1-7 Colloquy of Bride and Friends (Her)
Note: I learned a new word from this subtitle provided by the NRSV. Colloquy: a conversational exchange; dialogue.
A confession: I usually do not understand the hidden meanings in poetry, so this is going to be a real stretch for me. For one, the point of view and object of the conversation are inconsistent. In this first section, the bride goes from speaking to her friends to speaking to her beloved. Besides that, the language is so personal, so explicit, it lends itself less to summary than even the Psalms do!
And a warning: Practically everything I'll write below will be guesswork -- my attempt to make sense of the Scriptures from my own reading, relying on better educated commentators as little as possible.
- Bride expresses to her friends and to her lover the superiority of his love
- She's dark-skinned, and a keeper of the vineyard, because her brothers in anger gave her that responsibility, so she hasn't been able to care for herself very well.
- She asks her beloved where his flocks are, so she can care for them.
- Him: "If you do not know, O fairest among women..." He tells her to follow the tracks of his flock and pasture hers beside his. Even though the NRSV puts this in the previous section, it seems to me like this is the Beloved speaking.
- Him: He compares her to a mare among Pharaoh's chariots, with attractive features, which he will ornament with gold and silver
- Her: My beloved is a sweet-smelling fragrance to me.
- Him: Extols her beauty; describes their house (green couch, beams of cedar, rafters of pine)
1-2 Him:
- He calls himself a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys.
- He calls her a lily among brambles.
- She compares him to an apple tree in the forest
- She compares his devotion to fruit, to a banquet and longs for his embrace
- She "adjures" the daughters of Jerusalem not to awaken love until it is ready.
Her:
- She sees her love come, "leaping" and "bounding," and compares him to a gazelle or young stag
- He stands outside. gazing at her window and bids her to come with him, for it is springtime
- He belongs to her, and she to him.
1-5 Love's Dream
- In her bed at night, she looks for him but can't find him, so she goes out into the streets to look for him.
- She asks the sentinels if they've seen him, and soon finds him.
- She holds on to him and takes him into her mother's house, into her mother's bedroom.
- Again, she "adjures" the daughters of Jerusalem, not to awaken love until it is ready.
- Something like a column of smoke smelling of perfume is coming
- It is Solomon with 60 of his mighty men, fully armed
- He's made himself a palanquin of silver, gold, and purple
- The bride bids the Daughters of Jerusalem to come and look at King Solomon and his crown, with which his mother crowned him on his wedding day.
1-15 Him:
- He praises the beauty of her eyes, hair, teeth, lips, mouth, cheeks, neck, and breasts (comparing them to things precious to a herdsman or farmer - doves, goats, ewes, pomegranates, etc.)
- "You are altogether beautiful, my love, there is no flaw in you."
- He tells her she has ravished his heart, that her love is better than wine.
- Using poetic garden terms he describes his anticipation of their coming together as one.
Song of Solomon 5
1 Him:
- He accepts her invitation
- He bids his friends to celebrate with him.
2-8 Her: Another Dream
- She sleeps and is awakened by her love knocking, asking her to open the door.
- Indecisive, she delays answering him, and when she finally, in anticipation, goes to the door, he is gone.
- She pursues him in the streets. This time when the sentinels find her, they beat her and take her cloak.
- She "adjures" the daughters of Jerusalem to find her love and tell him she is "faint with love."
- Friends: Why is your love any better than other loves?
- Her: She describes her love's physical appearance as radiant, describing his head, hair, eyes, cheeks, lips, arms, body, legs, appearance and speech.
- "This is my beloved and my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem."
1 Friends: Where has your love gone?
2-2 Her:
- Down to his garden, to pasture his flock and gather lilies.
- She belongs to him, and he to her
- He describes her beauty as overwhelming -- again, compares her eyes, hair, teeth, cheeks as before.
- Praised by 60 queens and 80 concubines; darling of her mother, flawless.
1-9 Him:
- Getting personal again: He praises her feet, thighs, navel, belly, breasts, neck, eyes, nose, head and hair. (Her nose is like a tower?)
- Getting sensual again: She is like a palm tree he wants to climb and to lay hold of its branches
- She invites him into the fields and vineyards to check on the vegetation
- There she will give him her love among the mandrakes and choice fruits
1-4 Her:
- She wants him to be as close to her as a brother, to lead him into her mother's bedroom, and to satisfy him
- She longs for his embrace
- She adjures the daughter of Jerusalem not to awaken love until it is ready. This is the third time she has said this. See chapters 2 and 3.
5 Her father? Sees her coming up from the wilderness with her beloved, remembers her birth
6-7 The value of love
- It's a strong as death, with flashes of unquenchable fire
- It's worth more than all the wealth of one's house
- She expresses concern for a young sister, and how her family will prepare her for marriage
- She recalls her own youth and development, how she was in Solomon's eyes
- She has her own vineyard -- her own special place in Solomon's heart?
- She listens for his voice, and asks him to come to her, like a gazelle or young stag.
After reading this book and giving my first impressions (I don't remember ever reading this book from "cover to cover" before), I did consult an online version of Matthew Henry's commentary. He gives the Song of Solomon only a spiritual application, seeing it as a love story between Christ and his church, his bride. Below are a few lines from his introduction. If you want to read the complete, quite lengthy, introduction, you'll find it at at Christian Classics Ethereal Library, among other places.
This Song of Solomon's is very much unlike the songs of his father David; here is not the name of God in it; it is never quoted in the New Testament; we find not in it any expressions of natural religion or pious devotion, no, nor is it introduced by vision, or any of the marks of immediate revelation.
...and therefore the Jewish doctors advised their young people not to read it till they were thirty years old, lest by the abuse of that which is most pure and sacred (horrendum dictu—horrible to say!) the flames of lust should be kindled with fire from heaven, which is intended for the altar only.
...It may more easily be taken in a spiritual sense by the Christian church, because the condescensions and communications of divine love appear more rich and free under the gospel than they did under the law, and the communion between heaven and earth more familiar. God sometimes spoke of himself as the husband of the Jewish church (Isa. lxiv. 5, Hos. ii. 16, 19), and rejoiced in it as his bride, Isa. lxii. 4, 5. But more frequently is Christ represented as the bridegroom of his church (Matt. xxv. 1; Rom. vii. 4; 2 Cor. xi. 2; Eph. v. 32), and the church as the bride, the Lamb's wife, Rev. xix. 7; xxi. 2, 9.
...It requires some pains to find out what may, probably, be the meaning of the Holy Spirit in the several parts of this book; as David's songs are many of them level to the capacity of the meanest, and there are shallows in them learned, and there are depths in it in which an elephant may swim. But, when the meaning is found out, it will be of admirable use to excite pious and devout affections in us; and the same truths which are plainly laid down in other scriptures when they are extracted out of this come to the soul with a more pleasing power.
Here's the beginning of another viewpoint, excerpted from a paper, simply entitled Notes on Song of Solomon by a Dr. Thomas L. Constable. I like his approach.
Probably the Song of Solomon was a single love poem that the writer designed to deal primarily with the subject of human love and marriage. This was the viewpoint of many ancient Jewish rabbis.19 It is also the conclusion most conservative commentators have come to who have sought to interpret this book in the same way they interpret other Bible books (i.e., literally, historically, and grammatically). It is also the conclusion of some liberal scholars who have analyzed the structure of the book.20 Love is an important subject of special revelation, and human love in particular is a central feature of it as well (cf. Lev. 19:18; Matt. 22:36-39; John 13:34-35). Consequently it should not seem incredible that God gave us this book to help us understand this subject better.21
No comments:
Post a Comment