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ARCHDEACON AGLEN, M.A.<p><span class= "bld"><p>INTRODUCTION</span><p><span class= "bld">TO</span><p><span class= "bld">THE SONG OF SOLOMON.</span><p>THE “Song of Songs”—from its Latin name, “canticum canticorum,” known generally as Canticles—holds, without question, the first place among the puzzles of literature. Such uncertainty attaches to its subject, its purpose, its authorship, and even its form, that it would have occupied in any literature a place similar to that of Shakespeare’s Sonnets in our own. Born on the sacred soil of Palestine, and appearing among the Holy Scriptures, it offers the greater difficulty of explaining its position. The history of the interpretation of the book from the earliest times has been a long apology to account for its place in the sacred Canon.<p>For from beginning to end there is not a single word in it which suggests any connection with religion. It presents itself as a page of secular literature that has become bound up with sacred. Of the rest of the Bible the forty-fifth Psalm is most naturally compared with it, since it has marriage for its theme, and is called in the inscription “A Song of Loves.” But there in the space of seven verses the name of God occurs four times. Here it is not found at all. The word “Jah” indeed appears in the Hebrew (<a href="/songs/8-6.htm" title="Set me as a seal on your heart, as a seal on your arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as the grave: the coals thereof are coals of fire, which has a most vehement flame.">Song of Solomon 8:6</a>), but only in its proverbial use as an expression of greatness. The forty-fifth Psalm, on the contrary, though on a secular subject, is as deeply religious in tone as any of those destined for Temple use. In the true Hebrew spirit everything is made subordinate to the master feelings of loyalty to the God Jehovah and reliance upon Him. In the Song of Songs not a trace of this feeling shows itself. There is not a single religious or spiritual sentiment of any kind, nor is there even the most distant allusion to any sacred rite or ordinance whatever. It is. only by the cabalistic method of the Rabbis that reference to the Mosaic system can be forced into the book. The Law, the Temple, the Sacrifices, are unknown. There is not the faintest echo of the worship of the sanctuary. The priest and Levite are silent, and the voice of the prophet is not heard.<p>Yet the absence of direct religious allusion is not the only, is not the principal, distinction which sets the Canticles in contrast with other parts of the Old Testament. Rather it is the absence of the religious intention which everywhere else controls Hebrew poetry. The poem stands alone as an instance of what Hebrew poetic genius could do when released from the religious purpose. Nature is no longer, as in the rest of sacred song, the veil of the Divine, admired and loved as the vesture, the dwelling of the Most High. The breath of spring, the flowers of the valley, the woods and hills, are here loved for their own sake. The universe is not now filled with the angels of Jehovah, “fulfilling His word.” The winds blowing from the north or the south, the streams flowing from the mountains, the lightning flash, “all are but ministers of love, and feed his sacred flame” (<a href="/context/songs/4-15.htm" title="A fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and streams from Lebanon.">Song of Solomon 4:15-16</a>; <a href="/songs/8-6.htm" title="Set me as a seal on your heart, as a seal on your arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as the grave: the coals thereof are coals of fire, which has a most vehement flame.">Song of Solomon 8:6</a>). The lessons of the lily, so dear to this poet, are not those of the Sermon on the Mount—it is to him only what the daisy was to Chaucer, a sweet emblem of the “truth of womanhede.” The grass is a verdant couch for him (<a href="/songs/1-16.htm" title="Behold, you are fair, my beloved, yes, pleasant: also our bed is green.">Song of Solomon 1:16</a>), not, as to the author of Psalms 104, a suggestion of a wide and beneficent providence, or, as to Isaiah, an emblem of human frailty. It is not because God has planted them that he recalls the cedars of Lebanon, nor because their majestic beauty humbles human pride, but because their branches form a shady bower for meetings with his love. Had we the whole literature of Palestine, doubtless there would be found among it many other specimens of poetry which in distinction from that which is directly religious in tone we call profane. Israel must have given birth to “bards of passion and of mirth.” Love and wine no doubt had their praises sung in the gathering of the vintage and at the harvest festivals. The strangeness lies in the fact of the admission of a specimen of amatory poetry into the sacred collection. How did the vigilance of those who watched the formation of the Canon allow it?<p>The allegorical and typical methods of interpretation which began with the Talmud, and have continued in favour till comparatively recent times, supply one answer to this question. Modern criticism for the most part substitutes a profound moral purpose for a concealed sacred meaning, as the <span class= "ital">raison d’être </span>of the poem. This introduction will only set forth the plan and purpose of the book as it can be gathered, without hypothesis, from itself.<p>1. The subject of the book is the sentiment of love.<p>2. The language is like that of all love poetry, passionate, sensuous, voluptuous, in some cases with Oriental licence passing the bounds of the Western standards of sobriety and propriety.<p>3. The lovers whose mutual passion is sung are wedded. This is evident, not alone from the use of the word <span class= "ital">khallah</span>—see note, <a href="/songs/4-8.htm" title="Come with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with me from Lebanon: look from the top of Amana, from the top of Shenir and Hermon, from the lions' dens, from the mountains of the leopards.">Song of Solomon 4:8</a>—which, though its common employment is to designate a wife, might possibly in the language of love be employed (as sister in the same verse) as a term of strong endearment, but by quite a sufficient number of indications which, combined, leave no doubt on the point. (1) The deliberations of the heroine’s family as to what shall be done with her when at a marriageable age are introduced in his own manner by the poet in one of the reminiscences of which the book is composed (<a href="/songs/8-8.htm" title="We have a little sister, and she has no breasts: what shall we do for our sister in the day when she shall be spoken for?">Song of Solomon 8:8</a> <span class= "ital">seq., with note</span>)<span class= "ital">, </span>and such a turn given as to show beyond question that she married the man of her choice. (2) There is impressed on the whole poem a feeling of the superiority of wedded love over concubinage, and of monogamy over polygamy. (3) The glowing pictures of Solomon’s marriage (<a href="/songs/3-6.htm" title="Who is this that comes out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke, perfumed with myrrh and frankincense, with all powders of the merchant?">Song of Solomon 3:6</a> <span class= "ital">seq.</span>) are introduced evidently either as a foil, to set off the simpler yet greater happiness of the poet, or because this very marriage is the actual subject of the poem. (4) Lastly, the only class of literature with which the poem can be naturally compared is the epithalamium. Many points of analogy with compositions of this class are noticed in the notes, and the one conjecture which is almost irresistible is that first started by Bossuet, that it was actually composed for such a purpose, and was a specimen of a species of literature common in Palestine.<p>4. Certain obstacles that lay in the way of this union, and which constancy and devotion succeeded in surmounting, furnish the incidents of the piece.