Song of Solomon 5 commentary

See how ready Christ is to accept the invitations of his people. What little good there is in us would be lost, if he did not preserve it to himself. He also invites his beloved people to eat and drink abundantly. The ordinances in which they honour him, are means of grace.

Churches and believers, by carelessness and security, provoke Christ to withdraw. We ought to notice our spiritual slumbers and distempers. Christ knocks to awaken us, knocks by his word and Spirit, knocks by afflictions and by our consciences; thus, Rev. 3:20. When we are unmindful of Christ, still he thinks of us. Christ's love to us should engage ours to him, even in the most self-denying instances; and we only can be gainers by it. Careless souls put slights on Jesus Christ. Another could not be sent to open the door. Christ calls to us, but we have no mind, or pretend we have no strength, or we have no time, and think we may be excused. Making excuses is making light of Christ. Those put contempt upon Christ, who cannot find in their hearts to bear a cold blast, or to leave a warm bed for him. See the powerful influences of Divine grace. He put in his hand to unbolt the door, as one weary of waiting. This betokens a work of the Spirit upon the soul. The believer's rising above self-indulgence, seeking by prayer for the consolations of Christ, and to remove every hinderance to communion with him; these actings of the soul are represented by the hands dropping sweet-smelling myrrh upon the handles of the locks. But the Beloved was gone! By absenting himself, Christ will teach his people to value his gracious visits more highly. Observe, the soul still calls Christ her Beloved. Every desertion is not despair. Lord, I believe, though I must say, Lord, help my unbelief. His words melted me, yet, wretch that I was, I made excuses. The smothering and stifling of convictions will be very bitter to think of, when God opens our eyes. The soul went in pursuit of him; not only prayed, but used means, sought him in the ways wherein he used to be found. The watchmen wounded me. Some refer it to those who misapply the word to awakened consciences. The charge to the daughters of Jerusalem, seems to mean the distressed believer's desire of the prayers of the feeblest Christian. Awakened souls are more sensible of Christ's withdrawings than of any other trouble.

Even those who have little acquaintance with Christ, cannot but see amiable beauty in others who bear his image. There are hopes of those who begin to inquire concerning Christ and his perfections. Christians, who are well acquainted with Christ themselves, should do all they can to make others know something of him. Divine glory makes him truly lovely in the eyes of all who are enlightened to discern spiritual things. He is white in the spotless innocence of his life, ruddy in the bleeding sufferings he went through at his death. This description of the person of the Beloved, would form, in the figurative language of those times, a portrait of beauty of person and of grace of manners; but the aptness of some of the allusions may not appear to us. He shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all that believe. May his love constrain us to live to his glory.

CHAPTER 5

So 5:1-16.

1. Answer to her prayer (Is 65:24; Re 3:20).

am come--already (So 4:16); "come" (Ge 28:16).

sister ... spouse--As Adam's was created of his flesh, out of his opened side, there being none on earth on a level with him, so the bride out of the pierced Saviour (Ep 5:30-32).

have gathered ... myrrh--His course was already complete; the myrrh, &c. (Mt 2:11; 26:7-12; Joh 19:39), emblems of the indwelling of the anointing Holy Ghost, were already gathered.

spice--literally, "balsam."

have eaten--answering to her "eat" (So 4:16).

honeycomb--distinguished here from liquid "honey" dropping from trees. The last supper, here set forth, is one of espousal, a pledge of the future marriage (So 8:14; Re 19:9). Feasts often took place in gardens. In the absence of sugar, then unknown, honey was more widely used than with us. His eating honey with milk indicates His true, yet spotless, human nature from infancy (Is 7:15); and after His resurrection (Lu 24:42).

my wine--(Joh 18:11)--a cup of wrath to Him, of mercy to us, whereby God's Word and promises become to us "milk" (Psa 19:10; 1Pe 2:2). "My" answers to "His" (So 4:16). The myrrh (emblem, by its bitterness, of repentance), honey, milk (incipient faith), wine (strong faith), in reference to believers, imply that He accepts all their graces, however various in degree.

eat--He desires to make us partakers in His joy (Is 55:1, 2; Joh 6:53-57; 1Jo 1:3).

drink abundantly--so as to be filled (Ep 5:18; as Hag 1:6).

friends--(Joh 15:15).

Canticle IV.--(So 5:2-8:4)--From the Agony of Gethsemane to the Conversion of Samaria.

2. Sudden change of scene from evening to midnight, from a betrothal feast to cold repulse. He has gone from the feast alone; night is come; He knocks at the door of His espoused; she hears, but in sloth does not shake off half-conscious drowsiness; namely, the disciples' torpor (Mt 26:40-43), "the spirit willing, the flesh weak" (compare Ro 7:18-25; Ga 5:16, 17, 24). Not total sleep. The lamp was burning beside the slumbering wise virgin, but wanted trimming (Mt 25:5-7). It is His voice that rouses her (Jon 1:6; Ep 5:14; Re 3:20). Instead of bitter reproaches, He addresses her by the most endearing titles, "my sister, my love," &c. Compare His thought of Peter after the denial (Mr 16:7).

dew--which falls heavily in summer nights in the East (see Lu 9:58).

drops of the night--(Psa 22:2; Lu 22:44). His death is not expressed, as unsuitable to the allegory, a song of love and joy; So 5:4 refers to the scene in the judgment hall of Caiaphas, when Jesus Christ employed the cock-crowing and look of love to awaken Peter's sleeping conscience, so that his "bowels were moved" (Lu 22:61, 62); So 5:5, 6, the disciples with "myrrh," &c. (Lu 24:1, 5), seeking Jesus Christ in the tomb, but finding Him not, for He has "withdrawn Himself" (Joh 7:34; 13:33); So 5:7, the trials by watchmen extend through the whole night of His withdrawal from Gethsemane to the resurrection; they took off the "veil" of Peter's disguise; also, literally the linen cloth from the young man (Mr 14:51); So 5:8, the sympathy of friends (Lu 23:27).

undefiled--not polluted by spiritual adultery (Re 14:4; Jas 4:4).

3. Trivial excuses (Lu 14:18).

coat--rather, the inmost vest, next the skin, taken off before going to bed.

washed ... feet--before going to rest, for they had been soiled, from the Eastern custom of wearing sandals, not shoes. Sloth (Lu 11:7) and despondency (De 7:17-19).

4. A key in the East is usually a piece of wood with pegs in it corresponding to small holes in a wooden bolt within, and is put through a hole in the door, and thus draws the bolt. So Jesus Christ "puts forth His hand (namely, His Spirit, Eze 3:14), by (Hebrew, 'from,' so in So 2:9) the hole"; in "chastening" (Psa 38:2; Re 3:14-22, singularly similar to this passage), and other unexpected ways letting Himself in (Lu 22:61, 62).

bowels ... moved for him--It is His which are first troubled for us, and which cause ours to be troubled for Him (Jr 31:20; Ho 11:8).

5. dropped with myrrh--The best proof a bride could give her lover of welcome was to anoint herself (the back of the hands especially, as being the coolest part of the body) profusely with the best perfumes (Ex 30:23; Es 2:12; Pr 7:17); "sweet-smelling" is in the Hebrew rather, "spontaneously exuding" from the tree, and therefore the best. She designed also to anoint Him, whose "head was filled with the drops of night" (Lu 24:1). The myrrh typifies bitter repentance, the fruit of the Spirit's unction (2Co 1:21, 22).

handles of the lock--sins which closed the heart against Him.

6. withdrawn--He knocked when she was sleeping; for to have left her then would have ended in the death sleep; He withdraws now that she is roused, as she needs correction (Jr 2:17, 19), and can appreciate and safely bear it now, which she could not then. "The strong He'll strongly try" (1Co 10:13).

when he spake--rather, "because of His speaking"; at the remembrance of His tender words (Job 29:2, 3; Psa 27:13; 142:7), or till He should speak.

no answer--(Job 23:3-9; 30:20; 34:29; La 3:44). Weak faith receives immediate comfort (Lu 8:44, 47, 48); strong faith is tried with delay (Mt 15:22, 23).

7. watchmen--historically, the Jewish priests, &c. (see on So 5:2); spiritually, ministers (Is 62:6; He 13:17), faithful in "smiting" (Psalm 141. 5), but (as she leaves them, {v.} 8) too harsh; or, perhaps, unfaithful; disliking her zeal wherewith she sought Jesus Christ, first, with spiritual prayer, "opening" her heart to Him, and then in charitable works "about the city"; miscalling it fanaticism (Is 66:5), and taking away her veil (the greatest indignity to an Eastern lady), as though she were positively immodest. She had before sought Him by night in the streets, under strong affection (So 3:2-4), and so without rebuff from "the watchmen," found Him immediately; but now after sinful neglect, she encounters pain and delay. God forgives believers, but it is a serious thing to draw on His forgiveness; so the growing reserve of God towards Israel observable in Judges, as His people repeat their demands on His grace.

8. She turns from the unsympathizing watchmen to humbler persons, not yet themselves knowing Him, but in the way towards it. Historically, His secret friends in the night of His withdrawal (Lu 23:27, 28). Inquirers may find ("if ye find") Jesus Christ before she who has grieved His Spirit finds Him again.

tell--in prayer (Jas 5:16).

sick of love--from an opposite cause (So 2:5) than through excess of delight at His presence; now excess of pain at His absence.

9. Her own beauty (Eze 16:14), and lovesickness for Him, elicit now their enquiry (Mt 5:16); heretofore "other lords besides Him had dominion over them"; thus they had seen "no beauty in Him" (Is 26:13; 53:2).

10. (1Pe 3:15).

white and ruddy--health and beauty. So David (equivalent to beloved), His forefather after the flesh, and type (1Sa 17:42). "The Lamb" is at once His nuptial and sacrificial name (1Pe 1:19; Re 19:7), characterized by white and red; white, His spotless manhood (Re 1:14). The Hebrew for white is properly "illuminated by the sun," white as the light" (compare Mt 17:2); red, in His blood-dyed garment as slain (Is 63:1-3; Re 5:6; 19:13). Angels are white, not red; the blood of martyrs does not enter heaven; His alone is seen there.

chiefest--literally, "a standard bearer"; that is, as conspicuous above all others, as a standard bearer is among hosts (Psa 45:7; 89:6; Is 11:10; 55:4; He 2:10; compare 2Sa 18:3; Job 33:23; Php 2:9-11; Re 1:5). The chief of sinners needs the "chiefest" of Saviours.

11. head ... gold--the Godhead of Jesus Christ, as distinguished from His heel, that is, His manhood, which was "bruised" by Satan; both together being one Christ (1Co 11:3). Also His sovereignty, as Nebuchadnezzar, the supreme king was "the head of gold" (Da 2:32-38; Col 1:18), the highest creature, compared with Him, is brass, iron, and clay. "Preciousness" (Greek, 1Pe 2:7).

bushy--curled, token of Headship. In contrast with her flowing locks (So 4:1), the token of her subjection to Him (Psa 8:4-8; 1Co 11:3, 6-15). The Hebrew is (pendulous as) the branches of a palm, which, when in leaf, resemble waving plumes of feathers.

black--implying youth; no "gray hairs" (Psa 102:27; 110:3, 4; Ho 7:9). Jesus Christ was crucified in the prime of vigor and manliness. In heaven, on the other hand, His hair is "white," He being the Ancient of days (Da 7:9). These contrasts often concur in Him (So 5:10), "white and ruddy"; here the "raven" (So 5:12), the "dove," as both with Noah in the ark (Ge 8:11); emblems of judgment and mercy.

12. as the eyes of doves--rather, "as doves" (Psa 68:13); bathing in "the rivers"; so combining in their "silver" feathers the whiteness of milk with the sparkling brightness of the water trickling over them (Mt 3:16). The "milk" may allude to the white around the pupil of the eye. The "waters" refer to the eye as the fountain of tears of sympathy (Eze 16:5, 6; Lu 19:41). Vivacity, purity, and love, are the three features typified.

fitly set--as a gem in a ring; as the precious stones in the high priest's breastplate. Rather, translate as Vulgate (the doves), sitting at the fulness of the stream; by the full stream; or, as Maurer (the eyes) set in fulness, not sunk in their sockets (Re 5:6), ("seven," expressing full perfection), (Zec 3:9; 4:10).

13. cheeks--the seat of beauty, according to the Hebrew meaning [Gesenius]. Yet men smote and spat on them (Is 50:6).

bed--full, like the raised surface of the garden bed; fragrant with ointments, as beds with aromatic plants (literally, "balsam").

sweet flowers--rather, "terraces of aromatic herbs"--"high-raised parterres of sweet plants," in parallelism to "bed," which comes from a Hebrew root, meaning "elevation."

lips--(Psa 45:2; Joh 7:46).

lilies--red lilies. Soft and gentle (1Pe 2:22, 23). How different lips were man's (Psa 22:7)!

dropping ... myrrh--namely, His lips, just as the sweet dewdrops which hang in the calyx of the lily.

14. rings set with ... beryl--Hebrew, Tarshish, so called from the city. The ancient chrysolite, gold in color (Septuagint), our topaz, one of the stones on the high priest's breastplate, also in the foundation of New Jerusalem (Re 21:19, 20; also Da 10:6). "Are as," is plainly to be supplied, see in So 5:13 a similiar ellipsis; not as Moody Stuart: "have gold rings." The hands bent in are compared to beautiful rings, in which beryl is set, as the nails are in the fingers. Burrowes explains the rings as cylinders used as signets, such as are found in Nineveh, and which resemble fingers. A ring is the token of sonship (Lu 15:22). A slave was not allowed to wear a gold ring. He imparts His sonship and freedom to us (Ga 4:7); also of authority (Ge 41:42; compare Joh 6:27). He seals us in the name of God with His signet (Re 7:2-4), compare below, So 8:6, where she desires to be herself a signet-ring on His arms; so "graven on the palms," &c., that is, on the signet-ring in His hand (Is 49:16; contrast Hag 2:23, with Jr 22:24).

belly--Burrowes and Moody Stuart translate, "body." Newton, as it is elsewhere, "bowels"; namely, His compassion (Psa 22:14; Is 63:15; Jr 31:20; Ho 11:8).

bright--literally, "elaborately wrought so as to shine," so His "prepared" body (He 10:5); the "ivory palace" of the king (Psa 45:8); spotless, pure, so the bride's "neck is as to tower of ivory" (So 7:4).

sapphires--spangling in the girdle around Him (Da 10:5). "To the pure all things are pure." As in statuary to the artist the partly undraped figure is suggestive only of beauty, free from indelicacy, so to the saint the personal excellencies of Jesus Christ, typified under the ideal of the noblest human form. As, however, the bride and bridegroom are in public, the usual robes on the person, richly ornamented, are presupposed (Is 11:5). Sapphires indicate His heavenly nature (so Joh 3:13, "is in heaven"), even in His humiliation, overlaying or cast "over" His ivory human body (Ex 24:10). Sky-blue in color, the height and depth of the love of Jesus Christ (Ep 3:18).

15. pillars--strength and steadfastness. Contrast man's "legs" (Ec 12:3). Allusion to the temple (1Ki 5:8, 9; 7:21), the "cedars" of "Lebanon" (Psa 147:10). Jesus Christ's "legs" were not broken on the cross, though the thieves' were; on them rests the weight of our salvation (Psa 75:3).

sockets of fine gold--His sandals, answering to the bases of the pillars; "set up from everlasting" (Pr 8:22, 23). From the head (So 5:11) to the feet, "of fine gold." He was tried in the fire and found without alloy.

countenance--rather, "His aspect," including both mien and stature (compare 2Sa 23:21, Margin; with 1Ch 11:23). From the several parts, she proceeds to the general effect of the whole person of Jesus Christ.

Lebanon--so called from its white limestone rocks.

excellent--literally, "choice," that is, fair and tall as the cedars on Lebanon (Eze 31:3, &c.). Majesty is the prominent thought (Psa 21:5). Also the cedars' duration (He 1:11); greenness (Lu 23:31), and refuge afforded by it (Eze 17:22, 23).

16. Literally, "His palate is sweetness, yea, all over loveliness," that is, He is the essence of these qualities.

mouth--so So 1:2, not the same as "lips" (So 5:13), His breath (Is 11:4; Joh 20:22). "All over," all the beauties scattered among creatures are transcendently concentrated in Him (Col 1:19; 2:9).

my beloved--for I love Him.

my friend--for He loves me (Pr 18:24). Holy boasting (Psa 34:2; 1Co 1:31).

I am come into my garden - באתי bathi, I came, or have come; this should be translated in the past tense, as the other preterite verbs in this clause. I think the latter clause of the preceding verse should come in here: "Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits. I have come into my garden, my sister, callah, or spouse; I have gathered my myrrh," etc. I have taken thee for my spouse, and am perfectly satisfied that thou art pure and immaculate.

Eat, O friends - drink abundantly - These are generally supposed to be the words of the bridegroom, after he returned from the nuptial chamber, and exhibited those signs of his wife's purity which the customs of those times required. This being a cause of universal joy, the entertainment is served up; and he invites his companions, and the friends of both parties, to eat and drink abundantly, as there was such a universal cause of rejoicing. Others think that these are the words of the bride to her spouse: but the original will not bear this meaning; the verbs are all plural.

I sleep, but my heart waketh - This is a new part; and some suppose that the fifth day's solemnity begins here. Though I sleep, yet so impressed is may heart with the excellences of my beloved, that my imagination presents him to me in the most pleasing dreams throughout the night. I doubt whether the whole, from this verse to the end of the seventh, be not a dream: several parts of it bear this resemblance; and I confess there are some parts of it, such as her hesitating to rise, his sudden disappearance, etc., which would be of easier solution on this supposition. Or part of the transactions mentioned might be the effects of the dream she had, as rising up suddenly, and going out into the street, meeting with the watchmen, etc., before she was well awake. And her being in so much disorder and dishabille might have induced them to treat her as a suspiciovs person, or one of questionable character. But it is most likely the whole was a dream.

For my head is filled with dew - She supposed he had come in the night, and was standing without, wet, and exposed to the inclemency of the weather.

I have put off my coat - The bride must have been in a dream or in much disorder of mind to have made the frivolous excuses here mentioned. The words relate to the case of a person who had gone to take rest on his bed. As they wore nothing but sandals, they were obliged to wash their feet previously to their lying down. I have washed my feet, taken off my clothes, and am gone to bed: I cannot therefore be disturbed. A Hindoo always washes his feet before he goes to bed. If called from his bed, he often makes this excuse, I shall daub my feet; and the excuse is reasonable, as the floors are of earth; and they do not wear shoes in the house - Ward.

My beloved put in his hand - If it were a real scene, which is mentioned in this and the two following verses, it must refer, from the well-known use of the metaphors, to matrimonial endearments. Or, it may refer to his attempts to open the door, when she hesitated to arise, on the grounds mentioned Sol 5:3. But this also bears every evidence of a dream.

My hands dropped with myrrh - It was a custom among the Romans, as Brissonius, Isidore, and others relate, to conduct the bride to the house of the bridegroom with lighted torches; and those who brought her anointed the door-posts with fragant oils, whence the name uxor, or as it was formerly written unxor, for a wife or married woman, because of the anointing which took place on the occasion; for sometimes the bride herself anointed the door-posts, and sometimes those who brought her; probably both at the same time. The same custom might have existed among the Jews. See Vossius' Etymologicon.

Took away my veil - They tore it off rudely, to discover who she was. See on Sol 5:2 (note). To tear the veil signifies, in Eastern phrase, to deflower or dishonor a woman.

I am sick of love - "I am exceedingly concerned for his absence; and am distressed on account of my thoughtless carriage towards him." The latter clause may be well translated, "What should ye tell him?" Why, "that I am sick of love." This ends the transactions of the third day and night.

What is thy beloved more than another beloved - This question gives the bride an opportunity to break out into a highly wrought description of the beauty and perfections of her spouse.

My beloved is white and ruddy - Red and white, properly mixed, are essential to a fine complexion; and this is what is intimated: he has the finest complexion among ten thousand persons; not one in that number is equal to him. Literally, "He bears the standard among ten thousand men;" or "He is one before whom a standard is borne," i.e., he is captain or chief of the whole.

His head is as the most fine gold - He has the most beautiful head, fine and majestic. Gold is here used to express excellence.

His locks are bushy - Crisped or curled. This may refer to his mustachios.

Black as a raven - His hair is black and glossy.

His eyes are as the eyes of doves - See on Sol 4:1 (note).

Washed with milk - The white of the eye, exceedingly white. By the use of stibium, in the East, the eye is rendered very beautiful; and receives such a lustre from the use of this article, that, to borrow the expression of a late traveler, "their eyes appear to be swimming in bliss." I believe this expression to be the meaning of the text.

Fitly set - Or, as the margin, very properly, sitting in fullness; not sunk, not contracted.

His cheeks are as a bed of spices - Possibly meaning a bed in the garden, where odoriferous herbs grew. But it has been supposed to refer to his beard, which in a young well-made man is exceedingly beautiful. I have seen young Turks, who had taken much care of their beards, mustachios, etc., look majestic. Scarcely any thing serves to set off the human face to greater advantage than the beard, when kept in proper order. Females admire it in their suitors and husbands. I have known cases, where they not only despised but execrated Europeans, whose faces were close shaved. The men perfume their beards often; and this may be what is intended by spices and sweet-smelling myrrh.

His lips like lilies - The שושנם shoshannim may mean any flower of the lily kind, such as the rubens lilium, mentioned by Pliny, or something of the tulip kind. There are tints in such flowers that bear a very near resemblance to a fine ruby lip.

