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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Song of Solomon 4:3 - 4:3
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The mouth is next praised:
3a Like a thread of crimson thy lips,
And thy mouth is lovely,
As distinguished from red-purple, אַרְגָּמָן, שָׁנִי (properly, shining, glistening; for this form has an active signification, like נָקִי, as well as a passive, like עָנִי) - fully, שָׁנִי תּוֹלַעַת - signifies the kermes or worm-colour; the karmese, the red juice of the cochineal. מִדְבָּרַךְ (מִדְבָּרֵיךְ) is translated by the lxx “thy speech;” Jerome, eloquium; and the Venet. “thy dialogue;” but that would be expressed, though by a ἁπ. λεγ., by מִדְבָּר דִבּוּרֵךְ is here the name of the mouth, the naming of which one expects; the preform. is the mem instrumenti: the mouth, as the instrument of speech, as the organ by which the soul expresses itself in word and in manner of speech. The poet needed for פִּיךְ a fuller, more select word; just as in Syria the nose is not called anf, but minchâr (from nachara, to blow, to breathe hard).
Praise of her temples.
3b Like a piece of pomegranate thy temples
Behind thy veil.
רַקָּה is the thin piece of the skull on both sides of the eyes; Lat., mostly in the plur., tempora; German, schläfe, from schlaff, loose, slack, i.e., weak = רַק. The figure points to that soft mixing of colours which makes the colouring of the so-called carnation one of the most difficult accomplishments in the art of painting. The half of a cut pomegranate (Jer. fragmen mali punici) is not meant after its outer side, as Zöckler supposes, for he gives to the noun rǎkkā, contrary to Jdg 4:21; Jdg 5:26, the meaning of cheek, a meaning which it has not, but after its inner side, which presents
(Note: The interior of a pomegranate is divided by tough, leather-like white or yellow skins, and the divisions are filled with little berries, in form and size like those of the grape, in the juicy inside of which little, properly, seed-corns, are found. The berries are dark red, or also pale red. The above comparison points to the mixing of these two colours.)
a red mixed and tempered with the ruby colour, - a figure so much the more appropriate, since the ground-colour of Shulamith's countenance is a subdued white.
(Note: The Moslem erotic poets compare the division of the lips to the dividing cleft into a pomegranate.)
Up to this point the figures are borrowed from the circle of vision of a shepherdess. Now the king derives them from the sphere of his own experience as the ruler of a kingdom. She who has eyes like doves is in form like a born queen.