Song of Songs (Part 7)
Anonymous
Your rounded thighs are like jewels,
the work of the hands of a skillful workman.
Your body is like a round goblet,
no mixed wine is wanting.
Your waist is like a heap of wheat,
set about with lilies.
Your two breasts are like two fawns,
that are twins of a roe.
Your neck is like an ivory tower.
Your eyes are like the pools in Heshbon by the gate of Bathrabbim.
Your nose is like the tower of Lebanon which looks toward Damascus.
Your head on you is like Carmel.
The hair of your head like purple.
The king is held captive in its tresses.
How beautiful and how pleasant you are,
love, for delights!
This, your stature, is like a palm tree,
your breasts like its fruit.
I said, “I will climb up into the palm tree.
I will take hold of its fruit.”
Let your breasts be like clusters of the vine,
the smell of your breath like apples,
Beloved
Your mouth like the best wine,
that goes down smoothly for my beloved,
gliding through the lips of those who are asleep.
I am my beloved's.
His desire is toward me.
Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field.
Let us lodge in the villages.
Let's go early up to the vineyards.
Let's see whether the vine has budded,
its blossom is open,
and the pomegranates are in flower.
There I will give you my love.
The mandrakes give forth fragrance.
At our doors are all kinds of precious fruits, new and old,
which I have stored up for you, my beloved.
[Song of Songs (Cantique des Cantiques)
by Gustave Moreau, 1893]
The Song of Songs ("Shir-HaShirim") is one of the books in the Hebrew Bible. According to the title line, it is by King Solomon, but modern theologians argue on linguistic grounds for a later dating, after the exile or even in the Hellenistic period.
The Song of Songs is unique within the Hebrew Bible: it shows no interest in Law or Covenant or the God of Israel, nor does it teach wisdom like Proverbs or Ecclesiastes; instead, it celebrates sexual love, giving the voices of two lovers, praising each other, yearning for each other, proffering invitations to enjoy. The two are in harmony, each desiring the other and rejoicing in sexual intimacy.
In modern Judaism the Song of Songs is read on the Sabbath during
the Passover, which marks the beginning of the grain-harvest as well as
commemorating the Exodus from Egypt. Jewish tradition reads it as an allegory of the relationship between God and Israel, Christianity as an allegory of Christ and his bride, the Church. The canonicity of the book was once disputed within the Jewish tradition. The great Torah scholar Rabbi Akiva (50-135 CE), however, committed himself to maintaining it in the canon, arguing the mystical meaning he attributed to it.
But, of course, it is nothing else but pure and very beautiful love poetry.
The above translation has been quoted from the "World English Bible" (also known as WEB), a public domain translation of the Bible. It is based on the 1901 American Standard Version, the Greek Majority Text, and the Hebrew Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia. Link to the World English Bible at Wikisource.