<p>5. There is a kind of unity in the book. The lovers are the same throughout, but the unity is of feeling, not of form. The poem has the <span class= "ital">appearance </span>of a collection of scattered pieces. Certain marks of division are self-evident; <span class= "ital">e.g., </span>at <a href="/songs/2-7.htm" title="I charge you, O you daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes, and by the hinds of the field, that you stir not up, nor awake my love, till he please.">Song of Solomon 2:7</a>; <a href="/songs/3-5.htm" title="I charge you, O you daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes, and by the hinds of the field, that you stir not up, nor awake my love, till he please.">Song of Solomon 3:5</a>; <a href="/songs/4-7.htm" title="You are all fair, my love; there is no spot in you.">Song of Solomon 4:7</a>; <a href="/songs/5-1.htm" title="I am come into my garden, my sister, my spouse: I have gathered my myrrh with my spice; I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey; I have drunk my wine with my milk: eat, O friends; drink, yes, drink abundantly, O beloved.">Song of Solomon 5:1</a>, and <a href="/songs/8-4.htm" title="I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, that you stir not up, nor awake my love, until he please.">Song of Solomon 8:4</a>. No commentator makes less than five breaks.<p>6. The poem does not consist of one continuous narrative, nor exhibit a plot progressively developed, but the <span class= "ital">same </span>story of courtship is repeated again and again in different forms, with the same conclusion.<span class= "note">[23]</span> In one case the actual form is repeated with expansions (comp. <a href="/songs/3-1.htm" title="By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loves: I sought him, but I found him not.">Song of Solomon 3:1</a> s<span class= "ital">eq. </span>with <a href="/songs/5-2.htm" title="I sleep, but my heart wakes: it is the voice of my beloved that knocks, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night.">Song of Solomon 5:2</a> <span class= "ital">seq.</span>)<span class= "ital">. </span>Descriptions, images, phrases, refrains, repeat themselves.<p><span class= "note">[23] This may seem an arbitrary assumption in the face of the attempts of so many eminent scholars to present the poem as a regular drama, but the unsatisfactory nature of <span class= "ital">all </span>such attempts is a sufficient testimony to the fact that they have overlooked the plain indications given by the book itself.</span><p>7. The story is varied by the use of dialogue. Different speakers can be plainly recognised; <span class= "ital">e.g., </span>a bridegroom in the character of a shepherd (whether real or assumed, as in so much pastoral poetry, is uncertain), a bride, the Shulamite, as a shepherdess, various maidens, the brothers of the bride. Others are conjectured, and the poem has frequently been arranged as a drama, with regular acts and scenes. All that is certain is that the author, as a matter of form, puts his sentiments into the mouth of different persons, instead of writing in his own person, and that his work is thoroughly dramatic in feeling.<p>These seven indications are clear and apparently beyond conjecture. Whether the writer had a concealed purpose beyond that of telling his story, whether it is his own passion which he paints so feelingly, or only an ideal representation of love, whether the scenes described are actual or imaginary, the characters historical or fictitious, all this will continue to be a matter of dispute; but it will never be questioned that there is in the Song of Solomon the delineation of a true and passionate love, a constancy tempted and tried, but triumphant over all obstacles, and proof against all seduction, “strong as death, inexorable as Hades,” and that the representation is given in verse of such exquisite melody and poetry of such blended sweetness and power, that it must, apart from all other merits, rank by these alone among the highest lyric attempts of the world.<p>But it has assumed a place far higher. Not only has it a place in the sacred canon, but it has, in the mystic sense attached to it, been regarded as the most sacred book there. Its first commentator, R. Akiba, who lived in the first century of our era, said of it, “The whole world is not worthy of the day in which this sublime song was given to Israel; for all the Scriptures are holy, but this sublime Song is most holy.” On the other hand, a recent commentator, E. Reuss (<span class= "ital">Le Cantique des Cantiques dit de Salomon, </span>Paris, 1879), hesitates to include it in his commentary on the Bible, lest his readers should be shocked at a book so totally different from all the rest of Scripture, and conceived in a spirit, if not anti-religious, yet positively strange to all religious sentiments. It was no doubt the shock experienced by pious minds that first suggested the allegorical method of interpretation, which in spite of the uncompromising verdict of criticism will probably continue to keep its hold on the book. As Renan says, “the mystical sense is false philosophically, but it is true religiously. It corresponds to the great sanctification of love inaugurated by Christianity.” Association consecrates no less than dedication. Words, though in themselves indifferent, when set to sublime music partake of its inspiration. So the Canticles can never, under any interpretation, altogether lose the sacred power impressed upon them by generations of pious minds. But apart from an assumed religious character, the poem has its proper place in the Bible. The passion of love is ennobling according as it partakes of the moral sentiment. There have been writers on the Song who have been unable to discover any trace of this controlling influence, “but from beginning to end only marks of folly, vanity, and looseness” (Whiston). Such a view loses sight of the Eastern origin of the poem, and neglects the undoubted contrast displayed throughout between the meretricious manners of the harem and the purity of a constant passion, between the evils of polygamy and the blessings attending the unalterable attachment of two loving souls. It is not a taint of voluptuousness that can rob of its principal worth such a representation of love as culminates in the magnificent description in <a href="/context/ecclesiastes/12-6.htm" title="Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern.">Ecclesiastes 12:6-7</a> of chapter 8, and this representation is alone enough to justify the admission of the Song into the Canon; for, in the language of Bunsen, “There would be something wanting in the Bible, if there was not found there an expression of the deepest and the strongest of all human feelings.”<p><span class= "bld">EXCURSUS ON NOTES TO SONG OF SOLOMON.<p>EXCURSUS I.</span>—<span class= "bld">ON THE DATE AND AUTHORSHIP OF THE SONG.</span><p>THE title and Rabbinical tradition are in favour of the Solomonic Authorship. But the value of the evidence of the title is not greater than that of the titles of the Psalms, which need the confirmation of internal evidence before they are accepted as authority. Beyond this there is no external evidence whatever.<p>INTERNAL EVIDENCE:—I. For the Solomonic Authorship.<p>(1) The knowledge displayed of plants and animals, and other productions of nature, which is in accordance with <a href="/1_kings/4-33.htm" title="And he spoke of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even to the hyssop that springs out of the wall: he spoke also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes.">1Kings 4:33</a>.<p>(2) The evidence of wide acquaintance with foreign things, products of the East, &c, such as we know Solomon possessed; add to this the decidedly secular tone and feeling, a tone and feeling belonging only to this age.