Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Song of Solomon 5:2
I sleep, but my heart waketh: [it is] the voice of my beloved that knocketh, [saying], Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, [and] my locks with the drops of the night.
2. I sleep, but my heart waketh ] This clause states the circumstances under which the succeeding action takes place. As the dream is narrated at a later time, the participles should be rendered by the past tense, I was sleeping, but my heart was awake.
it is the voice of, &c.] Rather, Hark! my love is knocking.
my sister ] Oettli says Solomon never calls the Shulammite by this intimate name. Budde thinks it significant that he does not here call her kallh = ‘bride.’ Evidently he thinks that a post-nuptial word, but it is not necessarily so.
my undefiled ] Rather, ‘my perfect’ or ‘immaculate one.’
filled with dew ] The dew in Palestine is often very heavy. Cp. Jdg 6:38. From the fact that he about whom she dreamed is imagined to be in such a case, it is probable that the shepherd lover rather than Solomon is the object of her thoughts, and that she dreams of him as coming to her mother’s house.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Chap. Son 5:2 to Son 6:3. A Dream
On the hypothesis we have adopted, a night must be supposed to intervene between Son 5:1-2. After the interview with the king and that with her lover night came; and as she slept she dreamed one of those troubled dreams consisting of a series of efforts frustrated, which so often follow on an agitated day. On the following morning she narrates the dream to the ladies of the court. Son 5:2-7 relate the dream. In Son 5:8 the Shulammite, having just awaked and being still under the influence of her dream, asks the ladies, if they should find her lost lover, to tell him she is sick from love. In Son 5:9 they reply, asking with surprise what there is in her lover that moves her in such a fashion. In Son 5:10-16 she gives a description of her lover as he dwells in her brooding imagination, and concludes in triumph, “ This is my beloved and this is my friend.” In ch. Son 6:1, the court ladies ask eagerly whither this model of manly beauty is gone, and to this, in Son 5:2-3, the Shulammite replies vaguely and evasively, and claims her lover for herself alone. Now all this is quite in place if a love-tale is being presented in a series of songs, but in a collection of verses to be sung at weddings in general it is impossible that the bride could be made to speak thus. Such references to pre-nuptial love would be not only unbecoming, but impossible. But in still another way this song is fatal to Budde’s popular-song theory. In such a collection of wedding songs there is, of course, no connexion between the various lyrics. Each of them stands by itself, and there is no possibility of action of a dramatic kind on the part of the bride and bridegroom such as we undeniably have here. But Budde meets that by pointing out that Wetzstein reports a case in which a poet of the region where he discovered the wasf wrote a poem for a particular wedding. In that, before a description of the bride’s ornaments and person, an account is given of the agricultural processes by which the wealth expended on her trousseau had been obtained. But, besides the fact that in the case cited as parallel to this, the poem was not a popular song, but a poem prepared for the special occasion, the addition to the wasf there is a very legitimate extension of the description, and has none of the dramatic element in it. The dramatic element here is very pronounced, and is evidently intended to give unity and movement to the whole poem.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Some time may be supposed to have elapsed since the brides solemn espousals with the king Cant. 4:75:1. A transient cloud of doubt or estrangement is now passing over her soul, as by the relation of this dream she intimates to her friends. Ancient allegorical interpreters find here a symbol of the condition and feelings of Israel during the Babylonian captivity, when the glories and privileges of Solomons Temple were no more, and the manifested presence of the Holy One had been withdrawn. Israel in exile seeks the Lord Son 5:8, and will find Him again in the second temple Son 6:3-9.
I sleep, but my heart waketh – A poetical periphrasis for I dream. Compare the ancient saying: Dreams are the vigils of those who slumber, hopes are waking dreams.
The voice – Or, sound. Compare Son 2:8, note. She hears him knocking before he speaks.
My undefiled – literally, my perfect one. Vulgate immaculata mea. Compare Son 4:7.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Son 5:2
I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my Beloved that knocketh.
Asleep and yet awake-A Riddle
We are glad to perceive in this Song the varied experience of the bride. She was the well-beloved of the heavenly Bridegroom, but she was not without her faults. Let us bless God that in the Book of revealed truth He has not merely given us the ideal standard after which we are to seek, but He has also preserved for us the humbler patterns of those who have striven to reach to the utmost height, and who have climbed a good way towards it, but who, nevertheless, have proved that, though they were the best of men, they were men at the best. Thus our Lord has saved us from despair by making us to know that we may be sincere, and true, and accepted, though we, too, fall short as yet of the holiness which we pant after with our whole hearts.
I. First, then, here is slumber confessed. The spouse laments her state, and sighs out, I sleep. It strikes us at once that her sleep is a state recognized. We are astonished that she should say, I sleep, and we conclude that it is not so profound a sleep as it might be; for when a man can say, I sleep, he is not altogether steeped in slumber. I would not give you encouragement, if you are asleep at all to continue it; but yet I would say this, that if you mourn, over your sluggishness you are not altogether a sluggard, if you feel uneasy in your dulness you are not altogether given over to spiritual stupidity, if you are anxious to be aroused out of your slumber it is certain that you are not given over to sleep yourself into the sepulchre of insensibility. Cultivate a quick perception, and when you are aware of the slightest defalcation or decline, confess at once to God that you begin to sleep. Further, as this sleep is a matter recognized, so it is a matter complained of The spouse is not pleased with her condition. It is well for saints, when they perceive that they are in the least degree backsliding, that they should mourn before God, and accuse themselves before Him. Act tenderly to others, but severely towards yourselves. So all prudent men will do if God keep them prudent. This sleepiness is not a thing to be indulged in, but to be abhorred. To say the least of it, it is a low state of enjoyment. Sleep is peaceful and quiet, but it cannot enjoy the sweets of the senses, and the delights which the mind can receive thereby. If we fail to enjoy the banquets of our Bridegrooms love it must be because a deadness is stealing over us, and we are not so thoroughly alive and awake as we were in days gone by; and this is a condition to be deplored as soon as it is perceived. We ought to complain of ourselves if we sleep, because it is a state of danger. While men slept the enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat. It is bad, then, to have a drowsy minister and drowsy church officers, for these will not watch the fields for God. Sleep is a state of inaction. A man cannot do his daily business while his eyes are closed in slumber. Yet again; this slumber should be not only a matter of complaint as an ill to be dreaded, but it should be regarded as a fault to be ashamed of. Make excuses for others, and let your Lord make excuses for you, but do not frame apologies on your own account. Furthermore, it is an evil to be fought against. When a man is obliged to say, I sleep, let him not content himself with sleeping on. Now is the time for much prayer: let him wrestle with this deadly foe till he is fully aroused. Falling into indifference on the road to heaven is something like sleeping on the vast plains of snow, where, if a man give way to the natural inclination to slumber which comes on through the intense cold, he may lie down and never rise again.
II. We reach the point of the paradox; here is watchfulness claimed by one who confessed to sleep. My heart waketh, says the bride, I sleep, but my heart waketh. Somewhat of heaven is about the man of God when the earth encompasses him most: Sin shall not have dominion over you: God has the throne still, even when Satan rages most. This inward life shows itself usually in the uneasiness of the declining heart. When a believer feels that he is not what he ought to be, nor what he wants to be, he cannot be happy. He cannot rest and be content. He sleeps, but his heart beats, sighs, and palpitates with dire unrest. The inner life shows itself, too, in desire, for the heart is the seat of desire, and it leads the man to say I am not what I would be. I live at a poor dying rate: Christs love is so great to me, and mine to Him so chill. Lord, lift me out of this frozen state. I cannot bear this grave of lethargy. Lord, bring my soul out of prison! Give me more grace; give me to love Jesus better, and to be more like Him. Poor as I am, I long to be enriched by Thy love and mercy; O visit me with Thy salvation! Such a pleading heart is still awake, though the mind may be dull. The spouse gave another proof of her wakefulness by her discernment. She says, It is the voice of my Beloved that knocketh. Even when half asleep she knew her Lords voice. You may catch a true believer at his worst, but he still knows the Gospel from anything else, and can detect another gospel in a moment. This wakefulness of heart shows itself often in the soul chiding itself. I sleep, saith she. She would not have blamed herself as I have tried to describe her doing if she had not been in some measure awake. This blessed living wakefulness within the heart will by and by display itself in action. The heart will wake up all that is within us, and we shall hasten to our Beloved.
III. Mystery solved. I sleep, but my heart waketh. How doth her heart wake? It is because the voice and knock of her Beloved are heard. Every child of God has a wondrous union with Christ. Because I live, saith Christ, Ye shall live also. Ask you why you are alive in such a body of death and grave of sin as your poor nature is? You live because Christ lives; and you cannot die till He does. This is why you cannot sleep as do others, because He does not so sleep. What a blessing is this vital union with the ever-blessed Head, immortal and unslumbering!
IV. Now for the lesson learned. It is this, be very careful when you possess great joys, for in this instance the spouse had been with the Beloved in choice fellowship, and yet was soon drowsy. High joys may produce slumber; the chosen three upon the mount Tabor were soon overcome with heaviness. Mind what you do when on the mount; be careful to carry a full cup with a steady hand. Next, when you are blaming yourselves for your own work, do not forget the work of the Spirit in you. I sleep: smite your heart for that, but do not forget to add if it be true, My heart waketh. Bless God for any grace you have, even if it be but little. Lastly, make sure above all things that you have that true faith which knows the voice of Jesus. He saith, Incline your ear, and come unto Me: hear, and your soul shall live. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me, and I give unto them eternal life. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Nearer and dearer
Spiritual sickness is very common in the Church of God, and the root of the mischief lies in distance from Jesus, following Christ afar off, and yielding to a drowsy temperament. Away from Jesus, away from joy. Without the sun the flowers pine; without Jesus our hearts faint.
I. The spouse confesses a very common sin: she cries, I sleep. She had no right to be asleep, for her Beloved knew no rest. He was standing without in the cold street, with His head wet with dew, and His locks with the drops of the night, why should she be at ease? He was anxiously seeking her, how was it that she could be so cruel as to yield to slumber! Do you not find, that almost unconsciously to yourselves, a spirit of indifference stems over you? You do not give up private prayer, but, alas! it becomes a mere mechanical operation. Shall such a King be served by lie-a-bed soldiers? Shall His midnight pleadings be repaid by our daylight sleepiness? Shall an agony of bloody sweat be recompensed by heavy eyelids and yawning mouths?
II. The song before us reminds us of a hopeful sign. My heart waketh. What a riddle the believer is! He is asleep, and yet he is awake. His true self, the I, the veritable Ego of the man is asleep; but yet his heart, his truest self, his affections, are awake. It is a hopeful sign when a man can conscientiously say as much as the spouse in this case, but remember it is not much to say. Do not pride yourself upon it. Be ashamed that you should be asleep at all. Do not congratulate yourself that your heart is awake. Be thankful that infinite love affords you grace enough to keep your heart alive, but be ashamed that you have no more when more may be had and should be had.
III. The third thing is a loving call. Asleep as the spouse was, she knew her Husbands voice, for this is an abiding mark of Gods people. My sheep hear My voice. A half-sleeping saint still has spiritual discernment enough to know when Jesus speaks. At first the Beloved One simply knocked. His object was to enter into fellowship with His Church, to reveal Himself to her, to unveil His beauties, to solace her with His presence. Such is the object of our blessed Lord, this morning, in bringing us to this house. Then the Bridegroom tried His voice. If knocking would not do, he would speak in plain and plaintive words, Open to Me, My sister, My love, My dove, My undefiled. The Lord Jesus Christ has a sweet way of making the word come home to the conscience; I mean, not now, that effectual and irresistible power of which we shall speak by and by, but that lesser force which the heart may resist, but which renders it very guilty for so doing. Now, observe the appeals which the Beloved here makes. He says, Open to Me, and His plea is the love the spouse has to Him, or professed to have, the love He has to her, and the relationship which exists between them. Did you notice that powerful argument with which the heavenly Lover closed His cry? He said, My head is filled with dew, and My locks with the drops of the night. Ah, sorrowful remembrances, for those drops were not the ordinary dew that fall upon the houseless travellers unprotected head, His head was wet with scarlet dew, and His locks with crimson drops of a tenfold night of Gods desertion, when He sweat as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground. My heart, how vile art thou, for thou shuttest out the Crucified. Behold the Man thorn-crowned and scourged, with traces of the spittle of the soldiery, canst thou close the door on Him? Wilt thou despise the despised and rejected of men? Writ thou grieve the Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief
IV. Yet the spouse hastened not to open the door, and I am afraid the like delay may be charged upon some of us. Our shame deepens as we pursue our theme, and think how well our own character is photographed here by the wise man; for notice, that after the knocking and the pleading, the spouse made a most ungenerous excuse. She sat like a queen, and knew no sorrow. She had put off her garments and washed her feet as travellers do in the East before they go to rest. Shall I English the excuse she made? It is this: O Lord, I know that if I am to enter into much fellowship with Thee, I must pray very differently from what I have done of late, but it is too much trouble; I cannot stir myself to energy so great. My time is so taken up with my business, I am so constantly engaged that I could not afford even a quarter of an hour for retirement. I have to cut my prayers so short. Is this the miserable excuse in part? Shall I tell out more of this dishonourable apology? It is this: I do not want to begin an examination of myself: it may reveal so many unpleasant truths. I sleep, and it is very comfortable to sleep; I do not want to be driven out of my comforts. Perhaps if I were to live nearer to Christ, I should have to give up some of the things which I so much enjoy. I have become conformed to the world of late; I am very fond of having Mr. So-and-so to spend aa hour with me in the evening, and his talk is anything but that which my Master would approve of, but I cannot give him up. I have taken to read religious novels. I could not expect to have the Lord Jesus Christs company when I am poring over such trash as that, but still I prefer it to my Bible; I would sooner read a fools tale than I would read of Jesus love.
V. Still, as a wonder of wonders, although shamefully and cruelly treated, the beloved Husband did not go away. We are told that He put in His hand by the hole of the door, and then the bowels of His spouse were moved for Him. Does not this picture the work of effectual grace, when the truth does not appeal to the ear alone, but comes to the heart, when it is no longer a thing thought on, and discussed and forgotten, but an arrow which has penetrated into the reins, and sticks fast in the loins to our wounding, and ultimately to our spiritual healing? No hand is like Christs hand. When He puts his hand to the work it is well done. He put in His hand: not His hand on me to smite me, but His hand in me to comfort me; to sanctify me. He put in His hand, and straightway His beloved began to pity Him, and to lament her unkindness.
VI. But now, observe the deserved chastisement which the Bridegroom inflicted. When her Spouse was willing to commune, she was not; and now that she is willing, and even anxious, what happens? I opened to my Beloved, but, says the Hebrew, He had gone, He had gone. The voice of lamentation the reduplicated cry of one that is in bitter distress. There must have been a sad relief about it to her sinful heart, for she must have felt afraid to look her dear One in the face after such heartless conduct; but sad as it would have been to face Him, it was infinitely sadder to say, He is gone, He is gone. Now she begins to use the means of grace in order to find Him. I sought Him, said she, and I found Him not. I went up to the house of God; the sermon was sweet, but it was not sweet to me, for He was not there. I went to the communion table, and the ordinance was a feast of fat things to others, but not were many; she kept them up by day and by night. I called Him, but He gave me no answer. She was not a lost soul, do not mistake that. Christ loved her just as much then as before, nay, loved her a great deal more. If there can be any change in Christs love, He must have much more approved of her when she was seeking Him in sorrow, than when she was reclining upon the couch and neglecting Him. But He was gone, and all her calling could not bring Him back. What did she then? Why, she went to His ministers, she went to those who were the watch-men of the night, and what said they to her? Did they cheer her? Perhaps they had never passed through her experience; perhaps they were mere hirelings. However it might be, they smote her.
