Song of Solomon 7-8

The Facts (Chapter number: Verse)

Song of Solomon 7 - How graceful are your feet in sandals, O queenly maiden! Your rounded thighs are like jewels, the work of a master hand. Your navel is a rounded bowl that never lacks mixed wine. Your belly is a heap of wheat, encircled with lilies. Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle. Your neck is like an ivory tower. Your eyes are pools in Heshbon, by the gate of Bath-rabbim. Your nose is like a tower of Lebanon, overlooking Damascus. Your head crowns you like Carmel, and your flowing locks are like purple; a king is held captive in the tresses.

How fair and pleasant you are, O loved one, delectable maiden! You are stately as a palm tree, and your breasts are like its clusters. I say I will climb the palm tree and lay hold of its branches. Oh, may your breasts be like clusters of the vine, and the scent of your breath like apples, and your kisses like the best wine that goes down smoothly, gliding over lips and teeth.

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.


Song of Solomon 8 - O that you were like a brother to me, who nursed at my mother's breast! If I met you outside, I would kiss you, and no one would despise me. I would lead you and bring you into the house of my mother, and into the chamber of the one who bore me. I would give you spiced wine to drink, the juice of my pomegranates. O that his left hand were under my head, and that his right hand embraced me! I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, do not stir up or awaken love until it is ready! Who is that coming up from the wilderness, leaning upon her beloved? Under the apple tree I awakened you. There your mother was in labor with you; there she who bore you was in labor.

Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm; for love is strong as death, passion fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. If one offered for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly scorned.

We have a little sister, and she has no breasts. What shall we do for our sister, on the day when she is spoken for? If she is a wall, we will build upon her a battlement of silver; but if she is a door, we will enclose her with boards of cedar. I was a wall, and my breasts were like towers; then I was in his eyes as one who brings peace. Solomon had a vineyard at Baal-hamon; he entrusted the vineyard to keepers; each one was to bring for its fruit a thousand pieces of silver. My vineyard, my very own, is for myself; you, O Solomon, may have the thousand, and the keepers of the fruit two hundred!

O you who dwell in the gardens, my companions are listening for your voice; let me hear it.

Make haste, my beloved, and be like a gazelle or a young stag upon the mountains of spices!

My Comments

Okay, it kinda got a bit icky once the mother and sister with no breasts suddenly became involved in this. Are they gonna have sex on the mother's bed? Or is this a euphemism for someone's vagina, not sure whose in this case? And what exactly are they doing for this sister? What makes one a wall or a door? Is it better to be a wall than a door? Is this some sort of metaphor for a chaste virgin and a woman who has premarital sex? If the young sister has sex before love/marriage how exactly do they plan to board her up? The image of boarding a woman up so that she may not be an open door for others is really, really disturbing and not the imagery I really wanted this book to leave me with. :\

Overall, this book was not terrible and was good for some giggles, but I fail to see its purpose. It has no real plot. It doesn't provide any sort of guidance or lessons. The only lesson it may be saying is "wait for love," but how can that be taken as a real warning when the entire book is praising love and waxing poetic about the physical relationship between two people. Based on the last section on the sister is this a book that is meant to encourage others to wait until marriage before being physical with one another? Is the warning to not look for love until you are ready a warning to not become physical with someone until one is married?

Odd how a book that is filled to the brim with sexual innuendos and praise for such a physical love would turn around and in its last breathe denounce such love (outside of marriage, anyways). This is another thing I really hate about the Bible. You can take one section and it says one thing and not 5 pages later it's saying the complete opposite. Without a hint of irony, mind you.

So, I guess the lesson we can take from this is that marriage is a passionate love adventure filled with phallic fruits and architectural body parts, a union which is something that melds two people together so much that they can hardly exist without the other. Without this bond that has been given to us by God love is dangerous. Love should be kept away until one is ready to face a life long promise of commitment and devotion. If one cannot wait till marriage (read: if a WOMAN cannot wait till marriage), she is not better than a door that allows anyone to enter and leave, and she should be boarded up by those around her in order to save her from the lustful urges which she is not ready for.

Ha! I knew the Bible couldn't get through one entire book without succumbing to its inherent sexism! The youthful sister at the end is the true audience of this book. It is the women who are plagued with having their womanly parts that must be warned about the dangers of love. The girls and woman are the ones who are done a dishonor by unmarried love; they are the ones who are the doors that need to be kept shut so that they may not be hurt by love. The boys and men, they are not ruined by this love. They do not need to be warned of the dangers of love nor do they need to warn others. Notice how it is the woman in this book who is always reminding the daughters of Jerusalem to "not stir or awaken love till it is ready." Ladies, it is our job and our job alone to understand the dangers of sex and how it will ruin it. We only have ourselves to blame if we become doors instead of walls.

I really had not noticed the trend before now. I looked at the warning about love to be a testament to the power love can hold over a person. A feel of powerlessness to a force greater than you, a force you may not be able to control. The idea that love is something we cannot control is a common theme in many love stories. So it would make sense for someone to warn people that love is great but at the same time one should not throw themselves into such a situation unless they known what it is they will be in for.

But they could not help adding the young sister into the mix. They just couldn't. I could have ended this book with nothing but good, giggly things to say, but no. They had to go and ruin the entire thing. The Song of Solomon brought it all home in no more than two sentences. Love as great as long as you're keeping those legs together before marriage, ladies! Ugh! I hate it when this shit gets turned around on me. Drop my guard for a bit and BAM!

Well, at least I now no longer wonder why this book is in the Bible. We all know God's number one priority in life is to make sure us women folk stay in our place and heaven forbid we have any sort of sexual independence or control.

I guess it has to remind men over and over and over again because men were constantly being made immoral and dumb by our mystical vagina powers and so God was treating the men like one would a puppy that you're trying to train but keeps getting distracted by a blowing leaf. Sit! Stop looking at the leaf! Sit! Good boy-no! Sit! Oh my god when did you have time to shit on the rug?! I was watching you the whole time! Hey, come back here! You were supposed to sit! Quit being so cute, I'm trying to hate you! D:

Friday: Isaiah