Lange Commentary - Song of Solomon 5:1

Lange Commentary - Song of Solomon 5:1 - 5:16

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Lange Commentary - Song of Solomon 5:1 - 5:16

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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

FOURTH SONG

Shulamith’s longing for her home again awakened.

Son_5:2 to Son_8:4

FIRST SCENE:

Shulamith and the Daughters of Jerusalem

(Son_5:2 to Son_6:3)

Shulamith (relating a dream).

² I was sleeping, but my heart was waking—

Hark! my beloved is knocking:

‘Open to me, my sister,

my dear, my dove, my perfect;

for my head is filled with dew,

my locks with drops of the night!’

³ “I have taken off my dress,

how shall I put it on?

I have washed my feet,

how shall I soil them?”—

⁴ My beloved extended his hand through the window,

and I was inwardly excited for him.

⁵ Up I rose to open to my beloved,

and my hands dropped with myrrh,

and my fingers with liquid myrrh,

upon the handle of the bolt.

⁶ I opened to my beloved,

and my beloved had turned away, was gone;

my soul failed, when he spoke;

I sought him but I did not find him,

I called him but he answered me not.

⁷ Found me then the watchmen, who go around in the city;

they struck me, wounded me,

took my veil off from me,

the watchmen of the walls.

⁸ I adjure you, ye daughters of Jerusalem,

if ye find my beloved—

what shall ye tell him?

“that I am sick of love.”

Daughters of Jerusalem

⁹ What is thy beloved more than (any other) beloved,

thou fairest among women?

What is thy beloved more than (any other) beloved,

that thou dost adjure us thus?

Shulamith

¹⁰ My beloved is white and ruddy,

distinguished above ten thousand.

¹¹ His head is pure gold,

his locks are hill upon hill,

black as a raven.

¹² His eyes like doves by brooks of water,

bathing in milk, sitting on fulness.

¹³ His cheeks like a bed of balm,

towers of spice plants;

his lips lilies,

dropping liquid myrrh.

¹⁴ His hands golden rods,

encased in turquoises;

his body a figure of ivory,

veiled with sapphires.

¹⁵ His legs columns of white marble

set on bases of pure gold;

his aspect like Lebanon,

choice as the cedars.

¹⁶ His palate is sweets,

and he is altogether precious.

This is my beloved, and this my friend,

ye daughters of Jerusalem.

Daughters of Jerusalem

VI. ¹ Whither has thy beloved gone,

thou fairest among women?

whither has thy beloved turned,

that we may seek him with thee?

Shulamith

² My beloved has gone down to his garden,

to the beds of balm,

to feed in the gardens

and to gather lilies.

³ I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine,

who feeds among the lilies.

SECOND SCENE:

solomon to the same as before

(Son_6:4 to Son_7:6)

Solomon

⁴ Fair art thou, my dear, as Tirzah,

comely as Jerusalem, terrible as bannered hosts,

⁵ Turn away thine eyes from me,

for they have taken me by storm.

Thy hair is as a flock of goats,

reposing on Gilead.

⁶ Thy teeth as a flock of sheep,

that go up from the washing,

all of which have twins,

and there is not a bereaved one among them.

⁷ Like a piece of pomegranate thy cheek

from behind thy veil.—

⁸ There are sixty queens

and eighty concubines

and virgins without number.

⁹ My dove, my perfect is one,

the only one of her mother,

the choice one of her that bare her.

Daughters saw her and called her blessed,

queens and concubines and they praised her:

¹⁰ “Who is this, that looks forth like the dawn,

fair as the moon, pure as the sun,

terrible as bannered hosts?”

Shulamith

¹¹ To the nut garden I went down,

to look at the shrubs of the valley,

to see whether the vine sprouted,

the pomegranates blossomed.

¹² I knew it not, my desire brought me

to the chariots of my people, the noble.

Daughters of Jerusalem

VII. ¹ Come back, come back, Shulamith,

Come back, come back, that we may look upon thee.

Shulamith

What do you see in Shulamith?

Daughters of Jerusalem

As the dance of Mahanaim.

Solomon

² How beautiful are thy steps in the shoes, O prince’s daughter,

thy rounded thighs are like jewels,

the work of an artist’s hands.

³ Thy navel is a round bowl,

let not mixed wine be lacking!

thy body is a heap of wheat,

set around with lilies.

⁴ Thy two breasts are like two fawns,

twins of a gazelle.

⁵ Thy neck like a tower of ivory,

thy eyes like pools in Heshbon

at the gate of the daughter of multitudes;

thy nose like the tower of Lebanon

which looks toward Damascus.

⁶ Thy head upon thee like Carmel,

and thy flowing locks like purple—

a king fettered by curls !

THIRD SCENE:

Solomon and Shulamith (alone)

(Son_7:7 to Son_8:4)

Solomon

⁷ How fair art thou and how comely,

O love, among delights!

⁸ This thy stature resembles a palm tree,

and thy breasts clusters.

⁹ I resolve: I will climb the palm,

will grasp its branches,

and be thy breasts, please, like clusters of the vine,

and the breath of thy nose like apples,

¹⁰ And thy palate like the best wine.….

Shulamith (interrupting him)

—going down for my beloved smoothly,

gliding over the lips of sleepers.