His hands - gold rings set with the beryl - This really seems to refer to gold rings set with precious stones on the fingers, and perhaps to circlets or bracelets about the wrists. Some suppose it to refer to the roundness and exquisite symmetry of the hand and fingers. תרשיש tarshish, which we translate beryl, a gem of a sea-green tint, had better be translated chrysolite, which is of a gold color.

His belly - bright ivory overlaid with sapphires - This must refer to some garment set with precious stones which went round his waist, and was peculiarly remarkable. If we take it literally, the sense is plain enough. His belly was beautifully white, and the blue veins appearing under the skin resembled the sapphire stone. But one can hardly think that this was intended.

His legs are as pillars of marble - Exquisitely turned and well-shaped; the sockets of gold may refer to his slippers. On these a profusion of gold and ornaments are still lavished in Asiatic countries.

His countenance is as Lebanon - As Lebanon exalts its head beyond all the other mountains near Jerusalem, so my beloved is tall and majestic, and surpasses in stature and majesty all other men. He is also as straight and as firm as the cedars.

His mouth is most sweet - His eloquence is great, and his voice is charming. Every word he speaks is sweetness, mildness, and benevolence itself. Then, her powers of description failing, and metaphor exhausted she cries out, "The whole of him is loveliness. This is my beloved, and this is my companion, O ye daughters of Jerusalem."

I come - This is the bridegroom's answer. I have - I have eaten of my pleasant fruits, I have taken notice of, and delight in the service and obedience of my people. O friends - Believers are here encouraged with freedom and chearfulness to eat and drink their spiritual food.

Asleep - I was dull, and sluggish. But - Yet in my very sleep my thoughts were running upon my beloved. It is - Between sleeping and waking, I heard his voice. Knocketh - By his word, and providence, and spirit, at the door of my heart. Open - Inviting me to let him into my soul. My love - This heap of kind compellations signifies Christ's fervent affection to his people. With dew - While I wait without thy door, which signifies his sufferings for the church's good. The drops - The dew which falls in the night.

My coat - My day clothes, as persons use to do when they go to rest. How - It is inconvenient and troublesome to do it at this time. Washed my feet - Which the eastern people commonly did when they went to bed.

By the hole - He assayed to open the door. When his word would not prevail, his spirit, which is called the finger of God, Luke 11:20, wrought inwardly upon my conscience. Were moved - With compassion for him and his sufferings, and with affection to him.

I rose - I went forth to receive him. Dropped - With oil or ointment made of myrrh, which dropped from the bridegroom's hand upon the door in great abundance, when he put it into the hole of the door, and consequently upon her hands and fingers when she touched the door to open it. By which she signifies, that Christ, though he withdrew himself from her, yet left a sweet savour behind him. The handles - Heb. with myrrh passing or flowing upon the handles of the lock, which place the bridegroom had touched when he attempted to open it.

With - drawn - Denied me his comfortable presence, as a just punishment for my former neglect. Faded - Heb. went out of me: I fainted and was ready to die away, for those endearing expressions related, ver.2, which then I did not heed. I sought - By diligent enquiry and importunate prayer.

Watch - men - The governors of the church, who, though by their place they are obliged to comfort the faithful, do frequently discourage them. Smote - With bitter calumnies and persecutions. The keepers - The same with the watchmen, whose office it is to keep the gates and walls of the city. My vine - Which was an ornament of her sex, and an ensign of her relation to Christ. And so the taking of this veil away, signifies their contemptuous usage of her, and endeavours to represent her, as one that had no relation to Christ.

O daughters - The church having passed the watchmen, proceeds in the pursuit of her beloved, and enquires of every particular believer whom she meets concerning him. Tell him - That I am ready to faint for want of his presence.

What is - Wherein doth he excel them? Believers might ask this, that they might be more fully informed of it.

White - The white may denote his pure and spotless innocency, and the ruddy colour his bloody passion.

As gold - It shines like gold, by reason of the crown of pure gold upon his head. We need not aim at a distinct application of this and the following particulars, unto some special excellency of Christ, because such things are mere conjectures, and the only design of this description is, to set forth the beauty of Christ under the notion of a most amiable person, in whom there is no defect or blemish, from the crown of his head to the sole of his feet.

Of doves - Lovely and pleasant, chaste and innocent. Rivers - Where they delight to abide. Milk - Doves of a milk white colour.

Cheeks - His face or countenance, an eminent part whereof is the cheeks. Spices - Of aromatic flowers which delight both the eye with a pleasant prospect, and the smell with their fragrancy. Lillies - Beautiful and pleasant.

Beryl - Beautiful, and precious, and richly adorned, as it were with gold rings set with precious stones. Belly - Which seems to be here used, for the whole body, reaching from the neck to the bottom of the belly. Saphires - Of a pure and bright white colour, intermixt with blue veins; for some saphires are of a bright blue colour.

Marble - White, and strait, and well shaped and strong. Gold - His feet are compared to gold, for their singular brightness, for which they are compared to fine - brass, Rev 1:15. Countenance - Heb. his aspect or appearance, his form or person. Lebanon - In respect of its cedars, tall, and upright, and stately.

Altogether - Not to run out into more particulars.

1 I Am come into my garden , my sister, my spouse; I have gathered my myrrhe with my spice, I have eaten my honey-comb with my honey, I have drunk my wine with my milk : eat, O friends c, drink, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved.

This is the Bridegrooms Answer to her Request, delivered in the next foregoing words.

I have eaten of my pleasant fruits, as thou didst desire. I have taken notice of, and delight in the service and Obedience of my People.

The friends of the Bridegroom. Whereby he understands either 1. The holy Angels and glorified Saints, who in a sublime and spiritual sense may be said to eat and drink in Heaven, the happiness whereof is frequently represented under the name and notion of a Feast: Or rather 2. Believers or Members of the Church militant upon Earth, who by the Argument of Christs gracious presence with them, and acceptation of their works signified in the last words, are here invited and encouraged with great freedom and chearfulness to eat and drink their spiritual Food, to feed upon Gods Holy Word and Sacraments, to eat the Flesh and drink the Blood of the Son of God, who here gives them, an hearty welcome to this Feast.

Marginal references: Or, and be drunken with loves.

2 I sleep , but my heart waketh : it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh , saying, Open to me , my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled : for my head is filled with dew , and my locks with the drops of the night .

Heb. I was asleep, i. e. I was dull, and sluggish, and insensible of his kind Expressions, and offers of Grace.

Yet in my very sleep my thoughts were running upon my Beloved, as is not unusual in such cases, which at last awakened me. Thus she implies the conflict which was between the Flesh and the Spirit, and the Spirits Victory in the Combate.

Between sleeping and waking I fancied that I heard his voice.

By his Word, and Providence, and Spirit, at the door of mine Heart, desirous that I would receive him by Faith and Love. Compare Rev. 3. 20.

Inviting me to accept of his gracious Offers, and to let him into my Soul.

This heap of kind compellations signifies Christs sincere and fervent Affection to his People, notwithstanding her manifold imperfections and infirmities. The title of dove signifies her Chastity and constant Faithfulness to her Husband, for which Doves are famous. How she is undefiled see on ch. 4. 7.

Whilest I wait without thy door. He alludes to the custom of Lovers, which oft and willingly suffer such inconveniencies for their hopes and desires of enjoying their Beloved, and signifies his sufferings for the Churches good.

The dew which falls in the end of the night, or towards the morning, whence it is called morning dew, Hos. 6. 4.

3 I have put off my coat , how shall I put it on ? I have washed my feet , how shall I defile them?

My day-cloaths, as persons use to do when they go to rest.

It is inconvenient and troublesom to do it at this time. Thus she tacitly reflects upon the Bridegroom for coming to her so unseasonably, and giving her such disturbance, and puts him off to another time, and excuseth her non-admission of him by her present indisposition, and the difficulty of the thing required of her.

Which the Eastern people commonly did when they went to Bed, partly to cool their Feet, and partly to cleanse them from that dust and sweat which they had contracted in the day time by Labour and Travel, as being used to go barefoot.

4 My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door , and my bowels were moved for him .

He assayed to open the door. When his Word would not prevail, his Spirit, which is ca[illegible: 1+ letters]led the finger of God, Luk. 11. 20. compared with Mat. 12. 28. wrought inwardly upon my Conscience, and affected mine heart.

With compassion for him and his sufferings, and with affection to him; for both these ways is this Phrase oft used, as Iob 37. 1. Phil. 2. 1, 2. &c.

Marginal references: Or, (as some read) in me.

5 I rose up to open to my beloved , and my hands dropped with myrrhe , and my fingers with sweet smelling myrrhe, upon the handles of the lock .

I repented of my former drowsiness and neglect, and went forth to receive him.

i. e. With Oil or Ointment made of Myrrhe, which either 1. She had taken out of her own stock to prepare her self for the entertainment of the Bridegroom: Or rather 2. Dropped from the Bridegrooms hand upon the door in great abundance, when he put it into the [illegible: 1 word] of the door, v. 4. and consequently upon her hands and fingers when she touched the door to open it. By which she signifies that Christ though he withdrew himself from her, yet left a sweet savour behind him, in [illegible: 1+ letters]using into her, and stir[illegible: 1+ letters]ing up in her the Graces of the Spirit, such as Repentance, which is bitter as Myrrhe, earnest desire after Christ, &c.

Heb. with [illegible: 1 word] passing or flowing upon the handles of the lock, which place the Bridegroom had touched when he attempted to open it.

Marginal references: Heb. passing, or running about, Nah. 1. 8. Heb.

6 I opened to my beloved, but my beloved had withdrawn himself , and was gone : my soul failed when he spake : I sought him , but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer .

Denied me his gracious and comfortable presence, as a just punishment for my former neglect and [illegible: 1+ letters]olly.

Either she repeats the same thing to shew how deeply she was affected with it: Or this is added to imply that he had not only stepped aside, but was quite gone away.

Heb. went out of me. I fainted and was ready to die away through excessive passion, as this Phrase is used, Gen. 35. 18. & 42. 28. and elsewhere.

Or, for what he spoke, for those endearing Expressions related v. 2. which then I did not heed, but this sad occasion brings them to my remembrance: as oft times that word which is ineffectual when it is preached, is afterwards brought to a mans Mind, and produceth blessed effects.

By diligent enquiry and importunate Prayer.

That so he might both chastise her folly, and quicken her desires, and prepare the way for a more hearty welcome, and his longer abode with her.

Marginal references: Ch. 3. 1.

7 The watch-men that went about the city , found me, they smote me, they wounded me ; the keepers of the walls took away my vail from me.

The Governours of the Church, as Ch. 3. 3. who, though by their place and office they be obliged to comfort and protect the faithful, do frequently discourage and oppress them, as they manifestly did both in the days of Isaiah, and Ieremiah, and the other holy Prophets, and in the time of Christ and his Apostles, and in divers other Ages.

With bitter Calumnies and Persecutions.

The same with the Watch-men, whose Office it is to keep the Gates and Walls of the City.

Which was an ornament of her Sex, Isa. 3. 23. and a badge of her Modesty, Gen. 24. 65. or an ensign of her Relation and Subjection to Christ, Gen. 20. 16. 1 Cor. 11. 5. And so the taking of this Veil away, signifies their contemptuous and injurious usage of her, their endeavours to blast her Reputation, and to represent and treat her as a common and impudent prostitute, and as one that had no Relation to Christ.

8 I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem , if ye find my beloved that ye tell him, that I am sick of love .

Of whom see on ch. 1. 5. & 2. 7. The Church having passed the Watch-men, and patiently born, and in a manner forgotten their injuries, proceeds in the pursuit of her beloved, and enquires of every particular Believer or Professor whom she meets concerning him.

That I am ready to faint for want of his presence, and the tokens of his Favour. Use all your interest and importunity with him on my behalf.

Marginal references: Heb. what.

9 What is thy beloved more than another beloved , O thou fairest among women ? What is thy beloved more than another beloved, that thou dost so charge us?

Wherein doth he excel them? Which Professors of Religion might ask, because they were ignorant of Christs Excellency, and true Believers might ask it, that they might be more fully informed of it, and might give the Spouse occasion to discourse of that subject which was very grateful to them.

Whose Beauty may command the Respects and Affections of the most worthy persons; and therefore we conclude it must be some person of transcendent excellency with whom thou are so highly enamoured.

Marginal references: Ch. 1. 8.

10 My beloved is white and ruddy , the chiefest among ten thousand .

Which two colours rightly mixed together, make a Face beautiful. Or the white may note his pure and spotless Innocency, and the brightness of his Glory and Majesty, and the ruddy colour may intimate his bloody passion, which made him amiable both to God and Men.

Heb. the standard bearer; for such are usually persons of great Eminency, both for Stature, and Courage, and Dignity.

Among all persons, Angels or Men. A certain number is put for an uncertain. There are other Kings, and Priests, and Prophets, but none to be compared with him.

Marginal references: Heb. a standard-bearer. or, taller than ten thousand.

11 His head is as the most fine gold , his locks are bushy, and black as a raven .

It shines like Gold, not in respect of the Hair, which is black, as it followeth, but by reason of his Crown of pure Gold upon his Head, Rev. 14. 14 Whereby she implies that her Bridegroom was a King, which she declared above, ch. 3. 11.

In which a part of Mans Beauty consists. I shall not trouble my Reader with a distinct application of this and the following particulars, unto some special part or excellency of Christ, because such things are meer conjectures without any solid grounds, and the only design of this description seems to be this, to set forth the beauty of Christ under the notion of a most compleat and amiable person, in whom there is no defect nor blemish, from the crown of his Head to the sole of his Feet.

Which is mentioned, partly because this was esteemed a beauty, and partly because it was an evidence of his Youth and vigor, as grey hairs are characters of age and infirmity, Hos. 7. 9.

Marginal references: Or, curled.

12 His eyes are as the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters , washed with milk , and fitly set .

Lovely and pleasant, chaste and innocent.

Where they delight to abide, and wherewith they bath themselves, and wash their Eyes, where also their Eyes are most lively and beautiful, both by the reflection of the waters, and from that pleasure which they take in such places.

Which may belong either 1. To the Eyes, which are supposed to be washed with water, as white and pure as Milk: Or 2. To the Doves, which are intimated to be of a milk-white colour, which in those parts was most esteemed, which colour also made the Eyes appear more lovely.

Neither sinking into the Head, nor standing out too much, but in a moderate and comely scituation. Heb. sitting in fullness: which may note a full and competently large Eye, which is esteemed one beauty of the Eye.

Marginal references: Ch. 1. 15. & 4. 1.; Heb. sitting in fulness, that is, fitly placed, & set as a precious stone in the soil of a Ring.

13 His cheeks are as a bed of spices , as sweet flowers : his lips like lilies , dropping sweet smelling myrrhe .

His Face or Countenance, an eminent part whereof is the Cheeks, in which the Beauty or Deformity of a Face doth much consist.

Which being higher than other parts of the Garden fitly represents the Cheeks, which are higher than other parts of the Face.

Not of drie spices, for they are not in Beds, but of Aromatical Flowers which delight both the Eye with a pleasant prospect, and the smell with their fragrancy. This may also signifie the down or hair upon the Bridegrooms cheeks, which is the evidence of his mature and vigorous Age, and may denote that Christs sweetness and gentleness is accompanied with Majesty, and Gravity, and just severity.

This may be added to explain the former Phrase. Or, towers of perfumes, i. e. Boxes in which perfumes were put, which by their height or form, had some resemblance to a Turret.

Beautiful and pleasant. Or this is meant of that sort of Lillies which were of a red or purple colour, as ancient Writers affirm, and so signifie the grateful colour of the Lips. This may note that Grace which was poured into Christs Lips, and which flowed from them in sweet and excellent discourses.

Not only graceful to the Eye, as Lillies are, but also fragrant to the smell.

Marginal references: Or, towers of perfumes.

14 His hands are as gold-rings set with the beryll : his belly is as bright ivory overlaid with Saphires .

The instruments of Action and of Distribution, which may design the actions of Christ and particularly his distributing Gifts and Graces to his Members.

Beautiful, and precious, and richly adorned, as it were with Gold-Rings set with precious stones.

Which seems to be here used, either 1. Metonimically, for the Bowels which are contained in the Belly: Or rather 2. Synecdochically, for the whole Body, reaching from the neck to the bottom of the Belly, which is distinguished from the Face, and the joints, which are described in the other clauses. For he speaks here of those parts which are visible to the Eye. And thus here is a compleat description of Christs beauty in all parts from his Head to his Feet.

Of a pure and bright white colour, intermixt with blew veins; for some Saphires are of a bright blew colour.

15 His legs are as pillars of marble , set upon sockets of fine gold : his countenance is as Lebanon , excellent as the cedars.

The instruments of local motion, and the supporters of the body.

White, and streight, and well shaped, and strong. Which may note the firmness and stability of Christs Kingdom in spight of all opposition.

Which add both beauty and strength to them. These may note his Feet compared to Gold, either for their great price and worth, or for their singular brightness, for which they are compared to fine-brass, Rev. 1. 15. or, as others, for his golden shoes wherewith they were covered or adorned, as the Spouse is commended from her shoes, Cant. 7. 1.

Heb. his aspect or appearance, his form or Person, as this Hebrew word is elsewhere used.

In respect of its Cedars, as the next words explain it, to wit, tall, and upright, and stately, and withal pleasant to the Eye.

16 His mouth is ‖ most sweet , yea, he is altogether lovely . This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem .

Which was said before in other words, v. 13. and is here justly repeated, because it was a principal part of Christs beauty, and the chief instrument of the Spouses Comfort and Happiness, which wholly depends upon his sweet and excellent Speeches, his holy Precepts, and gracious Offers and Promises contained in the Gospel.

Not to run out into more particulars, in one word there is no part of him which is not exquisitely beautiful.

And therefore you have no cause to wonder or to blame me if I am transported with Love to so excellent a personage.

Marginal references: Heb. his palate.; Heb. desires.; † Heb. sweetness.

Sol 5:1

She gives herself to him, and he has accepted her, and now celebrates the delight of possession and enjoyment. 1 I am come into my garden, my sister-bride;    Have plucked my myrrh with my balsam;    Have eaten my honeycomb with my honey;    Have drunk my wine with my milk -    Eat, drink, and be drunken, ye friends!

If the exclamation of Solomon, 1 a, is immediately connected with the words of Shulamith, Sol 4:16, then we must suppose that, influenced by these words, in which the ardour of love and humility express themselves, he thus in triumph exclaims, after he has embraced her in his arms as his own inalienable possession. But the exclamation denotes more than this. It supposes a union of love, such as is the conclusion of marriage following the betrothal, the God-ordained aim of sexual love within the limits fixed by morality. The poetic expression בּאתי לגנּי points to the אל eht ot  בּוא, used of the entrance of a man into the woman’s chamber, to which the expression (Arab.) dakhal bihā (he went in with her), used of the introduction into the bride’s chamber, is compared. The road by which Solomon reached this full and entire possession was not short, and especially for his longing it was a lengthened one. He now triumphs in the final enjoyment which his ardent desire had found. A pleasant enjoyment which is reached in the way and within the limits of the divine order, and which therefore leaves no bitter fruits of self-reproach, is pleasant even in the retrospect. His words, beginning with “I am come into my garden,” breathe this pleasure in the retrospect. Ginsburg and others render incorrectly, “I am coming,” which would require the words to have been בּא אני (הנּה). The series of perfects beginning with באתי cannot be meant otherwise than retrospectively. The “garden” is Shulamith herself, Sol 4:12, in the fulness of her personal and spiritual attractions, Sol 4:16; cf. כּרמי, Sol 1:6. He may call her “my sister-bride;” the garden is then his by virtue of divine and human right, he has obtained possession of this garden, he has broken its costly rare flowers. ארה (in the Mishna dialect the word used of plucking figs) signifies to pluck; the Aethiop. trans. ararku karbê, I have plucked myrrh; for the Aethiop. has arara instead of simply ארה. בּשׂמי is here שׂבּם deflected. While בּשׂם, with its plur. besâmim, denotes fragrance in general, and only balsam specially, bāsām = (Arab.) bashâm is the proper name of the balsam-tree (the Mecca balsam), amyris opobalsamum, which, according to Forskal, is indigenous in the central mountain region of Jemen (S. Arabia); it is also called (Arab.) balsaman; the word found its way in this enlarged form into the West, and then returned in the forms בּלסמון, אפּופלסמון, אפּלרלסמא (Syr. afrusomo), into the East. Balsam and other spices were brought in abundance to King Solomon as a present by the Queen of Sheba, 1Ki 10:10; the celebrated balsam plantations of Jericho (vid., Winer’s Real-W.), which continued to be productive till the Roman period, might owe their origin to the friendly relations which Solomon sustained to the south Arab. princess. Instead of the Indian aloe, Sol 4:14, the Jamanic balsam is here connected with myrrh as a figure of Shulamith’s excellences. The plucking, eating, and drinking are only interchangeable figurative descriptions of the enjoyment of love. “Honey and milk,” says Solomon, Sol 4:11, “is under thy tongue.” יער is like יערה,   1Sa 14:27, the comb (favus) or cells containing the honey, - a designation which has perhaps been borrowed from porous lava.Vid., Wetstein in the Zeitsch. für allgem. Erdkunde, 1859, p. 123.

