Jewish Parody and Allegory in Medieval Hebrew Poetry in Spain r 233dueling and virile male warriors, it is women who have turned the tables:
disguised as males, they display full competence in martial arts, charac-
teristic of tales of female prowess found in other contemporary tales such
as troubadour literature, with which Jacob ben Elazar would certainly
have been familiar.^77
In another proverbial twist of the blade, Jacob ben Elazar has portrayed
his women as wily and resourceful, capable of achieving their goals. Not
only do men praise their beloved’s beauty but the women also “take up
the word,” so to speak, and proclaim, in autoerotic terms, their own nu-
bile beauty and desire. They are sharp and canny. The tale of Yefefia and
Yemima illustrates their developing maturity. Far from being the ingénues
first encountered here, subservient to male seduction and lovemaking,
the two “slaves” have developed into proficient snarers of men, poets and
storytellers par excellence and sexual beings, comfortable in their sensu-
ality and sexuality and content in their spiritual fulfillment. In this game
of sexual politics the women star, not the men, neither quaking Yoshefe
nor asexual Masos. It is only the young, unfortunate Sippor whose voice
chirps and rings out in plaintive song, bewailing her sorry lot. Two women
get what they want: Yefefia and Yemima live in ongoing harmony. They
achieve love and attention; young Sippor does not. In Jacob ben Elazar’s
tale of “Sahar and Kima’s Love,” flint-hearted, elitist, imprisoned Kima
(l. 251) displays her wit, sagacity, and song making in matters of love and
morals before she succumbs to her husband’s autocratic behavior.
In the narration of these two mahbarot, the reader is left with the im-
pression that Jacob ben Elazar has applied his considerable linguistic skills
not only to satirize the game of love played out between men and women
through song but also to display his virtuosity and adroitness in the He-
brew language. Notwithstanding his satire, he displays eloquence and el-
egance in descriptions of the beauties of nature and his surroundings,
reminiscent of the sensual Song of Songs and contemporary medieval
poetry.
Jacob ben Elazar’s erotic prose and poetry might have antagonized
Maimonides, had he been alive, but Maimonides’ younger contemporary,
Moses ibn Ezra, writer non pareil of multilayered poetry, defended “love
(’ahava) and passion (ta’ava) as proper subjects for poetry,” because of
their charismatic appeal “in the sacred writings, even if their true inner
meaning is not always understood.”^78 And thus it is with Jacob ben Elazar’s
poetry.