<p>(3) Similarity with certain parts of the Book of Proverbs. Comp. <a href="/songs/5-6.htm" title="I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spoke: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer.">Song of Solomon 5:6</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/1-28.htm" title="Then shall they call on me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me:">Proverbs 1:28</a>—<a href="/songs/4-12.htm" title="A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse; a spring shut up, a fountain sealed.">Song of Solomon 4:12</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/5-15.htm" title="Drink waters out of your own cistern, and running waters out of your own well.">Proverbs 5:15</a>—<a href="/songs/4-5.htm" title="Your two breasts are like two young roes that are twins, which feed among the lilies.">Song of Solomon 4:5</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/5-19.htm" title="Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts satisfy you at all times; and be you ravished always with her love.">Proverbs 5:19</a>—<a href="/songs/8-7.htm" title="Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned.">Song of Solomon 8:7</a>, with <a href="/context/proverbs/6-34.htm" title="For jealousy is the rage of a man: therefore he will not spare in the day of vengeance.">Proverbs 6:34-35</a>—<a href="/songs/6-9.htm" title="My dove, my undefiled is but one; she is the only one of her mother, she is the choice one of her that bore her. The daughters saw her, and blessed her; yes, the queens and the concubines, and they praised her.">Song of Solomon 6:9</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/31-28.htm" title="Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her.">Proverbs 31:28</a>; also for analogies of diction comp. in the Hebrew, <a href="/songs/4-9.htm" title="You have ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse; you have ravished my heart with one of your eyes, with one chain of your neck.">Song of Solomon 4:9</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/1-9.htm" title="For they shall be an ornament of grace to your head, and chains about your neck.">Proverbs 1:9</a>—<a href="/songs/4-11.htm" title="Your lips, O my spouse, drop as the honeycomb: honey and milk are under your tongue; and the smell of your garments is like the smell of Lebanon.">Song of Solomon 4:11</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/5-3.htm" title="For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil:">Proverbs 5:3</a>—<a href="/songs/1-2.htm" title="Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for your love is better than wine.">Song of Solomon 1:2</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/27-6.htm" title="Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.">Proverbs 27:6</a>—<a href="/songs/7-2.htm" title="Your navel is like a round goblet, which wants not liquor: your belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies.">Song of Solomon 7:2</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/25-12.htm" title="As an earring of gold, and an ornament of fine gold, so is a wise reprover on an obedient ear.">Proverbs 25:12</a>—<a href="/songs/4-14.htm" title="Spikenard and saffron; calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense; myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices:">Song of Solomon 4:14</a>, with <a href="/proverbs/7-17.htm" title="I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.">Proverbs 7:17</a>.<p>(4) The language is such as we should expect from the Solomonic age. It belongs to the flourishing period of the Hebrew tongue. Highly poetical, vigorous and fresh, it has no traces of the decay which manifested itself in the declining period of Israel and Judah. All the Aramean colouring it has can be explained by the hypothesis of a northern origin (see below).<p>No one of these indications is conclusive, and all together amount to no more than a strong probability in favour of a date not far removed from the Solomonic era. They certainly make against the extreme view of Grätz, who finding, as he thinks, in the book, a number of words of Greek origin, brings its date down to the third or second century before our era. Others, also on linguistic grounds, have referred it to the post-exile times.<p>II. The view most generally accepted at present is that the poem was the work of a poet in the northern kingdom, composed not long after the separation of the two kingdoms, probably about the middle of the tenth century before Christ.<p>The following are among the chief reasons for accepting such a view.<p>(1) In evidence of its northern birthplace, are the frequent and almost exclusive mention of localities in the north; the author’s strongly expressed dislike of the luxury and expense of Solomon’s court, which necessitated the exactions that so contributed to the schisms between the two kingdoms (<a href="/1_kings/12-4.htm" title="Your father made our yoke grievous: now therefore make you the grievous service of your father, and his heavy yoke which he put on us, lighter, and we will serve you.">1Kings 12:4</a>, <span class= "ital">seq.; </span><a href="/2_chronicles/10-1.htm" title="And Rehoboam went to Shechem: for to Shechem were all Israel come to make him king.">2Chronicles 10:1</a>, <span class= "ital">seq.</span>); the entire absence of all allusions to the temple and its worship; the exaltation of Tirzah to an equal place with Jerusalem as a typo of beauty (6:4); dialectical peculiarities, which can only be accounted for on this hypothesis, or on the untenable one of an extremely late composition; the comparison with Hosea, undoubtedly a northern writer, which shows that the two authors “lived in the same circle of images, and that the same expressions were familiar to them” (Renan, <span class= "ital">Le Cantique des Cantiques, </span>p. 112, referring <span class= "ital">to </span>Hitzig, <span class= "ital">Das Hohelied, </span>pp. 9, 10).<p>This fact of a northern origin established, it follows almost inevitably that the date of the poem must be placed somewhere in the middle of the tenth century, for it was only during the period from 975 to 924 B.C. that Tirzah occupied the position of northern capital (see Note <span class= "ital">ad loc.</span>)<span class= "ital">; </span>and the whole tone and spirit of the book, together with its treatment of Solomon, is what we should expect at a time not far removed from the rupture of the two kingdoms. As yet tradition had not exaggerated the splendour of the Solomonic era: in the references to Solomon’s guard, his harem, and his arsenal, the figures are not extravagant, as in the comparatively late accounts in Kings and Chronicles. A crowd of smaller indications point the same way, <span class= "ital">e.g., </span>the mention of Heshbon, which had ceased to be an Israelitish town by Isaiah’s time (<a href="/isaiah/15-8.htm" title="For the cry is gone round about the borders of Moab; the howling thereof to Eglaim, and the howling thereof to Beerelim.">Isaiah 15:8</a>). The mention of the Tower of David, as still possessing a garrison (<a href="/songs/7-4.htm" title="Your neck is as a tower of ivory; your eyes like the fish pools in Heshbon, by the gate of Bathrabbim: your nose is as the tower of Lebanon which looks toward Damascus.">Song of Solomon 7:4</a>, and <a href="/songs/4-4.htm" title="Your neck is like the tower of David built for an armory, where on there hang a thousand bucklers, all shields of mighty men.">Song of Solomon 4:4</a>), the allusion to Pharaoh’s equipages have a similar tendency; while it is almost inconceivable that Solomon himself or any author, while that monarch was alive, and his rule all-powerful, could have represented him and his court in such an unfavourable light as they appear in the song. But it is exactly the representation we should look for in a poet of the northern kingdom in the early years after it revolted against the tyranny of the Davidic dynasty.<p><span class= "bld">EXCURSUS II.—ON THE FORM AND PURPOSE OF THE POEM.</span><p>The dramatic feeling was not altogether strange to the Hebrews, as we see from the Book of Job, the sixty-third chapter of Isaiah the concluding chapters of Micah, and certain of the Psalms. And there is undoubtedly a great deal of the dramatic element in the “Song of Songs.” Two characters at least speak, a bride and a bridegroom, and as early as the Alexandrian codex of the LXX. translation the dramatic character was recognised, the words “bride” and “bridegroom” being in many instances prefixed to denote the persons speaking. Following out the suggestions thus given by the poem itself, a great many commentators have arranged it as a regular drama, and suppose that it may actually have been put on the stage, but this hypothesis can only be supported by a long succession of other hypotheses. M. Renan, for example, thinks that all the actors must have been present on the stage at once, but always unobservant of what was going on outside their own rôle. And in fact the almost infinite diversity of conjecture hazarded in support of the dramatic theory and the tremendous liberties taken with the text by its advocates go far to disprove it altogether. But it is not necessary, on the other hand, to have recourse to a theory like Herder’s, that the Song is a collection of different love-poems selected and arranged by Solomon. The pieces have a certain unity of subject and style. This is now generally admitted, but they are so loosely connected that they might easily be detached, and a new arrangement made without altering the sense and purpose. Indeed various suggestions of such alterations have at times been made.