With honey and milk “under the tongue” wine is connected, to which, and that of the noblest kind, Sol 7:10, Shulamith’s palate is compared. Wine and milk together are οἰνόγαλα, which Chloe presents to Daphnis (Longus, i. 23). Solomon and his Song here hover on the pinnacle of full enjoyment; but if one understands his figurative language as it interprets itself, it here also expresses that delight of satisfaction which the author of Psa 19:6 transfers to the countenance of the rising sun, in words of a chaste purity which sexual love never abandons, in so far as it is connected with esteem for a beloved wife, and with the preservation of mutual personal dignity. For this very reason the words of Solomon, 1 a, cannot be thought of as spoken to the guests. Between Sol 4:16 and Sol 5:1 the bridal night intervenes. The words used in 1a are Solomon’s morning salutation to her who has now wholly become his own. The call addressed to the guests at the feast is given forth on the second day of the marriage, which, according to ancient custom, Gen 29:28; Jdg 14:12, was wont to be celebrated for seven days, Tob. 11:18. The dramatical character of the Song leads to this result, that the pauses are passed over, the scenes are quickly changed, and the times appear to be continuous.

The plur. דּודים Hengst. thinks always designates “love” (Liebe); thus, after Pro 7:18, also here: Eat, friends, drink and intoxicate yourselves in love. But the summons, inebriamini amoribus, has a meaning if regarded as directed by the guests to the married pair, but not as directed to the guests. And while we may say רוה דדים, yet not שׁכר דו, for shakar has always only the accus. of a spirituous liquor after it. Therefore none of the old translators (except only the Venet.: μεθύσθητε ἔρωσιν) understood dodim, notwithstanding that elsewhere in the Song it means love, in another than a personal sense; רעים and דח are here the plur. of the elsewhere parallels רע and דּוד, e.g., Sol 5:16, according to which also (cf. on the contrary, Sol 4:16) they are accentuated. Those who are assembled are, as sympathizing friends, to participate in the pleasures of the feast. The Song of Songs has here reached its climax. A Paul would not hesitate, after Eph 5:31., to extend the mystical interpretation even to this. Of the antitype of the marriage pair it is said: “For the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made herself ready” (Rev 19:7); and of the antitype of the marriage guests: “Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb” (Rev 19:9).

Sol 5:2 2 I sleep, but my heart keeps waking-    Hearken! my beloved is knocking:    Open to me, my sister, my love,    My dove, my perfect one;    For my head is filled with dew,    My locks (are) full of the drops of the night.

The partic. subst. clauses, Sol 5:2, indicate the circumstances under which that which is related in Sol 5:2 occurred. In the principal sentence in hist. prose ויּדפּק would be used; here, in the dramatic vivacity of the description, is found in its stead the interject.vocem = ausculta with the gen. foll., and a word designatingדּופק is knocking is not an attribute to the determinate דּודי my beloved which it follows, but a designation of state or condition, and thus acc., as the Beirut translation renders it: “hear my beloved in the condition of one knocking.” On the other hand, דוד דופק signifies “a beloved one knocking.” But “hear a beloved one knocking” would also be expressed acc. In classical language, the designation of state, if the subst. to which it belongs is indeterminate, is placed before it, e.g., “at the gate stood a beloved one knocking.” state or condition added, thought of as accus. according to the Semitic syntax (like Gen 4:10; Jer 10:22; cf. 1Ki 14:6). To sleep while the heart wakes signifies to dream, for sleep and distinct consciousness cannot be coexistent; the movements of thought either remain in obscurity or are projected as dreams. ער = ‛awir is formed from עוּר, to be awake (in its root cogn. to the Aryan gar, of like import in γρηγορεῖν, ἐγείρειν), in the same way as מת = mawith from מוּת. The שׁ has here the conj. sense of “dieweil” (because), like asher in Ecc 6:12; Ecc 8:15. The ר dag., which occurs several times elsewhere (vid., under Pro 3:8; Pro 14:10), is one of the inconsistencies of the system of punctuation, which in other instances does not double the ר; perhaps a relic of the Babylonian idiom, which was herein more accordant with the lingual nature of the r than the Tiberian, which treated it as a semi-guttural. קוצּה, a lock of hair, from קץ = קיץ, abscîdit, follows in the formation of the idea, the analogy of קציר, in the sense of branch, from קצר, desecuit; one so names a part which is removed without injury to the whole, and which presents itself conveniently for removal; cf. the oath sworn by Egyptian women, laḥajât muḳṣu̇si, “by the life of my separated,” i.e., “of my locks” (Lane, Egypt, etc., I 38). The word still survives in the Talmud dialect. Of a beautiful young man who proposed to become a Nazarite, Nedarim 9 a says the same as the Jer. Horajoth iii. 4 of a man who was a prostitute in Rome: his locks were arranged in separate masses, like heap upon heap; in Bereshith rabba c. lxv., under Gen 27:11, קוּץ, curly-haired, is placed over against קרח, bald-headed, and the Syr. also has ḳauṣoto as the designation of locks of hair-a word used by the Peshito as the rendering of the Heb. קוצּות, as the Syro-Hexap. Job 16:12, the Greek κόμη. טל, from טלל (Arab. ṭll, to moisten, viz., the ground; to squirt, viz., blood), is in Arabic drizzling rain, in Heb. dew; the drops of the night (רסיסי, from רסס, to sprinkle, to drizzle)According to the primary idea: to break that which is solid or fluid into little pieces, wherefore רסיסים means also broken pieces. To this root appertains also the Arab. rashh, to trickle through, to sweat through, II to moisten (e.g., the mouth of a suckling with milk), and the Aethiop. rasěḥa, to be stained. Drops scattered with a sprinkling brush the Arabs call rashaḥât; in the mystical writings, rashaḥât el-uns (dew-drops of intimacy) is the designation of sporadic gracious glances of the deity. are just drops of dew, for the precipitation of the damp air assumes this form in nights which are not so cold as to become frosty. Shulamith thus dreams that her beloved seeks admission to her. He comes a long way and at night. In the most tender words he entreats for that which he expects without delay. He addresses her, “my sister,” as one of equal rank with himself, and familiar as a sister with a brother; “my love” (רע), as one freely chosen by him to intimate fellowship; “my dove,” as beloved and prized by him on account of her purity, simplicity, and loveliness. The meaning of the fourth designation used by him, תּמּתי, is shown by the Arab. tam to be “wholly devoted,” whence teim, “one devoted” = a servant, and mutajjam, desperately in love with one. In addressing her tmty, he thus designates this love as wholly undivided, devoting itself without evasion and without reserve. But on this occasion this love did not approve itself, at least not at once.

Sol 5:3 3 I have put off my dress,    How shall I put it on again?    I have washed my feet,    How shall I defile them again?

She now lies unclothed in bed. כּתּנת is the χιτών worn next to the body, from כתן, linen (diff. from the Arab. ḳuṭun, cotton, whence French coton, calico = cotton-stuff). She had already washed her feet, from which it is supposed that she had throughout the day walked barefooted, - how (איככה, how? both times with the tone on the penult.;That it has the tone on the penult., like כּכה, e.g., Sol 5:9, is in conformity with the paragog. nature of .ה The tone, however, when the following word in close connection begins with ,א goes to the ult., Est 7:6. That this does not occur in איך אל, is explained from the circumstance that the word has the disjunctive Tifcha. But why not in איך אט? I think it is for the sake of the rhythm. Pinsker, Einl. p. 184, seeks to change the accentuation in order that the penult. accent might be on the second איך, but that is not necessary. Cf. Psa 137:7. cf. איכה, where ? Sol 1:7) should she again put on her dress, which she had already put off and laid aside (פּשׁט)? why should she soil (אטנּפם, relating to the fem. רגלי, for     אטנפן) again her feet, that had been washed clean? Shulamith is here brought back to the customs as well as to the home of her earlier rural life; but although she should thus have been enabled to reach a deeper and more lively consciousness of the grace of the king, who stoops to an equality with her, yet she does not meet his love with an equal requital. She is unwilling for his sake to put herself to trouble, or to do that which is disagreeable to her. It cannot be thought that such an interview actually took place; and yet what she here dreamed had not only inward reality, but also full reality. For in a dream, that which is natural to us or that which belongs to our very constitution becomes manifest, and much that is kept down during our waking hours by the power of the will, by a sense of propriety, and by the activities of life, comes to light during sleep; for fancy then stirs up the ground of our nature and brings it forth in dreams, and thus exposes us to ourselves in such a way as oftentimes, when we waken, to make us ashamed and alarmed. Thus it was with Shulamith. In the dream it was inwardly manifest that she had lost her first love. She relates it with sorrow; for scarcely had she rejected him with these unworthy deceitful pretences when she comes to herself again.

Sol 5:4 4 My beloved stretched his hand through the opening,    And my heart was moved for him. חוּר,Cf. the Arab. ghawr (ghôr), as a sinking of the earth, and khawr (khôr), as a breaking through, and, as it were, a piercing. The mouth of a river is also called khôr, because there the sea breaks into the riv. from the verb חוּר, in the sense of to break through (R. חר, whence also חרז, Sol 1:10, and חרם, Arab. kharam, part. broken through, e.g., of a lattice-window), signifies foramen, a hole, also caverna (whence the name of the Troglodytes, חרי, and the Haurân, חורן), here the loophole in the door above (like khawkht, the little door for the admission of individuals in the street or house-door). It does not properly mean a window, but a part of the door pierced through at the upper part of the lock of the door (the door-bolt). מן־החור is understood from the standpoint of one who is within; “by the opening from without to within,” thus “through the opening;” stretching his hand through the door-opening as if to open the door, if possible, by the pressing back of the lock from within, he shows how greatly he longed after Shulamith. And she was again very deeply moved when she perceived this longing, which she had so coldly responded to: the interior of her body, with the organs which, after the bibl. idea, are the seat of the tenderest emotions, or rather, in which they reflect themselves, both such as are agreeable and such as are sorrowful, groaned within her, - an expression of deep sympathy so common, that “the sounding of the bowels,” Isa 63:15, an expression used, and that anthropopathically of God Himself, is a direct designation of sympathy or inner participation. The phrase here wavers between עליו and עלי (thus, e.g., Nissel, 1662). Both forms are admissible. It is true we say elsewhere only naphshi 'ālai, ruhi 'ālai, libbi 'ālai, for the Ego distinguishes itself from its substance (cf. System d. bibl. Psychologie, p. 151f.); meai 'alai, instead of bi (בּקרבּ), would, however, be also explained from this, that the bowels are meant, not anatomically, but as psychical organs. But the old translators (lxx, Targ., Syr., Jerome, Venet.) rendered עליו, which rests on later MS authority (vid., Norzi, and de Rossi), and is also more appropriate: her bowels are stirred, viz., over him, i.e., on account of him (Alkabez: בעבורו). As she will now open to him, she is inwardly more ashamed, as he has come so full of love and longing to make her glad.

Sol 5:5 5 I arose to open to my beloved,    And my hands dropped with myrrh,    And my fingers with liquid myrrh,    On the handle of the bolt.

The personal pron. אני stands without emphasis before the verb which already contains it; the common language of the people delights in such particularity. The Book of Hosea, the Ephraimite prophet’s work, is marked by such a style. עבר מור, with which the parallel clause goes beyond the simple mōr, is myrrh flowing over, dropping out of itself, i.e., that which breaks through the bark of the balsamodendron myrrha, or which flows out if an incision is made in it; myrrha stacte, of which Pliny (xii. 35) says: cui nulla praefertur, otherwise דּרור מר, from דּרר, to gush out, to pour itself forth in rich jets. He has come perfumed as if for a festival, and the costly ointment which he brought with him has dropped on the handles of the bolts (מנעוּל, keeping locked, after the form מלבּוּשׁ, drawing on), viz., the inner bolt, which he wished to withdraw. A classical parallel is found in Lucretius, iv. 1171:“At lacrimans exclusus amator limina saepe Floribus et sertis operit postesque superbos Unguit amaracino” ...

Böttch. here puts to Hitzig the question, “Did the shepherd, the peasant of Engedi, bring with him oil of myrrh?” Rejecting this reasonable explanation, he supposes that the Shulamitess, still in Solomon’s care, on rising up quickly dipped her hand in the oil of myrrh, that she might refresh her beloved. She thus had it near her before her bed, as a sick person her decoction. The right answer was, that the visitant by night is not that imaginary personage, but it is Solomon. She had dreamed that he stood before her door and knocked. But finding no response, he again in a moment withdrew, when it was proved that Shulamith did not requite his love and come forth to meet it in its fulness as she ought.

Sol 5:6 6 I opened to my beloved;    And my beloved had withdrawn, was gone:    My soul departed when he spake -    I sought him, and found him not;    I called him, and he answered me not.

As the disciples at Emmaus, when the Lord had vanished from the midst of them, said to one another: Did not our heart burn within us when He spake with us? so Shulamith says that when he spake, i.e., sought admission to her, she was filled with alarm, and almost terrified to death.

Love-ecstasy (ἐκστῆναι, as contrast to γενέσθαι ἐν ἑαυτῷ) is not here understood, for in such a state she would have flown to meet him; but a sinking of the soul, such as is described by Terence (And. I 5. 16):“Oratio haec me miseram exanimavit metu.”

The voice of her beloved struck her heart; but in the consciousness that she had estranged herself from him, she could not openly meet him and offer empty excuses. But now she recognises it with sorrow that she had not replied to the deep impression of his loving words; and seeing him disappear without finding him, she calls after him whom she had slighted, but he answers her not. The words: “My soul departed when he spake,” are the reason why she now sought him and called upon him, and they are not a supplementary remark (Zöckl.); nor is there need for the correction of the text בּדברו, which should mean: (my soul departed) when he turned his back (Ewald), or, behind him (Hitz., Böttch.), from דּבר = (Arab.) dabara, tergum vertere, praeterire, - the Heb. has the word דּביר, the hinder part, and as it appears, דּבּר, to act from behind (treacherously) and destroy, 2Ch 22:10; cf. under Gen 34:13, but not the Kal דּבר, in that Arab. signification. The meaning of חמק has been hit upon by Aquila (ἔκλινεν), Symmachus (ἀπονεύσας), and Jerome (declinaverat); it signifies to turn aside, to take a different direction, as the Hithpa. Jer 31:22 : to turn oneself away; cf. חמּוּקים, turnings, bendings, Sol 7:2. חבק and אבק (cf. Gen 32:25), Aethiop. ḥaḳafa, Amhar. aḳafa (reminding us of נקץ, Hiph. הקּיף), are usually compared; all of these, however, signify to “encompass;” but חמק does not denote a moving in a circle after something, but a half circular motion away from something; so that in the Arab. the prevailing reference to fools, aḥamḳ, does not appear to proceed from the idea of closeness, but of the oblique direction, pushed sideways. Turning himself away, he proceeded farther. In vain she sought him; she called without receiving any answer. ענני is the correct pausal form of ענני, vid., under Psa 118:5. But something worse than even this seeking and calling in vain happened to her.

Sol 5:7 7 The watchmen who go about in the city found me,    They beat me, wounded me;    My upper garment took away from me,    The watchmen of the walls.

She sought her beloved, not “in the midbar” (open field), nor “in the kepharim” (villages), but בעיר, “in the city,” - a circumstance which is fatal to the shepherd-hypothesis here, as in the other dream. There in the city she is found by the watchmen who patrol the city, and have their proper posts on the walls to watch those who approach the city and depart from it (cf. Isa 62:6). These rough, regardless men, - her story returns at the close like a palindrome to those previously named, - who judge only according to that which is external, and have neither an eye nor a heart for the sorrow of a loving soul, struck (הכה, from נכה, to pierce, hit, strike) and wounded (פּצע, R. פץ, to divide, to inflict wounds in the flesh) the royal spouse as a common woman, and so treated her, that, in order to escape being made a prisoner, she was constrained to leave her upper robe in their hands (Gen 39:12). This upper robe, not the veil which at Sol 4:1, Sol 4:3 we found was called tsammā, is called רדיד. Aben Ezra compares with it the Arab. ridâ, a plaid-like over-garment, which was thrown over the shoulders and veiled the upper parts of the body. But the words have not the same derivation. The ridâ has its name from its reaching downward, - probably from the circumstance that, originally, it hung down to the feet, so that one could tread on it; but the (Heb.) redid (in Syr. the dalmatica of the deacons), from רדד, Hiph., 1Ki 6:32, Targ., Talm., Syr., רדד, to make broad and thin, as expansum, i.e., a thin and light upper robe, viz., over the cuttoněth, 3a. The lxx suitably translates it here and at Gen 24:65 (hatstsaiph, from tsa'aph, to lay together, to fold, to make double or many-fold) by θέριστρον, a summer overdress. A modern painter, who represents Shulamith as stripped naked by the watchmen, follows his own sensual taste, without being able to distinguish between tunica and pallium; for neither Luther, who renders by schleier (veil), nor Jerome, who has pallium (cf. the saying of Plautus: tunica propior pallio est), gives any countenance to such a freak of imagination. The city watchmen tore from off her the upper garment, without knowing and without caring to know what might be the motive and the aim of this her nocturnal walk.

Sol 5:8

All this Shulamith dreamed; but the painful feeling of repentance, of separation and misapprehension, which the dream left behind, entered as deeply into her soul as if it had been an actual external experience. Therefore she besought the daughters of Jerusalem: 8 I adjure you, ye daughters of Jerusalem,    If ye find my beloved, -    What shall ye then say to him?    “That I am sick of love.”

That אם is here not to be interpreted as the negative particle of adjuration (Böttch.), as at Sol 2:7; Sol 3:5, at once appears from the absurdity arising from such an interpretation. The or. directa, following “I adjure you,” can also begin (Num 5:19.) with the usual אם, which is followed by its conclusion. Instead of “that ye say to him I am sick of love,” she asks the question: What shall ye say to him: and adds the answer: quod aegra sum amore, or, as Jerome rightly renders, in conformity with the root-idea of חלה: quia amore langueo; while, on the other hand, the lxx: ὃτι τετροομένη (saucia) ἀγάπης ἐγώ εἰμι, as if the word were חללת, from חלל. The question proposed, with its answer, inculcates in a naive manner that which is to be said, as one examines beforehand a child who has to order something. She turns to the daughters of Jerusalem, because she can presuppose in them, in contrast with those cruel watchmen, a sympathy with her love-sorrow, on the ground of their having had similar experiences. They were also witnesses of the origin of this covenant of love, and graced the marriage festival by their sympathetic love.

Sol 5:9

When, therefore, they put to her the question: 9 What is thy beloved before another (beloved),    Thou fairest of women?    What is thy beloved before another (beloved),    That thou dost adjure us thus? the question thus asked cannot proceed from ignorance; it can only have the object of giving them the opportunity of hearing from Shulamith’s own mouth and heart her laudatory description of him, whom they also loved, although they were not deemed worthy to stand so near to him as she did who was thus questioned. Böttch. and Ewald, secs. 325 a, 326 a, interpret the מן in מדּור partitively: quid amati (as in Cicero: quod hominis) amatus tuus; but then the words would have been מה־מדוד דודך, if such a phrase were admissible; for מה־דוד certainly of itself alone means quid amati, what kind of a beloved. Thus the מן is the comparative (prae amato), and דּוד the sing., representing the idea of species or kind; מדּודים, here easily misunderstood, is purposely avoided. The use of the form השׁבעתנו for השׁבעתּינו is one of the many instances of the disregard of the generic distinction occurring in this Song, which purposely, after the manner of the vulgar language, ignores pedantic regularity.

Sol 5:10

Hereupon Shulamith describes to them who ask what her beloved is. He is the fairest of men. Everything that is glorious in the kingdom of nature, and, so far as her look extends, everything in the sphere of art, she appropriates, so as to present a picture of his external appearance. Whatever is precious, lovely, and grand, is all combined in the living beauty of his person.Hengstenberg finds in this eulogium, on the supposition that Solomon is the author, and is the person who is here described, incomprehensible self-praise. But he does not certainly say all this immediately of himself, but puts it into the mouth of Shulamith, whose love he gained. But love idealizes; she sees him whom she loves, not as others see him, - she sees him in her own transforming light.

She first praises the mingling of colours in the countenance of her beloved. 10 My beloved is dazzling white and ruddy,      Distinguised above ten thousand.

The verbal root צח has the primary idea of purity, i.e., freedom from disturbance and muddiness, which, in the stems springing from it, and in their manifold uses, is transferred to undisturbed health (Arab. ṣaḥḥ, cf. baria, of smoothness of the skin), a temperate stomach and clear head, but particularly to the clearness and sunny brightness of the heavens, to dazzling whiteness (צחח, Lam 4:7; cf. צחר), and then to parched dryness, resulting from the intense and continued rays of the sun; צח is here adj. from צחח, Lam 4:7, bearing almost the same relation to לבן as λαμπρός to λευκός, cogn. with lucere. אדום, R. דם, to condense, is properly dark-red, called by the Turks kuju kirmesi (from kuju, thick, close, dark), by the French rouge foncé, of the same root as דּם, the name for blood, or a thick and dark fluid. White, and indeed a dazzling white, is the colour of his flesh, and redness, deep redness, the colour of his blood tinging his flesh. Whiteness among all the race-colours is the one which best accords with the dignity of man; pure delicate whiteness is among the Caucasian races a mark of high rank, of superior training, of hereditary nobility; wherefore, Lam 4:7, the appearance of the nobles of Jerusalem is likened in whiteness to snow and milk, in redness to corals; and Homer, Il. iv. 141, says of Menelaus that he appeared stained with gore, “as when some woman tinges ivory with purple colour.” In this mingling of white and red, this fulness of life and beauty, he is דּגוּל, distinguished above myriads. The old translators render dagul by “chosen” (Aquila, Symm., Syr., Jerome, Luther), the lxx by ἐκλελοχισμένος, e cohorte selectus; but it means “bannered” (degel, Sol 2:4), as the Venet.: σεσημαιωμένος, i.e., thus distinguished, as that which is furnished with a degel, a banner, a pennon. Grätz takes dagul as the Greek σημειωτός (noted). With רבבן, as a designation of an inconceivable number, Rashi rightly compares Eze 16:7. Since the “ten thousand” are here though of, not in the same manner as דגולים, the particle min is not the compar. magis quam, but, as at Gen 3:14; Jdg 5:24; Isa 52:14, prae, making conspicuous (cf. Virgil, Aen. v. 435, prae omnibus unum). After this praise of the bright blooming countenance, which in general distinguished the personal appearance of her beloved, so far as it was directly visible, there now follows a detailed description, beginning with his head.

