Song of Solomon 5:3-13

3 I had put off my garment; how could I put it on again? I had bathed my feet; how could I soil them?

4 My beloved thrust his hand into the opening, and my inmost being yearned for him.

5 I arose to open to my beloved, and my hands dripped with myrrh, my fingers with liquid myrrh, upon the handles of the bolt.

6 I opened to my beloved, but my beloved had turned and was gone. My soul failed me when he spoke. I sought him, but did not find him; I called him, but he gave no answer.

7 Making their rounds in the city the sentinels found me; they beat me, they wounded me, they took away my mantle, those sentinels of the walls.

8 I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved, tell him this: I am faint with love.

9 What is your beloved more than another beloved, O fairest among women? What is your beloved more than another beloved, that you thus adjure us?

10 My beloved is all radiant and ruddy, distinguished among ten thousand.

11 His head is the finest gold; his locks are wavy, black as a raven.

12 His eyes are like doves beside springs of water, bathed in milk, fitly set.

13 His cheeks are like beds of spices, yielding fragrance. His lips are lilies, distilling liquid myrrh.

Song of Solomon 5:3-13 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO SONG OF SOLOMON 5

This chapter begins with Christ's answer to the church's request; in which he informs her, that he was come into his garden, as she desired, and gives an account of what he had done there; and kindly invites his dear friends to feast with him there, So 5:1; Then she relates her case and circumstances, which followed upon this, her sleepy frame, and ungrateful carriage to her beloved; which he resenting, withdrew from her, and this gave her sensible pain, So 5:2-6; what treatment she met with from the watchmen; her charge to the daughters of Jerusalem; and the questions they asked about her beloved, So 5:7-9; which put her upon giving a large description of him, by each of his parts, head, hair So 5:10-15; And the chapter is concluded with a general commendation of him and his loveliness, and a claim of interest in So 5:16.

Footnotes

• [a]. Meaning of Heb uncertain