VII. As the poor spouse did not then find Christ, but was repulsed in all ways, she adopted a last expedient. She knew that there were some who had daily fellowship with the King, daughters of Jerusalem who often saw Him, and therefore she sent a message by them, If ye see my Beloved, tell Him that I am sick of love. Enlist your brother saints to pray for you. Go with them to their gatherings for prayer. Their company will not satisfy you without Jesus, but their company may help you to find Jesus. Follow the footsteps of the flock, and you may by and by discover the Shepherd. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 2. I sleep, but my heart waketh] This is a new part; and some suppose that the fifth day’s solemnity begins here. Though I sleep, yet so impressed is my heart with the excellences of my beloved, that my imagination presents him to me in the most pleasing dreams throughout the night. I doubt whether the whole, from this verse to the end of the seventh, be not a dream: several parts of it bear this resemblance; and I confess there are some parts of it, such as her hesitating to rise, his sudden disappearance, &c., which would be of easier solution on this supposition. Or part of the transactions mentioned might be the effects of the dream she had, as rising up suddenly, and going out into the street, meeting with the watchmen, &c., before she was well awake. And her being in so much disorder and dishabille might have induced them to treat her as a suspicious person, or one of questionable character. But it is most likely the whole was a dream.
For my head is filled with dew] She supposed he had come in the night, and was standing without, wet, and exposed to the inclemency of the weather.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
I sleep, Heb. I was asleep, i.e. I was dull, and sluggish, and insensible of his kind expressions and offers of grace.
But my heart waketh; yet in my very sleep my thoughts were running upon my Beloved, as is not unusual in such cases, which at last awakened me. Thus she implies the conflict which was between the flesh and the Spirit, and the Spirits victory in the combat.
It is the voice of my Beloved; between sleeping and waking I fancied that I heard his voice.
That knocketh, by his word, and providence, and Spirit, at the door of mine heart, desirous that I would receive him by faith and love. Compare Rev 3:20. Saying,
Open to me; inviting me to accept of his gracious offers, and to let him in to my soul.
My sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: this heap of kind compellations signifies Christs sincere and fervent affection to his people, notwithstanding her manifold imperfections and infirmities. The title of
dove signifies her chastity and constant faithfulness to her Husband, for which doves are famous. How she is undefiled, See Poole “Son 4:7“.
My head is filled with dew, whilst I wait without thy door. He alludes to the custom of lovers, which oft and willingly suffer such inconveniences for their hopes and desires of enjoying their beloved, and signifies his sufferings for the churchs good.
The drops of the night; the dew which falls in the end of the night, or towards the morning, whence it is called morning dew, Hos 6:4.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
2. Sudden change of scene fromevening to midnight, from a betrothal feast to cold repulse. He hasgone from the feast alone; night is come; He knocks at the door ofHis espoused; she hears, but in sloth does not shake offhalf-conscious drowsiness; namely, the disciples’ torpor (Mt26:40-43), “the spirit willing, the flesh weak”(compare Rom 7:18-25;Gal 5:16; Gal 5:17;Gal 5:24). Not totalsleep. The lamp was burning beside the slumbering wise virgin,but wanted trimming (Mt25:5-7). It is His voice that rouses her (Jon 1:6;Eph 5:14; Rev 3:20).Instead of bitter reproaches, He addresses her by the most endearingtitles, “my sister, my love,” c. Compare His thought ofPeter after the denial (Mr16:7).
dewwhich falls heavilyin summer nights in the East (see Lu9:58).
drops of the night(Psa 22:2 Luk 22:44).His death is not expressed, as unsuitable to the allegory, asong of love and joy; So 5:4refers to the scene in the judgment hall of Caiaphas, when JesusChrist employed the cock-crowing and look of love to awaken Peter’ssleeping conscience, so that his “bowels were moved”(Luk 22:61; Luk 22:62);Son 5:5; Son 5:6,the disciples with “myrrh,” c. (Luk 24:1Luk 24:5), seeking Jesus Christin the tomb, but finding Him not, for He has “withdrawn Himself”(Joh 7:34; Joh 13:33);So 5:7, the trials by watchmenextend through the whole night of His withdrawal from Gethsemane tothe resurrection; they took off the “veil” of Peter’sdisguise; also, literally the linen cloth from the young man (Mr14:51); So 5:8, the sympathyof friends (Lu 23:27).
undefilednot pollutedby spiritual adultery (Rev 14:4;Jas 4:4).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
I sleep, but my heart waketh,…. Like persons that are half awake, half asleep, whom Cicero x calls “semisomni”. Christ and the church having feasted together at his invitation, she soon after fell asleep, as the disciples did after a repast with their Lord; yet not so fast asleep but that she was sensible of it; for this was not the dead sleep of sin, in which unconverted men are, and are insensible of; nor a judicial slumber some are given up unto, and perceive it not, yet a frame of spirit unbecoming saints, and displeasing to Christ; though consistent with grace, which at such a time is not, or very little, in exercise; they are slothful in duty, and backward to it; the phrase is sometimes used to describe a sluggish, slothful man y; they are indifferent and lukewarm about divine things, content themselves with the bare externals of religion, without the lively exercise of grace, and without fervency and spirituality in them, and seem willing to continue so; [See comments on Mt 25:6]; but the church here was not so overcome with sleep but her “heart was awake”. Jarchi, and some ancient Jewish writers z, interpret this and the former clause of different persons; the former, “I sleep”, of the bride; this, “my heart waketh”, of the bridegroom; and then the sense is, though I am in a sleepy frame, he who is “my heart”, a phrase used by lovers a, my soul, my life, my all, he never slumbers nor sleeps, he watches over me night and day, lest any hurt me; but both clauses are rather to be understood of the same person differently considered, as having two principles of grace and corruption, as the church has, which are represented as two persons; see Ro 7:18; as the carnal part in her prevailed, she was the “sleeping I”; as the new man, or principle of grace appeared, her “heart [was] awake”; for, notwithstanding her sleepy frame, she had some thoughts of Christ, and stirring of affection to him; Some convictions of her sin, and some desires of being in her duty perhaps, though overpowered by the fleshly part; the spirit was willing, but the flesh weak. Christ’s response to his church in this case follows, and is observed by her; he spoke to her so loud, that though sleepy she heard him, and owns it,
[it is] the voice of my beloved: in the ministration of the Gospel, which is to be distinguished from the voice of a stranger, even when dull and sleepy under hearing it, and little affected with it. Christ was the church’s beloved still, had an affection for him, though not thoroughly awaked by his voice, but sleeps on still; this method failing, he takes another, or repeats the same with an additional circumstance,
that knocketh, saying, “open to me”: which is to be understood not so much of his knocking by the ministry of the word to awaken her out of sleep, but in a providential way, by taking in his hand the rod of affliction, or scourge of persecution, and lashing therewith in order to bring her out of her carnal security; see Re 3:20; and he not only knocked but called,
[saying], open to me, open the door unto me, and let me in; so lovers are represented as at the door or gate to get admittance, and know not which to call most hard and cruel, the door or their lover b: there is an emphasis on the word “me”; me, thy Lord, thy head, thy husband, thy friend, that loves thee so dearly; to whom her heart was shut, her affections contracted, her desires towards him languid; wherefore he importunes her to “open” to him, which denotes an enlarging of her affections to him, an exercise of grace on him, an expression of the desires of her soul unto him; which yet could not be done without efficacious grace exerted, as in So 5:4; but, the more to win upon her, he gives her good words, and the most endearing titles, expressive of love and relation,
my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled, which are all made use of before, excepting the last; see So 1:9; that is, “my undefiled”, which she was, not as a descendant of Adam, nor as in herself, but as washed in the blood of Christ, justified by his righteousness, and sanctified by his Spirit; and as having been enabled by divine grace to preserve her chastity, and keep the “bed undefiled”,
Heb 13:4; not guilty of spiritual adultery among all her infirmities, even idolatry and superstition; see Re 14:4; or “my perfect one” c; not in a legal, but in an evangelical sense, being completely redeemed, perfectly justified, fully pardoned, and sanctified in every part, though not to the highest degree; and perfect in Christ, though not in herself: other arguments follow to engage her attention to his request;
for head is filled with dew, [and] my locks with the drops of the night; through standing so long at the door, in the night season, waiting to be let in; so lovers represent their case in such circumstances, as dealt very hardly with d: by which may be meant the sufferings of Christ, either in the persons of his ministers, who are exposed to the rage and reproach of men for ministering in his name to the church; or which he endured in his own person, in his estate of humiliation; and particularly in the night he was betrayed, and during the time of darkness he hung upon the cross, when he bore the sins of his people, and his Father’s wrath; compared to “dew”, and “drops of the night”, because of the multitude of them he endured in soul and body, and because so uncomfortable to human nature; though as dew is useful and fructifying to the earth, so were these the means of many fruits and blessings of grace, and of bringing many souls to glory; now though these arguments were expressed in the most strong, moving, and melting language, yet were ineffectual.
x Familiar. Epist. l. 7. Ep. 1. y “Qui vigilans dormiat”, Plauti Pseudolus, Act. 1. Sc. 3. v. 151. z Pesikta in Jarchi, Tanchama in Yalkut in loc. a “Meum mel, meum cor”, Plauti Poenulus, Act. 1. Sc. 2. v. 154, 170, 175. “Meum corculum, melliculum”, ibid. Casina, Act. 4. Sc. 4, v. 14. b “Janua vel domina”, &c, Propert. Eleg. 16. v. 17, 18, 19. c , Sept. “perfecta mea”, Montanus, Tigurine version, Marckius “integra mea”, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius, Michaelis. d “Me mediae noctes”, &c. Propert. ut supra. (Eleg. 16.) v. 22, &c.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
2 I sleep, but my heart keeps waking-
Hearken! my beloved is knocking:
Open to me, my sister, my love,
My dove, my perfect one;
For my head is filled with dew,
My locks (are) full of the drops of the night.
The partic. subst. clauses, Son 5:2, indicate the circumstances under which that which is related in Son 5:2 occurred. In the principal sentence in hist. prose would be used; here, in the dramatic vivacity of the description, is found in its stead the interject. vocem = ausculta with the gen. foll., and a word designating
(Note: is knocking is not an attribute to the determinate my beloved which it follows, but a designation of state or condition, and thus acc., as the Beirut translation renders it: “hear my beloved in the condition of one knocking.” On the other hand, signifies “a beloved one knocking.” But “hear a beloved one knocking” would also be expressed acc. In classical language, the designation of state, if the subst. to which it belongs is indeterminate, is placed before it, e.g., “at the gate stood a beloved one knocking.”)
state or condition added, thought of as accus. according to the Semitic syntax (like Gen 4:10; Jer 10:22; cf. 1Ki 14:6). To sleep while the heart wakes signifies to dream, for sleep and distinct consciousness cannot be coexistent; the movements of thought either remain in obscurity or are projected as dreams. = awir is formed from , to be awake (in its root cogn. to the Aryan gar , of like import in , ), in the same way as = mawith from . The has here the conj. sense of “ dieweil ” (because), like asher in Ecc 6:12; Ecc 8:15. The dag., which occurs several times elsewhere ( vid., under Pro 3:8; Pro 14:10), is one of the inconsistencies of the system of punctuation, which in other instances does not double the ; perhaps a relic of the Babylonian idiom, which was herein more accordant with the lingual nature of the r than the Tiberian, which treated it as a semi-guttural. , a lock of hair, from = , abscdit, follows in the formation of the idea, the analogy of , in the sense of branch, from , desecuit; one so names a part which is removed without injury to the whole, and which presents itself conveniently for removal; cf. the oath sworn by Egyptian women, lahajat muksusi , “by the life of my separated,” i.e., “of my locks” (Lane, Egypt, etc., I 38). The word still survives in the Talmud dialect. Of a beautiful young man who proposed to become a Nazarite, Nedarim 9 a says the same as the Jer. Horajoth iii. 4 of a man who was a prostitute in Rome: his locks were arranged in separate masses, like heap upon heap; in Bereshith rabba c. lxv., under Gen 27:11, , curly-haired, is placed over against , bald-headed, and the Syr. also has kausoto as the designation of locks of hair-a word used by the Peshito as the rendering of the Heb. , as the Syro-Hexap. Job 16:12, the Greek . , from (Arab. tll , to moisten, viz., the ground; to squirt, viz., blood), is in Arabic drizzling rain, in Heb. dew; the drops of the night ( , from , to sprinkle, to drizzle)
(Note: According to the primary idea: to break that which is solid or fluid into little pieces, wherefore means also broken pieces. To this root appertains also the Arab. rashh , to trickle through, to sweat through, II to moisten ( e.g., the mouth of a suckling with milk), and the Aethiop. raseha , to be stained. Drops scattered with a sprinkling brush the Arabs call rashahat ; in the mystical writings, rashahat el – uns (dew-drops of intimacy) is the designation of sporadic gracious glances of the deity.)
are just drops of dew, for the precipitation of the damp air assumes this form in nights which are not so cold as to become frosty. Shulamith thus dreams that her beloved seeks admission to her. He comes a long way and at night. In the most tender words he entreats for that which he expects without delay. He addresses her, “my sister,” as one of equal rank with himself, and familiar as a sister with a brother; “my love” ( ), as one freely chosen by him to intimate fellowship; “my dove,” as beloved and prized by him on account of her purity, simplicity, and loveliness. The meaning of the fourth designation used by him, , is shown by the Arab. tam to be “wholly devoted,” whence teim , “one devoted” = a servant, and mutajjam , desperately in love with one. In addressing her tmty, he thus designates this love as wholly undivided, devoting itself without evasion and without reserve. But on this occasion this love did not approve itself, at least not at once.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| The Love of Christ to the Church; Spiritual Desertion. | |
2 I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night. 3 I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them? 4 My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him. 5 I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers with sweet smelling myrrh, upon the handles of the lock. 6 I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer. 7 The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me. 8 I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved, that ye tell him, that I am sick of love.