<p>The division we accept gives the following lyrical pieces, which we regard not, strictly speaking, as separate poems, but as stanzas of the same poem, somewhat loosely strung together, and not arranged after any definite artistic method.<p>{<p>I<p><a href="/context/songs/1-2.htm" title="Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for your love is better than wine.">Song of Solomon 1:2-8</a>.<p>II.<p><a href="/songs/1-9.htm" title="I have compared you, O my love, to a company of horses in Pharaoh's chariots.">Song of Solomon 1:9</a> to <a href="/songs/2-7.htm" title="I charge you, O you daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes, and by the hinds of the field, that you stir not up, nor awake my love, till he please.">Song of Solomon 2:7</a>.<p>III.<p><a href="/context/songs/2-8.htm" title="The voice of my beloved! behold, he comes leaping on the mountains, skipping on the hills.">Song of Solomon 2:8-17</a>.<p>IV.<p><a href="/context/songs/3-1.htm" title="By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loves: I sought him, but I found him not.">Song of Solomon 3:1-5</a>.<p>V.<p><a href="/context/songs/3-6.htm" title="Who is this that comes out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke, perfumed with myrrh and frankincense, with all powders of the merchant?">Song of Solomon 3:6-11</a>.<p>{<p>VI.<p><a href="/context/songs/4-1.htm" title="Behold, you are fair, my love; behold, you are fair; you have doves' eyes within your locks: your hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from mount Gilead.">Song of Solomon 4:1-7</a>.<p>VII.<p><a href="/context/songs/4-8.htm" title="Come with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with me from Lebanon: look from the top of Amana, from the top of Shenir and Hermon, from the lions' dens, from the mountains of the leopards.">Song of Solomon 4:8-11</a>.<p>VIII.<p><a href="/songs/4-12.htm" title="A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse; a spring shut up, a fountain sealed.">Song of Solomon 4:12</a> to <a href="/songs/5-1.htm" title="I am come into my garden, my sister, my spouse: I have gathered my myrrh with my spice; I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey; I have drunk my wine with my milk: eat, O friends; drink, yes, drink abundantly, O beloved.">Song of Solomon 5:1</a>.<p>IX.<p><a href="/songs/5-2.htm" title="I sleep, but my heart wakes: it is the voice of my beloved that knocks, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night.">Song of Solomon 5:2</a> to <a href="/songs/6-3.htm" title="I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine: he feeds among the lilies.">Song of Solomon 6:3</a>.<p>X.<p><a href="/context/songs/6-4.htm" title="You are beautiful, O my love, as Tirzah, comely as Jerusalem, terrible as an army with banners.">Song of Solomon 6:4-9</a>.<p>XI.<p><a href="/context/songs/6-10.htm" title="Who is she that looks forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?">Song of Solomon 6:10-13</a>.<p>XII.<p><a href="/context/songs/7-1.htm" title="How beautiful are your feet with shoes, O prince's daughter! the joints of your thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a cunning workman.">Song of Solomon 7:1-10</a>.<p>XIII.<p><a href="/songs/7-11.htm" title="Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field; let us lodge in the villages.">Song of Solomon 7:11</a> to <a href="/songs/8-4.htm" title="I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, that you stir not up, nor awake my love, until he please.">Song of Solomon 8:4</a>.<p>XIV.<p><a href="/context/songs/8-5.htm" title="Who is this that comes up from the wilderness, leaning on her beloved? I raised you up under the apple tree: there your mother brought you forth: there she brought you forth that bore you.">Song of Solomon 8:5-7</a>.<p>XV.<p><a href="/context/songs/8-8.htm" title="We have a little sister, and she has no breasts: what shall we do for our sister in the day when she shall be spoken for?">Song of Solomon 8:8-10</a>.<p>XVI.<p><a href="/context/songs/8-11.htm" title="Solomon had a vineyard at Baalhamon; he let out the vineyard to keepers; every one for the fruit thereof was to bring a thousand pieces of silver.">Song of Solomon 8:11-12</a>.<p>XVII.<p><a href="/context/songs/8-13.htm" title="You that dwell in the gardens, the companions listen to your voice: cause me to hear it.">Song of Solomon 8:13-14</a>.<p>The break at the end of II., IV., and XIII. is marked by the formula, “I charge thee,” &c; at the end of III. and VI. by another formula, expressing the return of night, “until the day breaks,” &c, properly “until the day cools,” <span class= "ital">i.e., </span>the evening. Similarly the emphatic declaration, “I am my beloved’s,” &c, which ends the pieces IX. and XII. An abrupt change of situation sometimes indicates the beginning of a new stanza, as at end of I., VI., and XIV., or a question marks a new departure, as at the beginning of V. and XI. Some of the pieces, as indicated by the brackets, are more closely related than others. But in every case, without exception, there is described, or at least implied, under figures transparent enough, the complete union of the wedded pair. In fact each piece has exactly, whether short or long, whether more or less elaborate, the same general character and <span class= "ital">dénoûment. </span>Each tells from one or other point of view the story of a courtship, ending in the complete and happy union of the lovers. The book is a series of love-poems, written, or supposed to be written, by a husband for or to his own wife, to recall to her, in the midst of their perfect union, the difficulties their love had encountered, the obstacles thrown in its way, its devoted constancy on both sides, and ultimate conquest over every hindrance.<p>There is a further conjecture which the form of the poem suggests, it is that these love-poems, by whomsoever originally composed, were arranged and adapted for the celebration of marriages, since, as pointed out in the Notes, maidens and young men vie in praising, these the bridegroom’s beauty, those the bride’s. But whether arranged for any one particular marriage or to be used at such events generally, there is no indication. The daughters of Jerusalem and the friends of the bridegroom may actually have been introduced to sing these praises, or they may have only been present in fancy; we have no positive indication to guide us. Bossuet is really to be credited with this suggestion, though his division into seven portions to suit a period of seven days, the ordinary duration of an Eastern wedding, is somewhat too arbitrary. His conjecture in its general outline is accepted by Renan as well as by our own scholar Lowth; the former even finds confirmation of the Epithalamium hypothesis in the expression of <a href="/jeremiah/7-34.htm" title="Then will I cause to cease from the cities of Judah, and from the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride: for the land shall be desolate.">Jeremiah 7:34</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/25-10.htm" title="Moreover I will take from them the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones, and the light of the candle.">Jeremiah 25:10</a>, “the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.” The analogy of modern Eastern weddings is a still stronger confirmation of this conjecture, that the Song was employed as an Epithalamium, if not composed in that character. It also helps to explain what else would seem extravagant in the poem and bordering on the licentious. The manners of many countries allow at weddings a relaxation of the ordinary rules of propriety. It was so in Palestine. “The evening feast was one of boisterous merriment, almost amounting to rioting. There were regular joke-makers; anything however false might be said of the bride, and to make the gravest Rabbi, even the President of the Sanhedrim, sing or dance, seemed a special object of delight” (“Marriage among the Ancient Hebrews,” by the Rev. Dr. Edersheim, <span class= "ital">Bible Educator, </span>Vol. IV., p. 270). In the remarks on the Song of Songs, by Dr. J. J. Wetstein, given by Delitsch in an Appendix to his Commentary, many illustrations of the poem are adduced from modern Bedouin customs, among others, that of the Wasf, or a description of the personal perfections and beauty of the young couple, of which a specimen is actually given, very analogous in character and imagery to <a href="/context/songs/7-2.htm" title="Your navel is like a round goblet, which wants not liquor: your belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies.">Song of Solomon 7:2-6</a>. But it is not only the East which offers analogy. Love and its language are necessarily the same all the world over. Spenser’s famous Epithalamium helps us to understand the Song of Solomon.