SONG OF SONGS 7:10-13

I generally steer away from any detailed exegesis of passages from this particular book because of their almost X-rated nature, but these verses particular are relatively innocuous. And, as in trying to understand any portion of this poetic book, much depends on one's view of how the book of organized. So if you want a broad overview of that subject first, consult my post titled “What is the Importance of the Organization of the Song of Songs?”.

This quite unusual Old Testament book consists of a series of poetic speeches, mainly given by the hero and heroine, speaking of their overwhelming love for one another. But as to whether (a) they are married at the time or not; (b) the scenes are presented chronologically or by some other scheme; (c) they represent real events or fantasies in the characters' mind; or (d) the whole book concerns (literally) human love or (symbolically) divine love – all of these issues impact how we look at any given passage in the Song.

These verses represent the woman's response to the hero's rhapsodizing over her physical beauty in 7:1-9, and the poetic parallelism in her speech can be represented visually somewhat as follows:

    I am my beloved's and

        his desire is for me

    Come, my beloved

            let us go forth        into the fields and

                      lodge           in the villages

            let us go out early to the vineyards

                            and see whether the vines have budded

                                        whether the grape blossoms have opened and

                                                     the pomegranates are in bloom

    There I will give you my love.

        The mandrakes give forth fragrance and

        over our doors are all choice fruits, new as well as old

    which I have laid up for you,

O my beloved.

Within these few verses we can see examples of what are called by scholars introverted, incomplete, identical, stair-step, and emblematic parallelism (For definitions of these terms and examples of each, see my post titled “Understanding Biblical Poetry”).

Keeping that general introduction in mind, here is how various scholars approach the problems in this passage:

The Opening Verse

If this verse sounds familiar to you, it may be because the first line (“I am my beloved”) has appeared earlier in 2:16 and 6:3. But there is a significant difference in the second line. Instead of the following line reading “and my beloved is mine,” it reads “And his desire is for me.” As Snaith says, “So the possession is no longer mutual: the girl appears to be dominant here. This is particularly notable when we realize that the Heb. word for his desire (tesuqato) is used elsewhere in the OT only in Gen. 3:16...'yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you',,,As Gordis notes, the woman's subservience to the man becomes very different here, where the poet expresses the lovers' joyous desire for each other; perhaps her desirability gives her the upper hand.This variation seems to change the whole balance between the sexes.”

Henna

If you compare various English translations of these verses, you may note that in v. 11 the final verse is sometimes translated as “villages” (as in NRSV) and sometimes as the “henna bushes” (NEB).

Gledhill: “She is inviting him to spend the night in the kepharim with her. This can mean either villages or 'henna-bushes.' It is most likely that the latter is the meaning here. They want to be far away from human habitations, they are seeking the solitude of the rustic bower.”

Mandrakes

Then there is the obscure reference to “mandrakes” in v. 13 to deal with. Almost all commentators say the same thing regarding this root, namely, that it was widely considered as an aphrodisiac in ancient times. And to prove that point, they cite Genesis 30:14-19, the story in which Rachel wants to conceive a child by her husband Jacob.

However, to me that sounds like a rather weak explanation since the context of Genesis 30 clearly shows that there was nothing at all wrong with Jacob's libido; the problem was with Rachel's lack of fertility instead. And from the hero's comments in Song of Songs 7:1-10, it is obvious that he also is having no problem in getting sexually aroused. All of that appears to point to a situation in which the couple is already married since it would have been unheard of for an unmarried woman to wish to become pregnant.

But then, perhaps the reference to mandrakes, popularly called “love apples” at a later date, is just thrown in to add to the general sexual overtones in the poem. As Gledhill puts it: “The tangential mention of the mandrakes is a literary device to give a sexual frisson to the poetry.” And he also points out that the “Hebrew word for 'mandrakes' is etymologically related to the word dodim (love, caresses) encountered earlier in the Song (1:2).”

And then Longman adds: “Indeed, apparently the drug made from the plant is more likely to put one to sleep than get one excited. Yet the poet is interested more in literary effect than pharmacological accuracy.”

Old and New

This phrase concludes the poem, but what does it mean when she says that she has stored up old and new for her lover? Longman expresses the opinion of most scholars: “The immediately preceding context might suggest new and old sweet-smelling plants, but why old plants? I suspect that the terms 'new' and 'old' here are used as a merism. W.G.E. Watson defines a merism as 'when a totality is expressed in abbreviated form.' Specifically, this merism is one defined by 'polar word-pairs.'..Old and new things might mean all things. She has stored up or treasured (from spn) everything near and dear to her for her man. She gives him everything.”

Is the author King Solomon and if so, is he speaking of his personal experiences?

This is an issue that separates fundamentalists from some conservative Christians and all liberals.

Because the very first verse in the book states, “The Song of Songs, which is Solomon's,” there is the strong feeling among some that King Solomon was the author and that he was writing about his own life here. Thus, Akin says, “Solomon, at least at this point in his life, was a one-woman kind of man.”