In this song of loves and joys we have here a very melancholy scene; the spouse here speaks, not to her beloved (as before, for he has withdrawn), but of him, and it is a sad story she tells of her own folly and ill conduct towards him, notwithstanding his kindness, and of the just rebukes she fell under for it. Perhaps it may refer to Solomon’s own apostasy from God, and the sad effects of that apostasy after God had come into his garden, had taken possession of the temple he had built, and he had feasted with God upon the sacrifices (v. 1); however, it is applicable to the too common case both of the churches and particular believers, who by their carelessness and security provoke Christ to withdraw from them. Observe,
I. The indisposition that the spouse was under, and the listlessness that had seized her (v. 2): I sleep, but my heart wakes. Here is, 1. Corruption appearing in the actings of it: I sleep. The wise virgins slumbered. She was on her bed (ch. iii. 1), but now she sleeps. Spiritual distempers, if not striven against at first, are apt to grow upon us and to get ground. She slept, that is, pious affections cooled, she neglected her duty and grew remiss in it, she indulged herself in her ease, was secure and off her watch. This is sometimes the bad effect of more than ordinary enlargements–a good cause. St. Paul himself was in danger of being puffed up with abundant revelations, and of saying, Soul, take thy ease, which made a thorn in the flesh necessary for him, to keep him from sleeping. Christ’s disciples, when he had come into his garden, the garden of his agony, were heavy with sleep, and could not watch with him. True Christians are not always alike lively and vigorous in religion. 2. Grace remaining, notwithstanding, in the habit of it: “My heart wakes; my own conscience reproaches me for it, and ceases not to rouse me out of my sluggishness. The spirit is willing, and, after the inner man, I delight in the law of God, and with my mind I serve that. I am, for the present, overpowered by temptation, but all does not go one way in me. I sleep, but it is not a dead sleep; I strive against it; it is not a sound sleep; I cannot be easy under this indisposition.” Note, (1.) We ought to take notice of our own spiritual slumbers and distempers, and to reflect upon it with sorrow and shame that we have fallen asleep when Christ has been nigh us in his garden. (2.) When we are lamenting what is amiss in us, we must not overlook the good that is wrought in us, and preserved alive: “My heart wakes in Christ, who is dear to me as my own heart, and is my life; when I sleep, he neither slumbers nor sleeps.“
II. The call that Christ gave to her, when she was under this indisposition: It is the voice of my beloved; she knew it to be so, and was soon aware of it, which was a sign that her heart was awake. Like the child Samuel, she heard at the first call, but did not, like him, mistake the person; she knew it to be the voice of Christ. He knocks, to awaken us to come and let him in, knocks by his word and Spirit, knocks by afflictions and by our own consciences; though this is not expressly quoted, yet probably it is referred to (Rev. iii. 20), Behold, I stand at the door, and knock. He calls sinners into covenant with him and saints into communion with him. Those whom he loves he will not let alone in their carelessness, but will find some way or other to awaken them, to rebuke and chasten them. When we are unmindful of Christ he thinks of us, and provides that our faith fail not. Peter denied Christ, but the Lord turned and looked upon him, and so brought him to himself again. Observe how moving the call is: Open to me, my sister, my love. 1. He sues for entrance who may demand it; he knocks who could easily knock the door down. 2. He gives her all the kind and most endearing titles imaginable: My sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled; he not only gives her no hard names, nor upbraids her with unkindness in not sitting up for him, but, on the contrary, studies how to express his tender affection to her still. His loving-kindness he will not utterly take away. Those that by faith are espoused to Christ he looks upon as his sisters, his loves, his doves, and all that is dear; and, being clothed with his righteousness, they are undefiled. This consideration should induce her to open to him. Christ’s love to us should engage ours to him, even in the most self-denying instances. Open to me. Can we deny entrance to such a friend, to such a guest? Shall we not converse more with one that is infinitely worthy of our acquaintance, and so affectionately desirous of it, though we only can be gainers by it? 3. He pleads distress, and begs to be admitted sub form pauperis–under the character of a poor traveller that wants a lodging: “My head is wet with the dew, with the cold drops of the night; consider what hardships I have undergone, to merit thee, which surely may merit from thee so small a kindness as this.” When Christ was crowned with thorns, which no doubt fetched blood from his blessed head, then was his head wet with the dew. “Consider what a grief it is to me to be thus unkindly used, as much as it would be to a tender husband to be kept out of doors by his wife in a rainy stormy night.” Do we thus require him for his love? The slights which careless souls put upon Jesus Christ are him as a continual dropping in a very rainy day.
III. The excuse she made to put off her compliance with this call (v. 3): I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on again? She is half asleep; she knows the voice of her beloved; she knows his knock, but cannot find in her heart to open to him. She was undressed, and would not be at the pains to dress herself again; she had washed her feet, and would not have occasion to wash them again. She could not send another to open the door (it must be our own act and deed to let Christ into our hearts), and yet she was loth to go herself; she did not say, I will not open, but, How shall I? Note, Frivolous excuses are the language of prevailing slothfulness in religion; Christ calls to us to open to him, but we pretend we have no mind, or we have no strength, or we have no time, and therefore think we may be excused, as the sluggard that will not plough by reason of cold. And those who ought to watch for the Lord’s coming with their loins girt, if they ungird themselves and put off their coat, will find it difficult to recover their former resolution and to put it on again; it is best therefore to keep tight. Making excuses (Luke xiv. 18) is interpreted making light of Christ (Matt. xxii. 5), and so it is. Those put a great contempt upon Christ that cannot find in their hearts to bear a cold blast for him, or get out of a warm bed.
IV. The powerful influences of divine grace, by which she was made willing to rise and open to her beloved. When he could not prevail with her by persuasion he put in his hand by the hole in the door, to unbolt it, as one weary of waiting, v. 4. This intimates a work of the Spirit upon her soul, by which she was unwilling made willing, Ps. cx. 3. The conversion of Lydia is represented by the opening of her heart (Acts xvi. 14) and Christ is said to open his disciples’ understandings, Luke xxiv. 45. He that formed the spirit of man within him knows all the avenues to it, and which way to enter into it; he can find the hole of the door at which to put in his hand for the conquering of prejudices and the introducing of his own doctrine and law. He has the key of David (Rev. iii. 7), with which he opens the door of the heart in such a way as is suited to it, as the key is fitted to the wards of the lock, in such a way as not to put a force upon its nature, but only upon its ill nature.
V. Her compliance with these methods of divine grace at last: My bowels were moved for him. The will was gained by a good work wrought upon the affections: My bowels were moved for him, as those of the two disciples were when Christ made their hearts to burn within them. She was moved with compassion to her beloved, because his head was wet with dew. Note, Tenderness of spirit, and a heart of flesh, prepare the soul for the reception of Christ into it; and therefore his love to us is represented in such a way as is most affecting. Did Christ redeem us in his pity? Let us in pity receive him, and, for his sake, those that are his, when at any time they are in distress. This good work, wrought upon her affections, raised her up, and made her ashamed of her dulness and slothfulness (v. 5, I rose up, to open to my beloved), his grace inclining her to do it and conquering the opposition of unbelief. It was her own act, and yet he wrought it in her. And now her hands dropped with myrrh upon the handles of the lock. Either, 1. She found it there when she applied her hand to the lock, to shoot it back; he that put in his hand by the hole of the door left it there as an evidence that he had been there. When Christ has wrought powerfully upon a soul he leaves a blessed sweetness in it, which is very delightful to it. With this he oiled the lock, to make it go easy. Note, When we apply ourselves to our duty, in the lively exercises of faith, under the influence of divine grace, we shall find it will go on much more readily and sweetly than we expected. If we will but rise up, to open to Christ, we shall find the difficulty we apprehended in it strangely overcome, and shall say with Daniel, Now let my Lord speak, for thou hast strengthened me, Dan. x. 19. Or, 2. She brought it thither. Her bowels being moved for her beloved, who had stood so long in the cold and wet, when she came to open to him she prepared to anoint his head, and so to refresh and comfort him, and perhaps to prevent his catching cold; she was in such haste to meet him that she would not stay to make the usual preparation, but dipped her hand in her box of ointment, that she might readily anoint his head at his first coming in. Those that open the doors of their hearts to Christ, those everlasting doors, must meet him with the lively exercises of faith and other graces, and with these must anoint him.
VI. Her said disappointment when she did open to her beloved. And here is the most melancholy part of the story: I opened to my beloved, as I intended, but, alas! my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone. My beloved was gone, was gone, so the word is.
1. She did not open to him at his first knock, and now she came too late, when afterwards she would have inherited this blessing. Christ will be sought while he may be found; if we slip our time, we may lose our passage. Note, (1.) Christ justly rebukes our delays with his denials, and suspends the communications of comfort from those that are remiss and drowsy in their duty. (2.) Christ’s departures are matter of great grief and lamentation to believers. The royal psalmist never complains of any thing with such sorrowful accents as God’s hiding his face from him, and casting him off, and forsaking him. The spouse here is ready to tear her hair, and rend her clothes, and wring her hands, crying, He is gone, he is gone; and that which cuts her to the heart is that she may thank herself, she provoked him to withdraw. If Christ departs, it is because he takes something unkindly.
2. Now observe what she does, in this case, and what befel her. (1.) She still calls him her beloved, being resolved, how cloudy and dark soever the day be, she will not quit her relation to him and interest in him. It is a weakness, upon every apprehension either of our own failings or of God’s withdrawings, to conclude hardly as to our spiritual state. Every desertion is not despair. I will say, Lord, I believe, though I must say, Lord, help my unbelief. Though he leave me, I love him; he is mine. (2.) She now remembers the words he said to her when he called her, and what impressions they made upon her, reproaching herself for her folly in not complying sooner with her convictions: “My soul failed when he spoke; his words melted me when he said, My head is wet with dew; and yet, wretch that I was, I lay still, and made excuses, and did not open to him.” The smothering and stifling of our convictions is a thing that will be very bitter in the reflection, when God opens our eyes. Sometimes the word has not its effect immediately upon the heart, but it melts it afterwards, upon second thoughts. My soul now melted because of his words which he had spoken before. (3.) She did not go to bed again, but went in pursuit of him: I sought him; I called him. She might have saved herself this labour if she would but have bestirred herself when he first called; but we cut ourselves out a great deal of work, and create ourselves a great deal of trouble, by our own slothfulness and carelessness in improving our opportunities. Yet it is her praise that, when her beloved has withdrawn, she continues seeking him; her desires toward him are made more strong, and her enquiries after him more solicitous, by his withdrawings. She calls him by prayer, calls after him, and begs of him to return; and she not only prays but uses means, she seeks him in the ways wherein she used to find him. (4.) Yet still she missed of him: I could not find him; he gave me no answer. She had no evidence of his favour, no sensible comforts, but was altogether in the dark, and in doubt concerning his love towards her. Note, There are those who have a true love for Christ, and yet have not immediate answers to their prayers for his smiles; but he gives them an equivalent if he strengthens them with the strength in their souls to continue seeking him, Ps. cxxxviii. 3. St. Paul could not prevail for the removing of the thorn in the flesh, but was answered with grace sufficient for him. (5.) She was ill-treated by the watchmen; They found me; they smote me; they wounded me, v. 7. They took her for a lewd woman (because she went about the streets at that time of night, when they were walking their rounds), and beat her accordingly. Disconsolate saints are taken for sinners, and are censured and reproached as such. Thus Hannah, when she was praying in the bitterness of her soul, was wounded and smitten by Eli, one of the prime watchmen, when he said to her, How long wilt thou be drunken? so counting her a daughter of Belial, 1Sa 1:14; 1Sa 1:15. It is no new thing for those that are of the loyal loving subjects of Zion’s King to be misrepresented by the watchmen of Zion, as enemies or scandals to his kingdom; they could not abuse and persecute them but by putting them into an ill name. Some apply it to those ministers who, though watchmen by office, yet misapply the word to awakened consciences, and through unskillfulness, or contempt of their griefs, add affliction to the afflicted, and make the hearts of the righteous sad whom God would not have made sad (Ezek. xiii. 22), discouraging those who ought to be encouraged and talking to the grief of those whom God has wounded, Ps. lix. 26. Those watchmen were bad enough that could not, or would not, assist the spouse in her enquiries after her beloved (ch. iii. 3); but these were much worse, that hindered her with their severe and uncharitable censures, smote her and wounded her with their reproaches, and though they were the keepers of the wall of Jerusalem, as if they had been the breakers of it, took away her veil, from her rudely and barbarously, as if it had been only a pretence of modesty, but a cover of the contrary. Those whose outward appearances are all good, and who yet are invidiously condemned and run down as hypocrites, have reason to complain, as the spouse here, of the taking away of their veil from them. (6.) When she was disabled by the abuses the watchmen gave her to prosecute her enquiry herself she gave charge to those about her to assist her in the enquiry (v. 8): I charge you, O you daughters of Jerusalem! all my friends and acquaintance, if you find my beloved, it may be you may meet with him before I shall, what shall you tell him? so some read. “Speak a good word for me; tell him that I am sick of love.” Observe here, [1.] What her condition was. She loved Jesus Christ to such a degree that his absence made her sick, extremely sick, she could not bear it, and she was in pain for his return as a woman in travail, as Ahab for Naboth’s vineyard, which he so passionately coveted. This is a sickness which is a sign of a healthy constitution of soul, and will certainly end well, a sickness that will not be death, but life. It is better to be sick of love to Christ than at ease in love to the world. (2.) What course she took in this condition. She did not sink into despair, and conclude that she should die of her disease, but she sent after her beloved; she asked the advice of her neighbours, and begged their prayers for her, that they would intercede with him on her behalf. “Tell him, though I was careless, and foolish, and slothful, and rose not up so soon as I should have done to open to him, yet I love him; he knows all things, he knows that I do. Represent me to him as sincere, though in many instances coming short of my duty; nay, represent me to him as sincere, though in many instances coming short of my duty; nay, represent me as an object of his pity, that he may have compassion on me and help me.” She does not bid them tell him how the watchmen had abused her; how unrighteous soever they were in it, she acknowledges that the Lord is righteous, and therefore bears it patiently. “But tell him that I am wounded with love to him.” Gracious souls are more sensible of Christ’s withdrawings than of any other trouble whatsoever.
| Languet amaus, non languet amor– The lover languishes, but not his love. |
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
PART IV – Son 5:2 to Son 6:9
TEMPORARY LAPSE
NOTE: Verses 2-8 are considered by many as a dream of the Shulamite. It appears more reasonable to regard it as an actual incident not fully explained.
Verse 2 reveals a temporary lessening of ardor by the Shulamite after some passage of time. She is asleep and dreaming or in a near sleep condition when the beloved, returning in the night from some necessary duty, knocks and asks her to open the door.
Verse 3 expresses her reluctance, offering the excuse that she has put off her coat and washed her feet.
Verse 4 indicates that the beloved made an effort to open the door by thrusting his fingers dipped in a costly unguent of myrrh into the hole by the door. The adhesive quality of the myrrh would often stick to the pins and enable one to lift them with the fingers. The effort was not successful in this instance, but awareness of it stirred the heart of the Shulamite.
Verses 5-6 reveal that she then rose up, opened the door, found sweet smelling myrrh on the handles of the door, but her beloved had withdrawn. She was distressed and began immediately to seek and call to him, but got no answer. Rejected, her beloved husband had disappeared.
Verse 7 affirms that the city watchman found her abroad in the city, beat and wounded her, and removed her veil. No reason for their harshness is given in the text, but it may have been prompted by her refusal to stop her wandering search and return home. It was not proper for a woman to be abroad in the streets at night.
EXCHANGE WITH DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM
Verse 8 is not clear as to the precise message the Shulamite wanted conveyed to her beloved, but it indicated to the women that he was regarded as more important than any other person and prompted their question raised in Vs. 9.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
Notes
Son. 5:2 : I sleep, but my heart waketh. Sleep, yeshenah, a participle or adjective, from to sleep. GESENIUS. The connection with what follows gives to and the sense of imperfects: I was sleeping, &c. ZCKLER, HITZIG. So GOOD, PERCY, BOOTHROYD, &c. DIODATI, MARTIN, and DUTCH: I slept or was asleep. Was sleeping as if inebriated with delights. MICHAELIS, A. CLARKE. Had laid her head down on her couch, waiting for her beloved, and had fallen asleep, and now relates her dream to her companions. GREGORY. Ro-counts an adventure, or perhaps a dream. PERCY. Most likely the latter. A. CLARKE. A dream, indicating perplexity and unconnectedness, and containing reminiscences of the former one. EWALD. Another part of the poem begins here: in Solomons absence, the Bride relates a dream to her attendans or the daughters of Jerusalem. DELITZSCH. A dream, indicative of her state of mind some days after the marriage festivities, her longing having been awakened for her native home. ZCKLER. The scene transferred to the Brides lowly cottage in the city, where she refused her husband admittance at night; a scene in accordance with her original position, but most inconsistent with her present rank, and explicable only on the ground of allegory. M. STUART. Second half of the Book begins here, shewing the Brides original condition, and how her longing for the King was brought about. HAHN. My heart waketh. Rather, was waking or awake. So EWALD, ZCKLER, &c. (libbi) my heart; used in the O.T. sense, of the centre and organ of the entire life of the soul. ZCKLER. My soul. EWALD. My mind. DAVIDSON. The intellectual faculties or region of thought. HITZIG. Her sleep nearer waking than sleeping. SANCTIUS. Like Balaam, fallen asleep, but with the eyes open (Num. 24:4). PATRICK. Spoken of one asleep, or partly so, being excited by an unexpected call. FRY. Her mind awake and filled with the object of her affection. NOYES. Thus allegorized; TARGUM: Israel, when carried to Babylon, like a man asleep and unable to awake. RABBINS: Asleep as to the commandments, but my heart awake to the duties of piety: asleep as to my redemption, but the Blessed One awake to redeem me. WEISS: Ancient Church relates her experience after the dedication of the Temple (2Ch. 12:1; Isa. 1:21; Isa. 5:7; Jer. 2:21; Sam. Son. 4:1); a moral sleep intended; a state of spiritual drowsiness and inactivity. AINSWORTH: The spouse having eaten and drunk largely of the blessings of Christ, begins to remit her zeal, and neglect the works of faith and love: the heart, however, or inner man, the spirit, or the man as he is regenerate, still awake. DEL RIO: Awake in the inward soul, while the external senses were lulled. HAHN: An unnatural sleep; the original condition of the Bride or the Gentile nations living without God; a life without liveliness, as a sleep. ZCKLER, and HENGSTENBERG: A dark scene: Apostasy of unbelieving mankind from God; especially the rejection of the Saviour. GREGORY and early interpreters: Saved from the billows, the Church falls asleep on the shore. BROUGHTON and COTTON: State of the Church in Constantines time. DAVIDSON: The disciples before Christs resurrection.