Sol 5:11 11 His head is precious fine gold,      His locks hill upon hill,      Black as the raven.

The word-connection פּז כּתם, occurring only here, serves as a designation of the very finest pure gold; for כּתם (hiding, then that which is hidden), from כתם, R. כת (vid., concerning the words appertaining to this root, under Psa 87:6), is the name of fine gold, which was guarded as a jewel (cf. Pro 25:12), and פּז (with long ā), is pure gold freed from inferior metals, from פּזז, to set free, and generally violently to free (cf. zahav muphaz, 1Ki 10:18, with zahav tahor, 2Ch 9:17). The Targ. to the Hagiog. translate פז by אובריזא (e.g., Psa 119:127), or אובריזין (e.g., Psa 19:11), ὄβρυζον, i.e., gold which has stood the fire-proof (obrussa) of the cupel or the crucible. Grammatically regarded, the word-connection kethem paz is not genit., like kethem ophir, but appositional, like narrah bethulah, Deu 22:28, zevahim shelamim, Exo 24:5, etc. The point of comparison is the imposing nobility of the fine form and noble carriage of his head. In the description of the locks of his hair the lxx render תלתלים by ἐλάται, Jerome by sicut elatae palmarum, like the young twigs, the young shoots of the palm. Ewald regards it as a harder parall. form of זלזלּים, Isa 18:5, vine-branches; and Hitzig compares the Thousand and One Nights, iii. 180, where the loose hair of a maiden is likened to twisted clusters of grapes. The possibility of this meaning is indisputable, although (Arab.) taltalat, a drinking-vessel made of the inner bark of palm-branches, is named, not from taltalah, as the name of the palm-branch, but from taltala, to shake down, viz., in the throat. The palm-branch, or the vine-branch, would be named from תּלתּל, pendulum esse, to hang loosely and with a wavering motion, the freq. of תּלה, pendere. The Syr. also think on תלה, for it translates “spread out,” i.e., a waving downward; and the Venet., which translates by ἀπαιωρήματα. The point of comparison would be the freshness and flexibility of the abundant long hair of the head, in contrast to motionless close-lying smoothness. One may think of Jupiter, who, when he shakes his head, moves heaven and earth. But, as against this, we have the fact: (1) That the language has other names for palm-branches and vine-branches; the former are called in the Sol 7:9, sansinnim. (2) That תלתלים, immediately referred to the hair, but not in the sense of “hanging locks” (Böttch.), is still in use in the post-bibl. Heb. (vid., under Sol 5:2); the Targ. also, in translating דּגוּרין דּגורין, cumuli cumuli, thinks תלתלים = תּלּין תּלּין, Menachoth 29 b. A hill is called תל, (Arab.) tall, from טלל, prosternere, to throw along, as of earth thrown out, sand, or rubbish; and תּלתּל, after the form גּלגּל, in use probably only in the plur., is a hilly country which rises like steps, or presents an undulating appearance. Seen fro his neck upwards, his hair forms in undulating lines, hill upon hill. In colour, these locks of hair are black as a raven, which bears the Semitic name עורב from its blackness (ערב), but in India is called kârava from its croaking. The raven-blackness of the hair contrasts with the whiteness and redness of the countenance, which shines forth as from a dark ground, from a black border. The eyes are next described.

Sol 5:12 12 His eyes like doves by the water-brooks,      Bathing in milk, stones beautifully set

The eyes in their glancing moistness (cf. ὑγρότης τῶν ὀμμάτων, in Plutarch, of a languishing look), and in the movement of their pupils, are like doves which sip at the water-brooks, and move to and fro beside them. אפיק, from אפק, continere, is a watercourse, and then also the water itself flowing in it (vid., under Psa 18:16), as (Arab.) wadin, a valley, and then the river flowing in the valley, bahr, the sea-basin (properly the cleft), and then also the sea itself. The pred. “bathing” refers to the eyes (cf. Sol 4:9), not to the doves, if this figure is continued. The pupils of the eyes, thus compared with doves, seem as if bathing in milk, in that they swim, as it were, in the white in the eye. But it is a question whether the figure of the doves is continued also in ישׁבות על־מלּאת. It would be the case of milleth meant “fulness of water,” as it is understood, after the example of the lxx, also by Aquila (ἐκχύσεις). Jerome (fluenta plenissima), and the Arab. (piscinas aqua refertas); among the moderns, by Döpke, Gesen., Hengst., and others. But this pred. would then bring nothing new to Sol 5:12; and although in the Syr. derivatives from melā' signify flood and high waters, yet the form milleth does not seem, especially without מים, to be capable of bearing this signification. Luther’s translation also, although in substance correct: und stehen in der fülle (and stand in fulness) (milleth, like שׁלמותא of the Syr., πληρώσεως of the Gr. Venet., still defended by Hitz.), yet does not bring out the full force of milleth, which, after the analogy of כּסּא, רצפה, appears to have a concrete signification which is seen from a comparison of Exo 25:7; Exo 27:17, Exo 27:20; Exo 39:13. There מלּאה and מלּאים signify not the border with precious stones, but, as rightly maintained by Keil, against Knobel, their filling in, i.e., their bordering, setting. Accordingly, milleth will be a synon. technical expression: the description, passing from the figure of the dove, says further of the eyes, that they are firm on (in) their setting; על is suitable, for the precious stone is laid within the casket in which it is contained. Hitzig has, on the contrary, objected that מלאת and מלאים denote filling up, and thus that milleth cannot be a filling up, and still less the place thereof. But as in the Talm. מוּליתא signifies not only fulness, but also stuffed fowls or pies, and as πλήρωμα in its manifold aspects is used not only of that with which anything is filled, but also of that which is filled (e.g., of a ship that is manned, and Eph 1:23 of the church in which Christ, as in His body, is immanent), - thus also milleth, like the German “Fassung,” may be used of a ring-casket (funda or pala) in which the precious stone is put. That the eyes are like a precious stone in its casket, does not merely signify that they fill the sockets, - for the bulbus of the eye in every one fills the orbita, - but that they are not sunk like the eyes of one who is sick, which fall back on their supporting edges in the orbita, and that they appear full and large as they press forward from wide and open eyelids. The cheeks are next described.

Sol 5:13 13 a His cheeks like a bed of sweet herbs,        Towers of spicy plants.

A flower-bed is called ערוּגה, from ערג, to be oblique, inclined. His cheeks are like such a soft raised bed, and the impression their appearance makes is like the fragrance which flows from such a bed planted with sweet-scented flowers. Migedaloth are the tower-like or pyramidal mounds, and merkahhim are the plants used in spicery. The point of comparison here is thus the soft elevation; perhaps with reference to the mingling of colours, but the word chosen (merkahhim) rather refers to the lovely, attractive, heart-refreshing character of the impression. The Venet., keeping close to the existing text: αἱ σιαγόνες αὐτοῦ ὡς πρασιὰ τοῦ ἀρώματος πύργοι ἀρωματισμῶν (thus not a̓ρωματιστῶν] according to Gebhardt’s just conjecture). But is the punctuation here correct? The sing. כערוגת is explained from this, that the bed is presented as sloping from its height downward on two parallel sides; but the height would then be the nose dividing the face, and the plur. would thus be more suitable; and the lxx, Symm., and other ancient translators have, in fact, read כערוגת. But still less is the phrase migdeloth merkahhim to be comprehended; for a tower, however diminutive it may be, it not a proper figure for a soft elevation, nor even a graduated flowery walk, or a terraced flowery hill, - a tower always presents, however round one may conceive it, too much the idea of a natural chubbiness, or of a diseased tumour. Therefore the expression used by the lxx, φύουσαι μυρεψικά, i.e., מרק' מהדּלות, commends itself. Thus also Jerome: sicut areolae aromatum consitae a pigmentariis, and the Targ. (which refers לחיים allegorically to the לוּחי of the law, and merkahhim to the refinements of the Halacha): “like the rows of a garden of aromatic plants which produce (gignentes) deep, penetrating sciences, even as a (magnificent) garden, aromatic plants.” Since we read מגדּלות כערוגת, we do not refer migadloth, as Hitzig, who retains כערוגת, to the cheeks, although their name, like that of the other members (e.g., the ear, hand, foot), may be fem. (Böttch. §649), but to the beds of spices; but in this carrying forward of the figure we find, as he does, a reference to the beard and down on the cheeks. גּדּל is used of suffering the hair to grow, Num 6:5, as well as of cultivating plants; and it is a similar figure when Pindar, Nem. v. 11, compares the milk-hair of a young man to the fine woolly down of the expanding vine-leaves (vid., Passow). In merkahhim there scarcely lies anything further than that this flos juventae on the blooming cheeks gives the impression of the young shoots of aromatic plants; at all events, the merkahhim, even although we refer this feature in the figure to the fragrance of the unguents on the beard, are not the perfumes themselves, to which megadloth is not appropriate, but fragrant plants, so that in the first instance the growth of the beard is in view with the impression of its natural beauty. 13 b His lips lilies,        Dropping with liquid myrrh.

Lilies, viz., red lilies (vid., under Sol 2:1), unless the point of comparison is merely loveliness associated with dignity. She thinks of the lips as speaking. All that comes forth from them, the breath in itself, and the breath formed into words, is עבר מור, most precious myrrh, viz., such as of itself wells forth from the bark of the balsamodendron. עבר, the running over of the eyes (cf. myrrha in lacrimis, the most highly esteemed sort, as distinguished from myrrha in granis), with which Dillmann combines the Aethiop. name for myrrh, karbê (vid., under Song  Num 5:5).

Sol 5:14 14 a His hands golden cylinders,        Filled in with stones of Tarshish.

The figure, according to Gesen., Heb. Wörterbuch, and literally also Heilgst., is derived from the closed hand, and the stained nails are compared to precious stones. both statements are incorrect; for (1) although it is true that then Israelitish women, as at the present day Egyptian and Arabian women, stained their eyes with stibium (vid., under Isa 54:11), yet it is nowhere shown that they, and particularly men, stained the nails of their feet and their toes with the orange-yellow of the Alhenna (Lane'sEgypt, I 33-35); and (2) the word used is not כּפּיו, but ידיו; it is thus the outstretched hands that are meant; and only these, not the closed fist, could be compared to “lilies,” for גּליל signifies not a ring (Cocc., Döpke, Böttch., etc.), but that which is rolled up, a roller, cylinder (Est 1:6), from גּלל, which properly means not κυκλοῦν (Venet., after Gebhardt: κεκυκλωμέναι), but κυλίνδειν. The hands thus are meant in respect of the fingers, which on account of their noble and fine form, their full, round, fleshy mould, are compared to bars of gold formed like rollers, garnished (ממלּאים, like מלּא, Exo 28:17) with stones of Tarshish, to which the nails are likened. The transparent horn-plates of the nails, with the lunula, the white segment of a circle at their roots, are certainly, when they are beautiful, an ornament to the hand, and, without our needing to think of their being stained, are worthily compared to the gold-yellow topaz. Tarshish is not the onyx, which derives its Heb. name שׁהם from its likeness to the finger-nail, but the χρυσόλιθος, by which the word in this passage before us is translated by the Quinta and the Sexta, and elsewhere also by the lxx and Aquila. But the chrysolite is the precious stone which is now called the topaz. It receives the name Tarshish from Spain, the place where it was found. Pliny, xxxviii. 42, describes it as aureo fulgore tralucens. Bredow erroneously interprets Tarshish of amber. There is a kind of chrysolite, indeed, which is called chryselectron, because in colorem electri declinans. The comparison of the nails to such a precious stone (Luther, influenced by the consonance, and apparently warranted by the plena hyacinthis of the Vulg., has substituted golden rings, vol Türkissen, whose blue-green colour is not suitable here), in spite of Hengst., who finds it insipid, is as true to nature as it is tender and pleasing. The description now proceeds from the uncovered to the covered parts of his body, the whiteness of which is compared to ivory and marble. 14 b His body an ivory work of art,        Covered with sapphires.

The plur. מעים or מעים, from מעה or מעי (vid., under Psa 40:9), signifies properly the tender parts, and that the inward parts of the body, but is here, like the Chald. מעין, Dan 2:32, and the בּטן, Sol 7:3, which also properly signifies the inner part of the body, κοιλία, transferred to the body in its outward appearance. To the question how Shulamith should in such a manner praise that which is for the most part covered with clothing, it is not only to be answered that it is the poet who speaks by her mouth, but also that it is not the bride or the beloved, but the wife, whom he represents as thus speaking. עשׁת (from the peculiar Hebraeo-Chald. and Targ. עשׁת, which, after Jer 5:28, like ḳhalak, creare, appears to proceed from the fundamental idea of smoothing) designates an artistic figure. Such a figure was Solomon’s throne, made of שׁן, the teeth of elephants, ivory,Ivory is fully designated by the name שׁנהבּים, Lat. ebur, from the Aegypt. ebu, the Aegypto-Indian ibha, elephant. 1Ki 10:18. Here Solomon’s own person, without reference to a definite admired work of art, is praised as being like an artistic figure made of ivory, - like it in regard to its glancing smoothness and its fine symmetrical form. When, now, this word of art is described as covered with sapphires (מעלּפת, referred to עשׁת, as apparently gramm., or as ideal, fem.), a sapphire-coloured robe is not meant (Hitzig, Ginsburg); for עלף, which only means to disguise, would not at all be used of such a robe (Gen 38:14; cf. Gen 24:65), nor would the one uniform colour of the robe be designated by sapphires in the plur. The choice of the verb עלף (elsewhere used of veiling) indicates a covering shading the pure white, and in connection with ספּירים, thought of as accus., a moderating of the bright glance by a soft blue. For ספיר (a genuine Semit. word, like the Chald. שׁפּיר; cf. regarding ספר = שׁפר, under Psa 16:6) is the sky-blue sapphire (Exo 24:10), including the Lasurstein (lapis lazuli), sprinkled with golden, or rather with gold-like glistening points of pyrites, from which, with the l omitted, sky-blue is called azur (azure) (vid., under Job 28:6). The word of art formed of ivory is quite covered over with sapphires fixed in it. That which is here compared is nothing else than the branching blue veins under the white skin.

Sol 5:15 15 a His legs white marble columns,        Set on bases of fine gold.

If the beauty of the living must be represented, not by colours, but in figurative language, this cannot otherwise be done than by the selection of minerals, plants, and things in general for the comparison, and the comparison must more or less come short, because dead soulless matter does not reach to a just and full representation of the living. Thus here, also, the description of the lower extremity, which reaches from the thighs and the legs down to the feet, of which last, in the words of an anatomist,Hyrtl’s Lehrbuch der Anat. des Menschen, sec. 155. it may be said that “they form the pedestal for the bony pillars of the legs.” The comparison is thus in accordance with fact; the שׁוקים (from שוק = Arab. saḳ, to drive: the movers forward), in the structure of the human frame, take in reality the place of “pillars,” and the feet the place of “pedestals,” as in the tabernacle the wooden pillars rested on small supports in which they were fastened, Exo 26:18. But in point of fidelity to nature, the symbol is inferior to a rigid Egyptian figure. Not only is it without life; it is not even capable of expressing the curvilinear shape which belongs to the living. On the other hand, it loses itself in symbol; for although it is in conformity with nature that the legs are compared to pillars of white (according to Aquila and Theod., Parian) marble, - שׁשׁ = שׁישׁ,   1Ch 29:2 (material for the building of the temple), Talm. מרמרא, of the same verbal root as שׁוּשׁן, the name of the white lily, - the comparison of the feet to bases of fine gold is yet purely symbolical. Gold is a figure of that which is sublime and noble, and with white marble represents greatness combined with purity. He who is here praised is not a shepherd, but a king. The comparisons are thus so grand because the beauty of the beloved is in itself heightened by his kingly dignity.Dillmann proposes the question, the answer to which he desiderates in Ewald, how the maiden could be so fluent in speaking of the new glories of the Solomonic era (plants and productions of art). Böttcher answers, that she had learned to know these whilst detained at court, and that the whole description has this ground-thought, that she possessed in her beloved all the splendour which the women of the harem value and enjoy. But already the first words of the description, “white and ruddy,” exclude the sunburnt shepherd. To refer the gold, in the figurative description of the uncovered parts of the body, to this bronze colour is insipid. 15 b His aspect like Lebanon,        Distinguised as the cedars.

By בּחוּר the Chald. thinks of “a young man” (from בּחר = בּגר, to be matured, as at Psa 89:20); but in that case we should have expected the word כּארז instead of כּארזים. Luther, with all other translators, rightly renders “chosen as the cedars.” His look, i.e., his appearance as a whole, is awe-inspiring, majestic, like Lebanon, the king of mountains; he (the praised one) is chosen, i.e., presents a rare aspect, rising high above the common man, like the cedars, those kings among trees, which as special witnesses of creative omnipotence are called “cedars of God,” Psa 80:11 [10]. בּחוּר, electus, everywhere else an attribute of persons, does not here refer to the look, but to him whose the look is; and what it means in union with the cedars is seen from Jer 22:7; cf. Isa 37:24. Here also it is seen (what besides is manifest), that the fairest of the children of men is a king. In conclusion, the description returns from elevation of rank to loveliness.

Sol 5:16 16 a His palate is sweets (sweetnesses),        And he is altogether precious (lovelinesses).

The palate, חך, is frequently named as the organ of speech, Job 6:30; Job 31:30; Pro 5:3; Pro 8:7; and it is also here used in this sense. The meaning, “the mouth for kissing,” which Böttch. gives to the word, is fanciful; חך (= ḥnk, Arab. ḥanak) is the inner palate and the region of the throat, with the uvula underneath the chin. Partly with reference to his words, his lips have been already praised, 13 b; but there the fragrance of his breath came into consideration, his breath both in itself and as serving for the formation of articulate words. But the naming of the palate can point to nothing else than his words. With this the description comes to a conclusion; for, from the speech, the most distinct and immediate expression of the personality, advance is made finally to the praise of the person. The pluraliatant. ממתּקּים and מחמדּים designate what they mention in richest fulness. His palate, i.e., that which he speaks and the manner in which he speaks it, is true sweetness (cf. Pro 16:21; Psa 55:15), and his whole being true loveliness. With justifiable pride Shulamith next says: 16 b This is my beloved and this my friend,        Ye daughters of Jerusalem!

The emphatically repeated “this” is here pred. (Luth. “such an one is” ...); on the other hand, it is subj. at Exo 3:15 (Luth.: “that is” ...).

The Love of Christ to the Church.

1 I am come into my garden, my sister, my spouse: 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, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved.

These words are Christ's answer to the church's prayer in the close of the foregoing chapter, Let my beloved come into his garden; here he has come, and lets her know it. See how ready God is to hear prayer, how ready Christ is to accept the invitations that his people give him, though we are backward to hear his calls and accept his invitations. He is free in condescending to us, while we are shy of ascending to him. Observe how the return answered the request, and outdid it. 1. She called him her beloved (and really he was so), and invited him because she loved him; in return to this, he called her his sister and spouse, as several times before, ch. iv. Those that make Christ their best beloved shall be owned by him in the nearest and dearest relations. 2. She called the garden his, and the pleasant fruits of it his, and he acknowledges them to be so: It is my garden, it is my spice. When God was displeased with Israel he turned them off to Moses (They are thy people, Exod. xxxii. 7); and he called the appointed feasts of the Lord their appointed feasts (Isa. i. 14); but now that they are in his favour he owns them for his garden. "Though of small account, yet it is mine." Those that are in sincerity give up themselves and all they have and can do to Jesus Christ, he will do them the honour to stamp them, and what they have and do for him, with his own mark, and say, It is mine. 3. She invited him to come into his garden, and he says, I have come. Isa. lviii. 9, Thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am. When Solomon prayed that God would come and take possession of the house he had built for him, he did come; his glory filled the house (2 Chron. vii. 2), and (v. 16) he let him know that he had chosen and sanctified this house, that his name might be there for ever. Those that throw open the door of their souls to Jesus Christ shall find him ready to come in to them; and in every place where he records his name he will meet his people, and bless them, Exod. xx. 24. 4. She desired him to eat his pleasant fruits, to accept of the sacrifices offered in his temple, which were as the fruits of his garden, and he does so, but finds they are not gathered and ready for eating, therefore he does himself gather them. As the fruits are his, so is the preparation of them; he finds his heart unready for his entertainment, but does himself draw out into exercise those gracious habits which he had planted there. What little good there is in us would be shed and lost if he did not gather it, and preserve it to himself. 5. She only desired him to eat the fruits of the garden, but he brought along with him something more, honey, and wine, and milk, which yield substantial nourishment, and which were the products of Canaan, Immanuel's land. Christ delights himself greatly in that which he has both conferred upon his people and wrought in them. Or we may suppose this to have been prepared by the spouse herself, as Esther prepared for the king her husband a banquet of wine; it is but plain fare, and what is natural, honey and milk, but, being kindly designed, it is kindly accepted; imperfections are overlooked; the honey-comb is eaten with the honey, and the weakness of the flesh passed by and pardoned, because the spirit is willing. When Christ appeared to his disciples after his resurrection he did eat with them a piece of a honey-comb (Luke xxiv. 42, 43), in which this scripture was fulfilled. He did not drink the wine only, which is liquor for men, for great men, but the milk too, which is liquor for children, little children, for he was to be the holy child Jesus, that had need of milk. 6. She only invited him to come himself, but he, bringing his own entertainment along with him, brings his friends too, and invites them to share in the provisions. The more the merrier, we say; and here, where there was so great a plenty, there was not the worse fare. When our Lord Jesus fed 5000 at once they did all eat and were filled. Christ invites all his friends to the wine and milk which he himself drinks of (Isa. lv. 1), to the feast of fat things and wines on the lees, Isa. xxv. 6. The great work of man's redemption, and the riches of the covenant of grace, are a feast to the Lord Jesus and they ought to be so to us. The invitation is very free, and hearty, and loving: Eat, O friends! If Christ comes to sup with us, it is we that sup with him, Rev. iii. 20. Eat, O friends! Those only that are Christ's friends are welcome to his table; his enemies, that will not have him to reign over them, have no part nor lot in the matter. Drink, yea, drink abundantly. Christ, in his gospel, has made plentiful provision for poor souls. He fills the hungry with good things; there is enough for all, there is enough for each; we are not straitened in him or in his grace, let us not therefore be straitened in our own bosoms. Open the mouth widely, and Christ will fill it. Be not drunk with wine, but be filled with the Spirit, Eph. v. 18. Those that entertain Christ must bid his friends welcome with him; Jesus and his disciples were called together to the marriage (John ii. 2), and Christ will have all his friends to rejoice with him in the day of his espousals to his church, and, in token of that, to feast with him. In spiritual and heavenly joys there is no danger of exceeding; there we may drink abundantly, drink of the river of God's pleasures (Ps. xxxvi. 8), and be abundantly satisfied, Ps. lxv. 4.

