Hippolytus' commentary on the Song of songs in social and critical context

Abstract

This dissertation presents the first translation in English of the Georgian text of Hippolytus' commentary On the Song of Songs and discusses the authorship, provenance, rhetorical features, social setting, and hermeneutical proclivities of the In Cant. It argues for the traditional assumption that Hippolytus was a culturally eastern writer in Rome. This study builds upon previous musings by some scholars that the In Cant. is a work of baptismal instruction, arguing more precisely that it represents a mystagogy centering on the post-baptismal rite of anointing with oil as a symbol of receiving the Holy Spirit. The In Cant. should be imagined as performed in the convivial setting of a Paschal banquet. Such rites suggest a western provenance. Particular attention is given to the Greco-Roman context and Valentinian influences on the commentary. Hippolytus used New Testament passages, the Logos theology he inherited from Irenaeus, and also popular images of Greco-Roman domestic art as inspirations for his interpretation of the Song. Hippolytus used the Song to reinterpret popular images of Dionysus and Ariadne, the chariot of Helios and the zodiac, the Dioscuri Castor and Pollux, and Heracles and the Hesperides in the fabled Garden of the West. Themes of the commentary selected for discussion are Hippolytus' Logos theology, the attitude displayed by Hippolytus toward women, the synagogue, and heretics.