PART FOURTH
The Coolness and its Consequences
CHAPTER 5 Son. 5:2.CHAPTER 6 Son. 5:9
SCENE FIRST. Place: The Palace at Jerusalem. Speakers: Shulamite and the Ladies of the Court, or the Daughters of Jerusalem
SHULAMITE RELATING A NIGHTS EXPERIENCE
Son. 5:2
I sleep (or, was sleeping),
But my heart waketh (or, was awake).
The second great division of the Song now reached: the period after the marriage. The exposition more difficult. In the present section the Bride relates to the ladies of the Court her experience during the night. Probably a dream. The narrative, however, possibly given by the Bride in a song sung at the marriage, with the view of exhibiting both the Bridegrooms excellences, her entire love to him, and, at the same time, her own unworthiness of him. She has retired to rest, perhaps at the close of one of the seven days during which the nuptial feast continued (Jdg. 14:15-17). Her ardent love to her husband, and the delight she enjoyed in his fellowship, give rise apparently to a dream, exhibiting, as often happens, the opposite of the reality. After she has retired to rest, her Beloved knocks at her door, desiring admittance. She strangely and unkindly hesitates, and makes silly and selfish excuses for not admitting him. After pleading in vain for admittance, he withdraws, but not until he has inserted his hand into the hole of the door as if, according to oriental custom, for the purpose of opening it. Seeing his hand, she relents, and rises to open; but too late. He has withdrawn and is gone. Full of distress, she searches for him in the city, but in vain. At last, as it recalling to mind his ordinary haunt, in the eagerness of her desire to find him, she hastens to the spot.
The narrative, whether given as that of a dream or otherwise, designed, like the rest of the Song, to exhibit the experience of believers individually, as well as that of the Church as a whole. What was, perhaps, a dream to Shulamite, too often the reality in the case of the believer and the Church. The experience, in either case, as in hers, the effect of sleep. The narrative illustrative of
Spiritual Sleep and its Effects.
Verified
(1) In the state of the Jewish Church at the time of the Saviours advent. He came to His own, but His own received Him not. Jerusalem knew not the day of her visitation.
(2) In the case of the disciples, after the Last Supper, in the garden of Gethsemane. Heavy with sleep and unable to watch but one hour with their Master agonizing under the dews of the night; and afterwards abandoning, denying, or betraying Him.
(3) In the experience and history of the Christian Church after the Apostolic age. That state of the Church in general represented by the Church at Laodicea. So described as readily to recall this portion of the Song (Rev. 3:19-20).
(4) In the occasional experience of a child of God. A believers enjoyment of the Saviours fellowship not unfrequently followed by a state of carnal security and sleep. The danger here indicated for our warning. Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. The warning never more needed than at a time of special spiritual enjoyment. Like the Master Himself, believers often taken from the Jordan of enjoyment to the Wilderness of temptation.
The Bride asleep, though her heart was awake. In a believers worst state, spiritual life and love still in existence. His sleep that of carnal security, not that of spiritual death. His slumber that of the couch, not that of the grave; one from which an awakening is not difficult, and must sooner or later come. The flesh in a believer only asleep, while the spirit in him is still awake. Believers to distinguish between the two, and to understand their own spiritual experience.
THE BRIDEGROOMS APPEAL
Son. 5:2
The voice of my beloved that knocketh,
Saying, open to me, my sister, my love,
My dove, my undefiled;
For my head is filled with dew,
And my locks with the drops of the night.
Natural for a husband to repair to his home after the fatigues of the day; and as natural for him to expect a cordial welcome. Christs love indicated in the fact that He, too, comes from time to time, and knocks for admission into the heart (Rev. 3:20). His desire to receive entertainment from His people, and to enjoy fellowship with them. If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. The love and fellowship of His people the reward of His toil and travail for their salvation. The Son of God left His Fathers bosom to find a home in the sinners heart. His head, for our sakes, filled with dew, and His locks with the drops of the night. His nights often spent under the open sky in prayer on our behalf, while others rested in their bed. His last night on earth a sleepless one in some part of the high priests palace, with His hands still bound with cords as a criminal. In the text we have
Christs Call to His Sleeping Church.
I. The party CALLED. The Bride. Indicated in her own language: The voice of my beloved. Also in that of the Bridegroom: My sister, my love, &c. Strange that Christs Bride should ever be slow to admit Him. As true as it is strange. An effectual call addressed to those who constitute the Church whom He loved, and for whom He gave Himself. These found by Him originally in the sleep of death. Too apt to fall again into carnal slumber, though not into spiritual death. Only living souls able to distinguish Christs voice as the voice of their Beloved. Only a believer able to say: I sleep, but my heart waketh.
II. The STATE implied. One of spiritual sleep. Our natural state. One into which the believer may relapse, though never so deeply as before. Such
Spiritual Sleep
a state
(1) Of security and ease.
(2) Of indifference and unconcern.
(3) Of indolence and sloth.
(4) Of carnal indulgence.
(5) Of spiritual inactivity.
(6) Of insensibility to ones best interests.
(7) Of self-deceptionsleep usually accompanied with dreaming. Such a state the result of
(1) The body of sin and death still adhering to us.
(2) The worlds temptationsits cares, pleasures, pursuits, society.
(3) Satans endeavourshis old trade (Gen. 3:14; 2Ti. 2:26, margin).
(4) Sense of safety experienced after believing.
(5) Neglect of watching unto prayer, and other appointed means.
(6) A state of comfort and enjoyment.
(7) An avoidance of the cross.
III. The KNOCKING. The voice of my beloved that knocketh (or knocking). Christs Bride not allowed to remain in a state of spiritual sleep. Christ has to knock both before conversion and after it. Knocks both in outward warnings and inward calls. Knocks
(1) By His Word. Every appeal in the Bible a knock at the sleepers heart. The language of Christ in the Scripture as well as of all His faithful servants: Awake thou that sleepest, and Christ shall give thee light.
(2) By His Providence. A thorn in the flesh sent both to awaken and to keep awake. Christs knocks often heard on a bed of sickness, and in the chamber of death. His language often in trouble: As many as I love I rebuke and chasten: be ye zealous, therefore, and repent (Rev. 3:19).
(3) By His Spirit. The Spirit Christs Agent in dealing with mens souls. Knocks from without before conversion; from within, after it.
IV. The CALL to open. The voice added to the knock. Christ in earnest to be admitted. Open unto me. Will not force an entrance, but produce a welcome one. His people willing in the day of His power (Psa. 110:3). To open implies
(1) To invite His entrance. Like Laban to Eliezer, Come in thou blessed of the Lord.
(2) To give Him a hearty welcome as the inmate of our heart; glad to entertain Him and enjoy His fellowship.
(3) To remove the hindrances to His entranceany sinful habit, indulgence, or disposition. The dearest idol I have known. &c.
(4) To receive Him as an entire Savour, and to surrender ourselves to Him as our Prophet, Priest, and King.
V. The PLEA for admission. A threefold plea employed by the Bridegroom
1. His relation to the sleeper. My sister. Open to me. The last words emphatic. To Me, thy husband and Saviour. To Me, whom thou hast sworn to love, honour, and obey. The person who knocks, the strongest of all arguments for admission. The greatest of all shames to keep such a friend and Saviour at the door. When Christ knocks for admission into the heart, it is either as already a husband, or seeking to become one.
2. His love to the sleeper. Indicated in the terms He employs: My love, my dove, my undefiled. Christs love to sinners in general, and to His Church in particular, as seen especially in giving Himself for them, a powerful reason for admitting Him to their heart. That love further seen in passing over their defilement and unworthiness, and in regarding only the work of His Spirit in their hearts. The multiplication of the tenderest terms in addressing the sleeper, indicative
(1) Of the Bridegrooms great and unchanging love.
(2) Of His earnest desire for admission.
(3) Of the difficulty of awakening the sleeper.
3. What He has endured on the sleepers behalf. My head is filled with dew, &c. In visiting the Bride, and in seeking admission as the Bridegroom of His Church, during His earthly ministry, this often literally true. The Son of Man hath not where to lay His head. Often spent the whole night in prayer for His people under the open sky. Every man went unto his own house; but Jesus went into the Mount of Olives (Joh. 7:53; Joh. 8:1.) In redeeming His Church and saving a lost world, His visage was marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men. His last night on earth one of accumulated sufferings. His mental agony in the Garden towards midnight indicated by great sweat-like drops of blood falling down to the ground. His betrayal and arrest at midnight, followed by long weary hours in the high priests palace, while He stood bound as a criminal before the tribunal, first of Annas and then of Caiaphas, and remained the rest of the night in the hands of ruffian menials in the guard-roomspit on, buffeted, struck with rods, and made the subject of their fiendish sporttill led away at daybreak to the general council-room to undergo a third examination. His sacred head filled with the wrath-drops of that awful night, and of a still more awful day that followed it. Such a night and day of anguish, suffering, and blood it cost the Son of God to obtain admission to the sinners heart, in order to fill Him with the joys of salvation. What more powerful plea can be used for admission?
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
TEXT 5:28:4
FOURTH SCENEThe Kings Palace Son. 5:2 to Son. 8:4
Retrospect
Shulammite:
Narration to Court Ladies of another dream, Son. 5:2-7
TEXT 5:27
2.
I was asleep, but my heart waked:
It is the voice of my beloved that knocketh,
saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled;
For my head is filled with dew, my locks with the drops of the night.
3.
I have put off my garment; how shall I put it on?
I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?
4.
My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door,
And my heart was moved for him.
5.
I rose up to open to my beloved;
And my hands dropped with myrrh,
And my fingers with liquid myrrh,
Upon the handles of the bolt.
6.
I opened to my beloved;
But my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone.
My soul had failed me when he spake:
I sought him, but I could not find him;
I called him, but he gave me no answer.
7.
The watchmen that go about the city found me,
They smote me, they wounded me;
The keepers of the walls took away my mantle from me.
THOUGHT QUESTIONS 5:27
125.
What is meant by saying that she was asleep but her heart was awake?
126.
How could his voice knock? (it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh)
127.
Define each of the four names given in verse two?
128.
What is suggested by his reference to the excessive dew?
129.
The maid seems more interested in her feet than she is her beloved. How shall we understand this expression in verse three?
130.
If he unlocked the door why didnt he come in? Cf. verse four.
131.
As she arose did she use perfume? Or what is meant by the reference to myrrh in verse five?
132.
Why do you think her beloved left?
133.
Where did she look as she searched for him? Cf. verse six.
134.
She evidently ran out of the house. Why did the watchman hit her?
135.
Are the keepers of the walls the same persons as the watchmen? Why take her mantle or veil?
PARAPHRASE 5:27
Shulammite to Court Ladies:
2.
I was sleeping, and in dreaming (heard)
The sound of my beloved knocking (and saying),
Open to me, my sister, my companion, my dove, my undefiled!
For my head is drenched with dew,
And my locks with moisture of the night.
3.
(I thought) I have already taken off my gown,
How can I put it on again?
I have already bathed my feet,
How can I soil them?
4.
My beloved put his hand through the grille,
And my heart yearned for him.
5.
I rose up to open to my beloved,
My hands dripped with myrrh,
And my fingers with choice myrrh
Upon the handles of the lock,
6.
I opened to my beloved,
But my beloved had withdrawn himself and passed on.
When he had spoken my wits seemed to leave me.
I sought him but I found him not;
I called after him but there was no answer.
7.
The city watchmen found me;
They struck me; they wounded me.
Sentinels of the walls snatched away my veil.
COMMENT 5:27
Exegesis Son. 5:2-7
We are back in the palace of the kingeither at Jerusalem or his residence in the north nearer to Shunem.
It is morning in the chambers of Solomonthe maid from Shunem is recounting to the ladies of the court a vivid dream of the night. It is all so real she almost becomes again a participator as she tells it. I was asleep but I was constantly aware of my beloved from whom I am separated. All at once he was at the gate! I heard his voicehe knockedHe called to me: Open blood of my blood, love of my heart, my alert soft one, my purest one. I have been long in coming to you over many mountains. I have comeall through the night I have hastened to your sidemy head is wet with dew. Let me in. I turned on my bedI hardly knew what was happening. So very foolishly I thought only of myselfI cannot go to himI have undressed and bathed for bedI cannot go out in the courtyard to the gate I will soil my feet. I looked toward the doorhe had already entered the courtyard and was even now at the door of our house. His hand appeared through the hole near the door and attempted to unlock the door. When I saw his dear hand my heart almost stopped. I hardly knew what I was doingI jumped out of bed and threw a mantle over myselfI thought I must meet him with perfumeI dipped my hands in myrrhI hurried to the door, I could not move the lock or hold the handles of the door so full were my fingers with myrrh. When I did at least get the doors open, my beloved was gone! I was beside myselfPerhaps he came in another wayI looked in every room of these courtshe was nowhere to be found. I could yet hear his voice and his dear words of loveI called him, I called him againthere was no answer. I must find him. I will find him. I ran out the open dooracross the courtyard and out into the streets of the city. I had no sooner entered the streets than the watchmen were all around me. One of them struck me. It was a heavy blowI can yet feel the pain. One of the sentinels jerked my veil from me. I do not blame them, I must have appeared as a wanton woman wandering the streets at that hour. Was it only a dreamit was so realwas he really here?
We have chosen this form of narrative to give a degree of the reality that must have been present when it was first told. In our narrative we have tried to include the meaning of the text.
Marriage Son. 5:2-7
These verses would make a fine section for an evaluation of the actions of the bride and groomhow did they respond to this circumstance? What does it reveal of their character? In this evaluation we can see ourselves. First we shall consider the groom:
He has come a long way at great dangerHe openly gives expression of his heart. He is willing to consider the maid as his sisteri.e., he will treat her in the responsible manner of a brother. At the same time the term sister suggests the strongest blood relationships. He believes the very best of his brideshe is dove-like and pure.A virgin. Even when she does not answer his call or knock, he will yet try to enter. When he is unsuccessful he leaves. We do not know why he left. We could conjecture but it would be futile. the bride:
Her consciousness and sub consciousness was always upon her love. Even when asleep she was yet with him. This being true, she yet responds subconsciously in a selfish manner. Perhaps we could excuse her on grounds of confusion or frustration. One often acts irrationally upon being suddenly awakened. But why should she care about her appearance?or her feet?isnt his presence more important than her comfort? Why the excessive myrrh? We do appreciate her concernbut why so concerned? for her lover or for herself? Perhaps we are too critical of the bride. If we are, please correct our evaluation in a discussion on this subject.