<p>As to the versification of the Song of Songs, it contains examples of almost all the different forms of <span class= "ital">parallelism, </span>the name given to indicate that balance of clause against clause, either in regard to construction or sense, which constitutes the chief element of Hebrew rhythm. But the greater part of it is free even of the very lax rules which seem to have guided the poets of Israel. We may compare them to those irregular measures in which so many modern poets love to express their sweet and wayward fancies, in which the ear alone is the metrical law. Had the Song but the completeness given by rhyme, it would want no. thing of the richness of sound of the finest pieces of Tennyson’s <span class= "ital">Maud. </span>(See <span class= "ital">Bible Educator, </span>Vol. III., p. 48.)<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-1.htm">Song of Solomon 1:1</a></div><div class="verse">The song of songs, which <i>is</i> Solomon's.</div><a href="/songs/1-1.htm" title="The song of songs, which is Solomon's.">Song of Solomon 1:1</a> contains the title of the book: literally, <span class= "ital">A song of the songs </span>(Heb., <span class= "ital">Shîr hashîrîm</span>)<span class= "ital">, which to Solomon, i.e., of which Solomon is author. </span>This has been understood as meaning “one of Solomon’s songs,” with allusion to the 1,005 songs (<a href="/1_kings/4-32.htm" title="And he spoke three thousand proverbs: and his songs were a thousand and five.">1Kings 4:32</a>) which that monarch composed. But when in Hebrew a compound idea is to be expressed definitely, the article is prefixed to the word in the genitive. So here not merely <span class= "ital">“a </span>song of songs” (comp. holy of holies), <span class= "ital">i.e., “</span>a very excellent song,” but “<span class= "ital">The </span>song of songs,” <span class= "ital">i.e., </span>the most excellent or surpassing song. For the question of authorship and date of poem, see <span class= "ital">Excursus </span>I.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-2.htm">Song of Solomon 1:2</a></div><div class="verse">Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy love <i>is</i> better than wine.</div>(2) <span class= "bld">Love.</span>—Marg., <span class= "ital">loves, i.e., </span>caresses or kisses, as the parallelism shows. The LXX., followed by the Vulg., read <span class= "ital">breasts </span>(probably <span class= "ital">dadaï </span>instead of <span class= "ital">dôdaï</span>)<span class= "ital">, </span>the origin of many fanciful interpretations: <span class= "ital">e.g., </span>the two breasts = the two Testaments which breathe love, the first promising, the second revealing Christ. The reading is condemned by the obvious fact that the words are not spoken <span class= "ital">to </span>but <span class= "ital">by </span>a woman, the change of persons, from second to third, not implying a change of reference or speaker, but being an enallage frequent in sacred poetry. (Comp. <a href="/deuteronomy/32-15.htm" title="But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: you are waxen fat, you are grown thick, you are covered with fatness; then he forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation.">Deuteronomy 32:15</a>; <a href="/isaiah/1-29.htm" title="For they shall be ashamed of the oaks which you have desired, and you shall be confounded for the gardens that you have chosen.">Isaiah 1:29</a>, &c) Instead of “let him kiss me,” many prefer the reading “let him give me to drink,” which certainly preserves the metaphor (comp. <a href="/songs/7-9.htm" title="And the roof of your mouth like the best wine for my beloved, that goes down sweetly, causing the lips of those that are asleep to speak.">Song of Solomon 7:9</a>), which is exactly that of Ben Jonson’s:—<p>“Or leave a kiss but in the cup,<p>And I’ll not ask for wine.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-3.htm">Song of Solomon 1:3</a></div><div class="verse">Because of the savour of thy good ointments thy name <i>is as</i> ointment poured forth, therefore do the virgins love thee.</div>(3) <span class= "bld">Because of the savour.</span>—The general sense of this verse is plain, though grammatical difficulties render the literal translation doubtful. It should be divided into three clauses, not into two only, as in the Authorised Version: “Because of their odour (or, with regard to their fragrance) thy ointments (are) sweet.” There is no authority for taking <span class= "ital">riach = </span>sense of smell, or we should naturally translate “to the smell thy ointments are sweet.” The rendering of the next clause, “thy name is (like) oil poured forth,” is to be preferred, though it necessitates making either <span class= "ital">shemen </span>= oil, or <span class= "ital">shem = </span>name, feminine, for which there is no example, since the alternative, which takes <span class= "ital">tûrak </span>= poured forth, second masculine instead of third feminine, is harsh: “Thou art poured forth like oil with regard to thy name.” The image is an obvious one (comp. <a href="/ecclesiastes/7-1.htm" title="A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one's birth.">Ecclesiastes 7:1</a>). There is a play on words in <span class= "ital">shemen </span>and <span class= "ital">shemka.</span><p><span class= "bld">Virgins</span>.—Heb., <span class= "ital">alamôth</span>;<span class= "ital"> young girls. </span>(See Note, <a href="/songs/6-8.htm" title="There are three score queens, and fourscore concubines, and virgins without number.">Song of Solomon 6:8</a>.) Those who understand Solomon to be the object of the desire expressed in these verses understand by <span class= "ital">alamôth </span>“the ladies of the harem.” In the original these three verses plainly form a stanza of five lines<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-4.htm">Song of Solomon 1:4</a></div><div class="verse">Draw me, we will run after thee: the king hath brought me into his chambers: we will be glad and rejoice in thee, we will remember thy love more than wine: the upright love thee.</div>(4) <span class= "bld">The king hath brought me.</span>—The dramatic theory of the poem (see <span class= "ital">Excursus </span>II.) has been in a great measure built up on interpretations given to this verse. We understand it as a repetition, in another form, of the protestation of love made in <a href="/context/songs/1-1.htm" title="The song of songs, which is Solomon's.">Song of Solomon 1:1-3</a>. Like them, it forms a stanza of five lines. The clause, “the king hath brought,” &c, is—in accordance with a common Hebrew idiom, where an hypothesis is expressed by a simple perfect or future without a particle (comp. <a href="/proverbs/22-29.htm" title="See you a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men.">Proverbs 22:29</a>; <a href="/proverbs/25-16.htm" title="Have you found honey? eat so much as is sufficient for you, lest you be filled therewith, and vomit it.">Proverbs 25:16</a>)—to be understood, “Even should the king have brought me into his chambers, yet our transport and our joys are for <span class= "ital">thee </span>alone; even then we would recall thy caresses, those caresses which are sweeter than wine.”