¹¹ I am my beloved’s,

and for me is his desire.——

¹² Come, my beloved, let us go out to the country,

lodge in the villages,

¹³ Start early for the vineyards;

we shall see whether the vine has sprouted,

its blossoms opened,

the pomegranates flowered. …

there will I give thee my love.

¹⁴ The mandrakes give forth their odor,

and over our doors are all sorts of excellent fruit,

new as well as old,

(which), my beloved, I have laid up for thee.—

VIII. ¹ O that thou wert as a brother of mine,

who sucked the breasts of my mother!

should I find thee without I would kiss thee,

yet none would despise me.

² I would lead thee, bring thee to my mother’s house,

thou wouldst instruct me;

I would give thee to drink of the spiced wine,

of my pomegranate juice.

³ His left hand is under my head,

and his right embraces me.—

⁴ I adjure you, ye daughters of Jerusalem,

that ye wake not, and that ye waken not

love; till it please.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

1. The place of the action in this new section is without doubt the same as in the foregoing act. The dialogue with the daughters of Jerusalem (Son_5:8-9; Son_5:16; Son_6:1-3; Son_7:1); the mention of the “city” and the “keepers of its walls” in this fresh recital of a dream (Son_5:2-7) which reminds one of its predecessor (Son_3:1-5); the “garden” of Solomon, to which he has gone down, Son_6:2; finally and above all her appeal to her lover to go out with her “to the country” (Son_7:12) and to the house of his chosen one’s mother (Son_8:2), and there in the enjoyment of simple country pleasures to become to her “as a brother who had sucked the breasts of her mother” (Son_8:1); all this points to the king’s palace at Jerusalem as the scene, and more probably to some room in this palace, than to “contiguous grounds” or “the royal gardens,” as is thought by Delitzsch. The room in the Palace on Zion, which, according to scene 2 of the foregoing act, was used for the marriage feast, may very well be the one in which the whole of the present act was performed; for there is no indication any where of a change of scene, not even between Son_7:1-2, or between Son_5:6-7 of the same chapter (vs. Del.).—The time of the action is determined by its characteristic contents to have been some days or weeks later than the wedding festivities described in act third. For the relation of love so pure and happy at the beginning has since suffered certain checks and interruptions, which reveal themselves on the part of Shulamith at least by various symptoms of uneasiness, nay, of sadness and dejection, without her betraying, however, that she has been at all wounded or actually injured by her husband. The dream, which she tells her companions at the beginning of the section that she has very recently had in the night, begins exactly like the preceding, and runs on partly in the same way. It does not, however, end as that does in a bright and joyous manner, but with pain and fright. Seeking her beloved by night, she not only fails to find him—she is beaten and robbed by the watchmen! Her gloomy misgiving in respect to the unfaithfulness of her lover, expressed in her apprehension that she might soil her feet again, which had just been washed (Son_5:3, see in loc.), proves to be only too correct, and drives her therefore with an anxious and troubled heart to have it said to her lover, who has actually forsaken her for a time, “that she is sick of love”—of loving solicitude about his heart partially averted and alienated from her (Son_5:8)! She expresses this solicitude, it is true, not by open complaint; on the contrary, in what follows she sedulously avoids dropping any thing to the disadvantage of her husband in the hearing of the ladies of the court (Son_5:10-16), she apologizes for his leaving her by the harmless assumption that he may have gone “to feed in the gardens and to gather lilies,” Son_6:2, and only inserts in her exclamation at the close an allusion indicative of painful longing in respect to the way that she wishes to be and to remain her beloved’s, viz., that he should now as formerly “feed among the lilies,” that he should be and remain a guileless, pure and simple-hearted country lover (Son_6:3)!—When, therefore, Solomon himself returns to her after a considerable absence, the manifestations of her partial dissatisfaction with him assume a somewhat altered form. She regards him gravely and sternly, and thus leads him in the picture of her beauty and loveliness, which, full of ecstacy, he again begins to sketch (Son_6:4 ff.; comp. Son_4:1 ff.) to introduce some allusions to her “terribleness” (Son_6:4; Son_6:10), as well as to the effect of the glance of her eyes (Son_6:5 a), which “overcome” or “dismay” him. The spirited statement of the prior rank accorded to her above all his wives and virgins, into which this description finally passes (Son_6:8-10), she leaves wholly unnoticed; nay, she answers it with a description of what she once did and was engaged in, when a simple country maid in happier circumstances, and with more agreeable surroundings (Son_6:11), and thereupon she gives him plainly enough to understand that the elevation bestowed upon her in consequence of her love “to the state-carriages of her people, the noble,” i.e. to the highest rank among the nobles of her people, had also led to her being painfully undeceived (Son_6:12). She even wishes to escape from the society of the voluptuous ladies of the court, which has become irksome to her, and she is induced to return and remain, not so much by their urgent entreaties and representations (Son_7:1) as simply and alone by her unconquerable love to Solomon, whom she hopes finally to free from his corrupt surroundings and to gain wholly for herself and for the purer pleasures of her life at home.—To the new and exaggerated laudation of her charms, in which her lover hereupon indulges (Son_7:2 ff.) she listens in silence; as in one place at least they offend against the rules of modesty (Son_7:3), she deigns not to answer. Not until the other ladies had left her alone with Solomon, does she venture to open her heart to him and to give free expression to her longing desire, which has been most strongly aroused, to return to her home and to have her lover changed from a voluptuous servant of sin to an innocent child of nature like herself. She does this by interrupting (Son_7:10) the fond language of her husband just where it had become most urgent and tender, and chiming in with what had been begun by him. With extraordinary address and delicacy she first, as it were, disarms and fetters him (Son_7:10-11) and then brings her desire before him with such overpowering force and urgency that refusal is impossible, and he is borne along as on the wings of the wind by her pure love, which triumphs thus over the enticements and temptations of his court (Son_7:12 ff.). He need not utter a word of express consent to her request; she has him completely in her power, and as he has just called himself “a king fettered by her locks” (Son_7:6), she but briefly refers to the fact, that his whole desire is toward her (Son_7:11 b), that “his left arm is under her head, and his right embraces her” (Son_8:3), and then leaves the scene on the arm of her beloved with that exclamation twice before uttered to the daughters of Jerusalem (Son_8:4), and which this time has the force of farewell advice.

