ukrainian contribution to Russian culture: A critique of Georges Florovsky’s theory of ‘the pseudomorphosis of orthodoxy.’ Slavica Gandensia, 20, 67–119.

Vlasovs’kyi, I. – Власовський, І. (1955–1956). Нариси історії української православної церкви, vol. 2. New York: Ukrainian Orthodox Church of USA.

Zhivov, V.M. – Живов, В.М. (2004). Из церковной истории времен Петра Великого. Москва: Новое Литературное Обозрение.

Published
2022-09-29
How to Cite
[1]
Bartolini, M.G. 2022. “A garden enclosed, a fountain sealed”: The Song of Songs and its Ecclesiastical Significance in Seventeenth-century Ukraine. Perspectives on Culture. 38, 3 (Sep. 2022), 123-136. DOI:https://doi.org/10.35765/pk.2022.3803.09.
Section
Studies on Eastern Churches Culture within the Borders of the Former Polish-Lith