<p><span class= "bld">The upright love thee.</span>—Marg., <span class= "ital">they love thee uprightly; </span>Heb., <span class= "ital">meysharîm, </span>used in other places either (1) in the abstract, “righteousness,” &c, <a href="/psalms/17-2.htm" title="Let my sentence come forth from your presence; let your eyes behold the things that are equal.">Psalm 17:2</a>; <a href="/psalms/99-4.htm" title="The king's strength also loves judgment; you do establish equity, you execute judgment and righteousness in Jacob.">Psalm 99:4</a>; <a href="/proverbs/8-6.htm" title="Hear; for I will speak of excellent things; and the opening of my lips shall be right things.">Proverbs 8:6</a> (so LXX. here); or (2) adverbially, <a href="/psalms/58-2.htm" title="Yes, in heart you work wickedness; you weigh the violence of your hands in the earth.">Psalm 58:2</a>; <a href="/psalms/75-3.htm" title="The earth and all the inhabitants thereof are dissolved: I bear up the pillars of it. Selah.">Psalm 75:3</a> (and <a href="/songs/7-9.htm" title="And the roof of your mouth like the best wine for my beloved, that goes down sweetly, causing the lips of those that are asleep to speak.">Song of Solomon 7:9</a> below; but there the <span class= "ital">Lamed </span>prefixed fixes the adverbial use). The Authorised Version follows the Vulg., <span class= "ital">Recti diligunt te, </span>and is to be preferred, as bringing the clause into parallelism with the concluding clause of <a href="/songs/1-3.htm" title="Because of the smell of your good ointments your name is as ointment poured forth, therefore do the virgins love you.">Song of Solomon 1:3</a> : “Thou who hast won the love of all maidens by thy personal attractions, hast gained that of the sincere and upright ones by thy character and thy great name.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-5.htm">Song of Solomon 1:5</a></div><div class="verse">I <i>am</i> black, but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon.</div>(5) <span class= "bld">As the tents of Kedar</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e., Dark as the Kedareen tents of black goats’ hair, beautiful as the royal pavilions with their rich hangings. </span>For a similar style of parallelism, comp. <a href="/isaiah/15-3.htm" title="In their streets they shall gird themselves with sackcloth: on the tops of their houses, and in their streets, every one shall howl, weeping abundantly.">Isaiah 15:3</a> : “On her housetops, and to her open streets, every one howleth, descendeth with weeping.” For <span class= "ital">Kedar, </span>see <a href="/genesis/25-13.htm" title="And these are the names of the sons of Ishmael, by their names, according to their generations: the firstborn of Ishmael, Nebajoth; and Kedar, and Adbeel, and Mibsam,">Genesis 25:13</a>.<p>As the poet puts this description of the lady’s complexion into her own mouth, we must understand it as a little playful raillery, which is immediately redeemed by a compliment. It also prepares the way for the reminiscence of an interesting passage in her early life. See next verse.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-6.htm">Song of Solomon 1:6</a></div><div class="verse">Look not upon me, because I <i>am</i> black, because the sun hath looked upon me: my mother's children were angry with me; they made me the keeper of the vineyards; <i>but</i> mine own vineyard have I not kept.</div>(6) <span class= "bld">Look not </span>. . .<span class= "ital">—i.e., with disdain, </span>as in <a href="/job/41-34.htm" title="He beholds all high things: he is a king over all the children of pride.">Job 41:34</a> (Heb. 26).<p><span class= "bld">Black.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">blackish.</span><p><span class= "bld">The sun </span>. . .—The word translated <span class= "ital">looked upon </span>occurs only twice besides (<a href="/job/20-9.htm" title="The eye also which saw him shall see him no more; neither shall his place any more behold him.">Job 20:9</a>; <a href="/job/28-7.htm" title="There is a path which no fowl knows, and which the vulture's eye has not seen:">Job 28:7</a>). The “all-seeing sun” is a commonplace of poetry; but here with sense of scorching. The heroine goes on to explain the cause of her exposure to the sun. Her dark complexion is accidental, and cannot therefore be used as an argument that she was an Egyptian princess, whose nuptials with Solomon are celebrated in the poem.<p><span class= "bld">Mother’s children</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e.</span>, <span class= "ital">brothers, </span>not necessarily <span class= "ital">step-brothers, </span>as Ewald and others. (Comp. <a href="/psalms/50-20.htm" title="You sit and speak against your brother; you slander your own mother's son.">Psalm 50:20</a>; <a href="/psalms/69-8.htm" title="I am become a stranger to my brothers, and an alien to my mother's children.">Psalm 69:8</a>.) The reference to the mother rather than the father is natural in a country where polygamy was practised.<p><span class= "bld">Mine own vineyard </span>. . .—The general sense is plain. While engaged in the duties imposed by her brothers, she had been compelled to neglect something—but what? Some think her <span class= "ital">beloved, </span>and others her <span class= "ital">reputation; </span>Ginsburg, literally, <span class= "ital">her own special vineyard. </span>But the obvious interpretation connects the words immediately with the context. Her <span class= "ital">personal appearance </span>had been sacrificed to her brothers’ severity. While tending their vines she had neglected her own complexion.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-7.htm">Song of Solomon 1:7</a></div><div class="verse">Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou feedest, where thou makest <i>thy flock</i> to rest at noon: for why should I be as one that turneth aside by the flocks of thy companions?</div>(7) <span class= "bld">Where thou feedest . . . thy flock . . . For why should I be . . .</span>?—The marginal reading, <span class= "ital">that is veiled, </span>follows the LXX. in rendering the Hebrew literally. But it has been found somewhat difficult to assign a meaning to a literal translation. The su<span class= "ital">ggestions=unknown </span>(Ewald), <span class= "ital">veiled as a harlot </span>(Delitzsch, &c; comp. <a href="/genesis/38-15.htm" title="When Judah saw her, he thought her to be an harlot; because she had covered her face.">Genesis 38:15</a>), <span class= "ital">fainting </span>(Gesenius), seem all wide of the mark, since the question only refers to the danger of missing her beloved through ignorance of his whereabouts. A transposition of two letters would give a word with a sense required = <span class= "ital">erring, wandering about, </span>a sense, indeed, which old Rabbinical commentators gave to this word itself in <a href="/isaiah/22-16.htm" title="What have you here? and whom have you here, that you have hewed you out a sepulcher here, as he that hews him out a sepulcher on high, and that engraves an habitation for himself in a rock?">Isaiah 22:16</a> (Authorised Version, <span class= "ital">cover</span>); and probably the idea involved is the obvious one that a person with the head muffled up would not find her way easily, as we might say, “Why should I go about blindfold?”<p>The Rabbinical interpretation of this verse is a good instance of the fanciful treatment the book has received: “When the time came for Moses to depart, he said to the Lord, ‘It is revealed to me that this people will sin and go into captivity; show me how they shall be governed and dwell among the nations whose decrees <span class= "ital">are oppressive as the heat; </span>and wherefore is it they shall wander among the flocks of Esau and Ishmael, who make <span class= "ital">them idols equal to thee as thy companions?’”</span><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-8.htm">Song of Solomon 1:8</a></div><div class="verse">If thou know not, O thou fairest among women, go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock, and feed thy kids beside the shepherds' tents.</div>(8) <span class= "bld">If thou know not.