2. The sketch here given of the inner progress of the action in the course of this act departs in several important particulars from the view of the later interpreters; but it appears to us to be the only one which corresponds with the language and the design of the poet. It is principally distinguished from the view of Delitzsch, which approaches it most nearly, by its taking the “little disturbances” and troubles in the life of the newly married pair, which this scholar also affirms, to be more serious and real, and not restricting them for instance barely to the tragic contents of that story of her dream (Son_5:2-7) but letting the dissatisfaction of the chaste bride with the voluptuous conduct of the king and his court come properly forward as the actual cause of the clouded horizon of their married state. Our view too repels the assumption shared by Delitzsch with several recent commentators, but destitute of proof, that the description of Shulamith’s charms contained in Son_7:2 ff. was occasioned by a “country-dance” which she was executing before him and the ladies of the court,—a hypothesis dubious in every point of view, and upon which Shulamith’s character could scarcely be freed from moral taint (for the dance in question, the “dance of Mahanaim” can scarcely be conceived of as other than an unchaste pantomime); and from this it would be but a single step to the notion of Renan that Solomon in this passage describes the charms of a danseuse of the harem, or to the similar one of Hitzig, that the king is here “cooing round a concubine.” Finally our view differs in one point at least from that of Delitzsch in respect to the division into scenes, inasmuch as it rejects the opening of a new scene or even act after Son_6:9 (comp. in loc., as well as the Introduction, § 2, Rem. 2), and consequently takes the whole to be one act with three scenes, of which the first extends to Son_6:3; the second to Son_7:6; and the third from that to Son_8:4. Against the assumption of a point of division after Son_7:6 it has often indeed been urged (see e.g.Ew., Hitz., Weissb., and Hengstenb. too) that the passage Son_7:2-10 forms a continuous description of the beauties of the beloved, beginning with her feet and ending with her nose and palate. But with the more general exclamation Son_7:7, “How fair and how delightful art thou, O Love, among the joys!” this description evidently assumes an entirely different character from that it had before in Son_5:2-6, where the individual members are enumerated very much as had been done previously (Son_4:1-3 and Son_6:5-7) only in inverted order, and certain comparisons are instituted with them. And what Shulamith says to her lover (Son_7:10 ff.) in the closest connection with the second description (or rather interrupting it and proceeding of her own motion), is of such a nature that it can scarcely be conceived of as spoken in the presence of the “daughters of Jerusalem,” who had been present before. On which account Delitzsch’s assumption that a new scene begins with Son_7:7, does not in fact deserve so unceremonious an epithet as that of “purely gratuitous,” which Hitzig bestows upon it. The assumption of Hitz., Böttcher, Ren. and Hengstenberg that a new scene does not begin until Son_7:12, might with equal propriety be denominated gratuitous; and so might many other modes of division which differ from ours, e.g., that followed by Ewald, Döpke, Böttcher, Hitz., Hengstenb., etc., and in general by most of the recent writers according to which a new scene opens with Son_7:2; that of Vaih. and others (particularly the older writers) which begins this new scene with Son_7:1; the assertion of Ewald that Son_6:10 to Son_7:1 is a dialogue between the ladies of the court and Shulamith which is repeated by Solomon, etc. The question as to the beginning and end of the scenes in this act moreover appears to be of little consequence, inasmuch as the locality of the action, as has been before shown, does not change. The only matters involved are 1) an entrance at Son_6:4 of Solomon, who had not been present before and 2) an exit or retirement of the chorus in the neighborhood of Son_7:6, or Son_7:11. And this retirement of the chorus is furthermore, as is shown by the epiphonema Son_8:4, probably not to be conceived of as a total disappearance but simply as a withdrawal to the background, as toward the end of Act first (see above, p. 62).

3. Scene first. a.Shulamith’s story of her dream,Son_5:2-8.—This like the similar passage Son_3:1-5 must be a dream, which Shulamith had had shortly before, and which she now relates as indicative of the state of her mind. In opposition to the opinion that Shulamith is relating a real outward occurrence (Döpke, Hahn, Weissb., etc.) may be urged both the analogy of that prior passage and that such an affair is inconceivable in the history of Solomon’s love to Shulamith. It would have conflicted with decorum for that, which is narrated in vs. 2–5, to have actually taken place; and for the favorite of the king to have been beaten and robbed by the city night watch as is related Son_5:7, would form the non plus ultra of historical improbability. Besides the visionary character of the experience described is indicated not only by the introductory words, when correctly explained, “I was sleeping but my heart was waking,” but also by several characteristic particulars, as Son_5:3; Son_5:6.

