Song of Solomon 5

Key Terms

Translator Notes

1. The five first-person perfects create a rhythm of completion: gathered, eaten, drunk. Every image from the spice garden of chapter 4 is now consumed. The garden that was locked is now fully entered and enjoyed.
2. The final imperative ('eat, friends; drink deeply, lovers') is one of the Song's most debated lines. The identity of the speaker is unknown, but the effect is clear: an outside voice sanctions and celebrates the lovers' union.

Key Terms

Translator Notes

1. Ani yeshenah ve-libbi er ('I was asleep but my heart was awake') — the body sleeps while desire remains alert. She hears him knocking (dofek) and calling through the door with four terms of endearment: sister, darling, dove, perfect one. His appeal is both romantic and pathetic — he stands outside in the night dew, wet-haired, begging entry.
2. The knocking on the door and the request to 'open' (pitchi li) carries obvious sexual overtones alongside the literal scene.

Translator Notes

1. Her hesitation is the chapter's turning point. She has undressed and bathed for sleep; rising to open the door would mean redressing and dirtying her feet. The excuses seem trivial, but they create the fatal delay. By the time she acts, he will be gone. This is the Song's most painful moment of missed connection — desire that hesitates loses.

Translator Notes

1. He reaches his hand through the latch-hole (chor) — the opening in the door through which a hand could reach to lift the internal bar. The image is intensely physical and erotically charged: his hand penetrating the opening. Her response is visceral: me'ay hamu alav ('my insides churned/trembled for him') — me'im are the intestines, the gut, the deepest interior of the body. Her desire is not in her mind but in her bowels.

Translator Notes

1. She finally rises — and finds that he has left myrrh on the door handle. Her hands drip with mor over ('liquid myrrh, flowing myrrh') as she touches the bolt (man'ul). The myrrh is his trace, his residue — he was here, he touched this very surface, and his fragrance remains. The image is simultaneously romantic and tragic: the perfume of his presence lingers after his departure.

Translator Notes

1. Dodi chamaq avar ('my beloved had turned and gone') — chamaq means 'to slip away, to withdraw.' He came, he waited, he left. Nafshi yats'ah be-dabbero ('my soul went out at his speaking/going') — her nefesh departs, she nearly dies from the pain of his absence. The seeking-and-not-finding language returns from 3:1-2, but now without resolution. She seeks, calls — silence.

Key Terms

Translator Notes

1. The parallel to 3:3 is exact — until it turns violent. The same watchmen, the same city, but now hikkuni petsa'uni ('they beat me, they wounded me'). They also nasa'u et redidi me'alay ('they took my veil from me') — stripping a woman's covering is an act of public shaming (cf. Isaiah 47:2-3). The Song offers no explanation for this violence. The text simply absorbs it and moves forward. A woman seeking love in a dangerous world encounters the world's brutality.

Translator Notes

1. The adjuration returns but transformed — no longer a warning about love's timing but a desperate message to be relayed. Cholat ahavah ani ('I am sick with love') echoes 2:5 but now the lovesickness has a sharper edge. She is beaten, stripped, alone in the dark, and her message to her absent beloved is simply: I am dying of desire for you.

Translator Notes

1. The Daughters of Jerusalem ask the question that prompts the wasf: mah dodekh mi-dod ('what is your beloved more than a beloved?') — what makes him special? Why should we carry your message? The double question demands an answer, and she will give them one that transforms the entire second half of the chapter.

Key Terms

Translator Notes

1. Tsach ve-adom ('radiant and ruddy') — tsach means 'dazzling, bright, clear' and adom means 'red, ruddy.' The combination suggests glowing health: bright skin flushed with vitality. Dagul me-revavah ('distinguished/bannered among ten thousand') — like a banner visible above a crowd of ten thousand, he stands out. The wasf begins with the whole before moving to parts.

Translator Notes

1. Ketem paz ('finest gold, pure gold') — his head shines like the highest grade of refined gold. Qevutsotav taltalim ('his locks are clusters/curls') — the hair is thick, wavy, hanging in heavy ringlets. Shechorot ka-orev ('black as a raven') — the contrast between gold head and raven-black hair creates a striking image of brilliance framed by darkness.

Translator Notes

1. The dove metaphor from 1:15 returns, now applied to the man. His eyes are doves beside water (al afiqe mayim — 'beside water channels'), bathed in milk (rochotsot be-chalav — white, glistening), and yoshvot al mille't ('sitting/mounted in their settings,' like gems in a bezel). The image layers: doves by water, washed in white, perfectly set — his eyes are jewels alive with gentle beauty.

Translator Notes

1. His cheeks are arugat ha-bosem ('beds of spice') — the garden metaphor now applies to his face. Migdelot merqachim ('towers of perfumes') — his cheekbones rise like towers from which scent pours. His lips are shoshannim ('lilies') dripping mor over ('liquid myrrh'). When he speaks, when he kisses, myrrh flows. His face is a spice garden; his mouth produces the most precious resin.

Key Terms

Translator Notes

1. Yadav gelile zahav ('his hands are gold cylinders') — gelilim are round, cylindrical rods. His fingers are smooth gold tubes set with tarshish (beryl or chrysolite — a yellow-green gem). Me'av eshet shen ('his belly/torso is a plaque of ivory') — his abdomen is smooth, pale, and hard as worked ivory, me'ullefet sappirim ('overlaid with sapphires' — blue lapis lazuli veining beneath the skin). The materials are those of temple furniture and royal vessels.

Translator Notes

1. Shoqav ammude shesh ('his legs are pillars of marble/alabaster') set on adne paz ('bases of pure gold') — he stands like a temple. Mar'ehu ka-Levanon ('his appearance is like Lebanon') — not a single tree but an entire mountain range: vast, majestic, covered with forests. Bachur ka-arazim ('choice as the cedars') — he is the finest specimen, selected like the best cedar for the temple. His body is architecture, landscape, and forest.

Key Terms

Translator Notes

1. Chikko mamtaqqim ('his palate/mouth is sweetnesses') — the plural intensifies: not merely sweet but the essence of sweetness. Ve-kullo machamaddim ('and all of him is desires/delights') — machamad is 'that which is desired, a precious thing.' He is not just desirable but the embodiment of desire itself.
2. The closing declaration zeh dodi ve-zeh re'i ('this is my beloved and this is my friend') answers the daughters' question from verse 9 and reasserts the Song's central insight: the lover is also the friend. Dod (lover) and re'a (friend, companion) are held together. Erotic passion and genuine friendship are not opposed but fused.