</span>—With this verse one subsection of the poem plainly ends. Most of the supporters of the dramatic theory make <a href="/songs/1-9.htm" title="I have compared you, O my love, to a company of horses in Pharaoh's chariots.">Song of Solomon 1:9</a> begin the second scene of Act I.; and many of them understand this reply to the heroine’s question as an ironical allusion on the part of the court ladies to her low birth. We take it rather as one of the many playful ways in which the poet either recalls or arranges meetings with the object of his passion (comp. <a href="/context/songs/2-10.htm" title="My beloved spoke, and said to me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away.">Song of Solomon 2:10-14</a>). In the first seven verses he imagines her sighing for him, and in his absence, fancying, as lovers do, causes which might keep them asunder or make him forsake her, such as the loss of her complexion, her abduction into a royal harem; and then in <a href="/songs/1-8.htm" title="If you know not, O you fairest among women, go your way forth by the footsteps of the flock, and feed your kids beside the shepherds' tents.">Song of Solomon 1:8</a> shows how groundless her fears are by playfully suggesting a well known way of finding him.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-9.htm">Song of Solomon 1:9</a></div><div class="verse">I have compared thee, O my love, to a company of horses in Pharaoh's chariots.</div>(9) <span class= "bld">Company of horses.</span>—So Vulg., <span class= "ital">equitatus, </span>but Heb. <span class= "ital">susah </span>more properly = <span class= "ital">mare, </span>as in LXX., <span class= "greekheb">Τῇ ἵππῳ μου</span><span class= "ital">.</span> The ground of the comparison is variously understood. Some, offended at the comparison of female beauty to that of a horse, think the rich trappings of a royal equipage suggested it, while on the other hand, the mention of the caparisoned steed may have suggested the reference to the lady’s ornaments. But Anacreon (60) and Theocritus (Idyll xviii. 30, 31), and also Horace (Ode iii. 11), have compared female with equine beauty; and an Arab chief would not hesitate to prefer the points of his horse to the charms of his mistress.<p><span class= "bld">Chariots.</span>—The plural shows that the image is general, and with no reference to any one particular equipage. Pharaoh’s teams are selected as pre-eminently fine by reputation. The supposition that there is a reference to some present from the Egyptian to the Israelite monarch is gratuitous. The kings of Israel bought their horses and chariots at a high price (<a href="/1_kings/10-29.htm" title="And a chariot came up and went out of Egypt for six hundred shekels of silver, and an horse for an hundred and fifty: and so for all the kings of the Hittites, and for the kings of Syria, did they bring them out by their means.">1Kings 10:29</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-10.htm">Song of Solomon 1:10</a></div><div class="verse">Thy cheeks are comely with rows <i>of jewels</i>, thy neck with chains <i>of gold</i>.</div>(10) <span class= "bld">Rows.</span>—Heb., <span class= "ital">tôrim, </span>from <span class= "ital">tûr </span>= went round; hence = either circlets or strings of jewels, or the round beads themselves of which necklaces, &c, were made.<p><span class= "bld">Chains.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">perforated, i.e.</span>, beads, or possibly coins strung together. “Arab ladies, particularly the married, are extravagantly fond of silver and gold ornaments, and they have an endless variety of chains, bracelets, anklets, necklaces, and rings. It is also quite common to see thousands of piastres, in various coins, round the forehead and suspended from the neck, and covering a system of network, called suffa, attached to the back of the head-dress, which spreads over the shoulders and falls down to the waist” (Thomson, <span class= "ital">The Land and the Book</span>)<span class= "ital">.</span><p>Olearius (quoted by Harmer) says:—“Persian ladies use as head-dress two or three rows of pearls, which pass round the head and hang down the cheeks, so that their faces seem set in pearls.” Lady Mary Montague describes the Sultana Hafitan as wearing round her head-dress four strings of pearls of great size and beauty.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-11.htm">Song of Solomon 1:11</a></div><div class="verse">We will make thee borders of gold with studs of silver.</div>(11) <span class= "bld">Borders.</span>—The same word translated <span class= "ital">rows </span>in preceding verse. In the dramatic theory, this verse put into Solomon’s mouth takes the form of a seductive offer of richer and more splendid ornaments to dazzle the rustic maiden; but no theory is necessary to explain a fond lover’s wish to adorn the person of his beloved.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-12.htm">Song of Solomon 1:12</a></div><div class="verse">While the king <i>sitteth</i> at his table, my spikenard sendeth forth the smell thereof.</div>(12) <span class= "bld">While the king sitteth.</span>—There is no need to imagine a scene where the monarch, having failed in his attempt to allure the shepherdess by fine offers, retires to his banquet, leaving her to console herself with the thoughts of her absent shepherd love. As in <a href="/songs/1-2.htm" title="Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for your love is better than wine.">Song of Solomon 1:2</a> the poet makes his mistress prefer his love to wine, so here she prefers the thought of union with him to all the imagined pleasures of the royal table.<p><span class= "bld">Spikenard</span>—Heb., <span class= "ital">nerd</span>—is exclusively an Indian product, procured from the <span class= "ital">Nardostachys jatamansi, </span>a plant of the order <span class= "ital">Valerianaceœ. </span>It was imported into Palestine at a very early period. The perfume is prepared by drying the shaggy stem of the plant (see Tristram’s <span class= "ital">Nat. Hist. of Bible, </span>pp. 484, 485). There is a sketch of the plant in Smith’s <span class= "ital">Bibl. Dict.</span><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-13.htm">Song of Solomon 1:13</a></div><div class="verse">A bundle of myrrh <i>is</i> my wellbeloved unto me; he shall lie all night betwixt my breasts.</div>(13) <span class= "bld">A bundle of myrrh.</span>—The mention of perfumes leads the poet to a new adaptation of the language of flowers. For myrrh (Heb., <span class= "ital">môr</span>)<span class= "ital">, </span>see <a href="/genesis/37-25.htm" title="And they sat down to eat bread: and they lifted up their eyes and looked, and, behold, a company of Ishmeelites came from Gilead with their camels bearing spices and balm and myrrh, going to carry it down to Egypt.">Genesis 37:25</a>. For various personal and domestic uses, see <a href="/psalms/45-8.htm" title="All your garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia, out of the ivory palaces, whereby they have made you glad.">Psalm 45:8</a>; <a href="/proverbs/7-17.htm" title="I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.">Proverbs 7:17</a>; <a href="/proverbs/5-13.htm" title="And have not obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined my ear to them that instructed me!">Proverbs 5:13</a>. Ginsburg quotes from the Mischna to prove the custom, alluded to in the text, of wearing sachets, or bottles of myrrh, suspended from the neck. Tennyson’s exquisite little song in <span class= "ital">The Miller’s Daughter </span>suggests itself as a comparison:—<p>“And I would be the necklace,<p>And all day long to fall and rise<p>Upon her balmy bosom<p>With her laughter or her sighs.<p>And I would lie so light, so light,<p>I scarce should be unclasped at night.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-14.htm">Song of Solomon 1:14</a></div><div class="verse">My beloved <i>is</i> unto me <i>as</i> a cluster of camphire in the vineyards of Engedi.</div>(14) <span class= "bld">Camphire.</span>—Marg<span class= "ital">., cypress: Heb., côpher. </span>There is no doubt of the identity of this plant with the <span class= "ital">Henna </span>of the Arabs, the <span class= "ital">Lawsonia aïba </span>or <span class= "ital">inermis </span>of botanists. Robinson found it growing in abundance at En-gedi (where <span class= "ital">alone </span>it is found), and suggested the identification (see his Note, <span class= "ital">Researches, ii.