Son_5:2. I was sleeping but my heart was waking.—Hitzig adduces a striking parallel to the thought that in a dream the heart or spirit is awake, while the rest of the person sleeps, from Cic. de divin. I. Song 30: “jacet corpus dormientis ut mortui, viget antem et vivit animus.”Weissbagh’s objections (p. 211) to this parallel as inadmissible amount to nothing. Comp. F. Splittgerber, Schlaf und Tod, nebst den damit zusammenhängenden Erscheinungen des Seelenlebens (Halle, 1866), p. 37 ff., espec. p. Song 43: “The soul is still in the body during sleep, though freer from it than in the state of wakefulness. It is in a condition of inner self-collection and concentration in order that it may afterwards operate with the greater force upon the course of things around it in its particular sphere of life.” And p. 71, “The soul sinks down in sleep to its innermost life-hearth, and loses itself there in that potential self-consciousness, which forms the proper essential quality of our spirits;—whilst in dreams it lifts itself to a comparatively higher region, that of the dawning consciousness, as it were, a region which stands considerably nearer the surface of the outward life and the daily consciousness, which moves upon it, and whose images therefore leave behind more impressive traces in our memory, which extend into our waking moments.” Hence Göschel not incorrectly remarks: “If sleep is to be conceived of as depression, ( êáôáöïñÜ ), dreaming is elevation ( áíáöïñÜ ).” From this statement also it further appears why the view maintained by Grot. and Döpke, that àðé éùׁðä åìáé òø denotes a condition midway between sleep and wakefulness, a semi-sleep, is superfluous; an opinion by the way, which has the meaning of the words against it, for “I slept” is not the same thing as “I was half asleep.” The heart stands here in its customary O. Test. sense of the centre and organ of the entire life of the soul, not barely for the intellectual faculties of the soul, the region of thought, as Hitzig maintains. Comp. further on Pro_2:10 (in this commentary.)—Hark, my beloved is knocking: Open to me, my sister, my dear, my dove, my perfect. Compared with the similar passage Son_2:8 this fond quadruple address shows a considerable advance in the relation between the loving pair. The predicate “my fair one,” which there stands with “my dear” is here wholly wanting, and is supplied by the more intimate “my sister,” which since Shulamith’s marriage had become the common pet name, by which Solomon called her (see Son_4:9-10; Son_4:12, Son_5:1). He had it is true already said “my dove” to her before their nuptials (Son_2:14, comp. again Son_6:9); but “my perfect” is an entirely new appellation (comp. likewise again Son_6:9), which it is likely was first adopted after their marriage, and by which Solomon probably designed to express her innocence and purity ( úַîָּä perfect, integra) in contrast with the character of his other wives, who were not so perfect and pure. For he can scarcely have employed this appellation unmeaningly, as “my angel” among us (vs.Döpke and Hitz.), [nor can it mean as Thrupp alleges “mine perfectly or entirely.”]—For my head is filled with dew, my locks with drops of the night. The copiousness of the nightly fall of dew in Palestine is attested also by the well-known history of Gideon’s fleece, Jdg_6:38; comp. also Psa_110:3; 2Sa_17:12; Mic_5:6; Bar_2:25. That Shulamith sees her lover come to her window dripping with the dew of the night, and chilly too in consequence, might seem to imply that she thought of him as a shepherd, who as ἀãñáõëῶí “abiding in the field” (Luk_2:8) had had to endure wet and cold, and hence had sought shelter in her dwelling. But to explain that representation it is sufficient to assume that the first half of her dream (Son_5:2-4) transports her back to her home, or in other words that now in her dream, as she had done before when awake (see Son_1:7; Son_2:16; Son_4:6) she transfers her lover without more ado from the sphere of royalty to that of a shepherd’s life. That in the latter half of her dream (Son_5:6-7) she thinks of him again as living in the city, and herself too as wandering about in the city looking for him, is a feature of the most delicate psychological truth, which has its analogue in the story of her previous dream, Son_3:1-4.

Son_5:3. I have taken off my dress. ëֻּúָּðְúִּé lit., “my tunic, my under garment.” She here too thinks herself back again in her former humble circumstances, where she commonly wore nothing but a tunic, ÷éôþí (comp. Exo_22:25 f.; 2Sa_13:18, also Mar_6:9,) and consequently in the night was entirely unclothed with the exception of the warm covering or upper garment ( ùִׂîְìָä , Ex. ibid., Gen_9:23; Deu_22:17) under which she slept.—I have washed my feet: how shall I soil them? This is again another particular referring back to her former scanty mode of life in the country. She did not then wear the shoes, which since her elevation to be a prince’s daughter (Son_7:2) she was now obliged to wear: on the contrary she ordinarily went barefoot in the house and in its immediate vicinity, except in long walks in the country when she wore sandals, (comp. Amo_2:6; Amo_8:6; Deu_29:4; Jos_9:5). Hence the feet washed before going to bed might easily get dirty again on the floor of the house. The soiling of the feet is in the religious and ethical region a symbol of moral contamination from the petty transgressions of every-day life (Joh_13:10); and in the figurative language of dreams it is a well-known symbol of moral defilement reproved by the conscience and accompanied with shame, comp. (Schubert, Symbolik des Traums, 3d edit. p. 13, Splittberger, ibid. p. 128 ff.). It is therefore from going out to her lover, this symbol of more intimate and enduring intercourse with him, that she apprehends the soiling of her feet. Hence the objections which she makes to complying with his request, and the cold, almost indifferent, if not exactly “rude” (Del.) tone of her answer.

