Song of Songs 7: Deeper Intimacy

Preliminary Comments: Please ensure you have read the notes in the Introduction. Very well, to begin with, the study which simply seeks to help the reader absorb the text more easily:

Possible breakdown [ignoring ‘the Friends’]:

• v.1-9 Again he extols her beauty and declares his desire for her
• v.10-13 She expresses her desire to be with him and go away with him

[A third time he describes her but now more intimately and in more detail – a sign of their growing relationship]

v.1 How beautiful your sandalled feet,
    O prince’s daughter!
Your graceful legs are like jewels,
    the work of an artist’s hands.

v.2 Your navel is a rounded goblet
    that never lacks blended wine.
Your waist is a mound of wheat
    encircled by lilies.

v.3 Your breasts are like two fawns,
    like twin fawns of a gazelle.

v.4 Your neck is like an ivory tower.
Your eyes are the pools of Heshbon
    by the gate of Bath Rabbim.
Your nose is like the tower of Lebanon
    looking towards Damascus.

v.5 Your head crowns you like Mount Carmel.
    Your hair is like royal tapestry;
    the king is held captive by its tresses.

[Words of such intimacy that it would almost be rude or demeaning of their love to comment upon them.]

v.6 How beautiful you are and how pleasing,
    my love, with your delights!

v.7 Your stature is like that of the palm,
    and your breasts like clusters of fruit.

v.8 I said, ‘I will climb the palm tree;
    I will take hold of its fruit.’
May your breasts be like clusters of grapes on the vine,
    the fragrance of your breath like apples,

v.9     and your mouth like the best wine.

She

v.9b.10 she pours out wine for him just as she pours out love to him and declares their commitment of love to one another

 May the wine go straight to my beloved,
    flowing gently over lips and teeth.
v.10 I belong to my beloved,
    and his desire is for me.

v.11-13 let’s get away to the country where we can share in each other even more, let’s joy in the wonder of the blossoms and scents of nature

v.11 Come, my beloved, let us go to the countryside,
    let us spend the night in the villages.

v.12 Let us go early to the vineyards
    to see if the vines have budded,
if their blossoms have opened,
    and if the pomegranates are in bloom –
    there I will give you my love.

v.13 The mandrakes send out their fragrance,
    and at our door is every delicacy,
both new and old,
    that I have stored up for you, my beloved.

[Concluding Comment: He extols her beauty [v.1-4] and his desire for her [v.5-9] and she reciprocates with her desire for him and to go away together. Still no identification and no reference to Solomon.]

For those who may wish to make a study of this chapter, to perhaps think some more about what you have been reading, use the link below: