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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Song of Solomon 2:7 - 2:7
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
7 I adjure you, ye daughters of Jerusalem,
By the gazelles or the hinds of the field,
That ye arouse not and disturb not love
Till she pleases.
It is permitted to the Israelites to swear, נִשִׁבַּע, only by God (Gen 21:23); but to adjure, הִשְׁבִּיעַ, by that which is not God, is also admissible, although this example before us is perhaps the only direct one in Scripture. צְבִי (= צַבְי, dialect. טַבְי), fem. צִבְיָה (Aram. טָבִיתָא, Act 9:36), plur. tsebaim or tsebajim, fem. tsabaōth (according with the pl. of צָבָא), softened from tsebajōth, is the name for the gazelle, from the elegance of its form and movements. אַיְלוֹת is the connecting form of אַיָּלוֹת, whose consonantal Yod in the Assyr. and Syr. is softened to the diphthong ailuv, ailaa; the gen. “of the field,” as not distinguishing but describing, belongs to both of the animals, therefore also the first is without the article. אוֹ (after the etymon corresponding to the Lat. vel) proceeds, leaving out of view the repetition of this so-called Slumber-Song (Son 3:5; cf. Son 8:4, as also Son 2:9), from the endeavour to give to the adjuration the greatest impression; the expression is varied, for the representations flit from image to image, and the one, wherever possible, is surpassed by the other (vid., at Pro 30:31).
Under this verse Hengst. remarks: “The bride would not adjure by the hinds, much more would she adjure by the stage.” He supposes that Solomon is here the speaker; but a more worthless proof for this could not be thought of. On the contrary, the adjuration by the gazelles, etc., shows that the speaker here is one whose home is the field and wood; thus also not the poet (Hitz.) nor the queen-mother (Böttch.), neither of whom is ever introduced as speaking. The adjuration is that love should not be disturbed, and therefore it is by the animals that are most lovely and free, which roam through the fields. Zöckler, with whom in this one point Grätz agrees, finds here, after the example of Böttch. and Hitz., the earnest warning against wantonly exciting love in themselves (cf. Lat. irritamenta veneris, irritata voluptas) till God Himself awakens it, and heart finds itself in sympathy with heart. But the circumstances in which Shulamith is placed ill accord with such a general moralizing. The adjuration is repeated, Son 3:5; Son 8:4, and wherever Shulamith finds herself near her beloved, as she is here in his arms. What lies nearer, then, than that she should guard against a disturbance of this love-ecstasy, which is like a slumber penetrated by delightful dreams? Instead of אֶתְכֶם, תָּעִירוּ, and תְּעֽוֹרֲרוּ, should be more exactly the words אֶתְכֶן, תָּעֵרֵרְנָה, and תְּעוֹרֵרְנָה; but the gram. distinction of the genera is in Heb. not perfectly developed. We meet also with the very same synallage generis, without this adjuration formula, at Son 5:8; Son 7:1; Son 4:2; Son 6:8, etc.; it is also elsewhere frequent; but in the Song it perhaps belongs to the foil of the vulgar given to the highly poetic. Thus also in the vulgar Arab. the fem. forms jaḳtulna, taḳtulna, corresponding to תִּקְטֹלְנָה, are fallen out of use. With העיר, expergefacere, there is connected the idea of an interruption of sleep; with עורר, excitare, the idea, which goes further, of arousing out of sleep, placing in the full activity of awakened life.
(Note: The distinction between these words is well explained by Lewisohn in his Investigationes Linguae (Wilna, 1840), p. 21: “The מעיר את־הישׁן is satisfied that the sleeper wakes, and it is left to him fully to overcome the influence of sleep; the מעורר, however, arouses him at once from sleepiness, and awakes him to such a degree that he is secured against falling asleep again.”)
The one adjuration is, that love should not be awakened out of its sweet dream; the other, that it should not be disturbed from its being absorbed in itself. The Pasek between מעירו and the word following has, as at Lev 10:6, the design of keeping the two Vavs distinct, that in reading they might not run together; it is the Pasek which, as Ben Asher says, serves “to secure to a letter its independence against the similar one standing next it.” הָאהֲמָה is not abstr. pro concreto, but love itself in its giving and receiving. Thus closes the second scene of the first act: Shulamith lies like one helpless in the arms of Solomon; but in him to expire is her life; to have lost herself in him, and in him to find herself again, is her happiness.