Son_5:4. My beloved extended his hand through the window. îִïÎäַçåֹø lit., from the hole,i.e., through the latticed window (for that is certainly what is intended here, as appears from Son_2:9, not a mere opening in the wall as Hitz. supposes) and from it toward me.This gesture of extending ( ùׁìç ) the hand in does not signify his intention to climb in through the window (Hitz.), nor his desire to gain access by forcibly breaking a hole through the wall (Hengstenberg after Eze_8:7-8) [so Wordsworth], but is rather the expression of an urgent request to be admitted. The customary gesture of a petitioner is, it is true that of spreading forth his hands ôָּøַùׂ ëַּôָּéå (Exo_9:29-31, etc.) But this could not be done in the present instance on account of the smallness of the window and the darkness of the night, and would besides have been unsuitable in relation to his beloved, for everywhere else it appears only as a usage in prayer. He must here, therefore, in craving admission adopt a gesture, which would at the same time express his longing to be united with his beloved (comp. Del. and Weissb. in loc.)—And I was inwardly excited over him; lit., “my bowels were agitated, sounded over him”—which according to Jer_31:20; Isa_16:11; Isa_63:15 is equivalent to “I felt a painful sympathy for him.” This was of course because she had let him stand out in the wet and cold. According to the reading òָìַé (so the so-called Erfurt Ms., see de Rossiin loc.) the feeling expressed would be regret instead of pity: “my bowels were agitated on me” (i.e. in me, or over me, on my account—comp. Hitz. and Ew. in loc.) But this slenderly attested reading appears to have crept into the text from Ps. 42:6, 12, and for this reason to deserve no attention.

Son_5:5. Up I rose to open to my beloved. àֲðִé stands after ÷ַîְúִּé without special emphasis, according to the more diffuse style of speaking among the people. So Hitz. no doubt correctly, whilst Weissb., is certainly far astray in asserting that Shulamith means by this àֲðִé to emphasize “her entire person in contrast with any particular parts.”And my hands dropped with myrrh and my fingers with liquid myrrh upon the handle of the bolt. That is to say, as my hands touched the handle of the bolt (or lock on the door of the house) in order to shove it back and open it, they dropped, etc. òַì ëַּôּåֹú äַîַּðְòåּì , whose genuineness Meier suspects without any reason, plainly shows that the dropping of myrrh did not proceed from Shulamith’s anointing herself, as she rose and dressed, (as Magn. and Weissb. imagine) [so too Burrowes], but from the fact that her lover had taken hold of the door on the outside with profusely anointed hands, and so had communicated the fluid unguent of myrrh to the bolt inside likewise. This might have resulted from the unguent flowing in from the outer lock through the keyhole (Hitz.), or some drops of myrrh from the hand of her lover inserted through the hole above the door, might have trickled down upon the inner lock, which was directly beneath (Del). Too accurate an explanation of the affair seems inadmissible from the indefinite dreamlike character of the whole narrative. But at any rate an anointing of the outer lock of the door by the lover on purpose is not to be thought of (with Less., Döpke, Ew., Vaih., etc.) because though classic parallels may be adduced for this “silent homage of love,” none can be brought from oriental antiquity.— îåֹø òåֹáֵø is not “overflowing myrrh,”i.e., dealt out in copious abundance (Ew.), but myrrh exuding or flowing out of itself in contrast with that which is solidified and gum-like, óìýñíá óôáêôÞ in contrast with óì . ðëáóôÞ (Theophr. Hist. Plant. 9, 4); comp. îøֹ ãְּøåֹø Exo_30:23, as well as above on Son_1:13.

Son_5:6. I opened to my beloved, comp. on 5a.—And my beloved had turned away, was gone. My soul failed when he spoke. That is, before, when he was speaking to me through the window (Son_5:2; Son_5:4), my breath for-sook me, my soul almost went out of me. It is consequently a supplementary remark, whose principal verb, however, is not necessarily to be taken as a pluperfect (vs. Döpke).—I sought him but I did not find him; I called him but he did not answer me. With the first of these lines comp. Son_3:2 b; with both together Pro_1:28; Pro_8:17.

