169 “Words Tinctured with Passion” St Gregory of Nyssa’s In Canticum Canticorum and the Emergence of Afective Mysticism in Byzantine Hymnography Andrew Mellas PhD Candidate, University of Sydney Abstract: St Gregory of Nyssa’s allegorical interpretation of the Song of Songs Christianised the Stoic ideal of apatheia and spiritualised the erotic textuality of the Canticle. Nevertheless, far from eschewing all emotion, his hermeneutics paved the way for a transiguration of the passions as a concept and the emergence of an afective mysticism in Byzantine hymnography. Unlocking the text’s spiritual sense, Gregory analogously read the lovers’ impassioned utterances as embodying a passion transcending earthly corporeality and touching divine eros. As allegory delves into the spiritual meaning of the Shulammite and her lover, human passion is anagogically immersed in divine passion and the mystical knowledge of the eschaton. This paper investigates the signiicance of Gregory’s In Canticum Canticorum for the history of emotions in Byzantium by examining its ainity with hymnography. It will particularly explore the nuptial metaphor in the Akathist Hymn and the transformation of passion in an epektasis of desire in St Romanos the Melodist’s kontakion on the harlot. I nviting his audience to enter the “holy of holies, that is, the Song of Songs,” St Gregory of Nyssa enjoined an “erotic love” that desires the “beauty of the divine nature” and “turn[s] passion into impassibility.” 1 His allegorical interpretation of the Song of Songs Christianised the Stoic ideal of apatheia and spiritualised the erotic textuality of the Canticle, paving the way for a transiguration of the passions as a concept and the 1 St Gregory of Nyssa, Homilies on the Song of Songs, trans. Richard A. Norris, Jr. (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012) 29. PHRONEMA, VOL. 30(2), 2015, 169-185