Communion Son. 5:2-7
We now take the maidens place as we attempt to relate these verses to our Lord and His bride. Oh, that we were as constantly concerned about the presence of our Lord as was the maid in the text. Even when we sleep He is not out of our sub consciousness. How often do we dream of our Lord? We have heard so often Rev. 3:20 misapplied. In the context this verse relates to lukewarm Christians, it reads: To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: . . . Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent. Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will go in and eat with him, and he with me (Rev. 3:14; Rev. 3:19-20). He loves us and believes in uswe are His blood-relative. We are His brother, His sisterwe do have the Holy Doveby His blood and grace we are virginsHe has, at great danger and from a great distance, come to us. How do we react to His knock?to His voice? We are about as mixed up as the maid. His call is never convenientwe are forever half asleep or busy with something or someone else. If He had just timed His coming on another dayor night or when I was better preparedon and on we goI would get my feet dirty if I answered His knockwe are sure you would! He got His feet dirty coming to call on you and me. But He is insistentif we will not answer He will attempt to unlock the doorsee His nail-pierced hand near the latch of your heart? We will get hurt looking for Himthe watchmen of the world will misunderstand our intentions and will tear aside all attempts of concealmentwe will become totally vulnerable! They will wound us deeply! But unlike the dream of the maidwe will find Himin the dark streets or deep needs of our world we shall find Him.
FACT QUESTIONS 5:27
175.
What are the circumstances of these verses:
176.
We have used synonymous expressions in describing the maid. Reword them again.
177.
She made a foolish mistake. Why?
178.
There was a time when she was especially moved. When was it?
179.
Why couldnt she get the door open?
180.
Where did she make her search?
181.
Why rush out into the streets? Why was she wounded?
182.
Discuss our evaluation of the groom. Have we left something out?
183.
Do we represent the bride accurately? Discuss.
184.
Do you believe there is any practical value in our comments on communion? If so, discuss its meaning in our present day life.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(2) I sleep.This begins the old story under an image already employed (Son. 3:1). Here it is greatly amplified and elaborated. The poet pictures his lady dreaming of him, and when he seems to visit her, anxious to admit him. But, as is so common in dreams, at first she cannot. The realities which had hindered their union reappear in the fancies of sleep. Then, when the seeming hindrance is withdrawn, she finds him gone, and, as before, searches for him in vain. This gives opportunity to introduce the description of the charms of the lost lover, and so the end of the piece, the union of the pair, is delayed to Son. 6:3.
My head is filled with dew.Anacreon, iii. 10 is often compared to this.
Fear not, said he, with piteous din,
Pray ope the door and let me in.
A poor unshelterd boy am I,
For help who knows not where to fly:
Lost in the dark, and with the dews,
All cold and wet, that midnight brews.
(Comp. also Propert. i. 16-23; Ovid, Amor. Ii. 19-21.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
2. The Beloved now disappears. A great German poet has said, that next to love’s joys are love’s anxieties. The play of poetry which must always keep time with nature demands the relief which the darker emotions of regret convey. The Enamoured tells of a dream, made of such “stuff” as the course of love develops, a bit of peevishness and remorse. In the mystery of sleep and dreams, the partition between the affairs of actual life and the wild, free movement of uncurbed fancy, is thin, and the scenes and doings of dreams are a broken and grotesquely-set reproduction of the elements gathered from waking experiences. I sleep, but, etc. Hebrew, I was asleep, but my heart was awake. This verse is, in Hebrew, very animated and abrupt. It is the voice, etc. Better, Hark! my Beloved! He is knocking! Omit saying. For my head, etc. The dews in Palestine are, for a part of the year, very heavy, like those of Greece, “all cold and wet.”
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
The Nightmare Begins.
Her BELOVED seeks to join her in her room, but she lets him go away. She is too filled with her own comfort and her own delightfulness.
‘I was asleep, but my heart awoke, It is the voice of my beloved who knocks, saying, “Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled, For my head is filled with dew, My locks with the drops of the night.”
Lying asleep in her luxurious bed it was as though she was suddenly awoken by a knock on the door, although it was only her heart that awoke. And her heart leaped as she heard the voice of her beloved. But despite his sweet words she was not too impressed when she learned that he had just come in from seeing to his sheep, so that ‘his head was filled with dew, and his locks with the drops of the night’. In her dream she was back with her old shepherd lover. Why could he not wait until he was more ready to enter her bed? Surely he did not expect her to receive him like that? She had grown too used to comfort.
How easily our love for our Lord can slip in a similar way, so that when He comes to us to put us under some inconvenience we are unwilling. When we first became His we were delighted to do anything that He asked. But now we have become more choosy. Let Him wait until we are in a better frame of mind. We do not want to be involved with the discomforts of His watch over the sheep. We do not want to share the inconveniences and consequences of the night watch. Our love has grown cold.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
SECTION 4.
HER SECOND NIGHTMARE ( Son 5:2
Sadly the original warmth of the marriage appears at some stage to have grown cold, for we find now that she has a nightmare that when her beloved comes to enjoy her love, she cannot be bothered to open the door to him, especially as he has come in damp and dripping from watching over the sheep. (She still dreams of him as her shepherd). How can he thus expect to share her bed? So she refuses to open to him. She is now so taken up with herself and her home comforts that she has no time for Him.
Then she regrets her folly, but when she repents she finds that it is too late for she discovers that he has gone. And so in her nightmare she wanders out into the city to seek him, and is treated by the watchmen and guards as a loose woman, her outer mantle being ripped from her. But she does not care. All that concerns her is that she cannot find her beloved, and she calls on the daughters of Jerusalem for their assistance, but finds that her pleas are dismissed.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
The Duties of Marriage: Learning to Abandon Self-will Literal Interpretation – The new bride still does not find perfect rest, for in Son 5:2-8 she experiences the new duties of a wife in which she has to now learn to deny herself and respond to her husband. After the wedding is consummated (Son 4:16 to Son 5:1), the Beloved finds herself settled into her bed in a place of perfect rest and contentment, a place she does not want to abandon. So, when the Lover calls his beloved in the early hours of the morning, before the dew has vanished, to leave her place of rest and open up and follow him (Son 5:2), she becomes aware of her own comfort (Son 5:3). She does not want to leave this place of perfect rest at first and become defiled with the world again. But she will soon find that in apathy to this call, her bed is no longer a place of rest, for her lover is now gone. She will now have to learn that abiding rest is not found in a particular event or place, but in a willingness to yield to her lover under any circumstance. When she finally responded to his call and opened to him, he had vanished (Son 5:4-6). In her pursuit of her own will and desires, she lost fellowship and unity with her husband. Then, in her abandonment of her own comfort and rest, she sought him publicly and found persecution and pain (Son 5:7). However, in a step of greater maturity and demonstration of love, she told all who would hear about her desire to be with her lover (Son 5:8). Her lover had not truly abandoned her, but rather, needed her to demonstrate her sacrificial love for him: for mature love must first be demonstrated through sacrifice and abandonment of self. Thus, we see the painful process of growth in marriage as the couples begin to learn to yield to their own selfish will and come into unity each day for God’s plan for their lives.
Note in this passage of Scripture that the husband never once changes in his feelings of love. But it is the wife who still experiences insecurities in their relationship. Thus, she has not yet entered into rest.
Figurative Interpretation – As this passage in Son 5:2-8 relates to our spiritual growth, we find in the Christian life that our place of rest today is not necessarily our place of rest in the future. In other words, we may be called to serve in a place in the body of Christ for a while. But when the Lord deals with us to step out in faith and enter into a different place of ministry, it is often to leave this place of comfort. If we do not get up and move, we soon lose our sense of peace and feel restless.
One of the opening verses of Songs reads, “Draw me, we will run after thee.” There are two occasions in Songs when the bride is drawn away by her Lover (Son 2:10; Son 5:2). There are times in our spiritual growth when the Lord “draws us” out of one phase of ministry and into a higher level of sacrifice. Son 5:2-8 describes just such a time when Christ calls a believer out of a place of rest.
Illustration – Kenneth Hagin tells the story of the time in his life when God called him out of the pastorate and into the field ministry as a teacher to the body of Christ. After years of preaching in small churches, he finally had a pastorate that paid him well, and his family was well taken care of. He had spent hours each that year praying in the Spirit, confessing Paul’s prayers in Ephesians over his life and his congregation. It was a time in his life when he found temporary rest from the struggles of the ministry. Yet, this rest was not to last long. When he turned back from this call into the field ministry, his health failed and he almost died. Repenting of his attitude, he humbly accepted this divine call to travel and teach the body of Christ about walking by faith. However, it was a challenging time. He wept often when leaving his family and driving far from home. He struggled financially during those early years. Yet, he had made the decision to persevere in this phase of his ministry. [205]
[205] Kenneth Hagin, The Spirit Upon and the Spirit Within (Tulsa, Oklahoma: Faith Library Publications, c2003, 2006), 105-11.
Illustration – In Joh 21:15-19 Jesus reconciles Peter back into fellowship with Himself. Peter knew that he had behaved in an immature manner by denying the Lord three times. So, Jesus is telling him that one day Peter would grow up and give his life for Christ just as he had seen his Master giving His own life to the Father’s will. Peter will mature in the faith. In Heb 5:11-14 Paul rebukes the Hebrews for not being more mature in their faith and lifestyle. As a father, I give my small children a lot of room to misbehave. But as a boss on my job, I am much more restrictive to my employees, simply because I expect an adult to behave differently than my children. This is what Paul is telling his readers in Heb 5:11-14. As we grow in the Lord, our journey becomes more and more narrow. We are required to walk the straight and narrow path. Jesus told Peter, “When thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest: but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not.” (Joh 21:18) In other words, when Peter was young, he could a lot of things that he wanted to do, but as he became old, he had to relinquish his will to others. His journey became straight and narrow. Church tradition tells us he was crucified upside down as a martyr for his Saviour. So it is in our Christian life as we mature in the Lord.
Son 5:2 I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night.
Son 5:2
Son 5:2 Literal Interpretation “it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled” – In Son 5:2 the Lover knocks on the door of his beloved’s home. “for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night” – Where has the Lover been so that his head is filled with dew? This description indicates that he had been in the garden that night, which is where she will find him in Son 6:2. If we look at Son 2:16-17 and Son 6:2-3 we can conclude that he has been feeding among the lilies in his garden until daybreak.
Son 2:16-17, “My beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies. Until the day break, and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of Bether.”
Son 6:2-3, “My beloved is gone down into his garden, to the beds of spices, to feed in the gardens, and to gather lilies. I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine: he feedeth among the lilies.”
Figurative Interpretation Son 5:2 suggests that the Holy Spirit comes again and asks for us to fellowship with Him. It is the Lord drawing us with cords of love to a deeper walk of communion. “I sleep, but my heart waketh” Watchman Nee interprets this phrase to mean that the believer is at rest in his relationship with Christ, but his heart is alert. [206] The heart is often used figuratively to refer to the spirit of man (Rom 2:29). However, the context suggests that as this person sleeps, his heart is awakened by the Spirit of God drawing him out of rest and into a deeper walk of communion with Christ. “it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh” – The Holy Spirit speaks to our spirits, not to our minds. Jesus knocks upon the door of our hearts for communion, “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.” (Rev 3:20) “saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled” He asks her to open her heart to a deeper commitment of devotion to Christ (Mike Bickle). [207] He calls her “my sister” to acknowledge their union as one, equal in this union. He calls her “my love” to acknowledge the power that binds them in covenant, and her free will to accept this love. He calls her “my dove” to acknowledge her regenerated spirit in Christ. He calls her “my undefiled” to acknowledge her purity before God. “for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night” Bickle suggests the description of Christ with dew upon his head reflects His time of agony in the Garden of Gethsemane. [208] Jesus made a great sacrifice to be able to come and commune with a child of God. The Lord is calling this child of God out of this position of rest and into a deeper walk that involves sacrifice and shame, which will take place in Son 5:7 when the beloved is wounded by the watchmen, and her veil is taken away in shame. However, I believe the dew represents the manifest anointing that comes from spending time in God’s presence. This anointing comes and goes in a believer’s life. It comes when retreating into the presence of God, and it retreats as one engages in the affairs and toils of this life. Christ is calling us to make a sacrifice and come apart with Him for a season of refreshment in the presence of God.
[206] Watchman Nee, Song of Songs (Fort Washington, Pennsylvania: CLC Publications, c1965, 2001), 97-8.
[207] Mike Bickle, Session 13 – The Ultimate 2-Fold Test of Maturity (Song of Solomon 5:1-8 ), in Song of Songs (Kansas City, Missouri: International House of Prayer, 1998), 3.
[208] Mike Bickle, Session 13 – The Ultimate 2-Fold Test of Maturity (Song of Solomon 5:1-8 ), in Song of Songs (Kansas City, Missouri: International House of Prayer, 1998), 1-2.
Son 5:3 I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?
Son 5:3
She thought that she would find rest in the time of courtship, but only found herself lovesick. She then thought that rest would be found in the engagement, but she suffered the pain of being separated from him. She then thought that marriage would bring her into rest, but in Son 5:2-8 she will find out that rest is not obtained through marriage alone. There is something else need, which will be dying to one’s own will.
Figurative Interpretation – Son 5:2 suggests that the Holy Spirit’s request for fellowship is met with man’s fleshly struggle to satisfy his physical desires, rather than yield to the Holy Spirit.
Son 5:4 My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him.
Son 5:4
Son 5:5 I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers with sweet smelling myrrh, upon the handles of the lock.
Son 5:5
Son 5:6 I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer.
Son 5:6
[209] Mike Bickle, Session 13 – The Ultimate 2-Fold Test of Maturity (Song of Solomon 5:1-8 ), in Song of Songs (Kansas City, Missouri: International House of Prayer, 1998), 12.
Son 5:7 The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me.
Son 5:7
Son 5:7 Literal Interpretation These watchmen of the city thought they were doing their king service by punishing this Shulamite they found wandering in the dark streets of the city. They believed she was out of order for being awake at night, rather than sleeping. Instead, they were abusing the king’s chosen one.
Figurative Interpretation – God has set watchmen over Israel and the Church to guide the people. When God’s chosen behave differently than other believers, it often disturbs church leaders. They do not understand why some individuals do not follow their traditions. They sometimes persecute such believers, thinking they are doing God a service.
Every person must encounter the Lord for himself, and not become dependent upon the Jewish priests and Church leaders for total guidance. Only those who passionately desire the Lord will look beyond the priesthood and Church leaders to find a personal encounter with Christ. For example under the Old covenant, a Jew had to look beyond the instructions of the Law and understand its original purpose was to bring a man to the Lord. Paul said in Galatians that the Law was given to the Jews as a way of guiding them to Christ. The Shulamite encountered these watchmen earlier in Son 3:3, but they did not harm her. The fact that they were antagonistic with this second encounter with the Beloved means that after the Resurrection of Christ the Law was no longer man’s instructor, and those who still clung to the Law also persecuted those who accepted Christ as the fulfillment of this very Law. God calls us beyond our church traditions. Perhaps the taking away of her veil symbolizes how a believer must be willing to lose his dignity over pursuing Christ Jesus.
Mike Bickle suggests Son 5:7 means that Church leaders have been allowed to persecute this child of God as a part of his trial of faith. [210] Watchman Nee interprets Son 5:7 to symbolize the stage of Christian growth in which a child of God allows himself to take up the afflictions of the Cross. [211] Paul describes this part of our Christian journey in Col 1:24, “Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the church:” As we seek the Lord and His ways, the world rejects us and persecutes us.
