Song of Solomon 1
Big idea: The book opens in the middle of a longing, with no introduction of the speakers and no situation explained — the first word out of her mouth is a wish to be kissed. What follows establishes the Song's two habits at once: she speaks first and most, and the praise runs both directions.
The chapter ends on a green couch under cedar beams, which is the first of the Song's outdoor rooms. Chapter 2 stays outside and opens the season: winter past, flowers out, and an invitation to come away.
1:1–8 — Draw me after you
The title claims Solomon in a Hebrew construction that can mean by him, for him, about him or in his manner, which is where the authorship question starts and mostly stays. Then the poem begins without preamble, in the third person and immediately in the second — let HIM kiss me, for YOUR love is better than wine — a switch that translations preserve because the abruptness is the effect. Her first extended speech is a defence of how she looks and a request to know where he will be at noon.
1 The Song of songs, which is Solomon’s. 2 Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth; for your love is better than wine. 3 Your oils have a pleasing fragrance. Your name is oil poured out, therefore the virgins love you. 4 Take me away with you. Let’s hurry. The king has brought me into his rooms. Friends We will be glad and rejoice in you. We will praise your love more than wine! Beloved They are right to love you. 5 I am dark, but lovely, you daughters of Jerusalem, like Kedar’s tents, like Solomon’s curtains. 6 Don’t stare at me because I am dark, because the sun has scorched me. My mother’s sons were angry with me. They made me keeper of the vineyards. I haven’t kept my own vineyard. 7 Tell me, you whom my soul loves, where you graze your flock, where you rest them at noon; for why should I be as one who is veiled beside the flocks of your companions? 8 If you don’t know, most beautiful among women, follow the tracks of the sheep. Graze your young goats beside the shepherds’ tents.
1:9–17 — Behold, you are beautiful
His first extended speech compares her to a mare among Pharaoh's chariot horses, which is not the compliment it sounds like in English — Egyptian chariots were drawn by stallions, so a mare loose among them is an image of something that stops an army in its tracks. Her reply works entirely by scent: nard, myrrh worn overnight, henna blossom from the oasis at En Gedi. The exchange ends with the two of them praising each other in almost the same words.
9 I have compared you, my love, to a steed in Pharaoh’s chariots. 10 Your cheeks are beautiful with earrings, your neck with strings of jewels. 11 We will make you earrings of gold, with studs of silver. 12 While the king sat at his table, my perfume spread its fragrance. 13 My beloved is to me a sachet of myrrh, that lies between my breasts. 14 My beloved is to me a cluster of henna blossoms from the vineyards of En Gedi. 15 Behold, you are beautiful, my love. Behold, you are beautiful. Your eyes are like doves. 16 Behold, you are beautiful, my beloved, yes, pleasant; and our couch is verdant. 17 The beams of our house are cedars. Our rafters are firs.
Scripture text: World English Bible (public domain).