Commentary on the Song of Songs (review)

This translation of the Commentary on the Song of Songs is an important contribution to the study of the early Christian church fathers. The fifteen page introduction (3-18) includes a palaeographical examination of Theodoret's text andits historical, mystical, and biblical significance as well as the author's approach to finding a spiritual—specifically Christological and ecclesiological—meaning in all items of the text. Also included in Hills's introduction is an outline of Theodoret's knowledge of the sciences including history, geography, topography, and psychology. Finally, there is a brief reference to the Christology of the Com-mentary, more precisely to "the statements about Jesus that suggest inadequate commitment to the hypostatic union" (15) and to the communicatio idiomatum.

The translation, which is preceded by a preface, is divided into chapters and is both accurate and erudite. The notes at the foot of each page provide the reader with numerous acute observations of historical, philological, and theological import on both the text and the translation.

The book offers a selective bibliography (121-22) as well as a general index (123-24), an index of biblical citations (125-29), and an index of modern authors (131).

This new translation of the Commentary on the Song of Songs has more than "instrumental" value; it significantly raises the standards of theological and religious scholarship through its careful philological analysis.