The Love of Christ to the Church; Spiritual Desertion.

2 I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night. 3 I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them? 4 My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him. 5 I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers with sweet smelling myrrh, upon the handles of the lock. 6 I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer. 7 The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me. 8 I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved, that ye tell him, that I am sick of love.

In this song of loves and joys we have here a very melancholy scene; the spouse here speaks, not to her beloved (as before, for he has withdrawn), but of him, and it is a sad story she tells of her own folly and ill conduct towards him, notwithstanding his kindness, and of the just rebukes she fell under for it. Perhaps it may refer to Solomon's own apostasy from God, and the sad effects of that apostasy after God had come into his garden, had taken possession of the temple he had built, and he had feasted with God upon the sacrifices (v. 1); however, it is applicable to the too common case both of the churches and particular believers, who by their carelessness and security provoke Christ to withdraw from them. Observe,

I. The indisposition that the spouse was under, and the listlessness that had seized her (v. 2): I sleep, but my heart wakes. Here is, 1. Corruption appearing in the actings of it: I sleep. The wise virgins slumbered. She was on her bed (ch. iii. 1), but now she sleeps. Spiritual distempers, if not striven against at first, are apt to grow upon us and to get ground. She slept, that is, pious affections cooled, she neglected her duty and grew remiss in it, she indulged herself in her ease, was secure and off her watch. This is sometimes the bad effect of more than ordinary enlargements—a good cause. St. Paul himself was in danger of being puffed up with abundant revelations, and of saying, Soul, take thy ease, which made a thorn in the flesh necessary for him, to keep him from sleeping. Christ's disciples, when he had come into his garden, the garden of his agony, were heavy with sleep, and could not watch with him. True Christians are not always alike lively and vigorous in religion. 2. Grace remaining, notwithstanding, in the habit of it: "My heart wakes; my own conscience reproaches me for it, and ceases not to rouse me out of my sluggishness. The spirit is willing, and, after the inner man, I delight in the law of God, and with my mind I serve that. I am, for the present, overpowered by temptation, but all does not go one way in me. I sleep, but it is not a dead sleep; I strive against it; it is not a sound sleep; I cannot be easy under this indisposition." Note, (1.) We ought to take notice of our own spiritual slumbers and distempers, and to reflect upon it with sorrow and shame that we have fallen asleep when Christ has been nigh us in his garden. (2.) When we are lamenting what is amiss in us, we must not overlook the good that is wrought in us, and preserved alive: "My heart wakes in Christ, who is dear to me as my own heart, and is my life; when I sleep, he neither slumbers nor sleeps."

II. The call that Christ gave to her, when she was under this indisposition: It is the voice of my beloved; she knew it to be so, and was soon aware of it, which was a sign that her heart was awake. Like the child Samuel, she heard at the first call, but did not, like him, mistake the person; she knew it to be the voice of Christ. He knocks, to awaken us to come and let him in, knocks by his word and Spirit, knocks by afflictions and by our own consciences; though this is not expressly quoted, yet probably it is referred to (Rev. iii. 20), Behold, I stand at the door, and knock. He calls sinners into covenant with him and saints into communion with him. Those whom he loves he will not let alone in their carelessness, but will find some way or other to awaken them, to rebuke and chasten them. When we are unmindful of Christ he thinks of us, and provides that our faith fail not. Peter denied Christ, but the Lord turned and looked upon him, and so brought him to himself again. Observe how moving the call is: Open to me, my sister, my love. 1. He sues for entrance who may demand it; he knocks who could easily knock the door down. 2. He gives her all the kind and most endearing titles imaginable: My sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled; he not only gives her no hard names, nor upbraids her with unkindness in not sitting up for him, but, on the contrary, studies how to express his tender affection to her still. His loving-kindness he will not utterly take away. Those that by faith are espoused to Christ he looks upon as his sisters, his loves, his doves, and all that is dear; and, being clothed with his righteousness, they are undefiled. This consideration should induce her to open to him. Christ's love to us should engage ours to him, even in the most self-denying instances. Open to me. Can we deny entrance to such a friend, to such a guest? Shall we not converse more with one that is infinitely worthy of our acquaintance, and so affectionately desirous of it, though we only can be gainers by it? 3. He pleads distress, and begs to be admitted sub formâ pauperis—under the character of a poor traveller that wants a lodging: "My head is wet with the dew, with the cold drops of the night; consider what hardships I have undergone, to merit thee, which surely may merit from thee so small a kindness as this." When Christ was crowned with thorns, which no doubt fetched blood from his blessed head, then was his head wet with the dew. "Consider what a grief it is to me to be thus unkindly used, as much as it would be to a tender husband to be kept out of doors by his wife in a rainy stormy night." Do we thus require him for his love? The slights which careless souls put upon Jesus Christ are him as a continual dropping in a very rainy day.

III. The excuse she made to put off her compliance with this call (v. 3): I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on again? She is half asleep; she knows the voice of her beloved; she knows his knock, but cannot find in her heart to open to him. She was undressed, and would not be at the pains to dress herself again; she had washed her feet, and would not have occasion to wash them again. She could not send another to open the door (it must be our own act and deed to let Christ into our hearts), and yet she was loth to go herself; she did not say, I will not open, but, How shall I? Note, Frivolous excuses are the language of prevailing slothfulness in religion; Christ calls to us to open to him, but we pretend we have no mind, or we have no strength, or we have no time, and therefore think we may be excused, as the sluggard that will not plough by reason of cold. And those who ought to watch for the Lord's coming with their loins girt, if they ungird themselves and put off their coat, will find it difficult to recover their former resolution and to put it on again; it is best therefore to keep tight. Making excuses (Luke xiv. 18) is interpreted making light of Christ (Matt. xxii. 5), and so it is. Those put a great contempt upon Christ that cannot find in their hearts to bear a cold blast for him, or get out of a warm bed.

IV. The powerful influences of divine grace, by which she was made willing to rise and open to her beloved. When he could not prevail with her by persuasion he put in his hand by the hole in the door, to unbolt it, as one weary of waiting, v. 4. This intimates a work of the Spirit upon her soul, by which she was unwilling made willing, Ps. cx. 3. The conversion of Lydia is represented by the opening of her heart (Acts xvi. 14) and Christ is said to open his disciples' understandings, Luke xxiv. 45. He that formed the spirit of man within him knows all the avenues to it, and which way to enter into it; he can find the hole of the door at which to put in his hand for the conquering of prejudices and the introducing of his own doctrine and law. He has the key of David (Rev. iii. 7), with which he opens the door of the heart in such a way as is suited to it, as the key is fitted to the wards of the lock, in such a way as not to put a force upon its nature, but only upon its ill nature.

V. Her compliance with these methods of divine grace at last: My bowels were moved for him. The will was gained by a good work wrought upon the affections: My bowels were moved for him, as those of the two disciples were when Christ made their hearts to burn within them. She was moved with compassion to her beloved, because his head was wet with dew. Note, Tenderness of spirit, and a heart of flesh, prepare the soul for the reception of Christ into it; and therefore his love to us is represented in such a way as is most affecting. Did Christ redeem us in his pity? Let us in pity receive him, and, for his sake, those that are his, when at any time they are in distress. This good work, wrought upon her affections, raised her up, and made her ashamed of her dulness and slothfulness (v. 5, I rose up, to open to my beloved), his grace inclining her to do it and conquering the opposition of unbelief. It was her own act, and yet he wrought it in her. And now her hands dropped with myrrh upon the handles of the lock. Either, 1. She found it there when she applied her hand to the lock, to shoot it back; he that put in his hand by the hole of the door left it there as an evidence that he had been there. When Christ has wrought powerfully upon a soul he leaves a blessed sweetness in it, which is very delightful to it. With this he oiled the lock, to make it go easy. Note, When we apply ourselves to our duty, in the lively exercises of faith, under the influence of divine grace, we shall find it will go on much more readily and sweetly than we expected. If we will but rise up, to open to Christ, we shall find the difficulty we apprehended in it strangely overcome, and shall say with Daniel, Now let my Lord speak, for thou hast strengthened me, Dan. x. 19. Or, 2. She brought it thither. Her bowels being moved for her beloved, who had stood so long in the cold and wet, when she came to open to him she prepared to anoint his head, and so to refresh and comfort him, and perhaps to prevent his catching cold; she was in such haste to meet him that she would not stay to make the usual preparation, but dipped her hand in her box of ointment, that she might readily anoint his head at his first coming in. Those that open the doors of their hearts to Christ, those everlasting doors, must meet him with the lively exercises of faith and other graces, and with these must anoint him.

VI. Her said disappointment when she did open to her beloved. And here is the most melancholy part of the story: I opened to my beloved, as I intended, but, alas! my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone. My beloved was gone, was gone, so the word is.

1. She did not open to him at his first knock, and now she came too late, when afterwards she would have inherited this blessing. Christ will be sought while he may be found; if we slip our time, we may lose our passage. Note, (1.) Christ justly rebukes our delays with his denials, and suspends the communications of comfort from those that are remiss and drowsy in their duty. (2.) Christ's departures are matter of great grief and lamentation to believers. The royal psalmist never complains of any thing with such sorrowful accents as God's hiding his face from him, and casting him off, and forsaking him. The spouse here is ready to tear her hair, and rend her clothes, and wring her hands, crying, He is gone, he is gone; and that which cuts her to the heart is that she may thank herself, she provoked him to withdraw. If Christ departs, it is because he takes something unkindly.

2. Now observe what she does, in this case, and what befel her. (1.) She still calls him her beloved, being resolved, how cloudy and dark soever the day be, she will not quit her relation to him and interest in him. It is a weakness, upon every apprehension either of our own failings or of God's withdrawings, to conclude hardly as to our spiritual state. Every desertion is not despair. I will say, Lord, I believe, though I must say, Lord, help my unbelief. Though he leave me, I love him; he is mine. (2.) She now remembers the words he said to her when he called her, and what impressions they made upon her, reproaching herself for her folly in not complying sooner with her convictions: "My soul failed when he spoke; his words melted me when he said, My head is wet with dew; and yet, wretch that I was, I lay still, and made excuses, and did not open to him." The smothering and stifling of our convictions is a thing that will be very bitter in the reflection, when God opens our eyes. Sometimes the word has not its effect immediately upon the heart, but it melts it afterwards, upon second thoughts. My soul now melted because of his words which he had spoken before. (3.) She did not go to bed again, but went in pursuit of him: I sought him; I called him. She might have saved herself this labour if she would but have bestirred herself when he first called; but we cut ourselves out a great deal of work, and create ourselves a great deal of trouble, by our own slothfulness and carelessness in improving our opportunities. Yet it is her praise that, when her beloved has withdrawn, she continues seeking him; her desires toward him are made more strong, and her enquiries after him more solicitous, by his withdrawings. She calls him by prayer, calls after him, and begs of him to return; and she not only prays but uses means, she seeks him in the ways wherein she used to find him. (4.) Yet still she missed of him: I could not find him; he gave me no answer. She had no evidence of his favour, no sensible comforts, but was altogether in the dark, and in doubt concerning his love towards her. Note, There are those who have a true love for Christ, and yet have not immediate answers to their prayers for his smiles; but he gives them an equivalent if he strengthens them with the strength in their souls to continue seeking him, Ps. cxxxviii. 3. St. Paul could not prevail for the removing of the thorn in the flesh, but was answered with grace sufficient for him. (5.) She was ill-treated by the watchmen; They found me; they smote me; they wounded me, v. 7. They took her for a lewd woman (because she went about the streets at that time of night, when they were walking their rounds), and beat her accordingly. Disconsolate saints are taken for sinners, and are censured and reproached as such. Thus Hannah, when she was praying in the bitterness of her soul, was wounded and smitten by Eli, one of the prime watchmen, when he said to her, How long wilt thou be drunken? so counting her a daughter of Belial, 1 Sam. i. 14, 15. It is no new thing for those that are of the loyal loving subjects of Zion's King to be misrepresented by the watchmen of Zion, as enemies or scandals to his kingdom; they could not abuse and persecute them but by putting them into an ill name. Some apply it to those ministers who, though watchmen by office, yet misapply the word to awakened consciences, and through unskillfulness, or contempt of their griefs, add affliction to the afflicted, and make the hearts of the righteous sad whom God would not have made sad (Ezek. xiii. 22), discouraging those who ought to be encouraged and talking to the grief of those whom God has wounded, Ps. lix. 26. Those watchmen were bad enough that could not, or would not, assist the spouse in her enquiries after her beloved (ch. iii. 3); but these were much worse, that hindered her with their severe and uncharitable censures, smote her and wounded her with their reproaches, and though they were the keepers of the wall of Jerusalem, as if they had been the breakers of it, took away her veil, from her rudely and barbarously, as if it had been only a pretence of modesty, but a cover of the contrary. Those whose outward appearances are all good, and who yet are invidiously condemned and run down as hypocrites, have reason to complain, as the spouse here, of the taking away of their veil from them. (6.) When she was disabled by the abuses the watchmen gave her to prosecute her enquiry herself she gave charge to those about her to assist her in the enquiry (v. 8): I charge you, O you daughters of Jerusalem! all my friends and acquaintance, if you find my beloved, it may be you may meet with him before I shall, what shall you tell him? so some read. "Speak a good word for me; tell him that I am sick of love." Observe here, [1.] What her condition was. She loved Jesus Christ to such a degree that his absence made her sick, extremely sick, she could not bear it, and she was in pain for his return as a woman in travail, as Ahab for Naboth's vineyard, which he so passionately coveted. This is a sickness which is a sign of a healthy constitution of soul, and will certainly end well, a sickness that will not be death, but life. It is better to be sick of love to Christ than at ease in love to the world. (2.) What course she took in this condition. She did not sink into despair, and conclude that she should die of her disease, but she sent after her beloved; she asked the advice of her neighbours, and begged their prayers for her, that they would intercede with him on her behalf. "Tell him, though I was careless, and foolish, and slothful, and rose not up so soon as I should have done to open to him, yet I love him; he knows all things, he knows that I do. Represent me to him as sincere, though in many instances coming short of my duty; nay, represent me as an object of his pity, that he may have compassion on me and help me." She does not bid them tell him how the watchmen had abused her; how unrighteous soever they were in it, she acknowledges that the Lord is righteous, and therefore bears it patiently. "But tell him that I am wounded with love to him." Gracious souls are more sensible of Christ's withdrawings than of any other trouble whatsoever. Languet amaus, non languet amor— The lover languishes, but not his love.

Enquiring after the Excellencies of Christ; The Church's Confidence in Christ.

9 What is thy beloved more than another beloved, O thou fairest among women? what is thy beloved more than another beloved, that thou dost so charge us? 10 My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand. 11 His head is as the most fine gold, his locks are bushy, and black as a raven. 12 His eyes are as the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, washed with milk, and fitly set. 13 His cheeks are as a bed of spices, as sweet flowers: his lips like lilies, dropping sweet smelling myrrh. 14 His hands are as gold rings set with the beryl: his belly is as bright ivory overlaid with sapphires. 15 His legs are as pillars of marble, set upon sockets of fine gold: his countenance is as Lebanon, excellent as the cedars. 16 His mouth is most sweet: yea, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem.

Here is, I. The question which the daughters of Jerusalem put to the spouse concerning her beloved, in answer to the charge she had given them, v. 9. Observe, 1. The respectful title they give to the spouse: O thou fairest among women! Our Lord Jesus makes his spouse truly amiable, not only in his eyes, but in the eyes of all the daughters of Jerusalem. The church is the most excellent society in the world, the communion of saints the best communion, and the beauty of the sanctuary a transcendent beauty. The saints are the most excellent people; holiness is the symmetry of the soul; it is its agreement with itself; it recommends itself to all that are competent judges of it. Even those that have little acquaintance with Christ, as those daughters of Jerusalem here, cannot but see an amiable beauty in those that bear his image, which we should love wherever we see it, though in different dresses. 2. Their enquiry concerning her beloved: "What is thy beloved more than another beloved? If thou wilt have us to find him for thee, give us his marks, that we may know him when we see him." (1.) Some take it for a scornful question, blaming her for making such ado about him: "Why shouldst thou be so passionate in enquiring after thy beloved, more than others are after theirs? Why shouldst thou be so set upon him, more than others that yet have a kindness for him?" Those that are zealous in religion are men wondered at by such as are indifferent to it. The many careless ones laugh at the few that are solicitous and serious. "What is there in him that is so very charming, more than in another person? If he be gone, thou, who art the fairest among women, wilt soon have another with an equal flame." Note, Carnal hearts see nothing excellent or extraordinary in the Lord Jesus, in his person or offices, in his doctrine or in his favours; as if there were no more in the knowledge of Christ, and in communion with him, than in the knowledge of the world and in its conversation. (2.) Others rather take it for a serious question, and suppose that those who put it intended, [1.] To comfort the spouse, who, they knew, would recover new spirits if she did but talk awhile of her beloved; nothing would please her better, nor give a more powerful diversion to her grief, than to be put upon the pleasing task of describing the beauties of her beloved. [2.] To inform themselves; they had heard, in general, that he was excellent and glorious, but they desired to know more particularly. They wondered what moved the spouse to charge them concerning her beloved with so much vehemence and concern, and therefore concluded there must be something more in him than in another beloved, which they are willing to be convinced of. Then there begin to be some hopes of people when they begin to enquire concerning Christ and his transcendent perfections. And sometimes the extraordinary zeal of one, in enquiring after Christ, may be a means to provoke many (2 Cor. ix. 2), as the apostle, by the faith of the Gentiles, would stir up the Jews to a holy emulation, Rom. xi. 14. See John iv. 10.

II. The account which the spouse gives of her beloved in answer to this question. We should always be ready to instruct and assist those that are enquiring after Christ. Experienced Christians, who are well acquainted with Christ themselves, should do all they can to make others acquainted with him.

1. She assures them, in general, that he is one of incomparable perfections and unparalleled worth (v. 10): "Do not you know my beloved? Can the daughters of Jerusalem be ignorant of him that is Jerusalem's crown and crowned head? Let me tell you then," (1.) That he has every thing in him that is lovely and amiable: My beloved is white and ruddy, the colours that make up a complete beauty. This points not at any extraordinary beauty of his body, when he should be incarnate (it was never said of the child Jesus, as of the child Moses, when he was born, that he was exceedingly fair, Acts vii. 20; nay, he had no form nor comeliness, Isa. liii. 2); but his divine glory, and the concurrence of every thing in him as Mediator, to make him truly lovely in the eyes of those that are enlightened to discern spiritual things. In him we may behold the beauty of the Lord; he was the holy child Jesus; that was his fairness. If we look upon him as made to us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, he appears, in all, very amiable. His love to us renders him lovely. He is white in the spotless innocency of his life, ruddy in the bloody sufferings he went through at his death,—white in his glory, as God (when he was transfigured his raiment was white as the light), ruddy in his assuming the nature of man, Adam—red earth,—white in his tenderness towards his people, ruddy in his terrible appearances against his and their enemies. His complexion is a very happy composition. (2.) That he has that loveliness in him which is not to be found in any other: He is the chief among ten thousand, a nonsuch for beauty, fairer than the children of men, than any of them, than all of them; there is none like him, nor any to be compared with him; every thing else is to be accounted loss and dung in comparison of him, Phil. iii. 8. He is higher than the kings of the earth (Ps. lxxxix. 27) and has obtained a more excellent name than any of the principalities and powers of the upper or lower world, Phil. ii. 9; Heb. i. iv.. He is a standard-bearer among ten thousand (so the word is), the tallest and comeliest of the company. He is himself lifted up as an ensign (Isa. xi. 10), to whom we must be gathered and must always have an eye. And there is all the reason in the world why he should have the innermost and uppermost place in our souls who is the fairest of ten thousands in himself and the fittest of twenty thousands for us.

