Chapter Five

1. A feast of the beloved. 2–7. The bride’s night impressions in seeking her friend. 8–16. In conversation with the maidens of Jerusalem, she praises her friend with encomiums.

Song of Songs 5:1. I came into my garden, my sister, my bride; I gathered my myrrh with my spice; I ate my honeycomb with my honey; I drank my wine with my milk. Eat, O friends, and drink; drink deeply, O lovers! In response to the bride’s invitation or wish (Song 4:16) the beloved comes into his garden and from all its fruits and spices prepares a feast for guests and friends. In the texts of the LXX, Slavonic, Vulgate, the second half of v. 16 of chapter IV is assigned to verse 1 of chapter V, which imparts greater wholeness to contiguous and kindred thoughts—one ending a chapter and the other beginning another.

Song of Songs 5:2. I slept, but my heart was awake. Hark! my beloved is knocking: ‘Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my perfect one! For my head is wet with dew, my locks with the drops of the night.’ Song of Songs 5:3. I have put off my garment; how can I put it on? I have washed my feet; how can I soil them? Song of Songs 5:4. My beloved put his hand to the latch, and my heart was thrilled within me. Song of Songs 5:5. I arose to open to my beloved, and my hands dripped with myrrh, my fingers with flowing myrrh, upon the handles of the bolt. Song of Songs 5:6. I opened to my beloved, but my beloved had turned and gone. My soul failed me when he spoke. I sought him, but found him not; I called him, but he gave me no answer. Song of Songs 5:7. The watchmen found me as they went about in the city; they beat me, they bruised me; the guards of the walls took away my mantle from me. In the words “I slept, but my heart was awake” is given a true and accurate characterization of passionate love filling all the being of a loving creature even during sleep: a single word from the beloved is enough for the one who loves her to awaken from sleep. The Midrash (s. 134) paraphrases the words of v. 2 thus: “The congregation of Israel says before God: Lord of the world! I sleep and do not fulfill commandments, but my heart is awake, it is stirred by love for people; I sleep, I do not speak of charity, but my heart is awake to perform it; I sleep—I neglect sacrifices, but my heart watches, reverently set toward reciting the Shema and prayer; I sleep—I do not go to the temple, but my heart is awake—it longs for the synagogues and schools; I sleep—I do not count on the end of suffering, but my heart watches—it longs ardently for deliverance, and God’s heart watches—to deliver me.” What is then said: 1) of the slowness and as if unwillingness of the bride to open the door to one knocking in the night cold at her door—her bridegroom (v. 3), and 2) of the sudden disappearance of him after she had opened the doors (v. 6, cf. 5), is not fully comprehensible in the realm of human relations of mutual love. Therefore it is of interest and significance to clarify this passage in Professor Olesnitsky’s spirit in terms of his already known theory. “Early in the morning, when Palestine is still sleeping, the rising sun already knocks at her door with its rays, still as if wet from the night’s freshness and abundant summer dew. But now it finds not the light and mobile life of spring, but a life already seduced by prolonged exultation and lazily responding to the call of the day’s luminary. The sun took offense and, when the earth finally awoke, hid itself in gray sandy mist, it became the frequent phenomenon in Palestine at this time of year—the phenomenon of simoom, poetically depicted in verse 7. The earth is met by certain watchmen, who beat her and forcefully tear from her the beautiful covering of her vegetation: these are meant as those constellations which, according to ancient cosmogony, are the cause of storms and upheavals on the earth’s surface… Although earlier, in the spring song (Song 3:3), Palestine met such watchmen, but then they did not cause her such harm as now, amid summer, and passed silently by (in early spring the phenomena of simoom are weak)… Amid the unexpected storm, which changed and laid bare the face of the whole land, the bride with regret dreams of the hidden peaceful and beautiful sun and depicts him in the poetic image Song 5:10-16, whose features and colors vividly indicate the brilliance of the sun and the purity of its rays… Where now is your bridegroom—the sun?—ask Palestine. He descended into his ethereal gardens, but he is still mine, and I belong to him especially” (p. 375–376).

Song of Songs 5:10. My beloved is radiant and ruddy, outstanding among ten thousand. Song of Songs 5:11. His head is the finest gold; his locks are wavy, black as a raven. Song of Songs 5:12. His eyes are like doves beside the water streams, bathed in milk, sitting beside full pools. Song of Songs 5:13. His cheeks are like beds of spices, yielding fragrance. His lips are lilies, dripping with flowing myrrh. Song of Songs 5:14. His arms are rods of gold set with jewels. His body is polished ivory set with sapphires. Song of Songs 5:15. His legs are alabaster columns set upon bases of gold. His appearance is like Lebanon, stately as the cedars. Song of Songs 5:16. His mouth is most sweet, and he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem! After the Bride’s meeting with the daughters of Jerusalem and her repetition of (v. 3) the already known adjuration (cf. Song 2:7) and their answering protest (v. 9), she gives with great enthusiasm a description, verses 10–16, of the incomparable beauty of her friend, with “this description, like the description of the bride, represents a deliberate selection of features and pictures of nature, obscuring the features of the human form, which, however, was needed here as well in order to impart unity of impression to individual features and to form correspondence to the other human form. And here human features stand so close to the details of nature that even the comparative particle (like) between them is considered superfluous” (Professor Olesnitsky, p. 357–358). In general the image of the Bridegroom is drawn here with especially bold comparisons in purely Eastern spirit (his head is finest gold; his locks are grape vines; his eyes are doves… his cheeks are a bed of spices fragrant; his lips are lilies; his legs are marble columns)… But precisely this hyperbolic character of the depiction of the Beloved gives grounds for a typological explanation of this image. “As we gaze into these pictures flooded with light, the human form of the bridegroom becomes more and more dim and finally transforms into the halo-shining image of the sun” (Professor Olesnitsky, p. 358). “But this beneficent power is not merely the elemental force or the visible sun, but also a political force, which biblical writers personified in the image of the sun (Jer 15:9) and whose representative at the time of the writing of the Song of Songs was King Solomon, mentioned by name six times in our sacred play” (p. 360). “By the indicated union of king and sun, there was formed in the poet’s mind such a lofty ideal image, that it was quite easy, without any violation of the unity of the picture, to append to it features defining the divine force beneficial to the land. In the sun and azure rising above the earth, King Solomon, as the beneficial genius of the land, in itself evoked in the poet’s mind the image of the glorified Messiah, destined to appear in the clouds of glory and to consummate all the highest heavenly blessings of the people” (p. 362).