Logos Bible Study

Song of Solomon 5

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5I have come to my garden, my sister bride,

I have gathered my myrrh with my spice,

I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey,

I have drunk my wine with my milk!

Eat, O friends! Drink and become drunk with love!a

The Maiden’s Dream: Seeking and Not Finding

2I was asleep butb my heart was awake.

A sound! My beloved knocking!c

“Open to me, my sister, my beloved,

my dove, my perfect one!

For my head is full of dew,

my hair drenched from the moist night air.”d

3I have taken off my tunic, must I put it on?e

I have bathed my feet, must I soil them?f

4My beloved thrust his hand into the opening,

and my inmost yearned for him.

5I myself arose to open to my beloved;

my hands dripped with myrrh,

my fingers with liquid myrrh

upon the handles of the bolt.

6I opened myself to my beloved,

but my beloved had turned and gone;g

my heart sankh when he turned away.i

I sought him, but I did not find him;

I called him, but he did not answer me.

7The sentinels making rounds in the city found me;

they beat me, they wounded me;

they took my cloakj away from me—

those sentinels on the walls!k

Adjuration Refrain

8I adjure you, O maidens of Jerusalem,l

if you find my beloved, what will you tell him?

Tell him that I am lovesick!m

The Maiden’s Praise of Her Beloved

9How is your beloved better than another lover,n

O most beautiful among women?

How is your beloved better than another lover, o

that you adjure us thus?

10My beloved is radiant and ruddy,p

distinguished amongq ten thousand.

11His head is gold, refined gold;

his locks are wavy, black as a raven.

12His eyes are like doves beside springsr of water,

bathed in milk, set like mounted jewels.st

13His cheeks are like beds of spice, a tower of fragrances;

his lips are lilies dripping liquid myrrh.

14His arms are rodsuv of gold engraved withw jewels;

his bellyx is polished ivory covered with sapphires.y

15His legs are columns of alabaster,z set on bases of gold;

his appearance is like Lebanon, choice as its cedars.a

16His mouthb is sweet,

and he is altogether desirable.

This is my beloved;

this is my friend, O young women of Jerusalem.c

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Footnotes

  1. aOr “Drink and become drunk, O lovers!”
  2. bOr “and”
  3. cOr “The sound of my beloved knocking!”
  4. dLiterally “my locks with drops of night”
  5. eLiterally “How will I put it on?”
  6. fLiterally “How will I soil them?”
  7. gOr “my beloved had left; he was gone”
  8. hOr “my soul left”
  9. iOr “when he was speaking.” Translations equivocate on how to translate this verb, since there are two terms in Hebrew spelled identically: “to speak” and “to turn aside” (HALOT 1:210). The context suggests the latter
  10. jOr “mantle”
  11. kLiterally “the sentinels of the walls”
  12. lLiterally “O daughters of Jerusalem”
  13. mLiterally “sick with love”
  14. nLiterally “What is your beloved more than another beloved …?”
  15. oLiterally “What is your beloved more than another beloved …?”
  16. pLiterally “red”
  17. qLiterally “more than”
  18. rOr “streams”
  19. sLiterally “dwelling in a setting”
  20. tOr “seated at a suitable mounting”
  21. uLiterally “cylinders”
  22. vOr “rings”
  23. wLiterally “filled with”
  24. xOr “body”
  25. yOr “works of ivory set with sapphire”
  26. zOr “marble”
  27. aLiterally “the cedars”
  28. bOr “his palate”
  29. cLiterally “O daughters of Jerusalem”

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