2. She gives a particular detail of his accomplishments, conceals not his power or comely proportion. Every thing in Christ is amiable. Ten instances she here gives of his beauty, which we need not be nice in the application of, lest the wringing of them bring forth blood and prove the wresting of them. The design, in general, is to show that he is every way qualified for his undertaking, and has all that in him which may recommend him to our esteem, love, and confidence. Christ's appearance to John (Rev. i. 13, &c.) may be compared with the description which the spouse gives of him here, the scope of both being to represent him transcendently glorious, that is, both great and gracious, made lovely in the eyes of believers and making them happy in himself. (1.) His head is as the most fine gold. The head of Christ is God (1 Cor. xi. 3), and it is promised to the saints that the Almighty shall be their gold (Job xxii. 25), their defence, their treasure; much more was he so to Christ, in whom dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, Col. ii. 9. Christ's head bespeaks his sovereign dominion over all and his vital influence upon his church and all its members. This is as gold, gold; the former word in the original signifies shining gold, the latter strong solid gold; Christ's sovereignty is both beautiful and powerful. Nebuchadnezzar's monarchy is compared to a head of gold (Dan. ii. 38), because it excelled all the other monarchies, and so does Christ's government. (2.) His locks are bushy and black, not black as the tents of Kedar, whose blackness was their deformity, to which therefore the church compares herself (ch. i. 5), but black as a raven, whose blackness is his beauty. Sometimes Christ's hair is represented as white (Rev. i. 14), denoting his eternity, that he is the ancient of days; but here as black and bushy, denoting that he is ever young and that there is in him no decay, nothing that waxes old. Every thing that belongs to Christ is amiable in the eyes of a believer, even his hair is so; it was pity that it should be wet, as it was, with the dew, and these locks with the drops of the night, while he waited to be gracious, v. 2. (3.) His eyes are as the eyes of doves, fair and clear, and chaste and kind, by the rivers of waters, which doves delight in, and in which, as in a glass, they see themselves. They are washed, to make them clean, washed with milk, to make them white, and fitly set, neither starting out nor sunk in. Christ is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, for they are doves' eyes, Hab. i. 13. All believers speak with pleasure of the omniscience of Christ, as the spouse here of his eyes; for, though it be terrible to his enemies as a flame of fire (Rev. i. 14), yet it is amiable and comfortable to his friends, as doves' eyes, for it is a witness to their integrity. Thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love thee. Blessed and holy are those that walk always as under the eye of Christ. (4.) His cheeks (the rising of the face) are as a bed of spices, raised in the gardens, which are the beauty and wealth of them, and as sweet flowers, or towers of sweetness. There is that in Christ's countenance which is amiable in the eyes of all the saints, in the least glimpse of him, for the cheek is but a part of the face. The half discoveries Christ makes of himself to the soul are reviving and refreshing, fragrant above the richest flowers and perfumes. (5.) His lips are like lilies, not white like lilies, but sweet and pleasant. Such are the words of his lips to all that are sanctified, sweeter than honey and the honey-comb; such are the kisses of his lips, all the communications of his grace; grace is poured into his lips, and those that heard him wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth. His lips are as lilies, dropping sweet-smelling myrrh. Never any lilies in nature dropped myrrh, but nothing in nature can fully set forth the beauty and excellence of Christ, and therefore, to do it by comparison, there must be a composition of images. (6.) His hands are as gold rings set with the beryl, a noted precious stone, v. 14. Great men had their hands adorned with gold rings on their fingers, set with diamonds or other precious stones, but, in her eye, his hands themselves were as gold rings; all the instances of his power, the works of his hands, all the performances of his providence and grace, are all rich, and pure, and precious, as gold, as the precious onyx and the sapphire, all fitted to the purpose for which they were designed as gold rings to the finger, and all beautiful and very becoming, as rings set with beryl. His hands, which are stretched forth both to receive his people and to give to them, are thus rich and comely. (7.) His bowels are as bright ivory, for so it should be rendered, rather than his belly, for it is the same word that was used for bowels (v. 4) and is often ascribed to God (as Isa. lxiii. 15; Jer. xxxi. 20), and so it denotes his tender compassion and affection for his spouse, and the love he has to her even in her desolate and deserted state. This love of his is like bright ivory, finely polished, and richly overlaid with sapphires. The love itself is strong and firm, and the instances and circumstances of it are bright and sparkling, and add much to the inestimable value of it. (8.) His legs are as pillars of marble, so strong, and stately, and no disgrace, no, not to the sockets of fine gold upon which they are set, v. 15. This bespeaks his stability and stedfastness; where he sets his foot he will fix it; he is able to bear all the weight of the government that is upon his shoulders, and his legs will never fail under him. This sets forth the stateliness and magnificence of the goings of our God, our King, in his sanctuary (Ps. lxviii. 24), and the steadiness and evenness of all his dispensations towards his people. The ways of the Lord are equal; they are all mercy and truth; these are the pillars of marble, more lasting than the pillars of heaven. (9.) His countenance (his port and mien) is as Lebanon, that stately hill; his aspect beautiful and charming, like the prospect of that pleasant forest or park, excellent as the cedars, which, in height and strength, excel other trees, and are of excellent use. Christ is a goodly person; the more we look upon him the more beauty we shall see in him. (10.) His mouth is most sweet; it is sweetness itself; it is sweetnesses (so the word is); it is pure essence, nay, it is the quintessence of all delights, v. 16. The words of his mouth are all sweet to a believer, sweet as milk to babes (to whom it is agreeable), as honey to those that are grown up (Ps. cxix. 103), to whom it is delicious. The kisses of his mouth, all the tokens of his love, have a transcendent sweetness in them, and are most delightful to those who have their spiritual senses exercised. To you that believe he is precious.

3. She concludes with a full assurance both of faith and hope, and so gets the mastery of her trouble. (1.) Here is a full assurance of faith concerning the complete beauty of the Lord Jesus: "He is altogether lovely. Why should I stand to mention particulars, when throughout there is nothing amiss?" She is sensible she does him wrong in the particular descriptions of him, and comes far short of the dignity and merit of the subject, and therefore she breaks off with the general encomium: He is truly lovely, he is wholly so; there is nothing in him but what is amiable, and nothing amiable but what is in him. He is all desires; he has all in him that one can desire. And therefore all her desire is towards him, and she seeks him thus carefully and cannot rest contented in the want of him. Who can but love him who is so lovely? (2.) Here is a full assurance of hope concerning her own interest in him: "This is my beloved, and this is my friend; and therefore wonder not that I thus long after him." See with what a holy boldness she claims relation to him, and then with what a holy triumph she proclaims it. It is property that sweetens excellency. To see Christ, and not to see him as ours, would be rather a torture than a happiness; but to see one that is thus lovely, and to see him as ours, is a complete satisfaction. Here is a true believer, [1.] Giving an entire consent to Christ: "He is mine, my Lord and my God (John xx. 28), mine according to the tenour of the gospel-covenant, mine in all relations, bestowed upon me, to be all that to me that my poor soul stands in need of." [2.] Taking an entire complacency in Christ. It is spoken of here with an air of triumph: "This is he whom I have chosen, and to whom I have given up myself. None but Christ, none but Christ. This is he on whom my heart is, for he is my best-beloved; this is he in whom I trust, and from whom I expect all good, for this is my friend." Note, Those that make Christ their beloved shall have him their friend; he has been, is, and will be, a special friend to all believers. He loves those that love him; and those that have him their friend have reason to glory in him, and speak of him with delight. "Let others be governed by the love of the world, and seek their happiness in its friendship and favours, This is my beloved and this is my friend. Others may do as they please, but this is my soul's choice, my soul's rest, my life, my joy, my all; this is he whom I desire to live and die with."

CHAP. V. Verſ. 1. I am come into my Garden.]

SO ready is the Lord Chriſt to fulfill the deſires of them that fear him, Sometimes hee not onely grants their prayer, Pſal. 145.19. but fulfills their counſel,Confeſſ. l. 5. c. 1. Pſal. 20.4. fits his mercy ad cardinem deſiderii, as Auſtin hath it, lets it be to his, even as they will. Or if he croſs them in the very thing they crave, they are ſure of a better: their prayers they ſhall have out either in money, or moneys worth. Chriſt, though he be a God that hideth himſelf, yet hee ſcorns to ſay unto the ſeed of Jacob, Seek yee mee in vain, Iſaiah 45.15, 19. that's enough for the Heathen Idols, verſ. 16, 18. Hee is not like Baal, who purſuing his enemies, could not hear his friends: or as Diana, that being preſent at Alexanders birth, could not at the ſame time reſcue her Epheſian Temple from the fire.Non vacat exiguis, &c. Hee is not like Jupiter, whom the Cretians painted without ears, as not being at leiſure to attend ſmall matters: and whom Lucian the Atheiſt feigneth to look down from heaven through certain creviſſes or chincks, at certain times: at which time, if Petitioners chance to pray unto him, they may have audience, otherwiſe not. No, no: the eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears are always open to their prayers, Pſal. 34.15. Flectitur iratus voce rogante Deus. Baſil compares prayer to a chayn, the one end whereof is linked to Gods ear, and the other to mans tongue. Sozomen ſaith of Apollonius, that hee never asked any thing of God in all his life that hee obtained not. And another ſaith of Luther, Iſte vir potuit apud Deum quod voluit. That man could do what hee would with God; it was but ask and have, with him.

I have gathered my myrrhe with my ſpice] i.e. I have highly accepted of thy graces and good works: theſe are to bee gathered onely in Chriſts Garden. Hedge-fruits and wilde-hearbs, or rather weeds, are every where almoſt to bee had. Moral vertues may bee found in a Cato, who was homo virtuti ſimilimus, a man as like vertue as may be, ſaith Velleius: And he addes (but I am not bound to beleeve him) Qui nunquam recte fecit, ut facere videretur, ſed quia aliter facere non poterat, vell. lib. 2. that Cato never did well that hee might ſeem to do ſo, but becauſe hee could not do otherwiſe than well: But why then (might a man have asked the Hiſtorian) did your ſo highly extolled Cato take up the trade of griping uſury? Why did he ſo ſhamefully proſtitute his wife, ſo cowardly kill himſelf? Was it not becauſe he lived in the wilde Worlds waſte, and grew not in the Churches garden, hence his fruits were not genuine? his moral vertues are but ſhining ſinnes, beautiful abominations, a ſmoother way to hell. Civil honeſt men are but Wolves chained up, tame Devils, Swine in a fair meadow, &c. Operam praeſtant, natura fera est, (as the Civil Law ſaith of thoſe mixt Beaſts, Elephants and Camels) they do the work of tame Beaſts, yet have the nature of wilde ones. They are cryed up for ſingularly honeſt as ever lived, by ſuch as are ſtrangers to the power of Godlineſs, and aliens from the Common-wealth of Iſrael; like as in Samaria's famine, a cab of Doves dung was ſold at a great rate, and an aſſes head at four pound. But Chriſt, and ſuch as have the minde of Chriſt, are otherwiſe minded: they look upon an unregenerate man, though ſober, juſt, chaſte, liberal, &c. as a vile perſon; Pſal. 15.4. and upon all their ſpecious works, as dead works: when as (contrarily) they honour them that fear the Lord, and ſet an high price (as Chriſt here doth) upon their good parts and practices. Myrrhe and ſpices, or aromatical fruits, are but dark ſhadows and repreſentations of them.

I have eaten mine hony-comb with mine hony] As it were cruſt and crumb together: not rejecting my peoples ſervices for the infirmities I finde cleaving unto them, but accepting what is good therein, and bearing with the reſt, I take all well a worth, and am as much delighted therewith, as any man is in eating of hony; whereof hee is ſo greedy, that withall hee devours the comb too ſometimes. Mr. Dudley Fenner. Chriſt feedeth (ſaith an Expoſitour here) upon all the fruits of his garden, hee ſo much delighteth in it, as hee eateth not onely the hony, as it were the moſt excellent duties or works of the Church, (ſee Heb. 13.15, 16, 21.) but alſo the hony-comb as it were the baſer ſervices and fruits of his Spirit, of leaſt account: that hee receiveth of all ſorts moſt ſweetly mingled together, both the common and daily fruits of godlineſs, underſtood in milk, and the more rare of greater price, as ſolemn faſts and feaſts, ſignified by wine: both which hee drinketh together, that is, accepteth of them all.

Eat, O friends] That is, O you holy Angels, (ſaith the former Interpreter) which as my Nobles, accompany mee the King of Glory in Heaven, and have ſome communion with me in the gifts I beſtow on you. Mr. Diodate alſo thinks the ſame: But I rather encline to thoſe that by Chriſts friends here underſtand thoſe earthly Angels, the Saints, (ſee John 15.14. Iſa. 41.8. Jam. 2.23. whom hee cheareth up and encourageth to fall to it luſtily, and by a ſancta crapula (as Luther calls an holy gluttony) to lay on, to feed hard, and to fetch hearty draughts, till they bee even drunk with loves, (as the Hebrew here hath it) being raviſhed in the love of God, where they are ſure to finde it (as in hony-pots) the deeper, the ſweeter. Such as ſo eat, are called Chriſts friends, (by a ſpecialty) and ſuch as ſo drink, his beloved, as Gregory here well obſerveth: and they onely do thus that hear the Word with delight, turn it in ſuccum & ſanguinem, concoct it, incorporate it, as it were, into their ſouls, and are ſo deeply affected with it, that like drunken men, they forget and let go all things elſe, that they may retain and practice it. Theſe are not drunk with wine, wherein is exceſs, but filled with the Holy Ghoſt, Epheſ. 5.16.

Verſ. 2. I ſleep, but my heart waketh] It was no ſound ſleep that ſhe took: Shee did not ſhort aloud in the Cradle of ſecurity (as thoſe do whom the Devil hath caſt into a deep Lethargy) but napped and nodded a little, and that by candle-light too, as thoſe wiſe Virgins did, Matth. 25.5. Shee ſlept with open eyes as the Lion doth: ſhee ſlept but half-ſleep: the Spirit was willing to wake, but the fleſh was weak and overwayed it, as it fared with thoſe ſleepy Diſciples, Matth. 26.41. Fain would this fleſh make ſtrange of that which the Spirit doth embrace. O Lord, how loth is this loitering ſluggard to paſs forth into Gods path, ſaid Mr. Sanders in a letter to his wife,Act. & Mon. fol. 1359. a little afore his death, with much more, to like purpoſe? As in the ſtate of Nature, men cared not for grace, but thought themſelves well enough, and wiſe enough without: ſo in the ſtate of Grace, they are not ſo carefull as they ſhould. Heaven muſt bee brought to them, they will ſcarce go ſeek it, 1 Pet. 1.13. And as the ſeven tribes are juſtly taxed by Joſhua for their negligence and ſloth in not ſeeking ſpeedily to poſſeſs the Land God had offered them, Joſh. 18.2. So may the moſt of Gods people be juſtly rebuked for grievous ſecurity about the heavenly Canaan. They content themſelves with a bare title, or hang in ſuſpenſe, and ſtrive not to full aſſurance: they follow Chriſt, but it is (as the people followed Saul) trembling: they are ſtill troubled with this doubt, or that fear, and all becauſe they are loth to be at the pains of working out their ſalvation, Phil. 2.12. Something is left undone, and their conſcience tells them ſo. Either they are lazy, and let fall the watch of the Lord, neglecting duty, or elſe they loſe themſelves in a wilderneſs of duties, by reſting in them, and by making the means their Mediatours, or by pleaſing themſelves (with the Church here) in unlawful liberties, after that they have pleaſed the Lord in lawful duties. The fleſh muſt bee gratified, and ſuch a luſt fulfilled. A little more ſleep, a little more ſlumber in Jezabels bed, (as Mr. Bradford was wont to phraſe it) Solomon muſt have his wine,Act. & Mon. and yet think to retain his wiſdome, Eccleſ. 2.3. Samſon muſt fetch a nap on Dalilahs knees, till God, by his Philiſtims, ſend our ſummons for ſleepers, wake them in a fright, cure ſecurity by ſorrow, as Phyſicians uſe to cure a Lethargy by caſting the Patient into a Burning Feaver. Cold diſeaſes muſt have hot and ſharp remedies: The Church here found it ſo. And did not David, when hee had ſinned away his inward peace, and wiped off, as it were,Pſal. 51. all his comfortables?

It is the voyce of my beloved that knocketh] Shee was not ſo faſt aſleep, but that the hidden man of the heart (as St. Peter calls him, 1 Ep. 3.4.) was awake, and his ears arrect and attent, ſo that ſhee ſoon heard the firſt call, or knock of Chriſt; whoſe care was to arrouſe her, that though ſhee ſlept a while through infirmity of the fleſh, yet ſhee might not ſleep the ſleep of death, Pſal. 13.3. dye in her ſins, as thoſe Jews did, John 8.21. In the ſweating ſickneſs (that reigned for many years together in this Kingdome) thoſe that were ſuffered to ſleep (as all in that caſe were apt to do) they died within a few hours. The beſt office therefore that any one could do them, was, To keep them waking, though againſt their wills. Sembably our Saviour, ſolicitous of his Churches welfare, and knowing her preſent danger, comes calling and clapping at the door other heart, and ſweetly wooes admiſſion and entertainment: but miſſeth of it. Hee knocketh and bounceth by the hammer of his Word, and by the hand of his Spirit, (ſee Revel. 3.20. with 2 Pet. 1.13.) and if the Word work not on his people, they ſhall hear the rod, and who hath appointed it, Mic. 6.9. that they may by ſome means bee brought to ſummon the ſobriety of their ſenſes before their own judgements; and ſeeing their danger, to go forth and ſhake themſelves, as Sampſon did, Judg. 16.

Open to mee, my Siſter, my Love, &c.] What irreſiſtible Rhetorick is here? what paſſionate and moſt pithy perſwaſions! Ipſa Suada, credo, ſi loqui poſſet, non potuiſſet [non-Latin text not transcribed], ubi quot verba tot tela, quae ſponſae animum percellant, fodicent, lancinent, ſhee was not ſo dead aſleep, but that ſhee could hear at firſt, and tell every tittle that he ſaid. And this ſhe doth here very finely, and to the full; that ſhee may aggravate againſt her ſelf the foulneſs of her fact in refuſing ſo ſweet an offer, in turning her back upon ſo bleſſed and ſo bleeding an embracement: the tearms and titles hee here giveth her, are expounded before. Ʋndefiled or perfect hee calleth her, for her Dove-like ſimplicity, purity, and integrity.

For mine head is filled with dew] i. e. I have ſuffered much for thy ſake, and waited thy leiſure a long while: and muſt I now go look my lodging? Doeſt thou thus requite (repulſe) thy Lord, O thou fooliſh woman and unwiſe? Is this thy kindneſs to thy friend?Jer. 13.27. Wo unto thee, O Jeruſalem: wilt thou not bee made clean? when ſhall it once bee? It is the ingratitude that makes the Saints ſinnes ſo hainous; which otherwiſe would bee far leſs than other mens; ſith his temptations are ſtronger, and his reſiſtance is greater. Oh when Gods grace ſhall come ſuing to us, nay kneeling to us; when Chriſt ſhall come with Hat in hand, and ſtand bare-headed, as here, and that in foul weather too, begging acceptance, and beſeeching us to be reconciled, and we will not, what an inexcuſible fault is this!

