Old Testament · Wisdom & Poetry
שִׁיר הַשִּׁירִים
Love unashamed, garden poetry between bride and beloved, strong as death itself.
Love poetry, frankly erotic, with no mention of God, law, or covenant anywhere in it. Its presence in Scripture has been explained for two thousand years, most often as an allegory of God and Israel or Christ and the church, and that reading produced some of the richest devotional writing in both traditions. The plainer reading, that it is what it appears to be, has become the more common one and is not the lesser: a canon that opens with a man and a woman naked and unashamed has an obvious place for a book celebrating desire without embarrassment. Notice that the woman speaks most of the lines, initiates, and is never passive, which was not the convention of the ancient love poetry around it.
If you remember one thing
Jewish and Christian readers have long read it allegorically, of God and Israel or Christ and the church, and it is also plainly what it looks like: unembarrassed love poetry, included in Scripture without apology.
“Love is strong as death.”
Song of Songs 8:6
Song of Songs 4:1-7
The frank description of a body. Uncomfortable to some readers precisely because it is in Scripture, and the discomfort is worth examining rather than resolving by allegory.
Song of Songs 5:7
The watchmen beat her and take her cloak. A moment of real violence in a love poem, and interpreters differ on whether it is dream or event.
Named here rather than skipped. Where Christians read a passage differently, we say so instead of choosing for you.
Everyone here has a write-up, drawn from the same records that explain the names while you read the text.
David's son, who asked God for wisdom and received riches and fame besides. He built the great temple in Jerusalem and his reign was Israel's golden age of peace. But his seven hundred wives turned his heart to their gods, and for that idolatry God foretold the kingdom would be torn in two after him.
A quiz for Song of Songs is on the workbench. In the meantime, the games for the judges, the kings, and the prophets are open.
