Porn in the Bible: Song of Songs

There's a gorgeous look at the Old Testament's most pornographic book over at Slate today. The sacred text that has caused a million sweaty, gobbling Baptists to tent their Bibles across their lust-turgid laps, The Song of Songs. Here's a description of Chapter 4:

It's the guy's turn to give the compliments. Either he's not as good a poet as she is, or you talked differently to girls back in the day. "Your hair is like a flock of goats … your teeth are like a flock of shorn ewes." Your brow is like "pomegranate split open." "Your neck is like the tower of David." You're so beautiful—your hair looks like goats! Your forehead is a pomegranate—a fruit that resembles, um, acne. And you have a neck that seems to be made of brick. Hmm. These lines wouldn't go over well at my house.

The most famous of his bodily tributes is: "Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle." This one isn't exactly insulting, but it's confusing. Fawns are bony, muscular, and jumpy—which is not how I would describe breasts.

He calls her a "locked garden." She takes up the metaphor, enthusiastically! "Awake, O north wind, and come, O south wind! Blow upon my garden that its fragrance may be wafted abroad. Let my beloved come to his garden, and eat its choicest fruits."

As porn was not allowed in the pews of the First Evangelical Church of Revere, my Christian cronies and I spent a great deal of time slavering over this chapter. I'll never forget the shock I experienced when a woman slugged me after referring to her breasts as the bony rump of a gazelle, though.

The Bible's Sexiest Book [Slate]