</span> 211). Tristram describes it thus: “It is a small shrub, eight or ten feet high, with dark back, pale green foliage, and clusters of white and yellow blossoms of a powerful fragrance. Not only is the perfume of the flower highly prized, but a paste is made of the dried and pounded leaves, which is used by the women of all ranks and the men of the wealthier classes to dye the palms of the hands, the soles of the feet, and the nails” (<span class= "ital">Nat. Hist. of the Bible, </span>p. 339). (Comp. also Thomson, <span class= "ital">The Land and the Book, </span>p. 602, who, however, prefers to identify <span class= "ital">côpher </span>with some specially favourite kind of grapes, but without giving any sufficient reason.) For En-gedi, see <a href="/joshua/15-62.htm" title="And Nibshan, and the city of Salt, and Engedi; six cities with their villages.">Joshua 15:62</a>. It is the only place in Southern. Palestine mentioned in this poem, the other allusions (except Heshbon, <a href="/songs/7-4.htm" title="Your neck is as a tower of ivory; your eyes like the fish pools in Heshbon, by the gate of Bathrabbim: your nose is as the tower of Lebanon which looks toward Damascus.">Song of Solomon 7:4</a>, which is in Moab) being to northern localities.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-15.htm">Song of Solomon 1:15</a></div><div class="verse">Behold, thou <i>art</i> fair, my love; behold, thou <i>art</i> fair; thou <i>hast</i> doves' eyes.</div>(15) <span class= "bld">Behold, thou art fair.</span>—The song is now transferred to a male speaker—the advocates for the dramatic theory cannot agree whether Solomon or the shepherd; and no wonder, since the poem gives no indication.<p><span class= "bld">My love.</span>—Marg., <span class= "ital">companion, </span>LXX. <span class= "greekheb">πλησίον</span><span class= "ital">, </span>in Heb. <span class= "ital">rayati, </span>is used for the female, <span class= "ital">dôdi </span>being her usual term for her lover. Beyond this the terms of endearment used cannot safely be pressed for any theory.<p><span class= "bld">Thou hast doves’ eyes.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">thine eyes are doves’. </span>The same image is repeated (<a href="/songs/4-1.htm" title="Behold, you are fair, my love; behold, you are fair; you have doves' eyes within your locks: your hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from mount Gilead.">Song of Solomon 4:1</a>), and adopted in return by the heroine (<a href="/songs/5-12.htm" title="His eyes are as the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, washed with milk, and fitly set.">Song of Solomon 5:12</a>). The point of the comparison is either quickness of glance or generally tenderness and grace. The dove, a favourite with all poets as an emblem of love, is especially dear to this bard. Out of about fifty mentions of the bird in Scripture, seven occur in the short compass of this book. For general account of the dove in Palestine, see <a href="/psalms/55-6.htm" title="And I said, Oh that I had wings like a dove! for then would I fly away, and be at rest.">Psalm 55:6</a>, and for particular allusions Notes below to <a href="/context/songs/2-11.htm" title="For, see, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone;">Song of Solomon 2:11-12</a>; <a href="/songs/2-14.htm" title="O my dove, that are in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs, let me see your countenance, let me hear your voice; for sweet is your voice, and your countenance is comely.">Song of Solomon 2:14</a>. (Comp. Shakespeare’s <span class= "ital">Coriolanus, </span>v. 3:—<p>“Or those doves’ eyes<p>That can make gods forsworn.”<p>Tennyson’s <span class= "ital">Maud:</span>—<p>“Do I hear her sing as of old,<p>My bird with the shining head,<p>My own dove, with her tender eye?”)<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-16.htm">Song of Solomon 1:16</a></div><div class="verse">Behold, thou <i>art</i> fair, my beloved, yea, pleasant: also our bed <i>is</i> green.</div>(16) <span class= "bld">Our bed is green.</span>—The heroine replies in similar terms of admiration, and recalls “the happy woodland places” in which they were wont to meet.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/songs/1-17.htm">Song of Solomon 1:17</a></div><div class="verse">The beams of our house <i>are</i> cedar, <i>and</i> our rafters of fir.</div>(17) <span class= "bld">Rafters.</span>—Marg., <span class= "ital">galleries </span>(comp. <a href="/songs/7-5.htm" title="Your head on you is like Carmel, and the hair of your head like purple; the king is held in the galleries.">Song of Solomon 7:5</a>); LXX., <span class= "greekheb">φατνώματα</span>;<span class= "ital"> </span>Vulg., <span class= "ital">laquearia</span>; Heb., <span class= "ital">rahît, </span>from <span class= "ital">rahat = </span>run, flow: hence (1) <span class= "ital">a gutter, </span>from the water running down (Gen. 3:38); (2) <span class= "ital">a curl, </span>from its flowing down the neck (<a href="/songs/7-5.htm" title="Your head on you is like Carmel, and the hair of your head like purple; the king is held in the galleries.">Song of Solomon 7:5</a>—Hebrews 6); (3) here <span class= "ital">rafters, </span>or roof beams, from their spreading overhead. “Our couch was the green grass, the arches of our bower the cedar branches, and its rafters the firs.” Others read <span class= "ital">rachitim, </span>which is explained as a transposition for <span class= "ital">charitim = </span>turned work. But the thought is plainly connected with the woods, not with a gorgeous house. For <span class= "ital">cedar </span>see <a href="/1_kings/4-33.htm" title="And he spoke of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even to the hyssop that springs out of the wall: he spoke also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes.">1Kings 4:33</a>.<p><span class= "bld">Fir.</span>—Heb., <span class= "ital">berôth </span>(Aramaic form of <span class= "ital">berôsh</span>)<span class= "ital">, </span>a tree often mentioned in connection with <span class= "ital">cedar </span>as an emblem of majesty, &c. (<a href="/ezekiel/31-8.htm" title="The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chestnut trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of God was like to him in his beauty.">Ezekiel 31:8</a>; <a href="/isaiah/37-24.htm" title="By your servants have you reproached the Lord, and have said, By the multitude of my chariots am I come up to the height of the mountains, to the sides of Lebanon; and I will cut down the tall cedars thereof, and the choice fir trees thereof: and I will enter into the height of his border, and the forest of his Carmel.">Isaiah 37:24</a>; <a href="/isaiah/60-13.htm" title="The glory of Lebanon shall come to you, the fir tree, the pine tree, and the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary; and I will make the place of my feet glorious.">Isaiah 60:13</a>). “The plain here has evidently been buried deep under sand long ages ago, precisely as at Beirût, and here are the usual pine forests growing upon it (Beirût is by some derived from <span class= "ital">berûth</span>)<span class= "ital">. </span>These are the finest specimens we have seen in Palestine, though every sandy ridge of Lebanon and Hermon is clothed with them. In my opinion it is the Heb. <span class= "ital">berôsh, </span>concerning which there is so much confusion in the various translations of the Bible . . . the generic name for the <span class= "ital">pine, </span>of which there are several varieties in Lebanon. <span class= "ital">Cypress </span>is rarely found there, but <span class= "ital">pine </span>everywhere, and it is the tree used for beams and rafters (Thomson, <span class= "ital">The Land and Book, </span>p. 511). The <span class= "ital">Pinus maritima </span>and the <span class= "ital">Aleppo pine </span>are the most common, the latter being often mistaken for the Scotch fir. (See Tristram, <span class= "ital">Nat. Hist. of Bible, </span>p. 353, &c.)<p><span class= "bld"><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers<br /><br />Text Courtesy of <a href="//biblesupport.com" target="_top">BibleSupport.com</a>. 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