Son_5:7. Found me then the watchmen,etc. Comp. Son_3:3, Hitz. correctly: “In her previous dream the watchmen make no reply to her question; here without being questioned they reply by deeds.”—Took my veil off from me. øָãִéã (from øָãַã spread out, disperse, make thin) is according to Isa_3:23 a fine light material thrown over the person like a veil, such as was worn by noble ladies in Jerusalem; comp. Targ. on Gen_24:65; Gen_38:14 where øãéãà represents the Heb. öָðִéó . ðָ ‍ ֽùְׂàåּ îֵòָìַé certainly means not a bare “lifting” (Meier), but a forcible tearing off and taking away of this article of dress; else this expression would not form with the preceding “they struck me, wounded me,” the climax, which the poet evidently intends.—The watchmen of the walls; not the subject of the immediately preceding clause (Weissb.), but a repetition of the principal subject which stands at the beginning of the verse. In her complaint she naturally comes back to the ruffians who had done all this to her, the villainous watchmen.—“Watchmen of the walls,” whose functions relate as in this instance to the interior of the city, and who, therefore, were not appointed principally with a view to the exterior circuit walls, occur also Isa_62:6.

Son_5:8. I adjure you,etc. For this expression, as well as the masc. form of address, comp. on Son_2:7.—What shall ye tell him? So correctly Ew., Heiligstedt, Del., Hengstenb. etc.; for although îָä sometimes expresses an earnest negative or prohibition, and might therefore be synonymous with àִí in Son_2:7; Son_3:5, yet the translation “do not tell him that I am sick of love” (Weissb. and others) yields a less natural sense than the one given above, according to which Shulamith seeks to induce her lover to a speedy return by the intelligence of her being sick of love. And in fact she connects a charge of this purport to the daughters of Jerusalem immediately with the narrative of her dream, because this had already evidenced in various ways that she had an almost morbid longing for her lover (see especially Son_5:4, b; Son_5:6-7.)

4. Continuation. b. Shulamith’s description of her lover, Son_5:9-16

Son_5:9. What is thy beloved more than (any other) beloved, thou fairest among women? This question of the daughters of Jerusalem which serves in an admirable way to connect what precedes with the following description of the beauty of her lover, springs from the assumption readily suggested by Son_5:2-4, that Shulamith’s lover was some other than Solomon; an assumption admitted without scruple by the voluptuous ladies of the court, in spite of their knowledge of the fact that Shulamith had shortly before given her hand to the king as her lawful husband. It is therefore a question of real ignorance and curiosity, which they here address to Shulamith, not the mere show of a question with the view of leading her to the enthusiastic praise of the king who was well known to the ladies of the court and beloved by them likewise (Del.); and quite as little was it a scornful question (Döpke, Meier) or reproachful (Magn.) or one involving but a gentle reproof (Hitz.)—against these last opinions the words “fairest among women” are decisive.

Son_5:10. My beloved is white and ruddy, distinguished above ten thousand. This general statement precedes the more detailed description of the beauties of her lover, which then follows Son_5:11-15 in ten particulars, at the close of which (Son_5:16) stands another general eulogium.—The aim of the entire description is evidently to depict Solomon, as one who is without blemish from head to foot, as is done 2Sa_14:25-26 in the case of his brother Absalom. A commendation of his fair color, or his good looks in general fitly stands at the head of the description.— öַç lit., “dazzling white;” stronger than ìָáָï ; an expression which may be applied to a king’s son, but scarcely to a simple young shepherd from the country. His face might very well be called ruddy or brownish (as 1Sa_16:12) but scarcely dazzling white; and it is to the face that the predicate mainly refers, as a comparison with Son_5:14-15 shows.—To white as the fundamental color is added the blooming red. ( àָãåֹí ) of the cheeks and other parts of the face both here in the case of Solomon and Lam_4:7 in the description of the fair Nazarites of Jerusalem, which reminds one of the passage before us.—“Distinguished above ten thousand,” lit. “from ten thousand, or a myriad” ( øְáָáָä ), i.e., surpassing an immense number in beauty. Comp. Psa_91:7, as well as the plur. øááåú Psa_3:7; Deu_33:17.— ãָּâåּì from ãֶּâֶì “standard, banner,” as in Lat. insignis from signum, denotes one that is conspicuous as a standard amidst a host of other men, signalized, distinguished above others, and îִï is again comparative as in Son_5:9. The expression is evidently a military one like ðִâְãָּìåֹú Son_6:4; Son_6:10.

Son_5:11. His head is pure gold. The comparison is not directed to the color of the face, as though this was to be represented as a reddish brown (Hitz.), but to the appearance of the head as a whole. From the combined radiance of his fresh and blooming countenance, and of his glossy black hair adorned with a golden crown, it presented to the beholder at a distance the appearance of a figure made of solid gold with a reddish lustre. ëֶּúֶí . according to Gesen., Hengstenb., and others, equivalent to that which is hidden, concealed = gold that is treasured up; according to Dietrich and others from ëúí “to be solid, dense,” hence massive gold; according to Hitz., Weissb., etc., equivalent to that which is reddish, of red lustre, which latter explanation is favored by Arabic parallels and by the expression ðëúí Jer_2:22. The adjective ôָּæ connected with it designates this gold as carefully refined and purified (comp. the Hoph. part. îåּôָּæ with the like sense 1Ki_10:18).—His locks are hill upon hill. úַּìְúַּìִּéí may be thus explained with Del., Weissb., etc., by deriving it from úָּìַì to raise, heap up (whence úֵּìִ a hill and úָּìåּì high, Eze_17:22). Commonly “palm branches,” (“flexible or curling palm branches” from úìì in the sense of “wavering or swaying to and fro”); or “pendent, hanging locks” (from úìä suspendit—so Hengstenb.); or “pendulous clusters of grapes” (as though úìúìּéí = æַìְæַìִּéí Isa_18:5—so Hitz.). The comparison reminds us somewhat of that with the flock of goats on Mount Gilead (Son_4:2; Son_6:5); which was also designed to set forth his long curling locks piled one on another.—Black as a raven. Parallels to this simile from Arab, poets, see in Hartmann, Ideal weibl. Schönheit, I. 45 f., comp. Magnus on Son_4:1 (p. 85) and Döpkein loc. The latter adduces particularly two verses of Motanebbi (from J. v. Hammer, p. 11):

“Black as a raven and thick as midnight gloom,

Which of itself, with no hairdresser, curls.”