However, Dobbs-Allsopp, along with many other scholars, points out that this opening phrase can be interpreted as saying either that the song is by Solomon [in which case, the rest of the book does not necessarily have to be about him] or about him. And in that latter case, one should keep in mind that “it was common practice in antiquity to attribute authorship to a well-known figure” such as David, Solomon, or Jeremiah. “The Song, though, because of its relatively late date, was clearly not written by Solomon.”

Bullock first cites the conservative author Gleason Archer's defense of Solomonic authorship because of, among other things, the author's knowledge of the flora and fauna of the time and place. But then he points out the possibility that this book was a somewhat sarcastic and negative portrait of Solomon's later reign written by an anonymous author during the time in which the northern part of the kingdom had “the heavy burdens and taxation and forced labor.”

Then there is the opinion of the Dictionary of Biblical Imagery, which states that the imagery of royal courts in the book “has mistakenly led some to argue that the Song is a story of a royal pair, perhaps Solomon and his Egyptian queen, but the language is love poetry, where the woman is a queen in the eyes of her lover and the man is a king in the eyes of his beloved.”

Appreciation for the book and deriving useful applications from it do not need to depend on the answer to this question.

Is the couple married?

There is no clear consensus regarding this subject, as you can see from the following back-and-forth opinions. Gledhill says, “It would appear that the lovers in these verses are not yet married, since the reason for their adventurous escapade into the countryside is presumably because they could not be alone together in any other place. If they were already married, there would be no need for this.”

However, that argument alone does not have much weight since (a) there are good reasons for married couples to want to get away from it all, (b) it is doubtful that a unmarried woman in that day and culture would take the risk getting pregnant with the shame which would ensue, (c) the woman's words may only express a fantasy, or (d) it may all be an allegory having nothing to do with a sexual encounter (see below for more comments on possibilities a, c, and d).

Despite those considerations, both NEB and JB assign these words to the “Bride.”

But treating the whole book from a symmetrical rather than a chronological viewpoint (see my post cited at the start of this short review) may actually give fuel to the belief that they are not married at this point of the story, but will become so somewhat later, as described in 5:1.

And finally, Childs says, “Nowhere is human love in itself celebrated in wisdom literature, nor in the whole Old Testament for that matter. Wisdom, not love, is divine, yet love between a man and his wife is an inextinguishable force within human experience.”

Are her words to be taken as reality or fantasy?

We know from the dream sequences in 3:1-5 and 5:2-6 that the woman has a rich fantasy life, and so there is really no need to take her words in Song 7:10-13 as a realistic proposal rather than just a deep desire on her part.

Adding to that possibility, Bullock feels that by v. 10, “We may assume that the king retires, for the maiden seems to engage in monologue, calling her beloved to go away with her (v. 11).” Hostetter, for one, agrees with this scenario.

What applications can we gain from this passage?

Gledhill offers two suggestions in this regard: “The literary fiction reminds us of our creatureliness and of our unashamed delight in participating in the natural order of things” and “Perhaps it may act as a stimulus to revive a flagging relationship by being more adventurous, more romantic and less mechanical”

“Sometimes the wife should be the aggressor and take the initiative in romancing her husband...For the first time in the Song, Shulammite took the initiative in requesting a time for romance and lovemaking with her husband. She knew that sex that took place only at home could run the risk of becoming routine. Vacations and special getaways often enhance and rekindle passion in marriage.” (Akin)

Many commentators, both ancient and modern, have also hesitated in treating this passage in a literal manner lest it encourage the idea that sex before marriage is endorsed in the Bible (even though the couple may have been married). And thus, they resort to a strictly allegorical interpretations. Marvin Pope's massive commentary on Song of Songs is so long because he devotes an inordinate number of pages to exhaustively canvassing all the allegorical and symbolic understandings of each passage proposed over the years.

Childs offers another good reason: “The theological reasoning behind the allegorical interpretations was not obscure. The Song of Songs formed part of the canon of sacred scripture...Did it not then follow that the book must have a sacred meaning if it had been incorporated into this sacred context?”

I will not attempt to cite all of the the various allegorical approaches but content myself with quoting Gledhill's catalog: “The behavior of the two lovers is used to illustrate the relationship between either Yahweh and Israel, or God and his church, or Jesus Christ and the individual believer. In the last case, the Song becomes a manual for advanced spirituality or the higher life. Some of the themes that are often interpreted allegorically are: seeking and finding; the desire for intimacy; the happiness of uninterrupted communion; the raptures and ecstasies of consummation; hindrances to fellowship; the threats of external and internal assaults; maintaining intimacy; holding fast; slowness in responding; restoration after rupture; the power of praise, the sins that spoil.”

It is quite easy to see how early commentators could get quite carried away in their allegories. However, there is an in-between view which has attracted many scholars lately, namely, the typological approach. It sticks with a literal understanding of the events and comments in the poem while also recognizing that they may have secondary application as types relating to spiritual manners.

And finally, there is Childs' comment regarding the nature of this book: “The polarity of 'secular versus sacred' is alien from the start to the categories of Hebrew wisdom. Rather, reflection on human experience without resort to the religious language of Israel's traditional institutions of law, cult, and prophecy is characteristic of wisdom, and is by no means a sign of secular origin.