[210] Mike Bickle, Session 13 – The Ultimate 2-Fold Test of Maturity (Song of Solomon 5:1-8 ), in Song of Songs (Kansas City, Missouri: International House of Prayer, 1998), 14-6.
[211] Watchman Nee, Song of Songs (Fort Washington, Pennsylvania: CLC Publications, c1965, 2001), 107-8.
Son 5:6-7 Comments – The Beloved’s Search for Her Lover – In Son 1:7 the Shulamite woman was searching for her Lover. She will search for him a number of times in this Song. The purpose of each search is to find rest. She will look for him during the phase of Courtship in Son 1:7. She will look for him again during the phase of Engagement in Son 3:1-4. She will search for him during the Wedding phase in Son 5:6-7. Finally, during the stage of a Maturing Marriage she learns his ways and becomes confident in his devotion towards her (Son 6:1-3).
Son 5:8 I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved, that ye tell him, that I am sick of love.
Son 5:8
Son 5:8 Figurative Interpretation Mike Bickle suggests that Son 5:8 symbolizes a humble respond in “love and humility.” [212]
[212] Mike Bickle, Session 13 – The Ultimate 2-Fold Test of Maturity (Song of Solomon 5:1-8 ), in Song of Songs (Kansas City, Missouri: International House of Prayer, 1998), 1.
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
The Maturing Process (Scene 4: The Garden, and the Vineyards) (Maturing in Divine Service [Perseverance]) Literal Interpretation – Son 5:2 to Son 8:4 describes the maturing process of marriage. The new bride has not yet entered into rest, for in Son 5:2-8 she experiences the final test of true love in which she has to now learn to deny herself and serve her husband. Her love is tested again to prove her devotion to him (Son 5:2-8). The hardship and persecution that results from this test and her desire for him in the midst of this trial serves as a powerful testimony to the daughters of Jerusalem as they ask her why she loves him so dearly and why he is more special than other men (Son 5:9). She then describes her Lover in a way that others have not known, by describing his unique characteristics above all others (Son 5:10-16). This symbolizes the journey of every wife to learn about her husband and to admire his unique characteristics. Her testimony provokes these maidens to seek him with her (Son 6:1), and she tells them how they can find him as well, assuring them of the strong bond love that holds them together (Son 6:2-3).
In Son 6:4-10 the husband expresses his love and admiration for the beauty and uniqueness of his wife. Her love has proven genuine. Just as the beloved emphasized her lover’s uniqueness in Son 5:9-16, so does he now express her uniqueness among women. In Son 6:11-13 the Shulamite visits the vineyards for the first time since being brought from her native village to the King’s palace (Son 6:11). This introduction to such a familiar setting seems to stir up a longing in her heart for her people and homeland (Son 6:12). Her people call her back (Son 6:13 a) and the king shows forth his jealousy for the first time with a mild rebuke to them (Son 6:13 b).
In Son 7:1-13 we have a description of the husband and wife coming together in the intimacy of the marriage bed. The man is first aroused by her physical beauty and uses his words in foreplay (Son 7:1-5). He then moves into the act of intercourse (Son 7:6-9). The wife responds with words expressing her desire to always yield to him as long as he continues his devotion to her (Son 7:10 to Son 8:4). This is the place of rest that the wife has been seeking in marriage, which is intimacy with her husband.
Figurative Interpretation Figuratively speaking, this fourth song represents man’s discipline to persevere in divine service. The intimacy of the marriage bed is where the wife finds rest as she yields herself totally to her husband. This is figurative of the believer yielding himself entirely to God’s plan and purpose for humanity.
A good example of this phase of loving God with all of our heart is seen in the life of Kathryn Kuhlman in her later years of ministry, whose healing minister touched the world during 1960’s and 70’s. Her services were marked by the distinct presence of the Holy Spirit, being manifested by divine healings, people shaking and being slain with the Holy Spirit. She tells of the heavy price she paid to have this anointing, which involved leaving an unscriptural marriage with a man she dearly loved. She came to a place and time when she died to her own will and yielded totally to the will of God. Her “thorn in the flesh” was carrying the pain of walking away from an earthly love affair in order to be in God’s perfect will. [201] She said, “Any of you ministers can have what I have if you’ll only pay the price.” She described the price that she paid as costing her everything. She said about a lifestyle of prayer, “If you find the power, you’ll find heaven’s treasure.” [202] She refers to the day when she made a decision to divorce a man who has been previously married. She explains how on that day Katherine died. [203] Another good example is seen in the early years of Arthur Blessitt’s call to take the cross around the world. In Central America a group of military police pulled him out of his mobile trailer and stood him up in front of a firing squad. Instead of pleading for his life, he reached into his trailer get these men some bibles. When he turned around to face the firing squad, everyone was on the ground. The power of God manifested and knocked everyone down. The point is that Arthur Blessitt no longer cared for his own life, but rather, his concern was to carry the testimony of Jesus Christ. [204]
[201] Benny Hinn, The Anointing (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1992), 63-4.
[202] Kathryn Kuhlman, “I Believe in Miracles,” on This is Your Day (Irving, Texas), on Trinity Broadcasting Network (Santa Ana, California, 28 January 2008), television program.
[203] Kathryn Kuhlman, “I Believe in Miracles,” on This is Your Day (Irving, Texas), on Trinity Broadcasting Network (Santa Ana, California, 28 January 2008), television program; Benny Hinn, The Anointing (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1992), 63-4.
[204] Arthur Blessitt, interviewed by Matthew Crouch, Behind the Scenes, on Trinity Broadcasting Network (Santa Ana, California, 2008), television program.
Outline – Note the proposed outline of this section:
1. Scene 1 – Love Is Tested Again Son 5:2 to Son 6:13
a) The Duties of Marriage Son 5:2-8
b) Becoming Familiar with One Another Son 5:9 to Son 6:13
i) The Uniqueness of the Husband Son 5:9-16
ii) The Beloved’s Commitment to Her Husband Son 6:1-3
iii) The Uniqueness of the Wife Son 6:4-10
iv) The Wife’s Desire to Return Home Son 6:11-13
2. Scene 2 – The Intimacy of the Marriage Bed Son 7:1 to Son 8:4
a) The Man’s Foreplay Son 7:1-5
b) The Act of Intercourse Son 7:6-9
c) The Woman’s Response to His Intimacy Son 7:10 to Son 8:4
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Son 5:2. I sleep, but my heart waketh The fifth day’s eclogue commences here; and contains a solemn declaration from the bridegroom, that he prefers his spouse to all others, chap. Son 6:9. The word tammathi, rendered my undefiled, signifies completely accomplished; one consummately possessed of all endowments both of body and mind. New Translation.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
DISCOURSE: 851
SPIRITUAL SLOTH REPROVED
Son 5:2-8. I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me my sitter, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night. I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on! I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them? My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him. I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers with sweet-smelling myrrh, upon the handles of the lock. I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake; I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer. The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me. I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved, that ye tell him, that I am sick of love.
TWO things we should guard against in reading the Song of Solomon: namely, the laying an undue stress on particular words, and the dwelling too minutely on particular circumstances. There is a latitude due to the very species of composition, that may well exempt it from severe criticism, and from an over-strained application of its several parts. No one can have ever read the Holy Scriptures without seeing many expressions, which modern delicacy and refinement constrain us to pass over, as offensive to our ears. These expressions occur both in the Law and in the Prophets; and therefore we cannot wonder if they occur in a composition intended to exhibit the mutual love subsisting between Christ and his Church, and shadowing it forth under the most delicate of all images, the mutual regards of a bridegroom and his bride. Allowance must be made for the customs of different nations: a thing may not be at all improper in one age or country, which in another age and country would be highly indecorous, as not being sanctioned by common usage. Besides, there are many customs which obtained in the days of Solomon, which, if they were known to us, would reflect light on many parts of this poem, which are involved in obscurity because we want the key to the explanation of them. Even what we do know must be touched upon with the greatest delicacy, lest what was written only for the inflaming of our spiritual affections, should become rather an occasion of evil. The true way to profit by this book is to take the general scope of it, rather than its particular images, as the subjects for our reflection. And, if we attend to this rule, we shall find the passage which we have now read, replete with instruction. It informs us of the reproof which the Bride received, for the indifference with which on one occasion she treated her beloved.
Let us distinctly notice,
I.
The indolence she indulged
She was in a state, not of absolute sleep, like the ungodly world, but of slumber, half asleep, and half awake; I sleep, but my heart waketh.
Moreover, when her beloved came to hold communion with her, she was inattentive to his voice: yea, notwithstanding he addressed her in terms of most endeared affection, and complained of the inconvenience he had sustained through her unwatchfulness, she still gave but little heed to his voice. In hot countries, the night dews are not only strong, but often very injurious to those who are exposed to them: yet even this consideration did not operate to produce in her that activity which the occasion required.
Instead of rising at his call, she urged vain and foolish excuses to justify her neglect: and in fact told him, that his visit at that time was unacceptable. These excuses were only a cloak for her own sloth and self-indulgence: had her graces been in lively exercise, the obstacles she complained of would have vanished in an instant. This conduct gives a striking picture of what too generally obtains amongst ourselves: it shews,
1.
Our slothful habits
[There is in the very best of men the flesh yet lusting against the Spirit, as well as the Spirit striving against the flesh, so that they cannot do the things they would [Note: Gal 5:17.]. Even St. Paul complained, that, whilst with his mind he served the law of God, with his flesh he was still in some measure subjected to the law of sin, not indeed as a willing servant, but as a captive, who in vain sought a perfect deliverance from that detested enemy [Note: Rom 7:14; Rom 7:18; Rom 7:22-23.]. True indeed, where due vigilance is kept up, the old man cannot gain any permanent advantage: but even when the spirit is willing, the flesh is too often weak; and all in some degree find, that when they would do good, evil is present with them. It is indeed greatly to be lamented, that the Wise Virgins should ever so resemble the Foolish Virgins, as to slumber and sleep like them: but so, alas! it is: and when, by reason of our failures, we are ready to complain, Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord! we need the rebuke which was given to that petition, Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, and put on thy strength, O Zion [Note: Isa 51:9; Isa 51:17; Isa 52:1.]!]
2.
Our insensibility to the kindness of our beloved
[How inexpressibly tender are his addresses to us! See the invitations, the entreaties, the expostulations that pervade every part of the sacred volume; and say whether they be not sufficient to melt the most obdurate heart! Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and sup with him, and he with me [Note: Rev 3:20.]. Yet how long does he stand and knock in vain! His pleadings too, how kind, how gracious, how forcible they are! Have I been a wilderness to Israel? Wherefore say my people, we will come no more unto thee [Note: Jer 2:31.]? Turn ye unto me; for I have redeemed you: I am even married unto you [Note: Jer 3:12; Jer 3:14.]: Turn ye, turn ye; why will ye die, O House of Israel? But all his expostulations have been to no purpose with respect to the generality; and even on the best they are far from operating to the extent they ought. St. Paul could say, The love of Christ constraineth us, or carries us away like a mighty torrent: but how many are the seasons when his attractions are not so felt by us, and when, instead of regarding him as the chiefest among ten thousand, we see scarcely any beauty or comeliness in him for which he is to be desired!]
3.
Our vain excuses with which we cloke our sins
[Something arising out of our present circumstances we are ready to plead in extenuation at least, if not in excuse, for our sloth. But, if we would deal faithfully with ourselves, we should see that all our pleas are a mere cloak for self-indulgence: we are called to crucify the flesh with the affections and lusts, but we do not like self-denial: to mortify our earthly members is a work in which we cannot bear to engage: the cutting off a right hand, and plucking out a right eye is so painful to us, that we cannot be prevailed upon to put forth the resolution it requires. We promise ourselves a more convenient season, which in too many instances never comes at all. Like those in the parable, we find some reason for declining the invitations sent us, and return for answer, I pray thee have me excused ]
A due consideration of her fault will prepare our minds for,
II.
The reproof she met with
At last, beginning to see her error, she rose to open to her beloved: and with such ardour of affection did she open to him, that myrrh dropped, as it were, from her hands upon the handle of the lock. But behold, he was gone; and though she sought him, she could not find him; and though she called after him, he gave her no answer. The watchmen too reproved her with great severity, as questioning even the sincerity of one who could so treat the beloved of her soul. And such reproof must we all expect, if we give way to sloth instead of watching unto prayer. We must expect,
1.
That he will depart from us
[Verily he is a God who hideth himself, a holy and a jealous God, that will make us to eat of the fruit of our own ways, and to be filled with our own devices. He has warned us not to grieve his Holy Spirit, lest he depart from us. I will go and return to my place, says he, till they acknowledge their offence [Note: Hos 5:15.]. And oh! how painful are the seasons when he withdraws from us, and leaves our souls in darkness! Even he himself, when for our sins he was deserted of his God, how bitterly did he cry; My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? O that we may never provoke him to put that cup into our hands! How distressing will it be to be reduced to any measure of that experience which Christ endured for us; O my God, why art thou so far from helping me, and from the voice of my roaring? I cry in the day time, but thou hearest not; and in the night season, and am not silent [Note: Mat 22:1-2.]! See David in this predicament [Note: Psa 42:3; Psa 77:6-9.] , and let us be instructed, lest we provoke him to depart from us also.]
2.
That the word and ordinances shall he unproductive of any solid comfort to us
[The Watchmen are the ministers, whose office is not only to instruct and comfort, but also to warn and rebuke with all authority. True it is, they may be too hasty and severe in their reproofs; and may by such indiscreet zeal make the heart of the righteous sad, when they should rather bind up the broken heart, and heal the wounded spirit. But it is possible also, that they may be too lenient, and speak peace to persons when there is no peace. But where there is no fault in their ministrations, God may make their word as a sword, to enter into the very bones of those who hear it, and to cut them to the heart. Even the promises, when held forth in all their fulness and all their freeness, may afford no comfort to the soul of one who is under the hidings of Gods face; but may add tenfold poignancy to all his griefs. How unhappy was the state of David, when even the thought of God himself was a source of sorrow and despondency, rather than of joy and peace! He remembered God, and was troubled; and his soul refused comfort. In like manner, all the wonders of redeeming love may be made a source of the deepest anguish to our souls, by the apprehension that we have no part or lot in them. If then we would not bring these heavy judgments on our souls, let us seek the Lord while he may be found, and call upon him while he is near.]
Address
1.
Those who yet enjoy the light of Gods countenance
[Happy, happy are ye, in the possession of this rich mercy: Surely such a state is a foretaste of heaven itself. But do not presume upon it. Do not say, My mountain stands strong; I shall never be moved; lest ye cause God to hide his face from you, and ye be troubled. Be not high-minded; but fear. Keep upon your watch-tower: let your loins be girt, and your lamps trimmed; and watch every moment for the coming of your Lord. Blessed is that servant, whom his Lord, when he cometh, shall find so doing.]
2.
Those who are under the hidings of their Redeemers face
[If others are not to presume, so neither are you to despond. If your sorrow endure for a night, there is joy awaiting you in the morning. This do: imitate the Bride in the passage before us. She desired the prayers and intercessions of the saints, and entreated them, in their seasons of communion with their Lord, to plead her cause: I charge you, when you shall see him, tell him that I am sick of love. She felt no grief like the absence of her beloved; and could find comfort in nothing but the restoration of his love. Thus let your hearts be fixed on him; even on him only: and suffer nothing to weaken your regards to him. Never entertain hard thoughts of him. Take shame to yourselves, till ye even lothe yourselves in dust and ashes: but relax neither your love to him, nor your confidence in him. Say with yourselves, Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him. Then will he in due season return to your souls, so that your light shall rise in obscurity, and your darkness be as the noon-day. Only be content to go on your way weeping, bearing the precious seed of penitence and faith; and you shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing your sheaves with you.]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night.
