Jewish Parody and Allegory in Medieval Hebrew Poetry in Spain r 239in History of Hebrew Poetry in Christian Spain and Southern France, 234–37, Schirmann
states that courtly love, abstinence from physical love, was not a “forever after ideal” in
Judaism, since its adherents are expected to marry and produce children.
- My translation of malakh yedidim as “guardian angel” is influenced solely by the
context in which this phrase is found. Since the two chaste, but aroused, lovers do not
engage in “physical touching” but satisfy themselves with imagined caresses, an [imagi-
nary] guardian angel was sent not only to prevent them from actual physical contact but
also to guard them from “messengers of love” (malakhei dodim, l. 115) who have aroused
their passion and through whom they hug and kiss each other (neshaqtiha neshaqa-
tni) and who are sent, perhaps, to encourage their mutual love. In his notes to this tale
of “Kima and Sahar’s Love,” the editor, Yonah David, 160, suggests that the term mal-
akh yedidim may be influenced by a foreign language which neither he nor Schirmann
(“L’amour spirituel,” 3l8) recognizes. Schirmann, however, in History of Hebrew Poetry in
Christian Spain and Southern France, 235 and n. 56, suggests that this phrase may refer
to a “friendly messenger” and may be borrowed from the Arabic. If Jacob ben Elazar’s
contact with troubadour literature was extensive, perhaps he knew such a phrase from
Provençal or Occitan literature. - Proverbs 1:3.
- Judges 16:2.
- See Judges 14:18: “If you hadn’t ploughed with my wife, you wouldn’t know the
answer [to my riddle].” The medieval commentator Rashi notes that the Philistine men
had engaged in sexual intercourse with Samson’s Philistine wife in order to pry from her
the answer to the riddle Samson had posed. - See also Raymond Scheindlin, “Sippurei ha-’ahavah shel ya ̔akov ben el ̔azar: Bein
sifrut ̔aravit le-sifrut romans,” Divrei ha-kongres ha- ̔olami ha-’ehad- ̔asar le-mada ̔ei
ha-yahadut 3 (1994): 16–17. - Each line in this poem contains four stichs, with the first three in each line ending
in identical rhymes and the fourth stich ending in an identical rhyme throughout the
poem. - l. 545: ve-’ey mitqey tokhah ot yedid ’o ’ey ne ̔im sefer.
- Songs 7:1. See also Scheindlin, Wine, Women, and Death, 81–82, who describes
this phenomenon in medieval love poetry. - Isaiah 62:5.
- See, e.g., Schirmann, “L’amour spirituel,” 318–19, and Ibn Hazm, The Dove’s Neck
Ring, “On the Virtue of Continence,” 262–84: “The finest quality that a man can display in
Love is continence: to abstain from sin and all indecency” (262). For additional informa-
tion on the idea of mystical love in Arabic literature, see Annemarie Schimmel, “Eros—
Heavenly and Not So Heavenly—in Sufi Literature and Life,” in Society and the Sexes
in Medieval Islam, 120–41, especially 122–24. See also Schirmann, “L’Amour spirituel,”
especially 317–19. Schirmann (316) also states that medieval Hebrew poets seemed to
have adhered to a certain “code mystérieux, lois de l’amour.” Dan Pagis, Change and Tra-
dition in the Secular Poetry of Spain and Italy (Hebrew) (Jerusalem: Keter, 1976), 221–22,
describes Jacob ben Elazar’s emphasis on spiritual love. - See Songs 7:3, ’agan-ha-sahar, in combined form.