Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• De Wet, Chris L.

Titel

The sex life of a psalm : Augustine and textual sexuality in Enarrationes in Psalmos 127 [128]

Ist Teil von

• Old Testament essays, 2011-01, Vol.24 (3), p.574-589

Ort / Verlag

Old Testament Society of South Africa (OTSSA)

Erscheinungsjahr

2011

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

EZB Free E-Journals

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• In the tradition of Roland Barthes and Jean-François Lyotard, this study explores the notion of textual sexuality, specifically in Augustine's sermon on Ps 127 [128]. The libidinality of the ancient near-eastern context of the psalm is discussed, with special emphasis on the virile male body and the fertile female body. There-after, Augustine's prosopological exegesis of the psalm is discussed. He presents the text as an involucrum, which is in itself a sexually nuanced term. The involucrum must be voyeuristically undressed, penetrated and impregnated through meditation, which eventually leads to the mystical birth of "true" and "spiritual" meaning. In Augustine's reading, Christ is now indicative of the beautiful and virile male, with the church as both fertile wife and progeny. The paper provides a glimpse into the "sex life" of a psalm by highlighting literary and textual libidinality, and presents it as a creative reading strategy for a post-modern society shaped by various sexualities.