Year One, October 22

Let Me Sing for My Beloved My Love Song1

We continue in the poetic book of the Song of Solomon. This book is also known as Canticles which means songs or hymns.

  

Song of Solomon 3:6-11

The first speakers are the Daughters of Jerusalem.

6 What is that coming up from the wilderness

like columns of smoke,

perfumed with myrrh and frankincense,

with all the fragrant powders of a merchant?

The friends of the Bridegroom reply.

7 Behold, it is the litter2 of Solomon!

Around it are sixty mighty men,

some of the mighty men of Israel,

8 all of them wearing swords,

and expert in war,

each with his sword at his thigh,

against terror by night.

9 King Solomon made himself a carriage

from the wood of Lebanon.

10 He made its posts of silver,

its back of gold, its seat of purple;

its interior was inlaid with love

by the daughters of Jerusalem.

11 Go out, O daughters of Zion,

and look upon King Solomon,

with the crown with which his mother crowned him

on the day of his wedding,

on the day of the gladness of his heart.

Then follows a song of The King, in which he praises the beauty of his bride.

  

Song of Solomon 4:1-7

1 Behold, you are beautiful, my love,

behold, you are beautiful!

Your eyes are doves

behind your veil.

Your hair is like a flock of goats

leaping down the slopes of Gilead. 

2 Your teeth are like a flock of shorn ewes

that have come up from the washing,

all of which bear twins,

and not one among them has lost its young.

3 Your lips are like a scarlet thread,

and your mouth is lovely.

Your cheeks are like halves of a pomegranate

behind your veil.

4 Your neck is like the tower of David,

built in rows of stone;

on it hang a thousand shields,

all of them shields of warriors.

5 Your two breasts are like two fawns,

twins of a gazelle,

that graze among the lilies.

6 Until the day breathes

and the shadows flee,

I will go away to the mountain of myrrh

and the hill of frankincense.

7 You are altogether beautiful, my love;

there is no flaw in you.

In the first song, beginning with verse seven, the king is seen in his traveling palanquin or chariot, coming up from the wilderness. We may explain this scene as picturing our Lord and King going up to his glory from this wilderness world. His escort includes attending angels and warrior angels; or, as John Milton calls them, “the [guiding] cherubim and the sworded seraphim.” They have kept watch around him in the wilderness of this world and continue with him to increase the magnificence of his ascension.3 Jesus will return to earth a second time the same way he left. Then his church will see him in all his glory. The purple of that glorious chariot of love represents the atoning blood. The church will ride with him, rejoicing in his salvation. Happy are those who by faith are part of this event.

In chapter four, the king sings about the beauty of his bride. Believers understand that this beauty is the righteousness of the Lord Jesus that he has given to them. In the sight of God, the saints are “altogether beautiful.” That is, they are perfect and without sin. Every single line in this book has special meaning. Spiritual minds will find great delight in discovering them.

  

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¹ Isaiah 5:1

² litter - That is, the sedan chair on which servants carry a king.

³ ascension - Refers to the resurrected King Jesus leaving the earth to take his rightful place on the throne of heaven.