Son_5:12. His eyes like doves by brooks of water. On the comparison of the eyes with doves comp. Son_1:15. In this case it is not doves in general, but particularly doves sitting “by brooks of water” (lit. water-channels or beds) to which the eyes are likened doubtless in order to represent the lustrous brightness and the moisture of the white of the eye by a figure like that employed Son_7:5, and to place it in fitting contrast with the iris whose varied hues resemble the plumage of the dove.—Bathing in milk, sitting on fulness. A further description of the relation of the “doves” to the “brooks of water,” i.e. of the iris (with the pupil) to the white that surrounds it. These water-brooks here appear to be filled up with milk instead of water, and the doves answering to the irides of both eyes are represented as bathing in this milk and accordingly as “sitting on” or “by fulness”—in which there is an allusion likewise to the convex form of the eye (correctly the Septuag., Vulg., Syr., and after them Hengstenb., Weissbach, etc.). îִìֵּàú , lit. “fulness,” an idea undefined in itself, is here limited by the preceding àôּé÷é îéí and therefore means “the fulness of the water-courses, that which fills them up” (Weissb.); and the òַì which stands before it, indicates the same sense substantially of sitting by this fulness, as is expressed by the same preposition before àôé÷é îéí (comp. Psa_1:3). Others take îִìֵּàú in the sense of “setting” as of a gem (comparing îִìֻּàַú àֶáֶï Exo_28:17) and hence translate “enthroned in a setting” (Magn.) or “jewels finely set” (Böttch., Del., preceded by Ibn Ezra, Jarch., Rosenm., Winer). But in opposition to this may be urged both the absence of àֶáֶï after the indefinite îìàú , and the prep. òַì instead of which áְּ might rather have been expected. More correctly Cocceius and Döpke, who explain it “over the setting” i.e. “over the edge of the brook,” though still they do violence to the natural meaning of îìàú .

Son_5:13. His cheeks like a bed of balm. The tert. compar. is not barely their delightful fragrance, but likewise the superb growth of beard upon his cheeks. Shulamith would scarcely have compared beardless cheeks with a bed of balm, i.e. a garden plot covered with plants. That she likens the two cheeks to but one bed may be explained from the fact that the beard, which likewise surrounds the chin and lips, unites them into one whole, which like the borders in many gardens has its two parallel sides (comp. Hitzig). The punctuation òֲøåּâúֹ , which the ancient versions seem to have followed (e. g, Vulg. “sicut areolæ aromatum”) and which Weissb. still prefers, accordingly appears to be less suitable than the sing. òֲøåּâַú here retained by the Masorites; whilst the plur. òֲøåּâåֹú is unquestionably the true reading in Son_6:2.—Towers of spice plants. The expression îִâְãְּìåֹú îֶøְ÷ָçִéí is doubtless so to be understood, as explanatory apposition to òֲøåּâַú äַáּùֶֹׁí and the bed of balm is accordingly to be conceived of as a plot embracing several “towers” or pyramidal elevations of aromatic herbs, by which the rich luxuriance of his beard and perhaps also its fine curly appearance is most fitly set forth (Ew., Delitzsch, Hengstenb., etc.). We can see no ground for the scruples, which are alleged to stand in the way of this explanation, or why we must with J. Cappellus suppose a reference to “boxes of unguents” (pyxides unguentorum) or with Hitzig, Friedr., Weissb., follow the Septuag. ( öýïõóáé ìõñåøéêÜ ) in reading the part. îְâַãְּìåֹú . The fem. plur. îִâְãְּìåֹú from îִâְãָּì is also attested by Son_8:10. The custom of raising fragrant plants on mounds of earth of a pyramidal or high tower-like shape, receives sufficient confirmation from Son_4:6 (the “mountain of myrrh” and the “hill of frankincense”). And the whole comparison appears to be entirely appropriate, if we but think of the beard on the chin and cheeks of her lover as not merely a soft down (Hitz.) but as a vigorous, finely cultivated and carefully arranged growth of hair. And in this we are justified in precise proportion as we rid ourselves of the notion of a youthful lover of the rank of a shepherd, and keep in view king Solomon in the maturity of middle life as the object of the description before us. Besides the circumstance that they were in the habit of perfuming the beard, as is still done to a considerable extent in the east (see Arvieux, R., p. 52; della Valle, II. 98; Harmer, Beobacht., II. 77, 83; Reiske on Tarafa, p. 46) may have contributed its share to the particular form of the comparison.—His lips lilies, dropping liquid myrrh.Of course it is not white but red lilies, lilies of the color, denoted Son_4:3 by the “crimson thread,” to which the lips of her lover are here likened. The “dropping of liquid myrrh” (comp. on Son_5:3) refers not to the lilies (Syr., Rosenm.) but directly to the lips. It serves to represent the lovely fragrance of the breath, which issues from her lips (comp Son_7:9); for the “loveliness of his speech” (Hengstenb., comp. Targ.) is not mentioned till Song 5:316.