We have here the description of the soul under a state of coldness and indifferency to her Lord. This is described under the image and figure of sleep; yet not a dead sleep of total insensibility; for she saith, Her heart waketh; and so as to hear and know the voice of her beloved, w ho is calling upon her and desiring admittance. But it is intended to represent that situation, which the people of God, everyone of them by experience, know but too much of: at times a coldness to divine things, an indifferency to the cause of Jesus: and sometimes to the neglect of ordinances, and the means of grace; or if sitting under the word, a hearing as though they heard not. It is a sad state this, and sometimes the temptation to it is carried on to a length truly alarming. And as it ariseth from a body of sin of death they carry about with them, believers can never be too earnest with the Lord to be kept from it. Our indifferency under it becomes the Worst symptom of it. And no doubt, it becomes also the greatest cause of the displeasure of the Lord. And did not his grace as much exceed our deserts, as his love is greater than ours, a recovery from it could never be expected.
Yea, perhaps many a child of God hath had his last days clouded in consequence of it, and gone out of life without that fulness of divine light, which the exercise of lively faith upon the person of Christ is sure to induce. Reader! pause over it. And while looking up with earnest prayer to be kept from it, learn to get more and more insight into that science which will tend to humble the soul, and exalt Jesus that teacheth us what a mass of sin, after all our attainments in grace, we virtually are. Truly did the Apostle say, and truly may all regenerated souls say the same, know that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. Rom 7:18 . How blessed is it to observe the unchangeable love of Jesus, as set forth in this sweet verse of his word. Though the church was fallen asleep, and seemingly regardless of her Lord; yet Jesus was not regardless of her. Though we fail in duty, Jesus never fails in his love. His love-calls in this verse are most tender and gracious. He stands at the door and knocketh. Rev 3:20 . And this by his word, by his servants the ministers of his gospel, by ordinances, by providences, by chastisements; in short, in numberless ways as shall best suit the blessed purposes of his grace. But in all and every one, see how tender his reproofs, how gentle his corrections. Sleepy and unworthy as his Church is, still is she his sister, his love, his dove, his undefiled. Oh! wonderful matchless grace! Oh! astonishingly gracious Saviour! We must not wholly pass over the several arguments the Lord Jesus makes use of, to enforce the Church to receive him. He saith, His head is filled with dew, and his locks with the drops of the night. By which perhaps may be understood, that he came with a fulness of grace, and would be himself as the dew unto Israel. Hos 14:6 ; Deu 32:2 . And perhaps the drops of the night is intended to manifest to the Church the Redeemer’s own personal sufferings, which he endured in order to bring blessings to her. The garden of Gethsemane, and the mount of Olives may well and fully explain. Psa 22 and Psa 69 compared with the Evangelists. Mat 26:1-75 etc.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Son 5:2 I sleep, but my heart waketh: [it is] the voice of my beloved that knocketh, [saying], Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, [and] my locks with the drops of the night.
Ver. 2. I sleep, but my heart waketh. ] It was no sound sleep that she took. She did not snort aloud in the cradle of security, as those do whom the devil hath cast into a deep lethargy, but napped and nodded a little, and that by candlelight too, as those wise virgins did; Mat 25:5 she slept with open eyes as the lion doth, she slept but half-sleep; the spirit was willing to wake, but the flesh was weak and overweighed it, as it fared with those sleepy disciples. Mat 26:41 Fain would this flesh make strange that which the Spirit doth embrace. O Lord, how loath is this loitering sluggard to pass forth into God’s path! said Mr Sanders a in a letter to his wife, a little before his death, with much more to like purpose. As in the state of nature, men cared not for grace, but thought themselves well enough and wise enough without; so, in the state of grace, they are not so careful as they should. Heaven must be brought to them, they will scarce go seek it. 1Pe 1:13 And as the seven tribes are justly taxed by Joshua for their negligence and sloth in not seeking speedily to possess the land God had offered them, Jos 18:2 so may the most of God’s people be justly rebuked for grievous security about the heavenly Canaan. They content themselves with a bare title, or hang in suspense, and strive not to full assurance; they follow Christ, but it is, as the people followed Saul, trembling; they are still troubled with this doubt, or that fear, and all because they are loath to be at the pains of “working out their salvation.” Php 2:12 Something is left undone, and their conscience tells them so. Either they are lazy and let fall the watch of the Lord, neglecting duty, or else they lose themselves in a wilderness of duties, by resting in them, and by making the means their mediators, or by pleasing themselves (with the Church here) in unlawful liberties, after that they have pleased the Lord in lawful duties. The flesh must be gratified and such a lust fulfilled. A little more sleep, a little more slumber in Jezebel’s bed, as Mr Bradford was wont to phrase it. b Solomon must have his wine, and yet think to retain his wisdom. Ecc 2:3 Samson must fetch a nap on Delilah’s knees, till God, by his Philistines, send out summons for sleepers, wake them in a fright, cure security by sorrow, as physicians use to cure a lethargy by casting the patient into a burning fever. Cold diseases must have hot and sharp remedies. The Church here found it so. And did not David, when he had sinned away his inward peace and wiped off, as it were, all his comfortables? Psa 51:1-19
It is the voice of my beloved that knocketh.
Open to me, my sister, my love, &c.
For mine head is filled with dew:] i.e., I have suffered much for thy sake, and waited thy leisure a long while; and must I now go look my lodging? Dost thou thus requite (repulse) thy Lord, O thou foolish woman and unwise? Is this thy kindness to thy friend? Woe unto thee, O Jerusalem, wilt thou not be made clean? when shall it once be. Jer 13:27 It is the ingratitude that makes the saint’s sins so heinous, which otherwise would be far less than other men’s, since his temptations are stronger and his resistance is greater. Oh, when God’s grace shall come sueing to us, nay, kneeling to us; when Christ shall come with hat in hand and stand bareheaded, as here, and that in foul weather too, begging acceptance and beseeching us to be reconciled, and we will not, what an inexcusable fault is this!
a Acts and Mon., fol. 1359.
b Acts and Mon.
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Son 5:2-8
2I was asleep but my heart was awake.
A voice! My beloved was knocking:
‘Open to me, my sister, my darling,
My dove, my perfect one!
For my head is drenched with dew,
My locks with the damp of the night.’
3I have taken off my dress,
How can I put it on again?
I have washed my feet,
How can I dirty them again?
4My beloved extended his hand through the opening,
And my feelings were aroused for him.
5I arose to open to my beloved;
And my hands dripped with myrrh,
And my fingers with liquid myrrh,
On the handles of the bolt.
6I opened to my beloved,
But my beloved had turned away and had gone!
My heart went out to him as he spoke.
I searched for him but I did not find him;
I called him but he did not answer me.
7The watchmen who make the rounds in the city found me,
They struck me and wounded me;
The guardsmen of the walls took away my shawl from me.
8I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
If you find my beloved,
As to what you will tell him:
For I am lovesick.
Son 5:2 I was asleep, but my heart was awake This starts a new poem (Son 5:2 to Son 6:3). This seems to be another dream like Son 3:1-4.
Open to me, my sister, my darling,
My dove, my perfect one This is a memory of the voice of bridegroom from the dream of the bride, Son 5:2-7. The verb open (BDB 834, KB 986, Qal IMPERATIVE), like so many terms in this context has sexual connotations and may be a euphemism for sexual intimacy (cf. Son 7:13). Notice it is repeated in Son 5:5-6.
As one reads this ambiguous passage, one wonders if this is reality or dream imagination. Is this one of many attempts of the man to make love to the maiden at night in secret? Is it an event during the week-long wedding in a city? Is it a dream of rejection and immediate grief over that rejection?
Again, could this be an approach of Solomon to a new member of his harem? It seems strange to me:
1. that Solomon would leave and accept a sexual rejection from a new member of his harem (the VERB open [BDB 834, KB 986] is a Qal IMPERATIVE)
2. that a new member of the royal harem could escape into the city
3. that night watchmen would not recognize or ask who the woman was before they beat her (and why)
Could this rejection be because the maiden truly loved a northern shepherd and not Solomon?
For my head is drenched with dew,
My locks with the damp of the night The second line has one rare word (i.e., locks, BDB 881) and a rare phrase, the damp of the night (BDB 944 CONSTRUCT BDB 538). Heavy dew often falls in Palestine in the early morning hours. Obviously this is a reference to a late visit from her newly married lover or a night visit before they were married.
Son 5:3 These are the two excuses the maiden uses for not opening the door to her lover:
1. she is undressed
2. she has washed her feet before getting into bed
These seem trivial if this referred to a newlywed or to her true lover (unless it was a nightmare).
As with several of the words in this literary unit, feet is a euphemism for genitalia (e.g., Jdg 3:24; Rth 3:4; 1Sa 24:3; 2Sa 11:8; 2Sa 11:11).
Son 5:4 My beloved extended his hand through the opening Literally this would refer to the small hole above the latch in ancient doors. It is possible to latch them in such a way that no one from the outside could open it and that is apparently what happened here. Because of the use of the term hand (BDB 388), in Isa 57:8 and as the term describing a raised pillar or monument, which may have originally referred to the phallic symbol of Canaanite shrines (cf. 1Sa 15:12; 2Sa 18:18; 1Ch 18:3; Isa 56:5, BDB 390, #4,a), some see this as a reference to male genitalia (BDB 390, #4,g and KB 387, #1, penis).
Even the term opening may refer to the maiden’s vagina (cf. NIDOTTE, vol. 2, p. 1032).
my feelings This is the word for bowels (BDB 588). The ancients believed that the lower viscera (liver, kidneys, bowels) was the seat of the emotions:
1. negative, Isa 16:11 (used of God); Jer 4:19 (used of Jeremiah)
2. positive, Isa 63:15; Jer 31:20 (used of God); also Psa 40:8 (used of David)
However, in this context it might refer to a sexual intensity (cf. Psa 71:6; Isa 49:1, womb).
Son 5:5 I arose to open the door to my beloved Obviously he had already left because she had taken too much time (1) to decide to open the door or (2) in preparing herself to receive him.
Son 5:7 They struck me and wounded me This is a very strange verse. Two theories have been postulated: (1) they struck (BDB 645, KB 697, Hiphil PERFECT and BDB 822, KB 954, Qal PERFECT, bruise [these are strong, violent terms, e.g., Psa 38:5; Isa 1:6]) her for disturbing the peace (i.e., Son 5:6 line 5) or (2) she was trying to invade Solomon’s private quarters (the king’s sleeping room was separate from the harem).
The guardsmen of the walls took away my shawl from me They either (1) tried to stop her and she fled, leaving her shawl (BDB 921 or veil) in their grasp or (2) after they had wounded her and removed her shawl they recognized her as a new member of the king’s harem.
Son 5:8 I adjure you, O daughter of Jerusalem This group responds in Son 5:9 and in Son 6:1. There are several possibilities for these daughters of Jerusalem: (1) virgins of Jerusalem; (2) members of the harem; (3) married women of the royal court; or (4) narrators (chorus as in dramas).
I sleep = I was asleep, or sleepy.
waketh = kept awake.
it is. Supply “it was”.
my beloved. Hebrew masculine.
that knocketh = he is knocking (masculine).
my love = my friend. Feminine. Hebrew. ra’yah, as in Son 1:9, Son 1:15; Son 2:2, Son 2:10, Son 2:13; Son 4:1, Son 4:7; Son 5:2; Son 6:4.
Son 5:2-8
Son 5:2-8
THE MAIDEN’S SECOND TRAGIC DREAM
“I was asleep, but my heart waked:
It is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying,
Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled;
For my head is filled with dew,
My locks with the drops of the night.
I have put off my garment; how shall I put it on?
I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?
My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door,
And my heart was moved for him.
I rose up to open for my beloved;
And my hands dropped with myrrh,
And my fingers with liquid myrrh,
Upon the handles of the bolt.
I opened to my beloved;
But my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone.
My soul had failed me when he spake:
I sought him, but I could not find him;
I called him, but he gave me no answer.
The watchmen that go about the city found me.
They smote me, they wounded me;
The keepers of the walls took away my mantle from me.
I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, If ye find my beloved,
Tell ye him, that I am sick from love.”
Waddey thought that the lover in this dream was Solomon. However, the fact of his being wet with dew contradicts this idea. The words fit the Shepherd lover far better. He would indeed have slept out doors; but who can imagine Solomon’s sleeping out, even in a dream?
Not many of the scholars whom we have consulted have risked any guess as to the exact meaning of this dream. That it is a dream is generally accepted; and Robinson with several others agreed that the time indicated is subsequent to the marriage. Bunn pointed out that the situation indicated in the dream, “Is tragic.
THE SPIRITUAL MEANING OF THE ALLEGORY
The Church is indeed married to Christ; but the Bridegroom has been taken away (Mat 9:15); this is beautifully symbolized here by the absence of the Shepherd. The mistreatment of the maiden stands for the persecutions, hatred, and bitterness of the world against the Bride of Christ (His Church). Her being wounded speaks of the martyrdoms of the faithful. The maiden’s crying after her beloved speaks of the fidelity of the Church to the Christ in his absence. We hardly need to be reminded that, “We must with many tribulations enter into the kingdom of God (Act 14:22).”
The function of this dream in the narrative is thus clear enough. It speaks of the absence of the bridegroom, and the certainty of his identity with the Shepherd. Did not Christ say, “I am the Good Shepherd.” Any alleged absence of Solomon here is an absurdity. It is the Good Shepherd who is in heaven where He is absent from the Church, his earthly bride.
Cook mentioned the Jewish understanding of the dream as a symbol of, “Israel’s condition in the Babylonian captivity, when the glories and privileges of Solomon’s Temple were no more.” Some Christian interpreters saw the bride’s sleep as the lethargy and indolence of the Church following the Great Persecutions.” Pope also mentioned a scholar (Gordis) who took the whole passage from Son 5:2 to Son 6:3 as a dream song. That would classify the whole passage as a dream and also ease some of the difficulties of interpretation. “Any absurdity can happen in a dream”! Nevertheless, we go along with Cook on this. He said of verse 8, “The bride wakes up here.
The following somewhat lengthy paragraph reaching through Son 6:3 is interpreted by Jewish writers as, “An allegory of Israel in captivity praising God, `by the waters of Babylon.’ Christian interpreters apply it directly to the Incarnate Son of God.”
Are we as anxious for our Lord to have access to our innermost thoughts and motivations as was the maiden in her marriage? It would be easy to give an easy agreement-but it could mean no more than many superficial marriages mean to those involved. We all have a tremendous capacity for ignoring what we do not like and of avoiding the unpleasant. Since our Lord lives in the same house with us (our bodies) I wonder if He shares this same capacity?
Exegesis Son 5:2-7
We are back in the palace of the king-either at Jerusalem or his residence in the north nearer to Shunem.
It is morning in the chambers of Solomon-the maid from Shunem is recounting to the ladies of the court a vivid dream of the night. It is all so real she almost becomes again a participator as she tells it. I was asleep but I was constantly aware of my beloved from whom I am separated. All at once he was at the gate! I heard his voice-he knocked-He called to me: Open blood of my blood, love of my heart, my alert soft one, my purest one. I have been long in coming to you over many mountains. I have come-all through the night I have hastened to your side-my head is wet with dew. Let me in. I turned on my bed-I hardly knew what was happening. So very foolishly I thought only of myself-I cannot go to him-I have undressed and bathed for bed-I cannot go out in the courtyard to the gate I will soil my feet. I looked toward the door-he had already entered the courtyard and was even now at the door of our house. His hand appeared through the hole near the door and attempted to unlock the door. When I saw his dear hand my heart almost stopped. I hardly knew what I was doing-I jumped out of bed and threw a mantle over myself-I thought I must meet him with perfume-I dipped my hands in myrrh-I hurried to the door, I could not move the lock or hold the handles of the door so full were my fingers with myrrh. When I did at least get the doors open, my beloved was gone! I was beside myself-Perhaps he came in another way-I looked in every room of these courts-he was nowhere to be found. I could yet hear his voice and his dear words of love-I called him, I called him again-there was no answer. I must find him. I will find him. I ran out the open door-across the courtyard and out into the streets of the city. I had no sooner entered the streets than the watchmen were all around me. One of them struck me. It was a heavy blow-I can yet feel the pain. One of the sentinels jerked my veil from me. I do not blame them, I must have appeared as a wanton woman wandering the streets at that hour. Was it only a dream-it was so real-was he really here?