Verſ. 3. I have put off my Coat] Thus the fleſh ſhews itſelf, not onely weak, but wayward, treacherous, and tyrannical; rebell it doth in the beſt, and reign it would, if it might bee ſuffered. This bramble would fain bee playing Rex, and doth ſo other-whiles, till hee be well buffeted (as St. Paul ſerved it, 1 Cor. 9.27.) and brought it into ſubjection. But what a ſilly excuſe maketh the Church here for her ſelf? Trouble mee not, for I am in bed, as hee ſaid to his friend, Luk. 11.7. My cloathes are off, my feet are waſhed, and I am compoſed to a ſettled reſt. But are you ſo? (might Chriſt have regeſted.) And is that the part and poſture of a vigilant Chriſtian? Might it not better have beſeemed you to have had your loyns girt up, your lamp in your hand, and your ſelf to have waited for your Lords return, that when hee came and knocked, you might have opened unto him immediately, Luk. 12.35, 36? Or, being got to bed, muſt you needs mend one fault with another? Is it ſuch a pains to ſtart up again and let in ſuch a gueſt, as comes not to take any thing from you, but to enrich you much more than once the Ark did Obed-Edom? And in this ſenſe ſome take thoſe words in the former verſe, for mine head is filled with dew, &c. as if Chriſt came unto her, full of the dew of bleſſings to enrich her. Sure it is, that Chriſt is no beggerly or niggardly gueſt. His reward is with him: hee brings better commodities than Abrahams ſervants did to Laban, or the Queen of Sheba to Solomon, even pureſt gold, whiteſt rayment, ſoveraign eye-ſalve, any thing, every thing, that heart can wiſh, or need require, Revel. 3.17, 19. How unworthily therefore deal they, and how ill do they provide for themſelves, that either deny or delay to entertain him, when either by the motions of his Spirit, by the words of his mouth, or by the works of his hands, he knocks at the doors of their hearts, and would come in to them? How do they make void or reject the counſel of God againſt themſelves, with thoſe unhappy Lawyers, Luk. 7.30. being ingrati gratiae Dei, as Ambroſe ſpeaketh, and judging themſelves unworthy of ever-laſting life, with thoſe perverſe Jews, Acts 13.46? Who can ſay it is otherwiſe than righteous, that Chriſt ſhould regeſt one day upon ſuch ungrateful Gadarens, Depart from mee yee wicked? that ſuch as ſay to him, as Felix did once to Paul, Go thy way for this time, when I have a convenient ſeaſon I will call for thee (Acts 24.26.) ſhould hear from him, Get you to the Gods whom yee have choſen, for I will not help you, &c. and that thoſe that would not obey this ſweet precept, Open to mee, &c. Come down Zachaeus, Luke 19.5. for to day I muſt abide at thy houſe, &c. ſhould have no other left to obey, but that dreadful, Go yee curſed, &c. The Church here did but luſt a while and linger, when ſhee ſhould have been up and about, and ſhee ſoon rued it deerly, bewailed it bitterly. Now what was it that ſhe did? Did ſhee rate Chriſt for comming at ſuch unſeaſonable hours? did ſhee anſwer him curriſhly, or drive him from her door? No ſurely, but onely pleads excuſe, and pretends inconvenience: Shee had put off her cloathes, waſht her feet, &c. A great chare ſhee had done: and it would have undone her, doubtleſs, to have dreſſed her again, and ſet her fair feet on the foul ground. There is none ſo wiſe as the ſluggard, Prov. 26.16. Hee hath got together a great many excuſes, which hee thinks will go for wiſdome: becauſe by them hee thinks to ſleep in a whole skin. Sinne and ſhifting came into the world together. But what ſaith the Apoſtle? Surely his counſel is moſt excellent, and worthy of all acceptation, Heb. 12.25. See that yee refuſe not him that ſpeaketh, ſc: by his Blood, Word, Sacraments, motions of his Spirit, Mercies, &c. Look to it, (as the Greek hath it) that yee refuſe not, [non-Latin text not transcribed] Gr: that yee ſhift him not off by frivolous pretences, and idle excuſes, as thoſe recuſant gueſts did, Mat. 22.5. as Moſes would have done, Exod. 3.11, 14. & 4.1, 10. and Jeremiah, c. 1.6. So again Heb. 2.3. How ſhall wee eſcape if wee neglect ſo great ſalvation? Hee ſaith not, if wee reject, renounce, perſecute, but if wee neglect, let ſlip, undervalue, &c. If when God ſends forth his mercy, and his truth, Pſal. 57.3. and looks that wee ſhould ſend a Lamb to that Lamb of God the Ruler of the land, Iſa. 16.1. wee ſend meſſages after him, ſaying, Wee will not have this man to rule over us, Luk. 19.14. Wee break his cords, thoſe cords of love, Hoſ. 11.4. and kick againſt his bowels; and inſtead of ſerving him, make him to ſerve with our ſins, and even weary him with our iniquities, Iſa. 43.24. How ſhall wee eſcape? What hill ſhall hide us? What will yee do in the end thereof?

Verſ. 4. My Beloved put in his hand by the hole] Or,Dimiſſit manu[illegible: 1 letter] a foramine. He let fall his hand from the hole, where hee was lifting at the latch, or ſee[illegible: 1 letter]ing to put by the bar: hee took it ſo unkindly to bee ſo ill anſwered, that hee [illegible: 2 letters]parted in diſpleaſure, and would bee no further troubleſome. Sleep on no[illegible: 1 letter] (quoth hee, as Mark 14.41.) and take your reſt. Hee that will hear, let him [illegible: 2 letters]ar, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. De Pomp[illegible: 1 letter]io Romano ap. Plutarch. and he that hath a minde to forbear, let him forbear, Ezek. 3.27. but at his own peril, the beſt that can come of it, is repentance, that fair and happy daughter of an ugly and odious mother. Delicatares eſt Spiritus Dei, ſaith one, The [illegible: 1 letter]pirit of God is a delicate thing; and hee that grieves that holy thing whereby [illegible: 1 letter]ee is ſealed, by giving way to a ſpirit of ſloth and ſlumber, may loſe his joy of faith, and go mourning to his grave. And although with much a do he ma[illegible: 1 letter] get aſſurance of pardon, yet his conſcience will be ſtill trembling, as Davids, Pſal. 51. till God at length ſpeak further peace: Even as the water of the Sea, after a ſtorm, is not preſently ſtill, but moves and trembles a good while after the ſtorm is over. Take heed therefore: Cavebis autem ſi pavebis, Rom. 11.21. But to take the words as they are here tranſlated, My Beloved put in his hand by the hole, that is, hee touched mine heart by his holy Spirit: and notwithſtanding my diſcourteous dealing with him, left a ſweet remembrance of himſelf behind him. As hee would not away, but continued ſtill knocking till hee had an anſwer, ſo, though the anſwer pleaſed him not, yet hee called not for his love-tokens back again, hee caſt her not off, as Ahaſhuerus did Vaſhti, (no, hee hates putting away, Mal. 2.16.) but as the Sun with his bright beams follows the paſſenger that hath turned his back upon it: So deals Chriſt by his back-ſliding people,Pſal. 23.6. Jonah 2.8. Jer. 3.22. (Surely goodneſs and mercy ſhall follow mee all the daies of my life, ſaith David, follow mee though I forſake mine own mercies, ſaith Jonah.) And as the ſame Sun-beams do convey the heat and influence thereof to the earth, thereby calling out the herbs and flowers, and healing thoſe deformities that winter had brought upon it: So doth Chriſt that Sun of Righteouſneſs, ariſe (to his ſervants that are benighted with ſin and ſorrow) with healing in his wings, that is, with the gratious influence of his holy Spirit, conveying the vertues of his blood to their conſciences, and cauſing them, as by a new ſpring of holy deſires and endeavours, to reflouriſh, Phil. 4.10.

And my Bowels were moved for him] They rumbled, tumultuated, and made a humming noiſe, as the Hebrew hath it. She means, that ſhee had no reſt in her Spirit, her heart (that chiefeſt of the bowels, or inwards) did even quake and ake within her; her thoughts afflicted her, ſhee was greatly diſquieted, and all for him, for the unkindneſs ſhee had offered him, or concerning him, or over him, as thoſe Penitentiaries in Zachary, that looked upon him whom they had pierced, and (by an inſtinct of the Spirit of grace powred plentifully upon them) mourned for him, or over him, till their hearts became a very Hadadrimmon, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. and fell aſunder in their boſomes like drops of water; and all for the indignities and injuries they had done to Chriſt. This is a ſorrow according to God, or, as God would have it, 1 Cor. 7.9. this is a repentance never to bee repented of, verſ. 10. This is that Rain-bow, which if God ſee ſhining in our hearts, hee will remember his holy Covenant. The Church here for inſtance. That ſhee ſorrowed after a godly ſort appears by thoſe ſeven ſigns ſet down, 2 Cor. 7.11. and here in this Chapter exemplified and evidenced. I ſleep, there's Indignation, but my heart waketh, there's Apology, or clearing herſelf. I aroſe to open, there is study, or carefulneſs and diligence. My ſoul failed when hee ſpake, there is her Zeal. I called on him, I ſought him, there's her vehement deſire. The Watchmen found mee, they ſmote mee, they unveiled [illegible: 1 letter]ee, there's her ſelf-revenge, whiles ſhee ſhrank not for any danger, but bearing patiently the Lords indignation, becauſe ſhee had ſinned againſt him, ſhee followed him through thick and thin, in the night, among the watch, &c. followed him hot-foot, and would not reſt till ſhee had recovered him. Lo this is the guiſe of a godly heart: it runs into ſinne ſometimes, but riſeth again ſoon after by repentance: it is at as much unreſt till reconciled to God, as hee that hath broke a bone, till it be well ſet again. When as a prophane Eſau can ſell his birth-right,Hac congerie impaenitentia Eſaui deſcribitur. Piſcat. (and with it his title to heaven) and when hee hath ſo done, hee can eat, and drink, and riſe up, and go his way without any the leaſt remorſe or regret, Ge[illegible: 1 letter]. 25.34. Wicked men grow worſe and worſe, ſaith the Apoſtle: and take long ſtrides towards hell, as if they feared it would bee full ere they [illegible: 1 letter]ome there. Some ſeek to out-ſin one another, like unhappy boys, that ſtr[illegible: 1 letter]ve who ſhall go furtheſt in the dirt: Noluit ſolita peccare, ſaith Seneca: et pudet non eſſe impudentes, ſaith Auſtin; Sin hath woaded an impuden [illegible: 2 letters] [illegible: 1 letter]n their faces: their ſpot is not the ſpot of Gods children, Deut. 32.[illegible: 1 letter].

Verſ. 5. I roſe up to open to my Beloved] This was repentance from ſinne, as that in the former verſe was repentance for ſinne. To repent; and yet to lye ſtill in ſinne, is to repent with a contradiction, ſaith Tertullian; Optima et aptiſſima paenitentia eſt nova vita, ſaith Luther. A new life is the beſt repentance. Up gets the Church, when once ſoundly ſenſible of her ſinne: and leaving her bed of carnal ſecurity, makes after Chriſt with all her might, with a redoubled diligence; to make ſome amends for her former negligence. Nunquam ſero, ſi ſerio. Late though it were ere ſhee ſtarted and ſtirred, yet better late than not at all. Wee are too much after-witted, for moſt part, Poſtmaſters, Epimetheuſſes: wee ſee not our folly (but cry with him, In craſtinum ſeria) till wee have ſmarted for it, and then wiſh, O mihi praeteritos, &c.

And my hands drop with myrrhe] That is, with the teſtimonies of his ſweetneſs left behinde him on the lock-handles, the better to allure her to his love. Philip Beroaldus, and many others,In Apul[illegible: 2 letters]um, lib. 2. M. Leſ. tell us of a very precious unguent Cinnamimum, becauſe made of Cinnamon and other ſweet odours; whoſe chief commendation is, that the very ſmell thereof, (if a man carries it about him) draws any woman, though paſſing by, and minding other things, to draw nigh to him. What truth is in this relation, I know not: but ſure it is, that the ſmell of the Goſpell, and thoſe ſpiritual bleſſings which the preſence of Chriſt had left behinde it, did notably attract and draw after him the Churches affections. Goodneſs is of it ſelf attractive:Velut aliqui volunt [non-Latin text not transcribed] quaſi [non-Latin text not transcribed]. Sic [non-Latin text not transcribed] quaſi [non-Latin text not transcribed]. The Greeks call it [non-Latin text not transcribed] from [non-Latin text not transcribed], and [non-Latin text not transcribed] from [non-Latin text not transcribed]: becauſe it doth as it were, invite and call to it; and every man is willing to run after it. Chriſt puts a ſecret inſtinct into his people to do ſo; like as nature hath put an inſtinct into the Bee, the Stork, and other creatures. And as the needle in a Sundial that hath been touched with an adamant, though it may bee forced this way, and that way, yet it reſts not till it look toward the North-pole: So the ſoul that hath aliquid Christi in it, that hath been once hand-faſted to Chriſt by a lively faith, though for a ſeaſon it may,Jam. 1.14. 2 Pet. 3.17. by the malice of Satan working with corruption, ſuffer ſome decays of her firſt love, be drawn aſide by ſome luſt, and enticed ſo as to fall from former ſtedfaſtneſs; yet after a while her thoughts will work, and the ſweet remembrance that Chriſt hath left behinde him, will make her to ſay, I will go and return to my first husband, Hoſ. 2 7. for then it was better with mee th[illegible: 1 letter]n now.

Verſ. 6. I opened to my Beloved, but my Beloved had with-drawn himſelf and was gone] Or, Hee was gone, hee was gone; a paſſionate complaint for his departure; which lay ſo much the heavier upon her ſpirit, becauſe by her unworthy uſage of him, ſhee had fooliſhly occaſioned it. Fools, becauſe of their tranſgreſſion and becauſe of their iniquity are afflicted: And when affliction comes with a ſting in the tail, it is very grievous.Pſal. 107.17, 19, 20. But then they cry unto the Lord in their trouble: he ſaveth them out of their diſtreſs; He ſendeth his word and healeth them, he ſendeth for them by his Spirit, and brings them back again into his own boſome, that his baniſhed be not expelled from him (2 Sam. 14.14.) though to themſelves and others, they may for preſent ſeem to bee as water ſpilled on the ground that cannot be gathered up again. Thoſe fragrant foot-ſteps and heart-attracting ſtamps of his favour, that ſweet ſmelling Myrrhe, mentioned in the former verſe, had ſo eneagered and edged her affections, that ſhee could not reſt till ſhee had recovered him. Shee opened unto her beloved, and, preſuming upon his patience,Heu rara hora, & parva mora. Dern. was in good hope to have had him at hand: But patientia laeſa fit furor, Chriſt will not always bear with our evil manners, but hide his face from us, like as we have behaved our ſelves evil in our doings, Micah 3.5. And whereas ſpiritual deſertions are of three ſorts, 1 Cautional, for preventing of ſinne, as Pauls ſeems to be. 2 Probational, for trial and exerciſe of grace, as Jobs. 3 Penal, for chaſtiſement of ſpiritual ſloth and ſluggiſhneſs, as here in the Church; this laſt is farre the heavieſt.

My ſoul failed when hee spake] Or, becauſe of his ſpeech, that ſweet ſpeech of his when hee ſo paſſionately wooed her, ver. 2. Then hee could have no audience nor admittance, now if he would but offer himſelf, hee might bee ſure of both. The word ſpoken doth not always preſently take effect in the hearers, but lies long as the ſeed under a clod, till Chriſt the good husbandman, come with ſome temptation, as with his clotting-beetle, and give it room to riſe. Then as the water caſts up her dead after a time, ſo do their memories caſt up that which ſeemed buried therein, by the help of the Holy Ghoſt their remembrancer: John 14.26. John 2.22. The new birth of ſome, (the recovery of others out of their relapſes) is like the birth of the Elephant, fourteen years after the ſeed is inſerted into the womb. Peter remembred Chriſts words, and repented, Mat. 26.75. If wee remember not what hath been preached unto us, all is loſt, 1 Cor. 15.2. If we leak, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. and let ſlip, actum eſt de nobis, Heb. 2.1. If we keep the Word, the Word will keep us, Prov. 6.22.

I ſought him] So ſoon as recovered out of my ſwoon, I ſet to ſeek him; The Church went not to bed again, to ſleep as before, neither ſtays ſhe longer within, than to caſt her veyl or her ſcarf over her head, without any further dreſs, abroad ſhee gets to ſeek him whom her ſoul loveth. She ſought him by ſerious and ſet meditation of the word and promiſes, but after all that royl and travell ſhee took therein, ſhee found him not. This is the greateſt grief that can befall a good heart in this preſent world: it is to ſuch little better than hell it ſelf. Thou hiddeſt thy face and I was troubled, ſaith David, Pſal. 30.8. Non fruſtra praedicant meptes hominum nitere liquido die, coactanube flacceſcere, ſaith Symmachus. Mens mindes are either clear or cloudy, as the weather is: but more truly, good mens mindes are as Gods countenance is. It is with the godly in deſertion, as with vapours drawn up by the Sun; which when the extracting force of the Sun leaves them, fall down again to the earth. And as in an Eclipſe of the Sun, there is a drooping in the whole frame of nature: ſo it is with the Saints, when Chriſt withdraws himſelf. Hell it ſelf is ſaid to bee a ſeparation from his preſence: the pain of loſs there is worſe than the pain of ſenſe: the tears of hell are not ſufficient to bewail the loſs of heaven.Bern. Laetemur igitur in Domino, ſed caveamus a recidivo.

I called him, but hee gave mee no anſwer] And it was but juſt: for ſhee had dealt ſo by him, ver. 2. Chriſt loves to retaliate. Such a proportion many times one may ſee between ſins and puniſhments, that you may ſay, ſuch a ſin brought forth this affliction, it is ſo like the father. Howbeit, his ear is not heavy that hee cannot hear: but your iniquities have hid his face from you that hee will not hear, Iſa. 59.1, 2. And this the Saints take (as well they may) for a ſore affliction, Lam. 3.8. when to all other their miſeries, hee addeth this, that hee will not come at them, that hee caſteth out their prayers, that hee deals by them as the Lionneſs doth by her young ones, which ſhee ſeems ſometimes to leave, till they have almoſt killed themſelves with roaring. This is to make them more carefull another time. None look at the Sunne but when it is in the eclipſe: Neither prize we (for moſt part) Gods loving countenance, till we have loſt it. In this caſe the courſe is, to ſet up a loud cry after him, as Micah did after his Gods, Judg. 18.23. Or rather as the Church here doth after her beloved, in many ſtrong cries and bitter tears, continuing inſtant in prayer, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. Rom. 12.12. The Greek word imports a metaphor from hunting dogges, that give not over the game, till they have got it. For incouragement; See the happy ſucceſs the Church here had: and further, take that ſaying of Brentius, Etiamſi fides tuae nec lucem hominibus, nec calorem cordi tuo afferat, tamen non abjicit Chriſtus, modo incrementum ores, i. e. Although thy faith, as ſmoaking flax, yield neither light to others, nor heat to thine own heart, yet Chriſt will not caſt thee off, ſo thou pray for more, and follow thy work cloſe, till thou have gotten it.

Verſ. 7. The Watch-men that went about the City, &c.] See the Note on Chap. 3.3. The Miniſters that walk the round, that watch for mens ſouls, Heb. 13.17. Iſa. 61.6. that know how to time a word, Iſa. 51.4. theſe ſmote her with the tongue, they buffeted her by juſt and ſharp reproofs for her negligence, they unveiled her for being abroad at that time of night (which ſhe needed not to have been, but for her own ſlothfulneſs) they dealt little better with her, than as if ſhee had been ſome light and lewd woman: and all this they might well do out of zeal to God, and godly jealouſie for her ſouls good; Unleſs it were that Hypocriſie of jealouſie exerciſed by the falſe Apoſtles over the Galatians, Chap. 4.17. Not Paſtours, but Impoſtours; not Over-ſeers, Non Epiſcopi, ſed Apoſcopi. but By-ſeers; potius graſſatores; quam cuſtodes, homonym[illegible: 1 letter]s tamen ſic dicti, out-throats rather than Keepers, wicked men taking upon them to bee Watch-men, Church-officers in name, but Church-robbers in deed. Such were thoſe, Iſa. 66.5. that hated and caſt out the true worſhippers, under a pretence of, Let the Lord bee glorified. Such an one was Diotrephes, that prating prelate, [non-Latin text not transcribed], that villanouſly intreated Gods faithful people, 3 John 9.10. And ſuch is that Man of ſinne, that Antichriſt of Rome, who, for ſo many hundred years together, hath ſmitten with the fiſt of wickedneſs, hath wounded and drawn blood from Chriſts deareſt Spouſe, and deſpoiled her of her veyl: that is, laboured to diſpriviledge her, and deprive her of that purity and ſoundneſs of Doctrine that hee hath committed unto her, as a means to hold her in the duty of all holy obedience and ſubjection unto him. 1 Cor. 11.5, 6, 10. Of theſe falſe friends, and deadly enemies, the Church here heavily complains, and might well have proceeded againſt them, as thoſe ſix Martyrs, burnt by Harpsfield, Archdeacon of Canterbury, when Queen Mary lay a dying. One of thoſe ſix that were then burnt (and thoſe were the laſt) John Cornford (ſtirred with a vehement zeal of God when they were excommunicated) pronounced ſentence of excommunication againſt all Papiſts in theſe words: In the name of our Lord Jeſus Chriſt, and by the power of his holy Spirit, and authority of his holy Catholick and Apoſtolick Church, wee do give here into the hands of Satan, to bee deſtroyed, the bodies of all thoſe blaſphemers and hereticks that do maintain any errour againſt his moſt holy Word,Act. & Mon. fol. 1862. or do condemn his moſt holy truth for hereſie, to the maintenance of any falſe Church, or feigned religion: ſo that by this thy moſt juſt judgement, (O moſt mighty God) againſt thine adverſaries, thy true religion may bee known, to thy great glory, and our comfort, and the edifying of all our Nation: Good Lord, ſo bee it.

Verſ. 8. I charge you, O daughters of Jeruſalem] Being evill intreated by her enemies, ſhee turns her to her friends; thoſe damſels, or daughters of Jeruſalem: (See chap. 2.7. & 3.5.) ſo the Lord Chriſt being tired out with the untractableneſs of his untoward hearers, turns him to his Father, Mat. 11.25, 26. Kings, as they have their cares and cumbers above other men, ſo they had of old their friends (by a ſpecialty, as Huſhai was Davids friend, 2 Sam. 15.37.) to whom they might eaſe themſelves, and take ſweet counſell, Pſal. 55.14. The ſervants of God are Princes in all lands: Pſal. 45. and as they have their croſſes not a few, ſo their comforts, in and by the communion of Saints. The very opening of their grievances one to another doth many times eaſe them: as the very opening of a vein cools the blood: Their mutual prayers one with and for another prevail much, if they bee fervent, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. Jam. 5.26. Prov. 27.17. or thorough-well wrought; as in this caſe they likely will be; for as Iron whe[illegible: 1 letter]s Iron, ſo doth the face of a man his friend. And as ferrum poteſt quod anrum non poteſt, Iron can do that ſometimes that Gold cannot (An Iron-key may open a cheſt wherein Gold is laid up) ſo a meaner mans prayer may bee more effectual ſometimes than a better mans, for himſelf. His own key may be ruſty, or out of order, and another mans do it better. Hence the Church is ſo importunate with the daughters of Jeruſalem (who were far behinde her in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord Jeſus Chriſt, as appears by that which follows) to commend her and her miſery to Chriſt, to tell him (where ever they meet with him) Behold, ſhee whom thou loveſt is ſick, thy Church (in whom thy love is concentrate, as it were, and gathered to an head) doth even languiſh with love, and is in ill caſe. Tell him, ſaith ſhee, What ſhall yee tell him? as the Hebrew hath it. An earneſt and paſſionate kinde of ſpeech (ſomewhat like that in Hoſea, Give them O Lord, Hoſ. 9.14. What wilt thou give them?) as if ſhee ſhould ſay, would you know what you ſhould tell him? even that which followeth, that I am ſick of love. See chap. 2.5.