Son_5:14. His hands golden rods. Others, as Coccei., Gesen., (Thesaur. p. 287), Rosenm., Döpke, Vaih., [so Eng. Ver.], take âְּìִéìֵé æָäָá to be gold rings, which they refer to the bent or closed hand, with allusion also to the fingernails colored with alhenna as compared with the jewels of the rings. Very arbitrarily, because 1) the curved or hollow hand must necessarily have been denoted by ëַó ; 2) the proper expression for ring would not have been âָּìִéì but çåֹúָí or èַáַּòַú ; 3) îְîֻìָּàִéí could no more express the idea of being “set with anything,” than turquoises standing with it could yield a figure even remotely appropriate for yellow-stained finger nails. âָּìִéì is rather roller, cylinder, rod, and the expression “golden rods” is applied primarily to the individual fingers with reference to their reddish lustre and finely rounded shape (comp. Son_5:11 a) and then by synecdoche to the hands consisting of the fingers.—Encased in turquoises. Whatever precious stone may be intended by úַּøְùִׁéùׁ , whether the chrysolite of the ancients (see Septuag.,Exo_28:17; Exo_39:13) which seems to answer to our topaz; or what is now called the turquoise (a light-blue semi-precious stone); or the onyx, which Hitzig proposes (though this was called ùֹׁäַí Gen_2:12, etc.), it is at all events in bad taste to understand by this encasing of the fingers in costly jewels anything but actual jewel ornaments with which his hands glittered, agreeably to the well-known custom in the ancient East of wearing many rings. (Comp. Winer, Realwörterb., Art., “Ringe” and “Siegelring”). The nails in and of themselves differed too little in color and lustre from the fingers and hands as a whole, to admit of their being compared with precious stones; and staining them with alhenna (comp. on Son_1:14) if practised at all in the time of Solomon, was most likely a custom restricted to women and which could scarcely have been likewise in use amongst men. On îִìֵּà in the sense of “encasing” (lit., to fill in the encasement or enclosure) comp. Exo_28:17; Exo_31:5; Exo_35:33. “Golden rods encased in turquoise” or “with turquoise” are properly such rods filled into the body of jewels here named i.e. surrounded and glittering with them (comp. Weissb. in loc.).—His body a figure of ivory, veiled with sapphires. îֵòָéå here, where the exterior parts of the body only are enumerated, is certainly not “his bowels, his inwards” (Hengstenberg), but “his body,” comp. Son_7:3, as well as Dan_2:32, where îֵòִéí also stands as a synonym of áֶּèֶï . It is only the pure white and the smooth appearance of the body, i.e. of the trunk generally, including the breast, thighs, etc., which can be intended by the comparison with an òֵùֶׁú ùֵׁï a “figure of ivory” ( òֵùֶׁú sing, of òַùְׁúּåֹú [but see Gesen. Lex. s. v.—Tr.] forms, thoughts, Job_12:5), a comparison in which that ivory work of art restored by Solomon according to 1Ki_10:18 may have been before the mind of the speaker. The sapphires veiling the statue are naturally a figure of the dress of sapphire-blue or better still of the dress confined by a splendid girdle studded with sapphires. On the latter assumption the apparent “unsuitableness of the comparison” vanishes, which certainly would have to be admitted (Hitz.) if the sapphire referred to the azure color of the dress. For it would evidently be too far-fetched, with Vaih. to refer the sapphire to the “blue veins appearing through the splendid white skin of the body,” and this would neither comport with the deep blue color of the sapphire or lapis lazuli, nor with the expression “veiled, covered ( îְòֻìֶּôֶú ) with sapphires.”—There is accordingly an indirect proof of the royal rank and condition of Shulamith’s lover in the representations of this verse likewise, especially in its allusions to the ornaments of precious stones on the hands and about the waist of the person described.

Son_5:15. His legs columns of white marble. The figure of an elegant statue is here continued with little alteration. To understand the ùׁåֹ÷ַéִí simply of the lower part of the legs and to assume that Shulamith omits to mention the éְøֵëַéִí i.e. the upper part of the legs from a fine sense of decorum (Hitz.) is inadmissible, because ùׁåֹ÷ַéִí according to passages like Pro_26:7; Isa_47:2 appears to include the upper part of the leg, whilst éְøֵëַéִí according to Gen_24:2; Exo_28:42 : Dan_2:32, etc., denotes rather the loins or that part of the body where the legs begin to separate. Further, the mention of the legs and just before of the body could only be regarded as unbecoming or improper by an overstrained prudishness, because the description which is here given avoids all libidinous details and is so strictly general as not even to imply that she had ever seen the parts of the body in question in a nude condition. It merely serves to complete the delineation of her lover, which Shulamith sketches by a gradual descent from head to foot, and moreover is to be laid to the account of the poet rather than to that of Shulamith, who is in every thing else so chaste and delicate in her feelings.—The legs are compared with “white marble” (