Verſ. 9. What is thy beloved more than another beloved] This capital queſtion is here doubled for the more vehemency; as alſo for the ſtrangeneſs of the matter, wherein they deſire much to bee better informed; and the rather, becauſe ſhee ſo ſtraightly chargeth, or rather ſweareth them. Something they muſt needs think was in it more than ordinary: ſith good people do not uſe to bee hot in a cold matter. But as in the Revelation, whenſoever heaven opened, ſome ſingular thing enſued: So when the Saints bee ſo ſerious in a buſineſs, ſure it is of very great concernment: Great matters are carried with great movings: as, for the diviſions of Reuben there were great thoughts of heart, Judg 5.15, 16 great impreſſions, great ſearchings. It is a common ſaying, Admiratio peperit Philoſophiam, Wonderment at the works of God, ſet men a work to enquire into the natural cauſes of them. Semblably theſe damſells of Jeruſalem, friends to the Church, little knowing the love of the Spouſe to Chriſt (which paſſed their knowledge) and yet willing to comprehend with all Saints the ſeveral dimenſions thereof;Eph. 3.18, 19 firſt, they acknowledge her, amidſt all her miſeries, to be the faireſt among women] (See chap. 1.8.) as gold is gold, though found in the dirt, or caſt into the furnace; and ſtars have their glory, though we ſee them ſometimes in a puddle, in the bottom of a well, nay, in a ſtinking ditch. Secondly, they propound to her two moſt profitable queſtions: The one concerning his perſon, Whereof wee have here a very lively and lofty deſcription, both generally, and in his parts. The other concerning the place of his abode, and where hee may be had, chap. 6.1. to the which ſhe makes anſwer, verſ. 2. and ſo her faith begins to revive, verſ. 3. which was the bleſſed effect of this their gracious communication. Conference in all arts and ſciences is a courſe of incredible profiting. Eſt aliquid quod ex magno viro vel tacente proficias, the very ſight,Prov. 31.26. Prov. 20.5. nay, thought of a good man oft doth good: how much more when hee openeth his mouth with wiſdome, and in his tongue is the Law of kindneſs? And ſurely it is a fine art to bee able to pierce a man, that is like a veſſell full of wine, and to ſet him a running. Elihu would ſpeak that hee might bee refreſht, Job 32. It would bee an eaſe to him, it would bee a great benefit to others: as the mother is in pain, till the childe hath ſuckt, and the childe not at quiet till hee hath done ſo. Fooliſh and unlearned queſtions about thoſe things whereof wee can neither have proof nor profit, wee are bound to avoid, 2 Tim. 2.23. knowing that they do gender ſtrifes, and breed crudities, fill men with winde, and make them queſtion-ſick, 1 Tim. 6.4. But profitable queſtions are frequently to bee propounded with a deſire to learn, and reſolution to practice: as the Virgin Mary demanded of the Angel, Luk. 1.34. the Diſciples of our Saviour, John 16.17, 19. &c. and hee reſolved them: which hee refuſed to do for the Jews, that asked him the ſame queſtion, John 7.35, 36. becauſe not with the ſame mind and deſire. So that frollick ſelf-ſeeker, with his fair offer of following Chriſt, was rejected: when thoſe that had more honeſt aims and ends, heard, Come and ſee, Mat. 8.19, 20. John 1.46. Theſe daughters of Jeruſalem do not therefore ask, becauſe they were utterly ignorant of Chriſt: but 1 That they might hear the Church what ſhee had to ſay of him, as they that love Chriſt, love to hear talk of him; his very name is mel[illegible: 1 letter]in ore, melos in aure, &c. 2 That by her diſcourſe they might better their knowledge: for the very Angells know not ſo much of this myſtery, but they would know more, and do therefore curiouſly pry into it, 1 Pet. 1.12. Yea, to theſe very Principalities and powers in heavenly places is made known by the Church the manifold wiſdome of God, in contriving mans ſalvation by Chriſt: they cannot but ſee an abundance of curious variety in this divine wiſdome: [non-Latin text not transcribed]. ſuch as is to be ſeen in the beſt pictures or textures, as the Apoſtles word importeth, Eph. 3.10.

Verſ. 10. My Beloved is white and ruddy, &c.] Love lacks no Rhetorick to lay forth the thing beloved in livelieſt colours; White and ruddy, What can bee more laudable and lovely? What can come nearer to a perfect ſymmetry, to a ſound and ſure conſtitution and complexion? Sure it is, that theſe two being comelily mixed, do make the moſt beautifull or orient look or colour; (ſee the Prophets deſcription of the Nazarites, Lam. 4.7.) And note (ſaith an Expoſitour) that the Holy Ghoſt joyneth both theſe together: the whiteneſs making the ruddineſs more freſh and fair, and the ruddineſs diſcerning the whiteneſs from paleneſs of face, or phlegmatick complexion. Sed ſunt in his myſteria inveſtiganda (ſaith another) ita que candor refert divinam Chriſti naturam, rubor humanam. White and red may ſignifie Chriſts God-head and Man-hood. God is called the Ancient of days, Dan. 9.7. his head and his hairs are white like wool, as white as ſnow, Rev. 1.14. Man had his name Adam of the red earth, out of which hee was taken, Gen. 2.7. Chriſt alſo, the ſecond Adam, became red with his own blood, whereby hee purchaſed the Church, Act. 10.28▪ (a bloody Spouſe ſhee was unto him) and paved for her a new and lively way into the moſt holy place, Heb. 10.20. Upon the battlements whereof hee hangs out ſtill, (as once that war-like Scythian did) a white flag of grace and mercy to penitent perſons, that humble themſelves at his feet for favour: but a red flag of juſtice and ſeverity to thoſe his enemies, that will not have him to rule over them: in token whereof his rayment is ſaid to be red, Iſa. 63.1, 2, 3. his veſture dipt in blood, Rev. 19.13.

The chiefeſt among ten thouſand] Heb. vexillatus praedecem millibus, that is, famous and conſpicuous among and above many, as Saul was higher than the people by the head and ſhoulders, as the Hachmonite was the chief of Davids mighties, 1 Chron. 11.11. Or the ſtandard-bearer of ten thouſand. Now the goodlieſt, and withall the ableſt men uſe to carry the banner or ſtandard. Chriſt ſtandeth for an enſign of the people, Iſa. 11.10. and hath ten thouſand times ten thouſand ſtanding before him, following him whereſoever he goeth, Rev. 7.9, 14. and ſinging, We will rejoyce in thy ſalvation, and in the name of our God, vexillabimus, wee will ſet up our banner, Pſal. 20.6. The Churches deſign here is to hold out Chriſt as altogether matchleſs and incomparable, that there is none like him in the earth, (as God ſaid of Job, chap. 1.8.) to teach us to eſteem him, as the people did David, more worth than ten thouſand others, 2 Sam. 18.3. to ſet him upon the chief chariot, and to give him the ſole command of all, as Pharaoh dealt by Joſeph. And as the Sun, Moon, and eleven ſtars in Joſephs viſion did obeyſance to him: ſo let our ſouls, bodies, all our temporal, natural, moral, and ſpiritual abilities be ſubject and ſerviceable to Chriſt; who, if hee be the chiefeſt of ten thouſand, ought to have as much love as ten thouſand hearts put into one, could hold.

Verſ. 11. His head is as the moſt fine gold] Here ſhee begins her particular praiſe of his ſeveral parts: and here ſhee may ſeem to ſpeak with the tongues of men and of Angels; performing (as Lovers uſe to do) that for him, that hee had done for her before, chap. 4.1, 2, 3, 4, &c. though all ſhe could ſay falleth far ſhort of him; and well ſhee might ſay after all, as Nazianzen ſometime ſaid of Baſil, There wants but his own tongue to commend him with. Loquimur de Deo non quantum debemus, ſed quantum poſſumus. In ſpeaking of Chriſts excellencies men may ſpeak what they can, they cannot poſſibly ſpeak ſo much as they ought, they cannot hyperbolize. If any ſhall think the Church doth here, hee muſt needs bee of thoſe that either know him not, or are not able to judge aright of his worth,Tull. de Orator. as once Cicero ſaid of Craſſus and Antonius the Oratours. Nuſquam Origines non ardet, ſed nuſquam eſt ardentior, &c. ſaith Eraſmus. Origen is never but earneſt,Eraſ. in praef. ad Orig. opera. howbeit hee is never more earneſt, than when hee diſcourſeth of Chriſt: in other things hee may ſeem to excell others, but in this hee excelleth himſelf. The ſame wee may well ſay of the Church in this place, in ſetting forth the ſurpaſſing purity and perfection of her Spouſe: Quem manibus propriis finxit cordata Minerva. And firſt ſhee makes his head to bee of the fineſt and firmeſt gold, Feſs-gold, ſo the Arabick, from the Hebrew, calleth it: and the land of Feſs ſeemeth to bee named of ſuch gold there. Davids Michtam or Golden Pſalm comes from one of the words here uſed. For in the Original thus it is,Or he is the gold of gold, as Athens was the Greece of Greece. His head is moſt gliſtering gold, yea, moſt ſolid gold. That is, his deity which dwells in him, is moſt pure and glorious, (for the head of Chriſt is God, 1 Cor. 11.3.) and that fulneſs of grace which is communicated to his humane nature, is wondrouſly beautiful: and ſo ſets it forth, as black curled locks do a freſh countenance.

Spectandus nigris oculis, nigro que capillo eſt.

Ver. 12. His eyes are as the eyes of Doves by the rivers of water, &c.] i. e. they are full of all innocency, ſingleneſs, and chaſtity: See the Notes on chap. 1.15. & 4.1. where Chriſt had attributed the very ſame to the Church, who is his image and glory, as the woman is of the man, 1 Cor. 11.7. the very looking-glaſs of his dignity, and reflex of his comelineſs. His eyes are elſewhere ſaid to bee as a flame of fire, ſharp and terrible, ſuch as pierce into the inward parts,Rev. 1.14. Dan. 10.6. and need no outward light. Here they are as the eyes of Doves, caſting an amiable, gracious, joyfull, and comfortable look upon his Church. As, his eyes behold, his eye-lids try the children of men (the one points out his knowledge, the other his critical deſcant) Pſal. 11.4. So hee caſteth an eye of ſingular providence and tender affection upon his afflicted people, I have ſeen, I have ſeen, ſaith hee, the ſufferings of my people. I know their ſorrows, and am come down to deliver them; His eye affects his heart, Exod. 3.7, 8. and his heart ſets his hand awork for their ſuccour and ſafety. Ezek. 1.8. wee read of faces, eyes, wings, hands, &c. all to expreſs the ſufficiency of Gods providence for all means of help. See Pſal. 33.18, 19. & 34.16. The Church is like the land of Canaan, which is ſaid to be a land which the Lord careth for: the eyes of the Lord are alwaies upon it, &c. Deut. 11.11. Hee ſeeth that lovelineſs in her, that hee overlooks all, as it were, to look upon her: hee beholds that worth in her, that the buzzards of the world cannot ken. Therefore the world knows us not, reſpects us not, becauſe it knew not him, 1 John 3.1. ſaw no ſuch beauty, that they ſhould deſire him, Iſa. 53.2. Nicoſtratus in Elian, himſelf being a cunning Artiſan, finding a curious piece of work, and being wondred at by one, and asked by one what pleaſure hee could take to ſtand gazing as hee did on the picture? anſwered, Hadſt thou mine eyes, thou wouldſt not wonder, but rather bee raviſhed as I am at the inimitable art of this piece. Semblably, had men thoſe dove-like ſingle eyes that Chriſt and his people have, waſhed in milk, that is, in milk-white waters, cleanſed from the duſt of ſinful prejudice, and fitly ſet, as a precious ſtone in the foyl of a ring, or as the precious filling-ſtones in the holy Ephod, Exod. 25.7. they would kiſs the Sonne, and admire his Spouſe. Whereas for want of Spiritual eyes, the Northern proverb is verified, unkent, unkiſt, unknown, unreſpected.

Verſ. 13. His cheeks are as a bed of ſpices] i. e. comely and pleaſant to the ſight, ſweet alſo to the ſmell; areolis ſimiles aromatum plenis: flouriſhing with a goodly, comely, freſh, and ſweet beard; ſo declaring his face not onely to be gracious and amiable, but alſo full of gravity, glory, and majeſty. There are that would have all theſe things to bee taken literally of Chriſts natural body: and that here is ſet down his Proſopography: But this was written long before Chriſt was incarnate; and therefore it muſt needs be meant in a metaphorical and allegorical ſenſe, hard to bee explained. Ego quid de ſingulis ſtatuam fateor me neſcire, ſaith a learned Interpreter. Allegorically to handle all theſe is not in my purpoſe or power, ſaith another: ſith the graces of Chriſt, as they cannot well bee expreſſed, ſo, by reaſon of our weakneſs, they cannot better bee declared. The drift of the holy Ghoſt is to paint out unto us the ſpiritual and heavenly love of his Church to Chriſt, who doth not, nor cannot ſatisfie her ſelf with any words, or compariſons of this kind. And ſecondly, to ſtir up our heartieſt and livelieſt affections to him, that hath ſuch a world of worth and wealth in him. As the worth and value of many peeces of ſilver is in one peece of gold, ſo all the petty excellencies ſcattered abroad in the creatures are united in Chriſt; yea all the whole volume of perfections which is ſpread thorow Heaven and Earth, is epitomized in him: why do wee not then make out to him, and deſpiſe all for him with Paul? Why do wee not with David chide our ſelves and others for loving vanity, Pſal. 4.2. and ſeeking after leaſing? How long wilt thou go about, O backſliding daughter, Iſa. 7.14. and fetch a compaſs? knoweſt thou not that the Lord hath created a new thing in the Earth? a woman ſhall compaſs a man, Jer. 31.22. that is, a Virgin ſhall conceive and bear a Son, even the Man Chriſt Jeſus, in whom it pleaſed the Father that there ſhould dwell all fulneſs, Col. 1.19. Make wee therefore ſtraight paths for our feet, Heb. 12.13. Let us go ſpeedily to Chriſt, Zech. 8.21. as Bees do to a Meddow full of flowers: as Merchants do to the Indies that are full of fruits and ſpices; that wee may return from him, full fraught with treaſures of truth and grace.

His lips like Lillies, dropping ſweet-ſmelling myrrhe] i. e. His word and doctrine is white, ſweet, pleaſant, far-ſpreading as Lillies; ſweet to the ſmell, and yet bitter to the taſte as myrrhe, no way pleaſing to the fleſh which it mortifieth, calling upon men to repent, reform, walk by rule, ſtrive to enter in at the ſtraight gate, reſiſt unto blood, ſtriving againſt ſin. Theſe things are good and profitable to men (as the Apoſtle ſpeaks in another caſe, (Tit. 3.8.) but they naturally care not to hear of them. Drop not yee, ſay they, (wee like not your Lillies dropping myrrhe and nitre) Let thoſe drop or propheſie, Micah 2.6. that preach pleaſing things; Wee like your Lillies, but care not for your Myrrhe: or if wee ſmell it, wee like not to taſte of it, becauſe little toothſome, however it may bee wholeſome.

Verſ. 14. His hands are as gold Rings ſet with the Beril] Or Chryſolite. Heb. Tarſhiſh, whence our word Turkeis (as it may ſeem) a precious ſtone, of colour blew like the Skie, or (as others ſay) green like the Sea: Aſher was graven upon this ſtone, who dwelt near the Sea, Exod. 28.20. Some write, that in former times this ſtone was moſt uſually ſet in ſuch Rings as Lovers did uſe to give one to another, or in Marriage-Rings; becauſe of the power that was thought to bee in it to procure and continue love and liking one of them towards another. Whatſoever ſtone it is, whether a Beril, Chryſolite, Carbuncle, Hyacinth, Onyx (for all theſe waies it is rendred) the Churches meaning is, that all the works of Chriſt, whether in the ſtate of Humiliation, or of Exaltation (for redemption wee have by his Abaſement, application of it by his Advancement) are moſt rare, dear, precious, and glorious, as numbers of Rings filled with all manner of coſtly ſtones: they are acceptable and honourable before God and man. And like as great men are known by their Rings, and rich Jewels, ſo is Chriſt by his Saints, the work of his hands, Iſa. 64.8.

His belly is as bright Ivory, overlaid with Sapphires] Heb. His bowels, in the dual; meaning his breaſt and belly, and there, the heart and lights, thoſe ſeats of the will and affections; here, the liver, ſtomach, entrails, which ſerve for nutrition and generation. By all this wee may well underſtand Chriſts inward affections outwardly manifeſted. Theſe are true and ſincere, as bright and white Ivory; they are alſo hearty and heavenly as Sapphires: various alſo and manifold, ſicut Sapphiri caeruleae ſunt, His bowels yearn toward his afflicted people, his heart is turned within him, his repentings are kindled together, Hoſ. 11.8, ſo the Poet, Ingemuit miſerans graviter, dextram que tetendit.Virg.

Verſ. 15. His leggs are as pillars of marble] A ſign of Chriſts firmneſs in his Kingdome, works, word, and government (ſaith a learned Expoſitour) and of his ſtrength to trample upon his enemies, as alſo of his united power to accompliſh the courſe of his three-fold office. Pillars both bear up the building, and beautifie it: neither can any thing be more ſure and ſolid than theſe, if ſet upon a firm foundation. The Pillars here mentioned are ſaid to bee ſet upon fine gold, that is, upon a foundation both fine, and firm, for gold hardly ruſteth or cankereth: whence it was (likely) that Tithonus and his Son Memnon, when they built the City of Suſa in Perſia, they joyned the ſtones together with gold, as Caſſiodorus writeth: Chriſts power is founded upon his divine Nature; and this is the Rock upon which the Church is built, and whereby it is ſet in ſafety from all miſeries and moleſtations ſatanical or ſecular. The gates of Hell ſhall not prevail againſt her. Chriſt and the Father are one; Pſal. 89.19. therefore none ſhall take her out of his hands. God hath laid help upon one that is mighty, even upon Emanuel the mighty ſtrong God, as hee is called, Iſa. 9.6. declared to bee the Son of God with power according to the ſpirit of holineſs, by the reſurrection from the dead, Rom. 1.4. that your Faith and hope might bee in God, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. Prorſus, perpotuo, perfecte. 1 Pet. 1.21. Truſt perfectly therefore to, or hope to the end, for the grace that is to bee brought unto you at the Revelation of Jeſus: ſith hee is able to ſave them to the uttermoſt that come unto God by him, 1 Pet. 1.13. Heb. 7.25.

His countenance is as Lebanon] His aſpect, his look or general view, i. e. Whatſoever of himſelf Chriſt is pleaſed to manifeſt and lay open unto us is pleaſant and delightful, goodly and glorious, excellent and eximious, choice as the Cedars, that are choſen before other trees; and why, ſee the Note on chap. 1.17.

Verſ. 16. His mouth is moſt ſweet] Heb. His palat, (that is, his word and promiſes, which are as it were the breath of Chriſts mouth) is all ſweet. This ſhee had celebrated before, verſ. 13. but, as not ſatisfied therewith, ſhee repeats it, and rolls it again as ſugar under her tongue. Shee doubles this commendation, to ſhew, that that is the chief lovely thing in Chriſt, his Word; this fruit ſhee had found ſweet unto her palat, chap. 2.3. and ſhee ſpareth not to ſet it forth, as here, the ſecond time, Mallemus carere, &c. Wee had rather bee without Fire, Water, Bread, Sun, Air, &c. (ſaith a Dutch Divine) than that one ſweet ſentence of our bleſſed Saviour, Come unto mee all yee that are weary, &c.

Yea hee is altogether lovely] Totus totus deſiderabilis, wholly amiable: every whit of him to bee deſired. Moſes thought him ſo, when hee preferred the reproach of Chriſt, the worſt part of him, the heavieſt peece of his croſs, before all the treaſures in Egypt, that Magazin of the world, Heb. 11.26. Thoſe of this world ſee no ſuch excellency and deſireableneſs in Chriſt, and his waies, (Pſal. 22.7.) nor can do, till ſoundly ſhaken, Hag. 2.7. I will ſhake all Nations, and then the deſire of all Nations, that is Chriſt, ſhall come with ſtirring affections, ſaying, as Iſa. 26.9. with my ſoul have I deſired thee in the night: yea with my ſpirit within mee will I ſeek thee early. Loe this is the voice of every true childe of the Church; and theſe deſires of the righteous ſhall bee ſatisfied, Prov. 10.24.

This is my Beloved, &c.] q.d. You may ſee I have cauſe to ſeek after him; neither can you do better than to do likewiſe: howſoever, when you ſee him, do my errand to him, as verſ. 7. And here wee have moſt excellent Rhetorick, which in the beginning of a ſpeech, requires [non-Latin text not transcribed], milder affections: in the end of it, [non-Latin text not transcribed], ſtronger paſſions, that may leaved deepeſt impreſſions.