We have chosen this form of narrative to give a degree of the reality that must have been present when it was first told. In our narrative we have tried to include the meaning of the text.
Marriage Son 5:2-7
These verses would make a fine section for an evaluation of the actions of the bride and groom-how did they respond to this circumstance? What does it reveal of their character? In this evaluation we can see ourselves. First we shall consider the groom:
He has come a long way at great danger-He openly gives expression of his heart. He is willing to consider the maid as his sister-i.e., he will treat her in the responsible manner of a brother. At the same time the term sister suggests the strongest blood relationships. He believes the very best of his bride-she is dove-like and pure.-A virgin. Even when she does not answer his call or knock, he will yet try to enter. When he is unsuccessful he leaves. We do not know why he left. We could conjecture but it would be futile. the bride:
Her consciousness and sub consciousness was always upon her love. Even when asleep she was yet with him. This being true, she yet responds subconsciously in a selfish manner. Perhaps we could excuse her on grounds of confusion or frustration. One often acts irrationally upon being suddenly awakened. But why should she care about her appearance?-or her feet?-isnt his presence more important than her comfort? Why the excessive myrrh? We do appreciate her concern-but why so concerned? for her lover or for herself? Perhaps we are too critical of the bride. If we are, please correct our evaluation in a discussion on this subject.
Communion Son 5:2-7
We now take the maidens place as we attempt to relate these verses to our Lord and His bride. Oh, that we were as constantly concerned about the presence of our Lord as was the maid in the text. Even when we sleep He is not out of our sub consciousness. How often do we dream of our Lord? We have heard so often Rev 3:20 misapplied. In the context this verse relates to lukewarm Christians, it reads: To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: . . . Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent. Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will go in and eat with him, and he with me (Rev 3:14; Rev 3:19-20). He loves us and believes in us-we are His blood-relative. We are His brother, His sister-we do have the Holy Dove-by His blood and grace we are virgins-He has, at great danger and from a great distance, come to us. How do we react to His knock?-to His voice? We are about as mixed up as the maid. His call is never convenient-we are forever half asleep or busy with something or someone else. If He had just timed His coming on another day-or night or when I was better prepared-on and on we go-I would get my feet dirty if I answered His knock-we are sure you would! He got His feet dirty coming to call on you and me. But He is insistent-if we will not answer He will attempt to unlock the door-see His nail-pierced hand near the latch of your heart? We will get hurt looking for Him-the watchmen of the world will misunderstand our intentions and will tear aside all attempts of concealment-we will become totally vulnerable! They will wound us deeply! But unlike the dream of the maid-we will find Him-in the dark streets or deep needs of our world we shall find Him.
Son 5:8. All this (Son 5:1-7) Shulamith dreamed; but the painful feeling of repentance, of separation and misapprehension which the dream left behind, entered as deeply into her soul as if it had been an actual external experience. Therefore her words to the daughters of Jerusalem are not out of place. (Delitzsch)
In contrast with the watchmen-at least the daughters of Jerusalem will understand her need. They have had similar experiences. She carries a deep love-sorrow without him all of life is out of focus. I am love-sick.
IV. Experiences Following Betrothal (Son 5:2-16; Son 6:1-13; Son 7:1-9)
1. The Bride (Son 5:2-16; Son 6:1-3).
The Maiden’s Troubled Dream.
(a) The Coming of the Beloved in the Night (Son 5:2-5)
(b) The Door Opened, but the Beloved Vanished (Son 5:6 a).
(c) Her Search (Son 5:6-16; Son 6:1-12).
1. Out in the Streets (6b).
2. The Ill Treatment of the Watchmen (7).
3. Appeal to the Women of Jerusalem (8).
4. Their Answer (9).
5. Her Description of Her Beloved (10-16).
6. Inquiry of the Women (Son 6:1).
7. Her Answer (Son 6:2).
(d) She Awakes (6:3).
14.
I sleep, but my heart waketh
Son 5:2-8
I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night. I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them? My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him. I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers with sweet smelling myrrh, upon the handles of the lock. I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer. The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me. I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved, that ye tell him, that I am sick of love.
What a sad but common story! Here is the church of Christ, his beloved, chosen, and redeemed Bride in her most lamentable condition. She is slothful, negligent, and indifferent. In other places the Bride speaks to Christ, but here she speaks of him, because now he had withdrawn himself.
Oh, yes, he is always with us. He will never leave us, nor forsake us. How we ought to thank God for that blessed fact. His mercy is everlasting! His love is immutable! His grace is indestructible! But he does sometimes, for our souls good, hide himself and appears to have forsaken us altogether. We are, at times, compelled to cry out with David, My God, my God, Why has thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?
When that is the case, when our fellowship and communion with Christ is broken, because of our base ingratitude, neglect, and indifference, the only remedy is that the Lord himself graciously return to us and revive our hearts according to his own sovereign pleasure.
How often we are compelled to speak as the Church speaks in this place, I sleep, but my heart waketh! Sometimes this cold, this deathly indifference steals over only one or two hearts in a congregation. Sometimes it seems to engulf entire assemblies. Sometimes this black plague seems to engulf the whole church of Christ. It is an experience with which I am afraid we are all too familiar. We all know by bitter experience the deep base notes of Newtons hymn
How tedious and tasteless the hours when Jesus no longer I see!
Sweet prospects, sweet birds, and sweet flowers, have all lost their sweetness to me.
The mid-summer sun shines but dim; the fields strive in vain to look gay;
But when I am happy in Him, Decembers as pleasant as May.
His name yields the richest perfume, and sweeter than music His voice;
His presence disperses my gloom, and makes all within me rejoice:
I should, were He always thus nigh, have nothing to wish or to fear;
No mortal so happy as I; my summer would last all the year.
Content with beholding His face, my all to His pleasure resigned,
No changes of season or place would make any change in my mind;
While blest with a sense of His love, a palace a toy would appear;
And prisons would palaces prove, if Jesus would dwell with me there.
Dear Lord, if indeed I am Thine, if Thou art my sun and my song,
Say, why do I languish and pine, and why are my winters so long?
Oh, drive these dark clouds from my sky, thy soul cheering presence restore;
Or take me unto Thee on high, where winter and clouds are no more.
There is within each of us a terrible tendency to become neglectful, indifferent, and lukewarm towards the Lord Jesus Christ. This common, sinful tendency of our nature must be marked, acknowledged and avoided.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love:
Heres my heart, Oh, take and seal it, seal it for Thy courts above.
I sleep.
Here is a very common sin. I sleep. The wise virgins often sleep with the foolish. Far too often this is the bad effect great privileges have upon our sinful hearts. When we indulge ourselves in carnal ease and security, our hearts become cold, neglectful, drowsy, and indifferent. Prayer becomes a burden. Devotion languishes. Worship sinks to nothing more than bodily exercise. Zeal dies.
But my heart waketh!
Here is a hopeful sign. But my heart waketh. It is a hopeful sign that there is grace in the heart when the heart struggles against that horrid, sinful sluggishness to which we are so prone. Ours is not the sleep of death. There is life within, struggling, struggling hard against sin (Rom 7:14-22).It is the voice of my Beloved.
Here is a very loving and tender call. It is the voice of my Beloved. All is not gone. Though my heart sleeps so foolishly, yet Christ is my Beloved. Though my love is so fickle, so shameful, and so unworthy of him, I do love him. And what is more, I still hear his voice and know his voice.
The Lord Jesus Christ tenderly knocks to awaken us to come and open to Him (Rev 3:20). By his Word, by his providence, and by his Spirit, the Son of God knocks at the hearts door of his beloved, because he will not be spurned by the object of his love. He will not leave his own. Neither will he let his own leave him. He has betrothed us unto himself forever (Hos 2:19).
He not only knocks for entrance. Our beloved Redeemer graciously calls us, wooing us to himself by his grace. Whose voice is it? It is the voice of my Beloved that knocketh. Who is he calling? My Sister! My Love! My Dove! My Undefiled! What does he call for? Open to me. Why is he calling? My head is filled with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night the night of his agony in Gethsemane, in the judgment hall, when he was crowned with thorns, piercing his brow.
I have put off my coat!
Here is a most ungrateful excuse. “I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?” (Son 5:3). Because of her carnal ease, she refused the Lords gracious invitation to communion. She did not want to trouble herself, and she did not want to be troubled, not even by him! Her heart was so cold that she preferred her ease to the fellowship of Christ. Let us be honest. We are often so wrapped up in worldly care and carnal ease that we become almost, if not altogether, indifferent to our Lord Jesus Christ!
My Beloved put in his hand!
But our Lord is gracious still. Our Redeemers love cannot be quenched. He is longsuffering, patient, and gracious to his people, even in our most sinful rejection and denial of him. Here is a picture of our Saviors persevering, effectual grace. “My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him” (Son 5:4). It is written, “Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth” (Psa 110:3). How our hearts rejoice to know that Christ will not leave his people to themselves. As the hymn writer put it, He will never, never leave us, nor will let us quite leave Him! His grace is effectual. His grace is persevering. His grace is irresistible. His grace is preserving. Yes, his grace is indestructible! He knocks; but we are so cold, so indifferent, so hard that we would never open to Him.
My Beloved had withdrawn himself!
Here is a sad picture of the loving chastisement our neglect and indifference brings upon us. “I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers with sweet smelling myrrh, upon the handles of the lock. I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer. The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me” (Son 5:5-7; Isa 54:9-10). Thank God for faithful watchmen who will not allow us to hide behind any veil, excusing our indifference and sin, but faithfully expose us to ourselves and point us to Christ for mercy and grace!
If ye find my Beloved
Here is one last hope. “I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved, that ye tell him, that I am sick of love” (Son 5:8). She could not find Christ for herself, so she employed the help and assistance of the Lords people.
Cherish the precious fellowship of Christ. Let nothing rob you of your rich privilege. Do nothing to drive him away (Eph 4:30). But when you have grieved the Spirit of God, when the Lord Jesus hides his face from you, do not despair. It is not because he has ceased to cherish you (1Jn 2:1-2), but because he cherishes you so much that he is determined to make you pine for him. Are you sick of love? Does your soul long for fresh tokens of Christs love to you? When your soul languishes, child of God, when sin robs you of Christs manifest presence and sweet communion, as soon as he calls, open to him. Today, if ye will hear his voice harden not your heart. Go back to the cross. Confess your sinful negligence. Go on seeking him. Trust Him still (2Sa 23:5; Lam 3:18-33).
Return, O Son of God return! Come knock again upon my door.
Dear Savior, my Beloved, return. Possess me and depart no more!
sleep
The bride is satisfied with her washed feet while the Bridegroom, His “head filled with dew,” and His “locks with the drops of night,” is toiling for others. See Luk 6:12; Luk 14:21-23. The state of the bride is not one of sin, but of neglect of service. She is preoccupied with the graces and perfections which she has in Christ through the Spirit; 1Co 12:4-11; Gal 5:22; Gal 5:23. It is mysticism, unbalanced by the activities of the Christian warfare. Her feet are washed, her hands drop with sweet smelling myrrh; but He has gone on, and now she must seek Him (cf. Luk 2:44; Luk 2:45).
sleep: Son 3:1, Son 7:9, Dan 8:18, Zec 4:1, Mat 25:4, Mat 25:5, Mat 26:40, Mat 26:41, Luk 9:32, Eph 5:14
the voice: Son 2:8, Son 2:10, Joh 10:4
knocketh: Rev 3:20
Open: Psa 24:7-10, Psa 81:10, Pro 23:26
my dove: Son 2:14, Son 6:9, Psa 119:1, Rev 3:4, Rev 14:4
my head: Son 8:7, Gen 29:20, Gen 31:40, Gen 31:41, Isa 50:6, Isa 52:14, Isa 53:3-5, Mat 8:17, Mat 25:35-45, Mar 1:35, Luk 6:12, Luk 22:44, 2Co 5:14, 2Co 5:15, Gal 2:20
Reciprocal: Gen 24:16 – known Job 24:8 – wet Psa 63:6 – General Son 1:9 – O my Son 4:9 – my sister Son 5:5 – rose Son 5:6 – my soul Son 6:4 – beautiful Isa 5:1 – wellbeloved Isa 26:9 – have I Dan 10:9 – was I Hag 1:2 – This Mat 12:50 – and sister Mar 3:34 – Behold Mar 13:36 – he find Joh 20:16 – She 1Co 9:5 – a sister
Son 5:2. I sleep I was dull and sluggish; but my heart waketh Yet in my very sleep my thoughts run upon my beloved. It is the voice of my beloved Between sleeping and waking, I heard his voice; that knocketh By his word, and providence, and Spirit, at the door of my heart; saying, Open to me Inviting me to let him into my soul; my sister, my love, &c. This heap of kind compellations signifies Christs fervent affection to his people. My head is filled with dew While I wait without the door, which signifies his sufferings for the churchs good. My locks with the drops of the night The dew which falls in the night.
Son 5:2-7. Another Dream-Poem.It is not certain where the division should be made here, but it is possible to treat these verses as a separate poem and regard Son 5:8 f. as the introduction to the wasf on the bridegroom (Son 5:10 to Son 6:3). The originality of Son 5:7 has been questioned as an expansion of Son 3:3, but it may well be part of a troubled dream. The description is very vivid and beautiful. The voice of the beloved heard at an untimely hour, his plaintive appeal, the delay, natural under the circumstances, the disappointment and adventurous search, the rough usage by the watchmen which brings the crisis; and lo it was a dream with all the excitement of reality.
Son 5:2. Note the piling up of epithets: undefiled, lit, as mg., perfect, my paragon.dew, the heavy night-mist of Palestine.
Son 5:3. coat or tunic, the single undergarment, longer in the case of women than men, worn next the skin; at night it was taken off and the somelah (Exo 22:16) thrown over the body.washed, etc. cf. Luk 7:44.
Son 5:4. hole: probably in the lattice for peeping out rather than one in the door for unfastening the lock.bowels (mg. and AV) is more literal; in OT psychology the heart is the seat of thought and the bowels of intense feeling (Jer 4:19).Spake: in this passage there is a bare possibility that the word may mean turned away, or should the line stand before Son 5:5 a?
Son 5:7. She received the rough treatment due to a suspicious character (2Sa 18:24, Isa 62:6, Psa 127:1).
5:2 {b} I sleep, but my heart waketh: [it is] the voice of my beloved that knocketh, [saying], Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled with dew, [and] my locks with the drops of the {c} night.
(b) The spouse says that she is troubled with the cares of worldly things, which is meant by sleeping.
(c) Declaring the long patience of the Lord toward sinners.
A. The Problem of Apathy 5:2-6:13
Sometime after the wedding, the Shulammite failed to respond encouragingly to Solomon’s demonstration of affection. This led him to withdraw from her. Shortly after that, she realized that a gap had opened up between them. They were no longer as intimate as they had been.
1. Indifference and withdrawal 5:2-8
IV. THE MATURING PROCESS 5:2-8:4
In this last major section of the book, the married love of Solomon and the Shulammite is in view. [Note: Delitzsch, p. 91.] This stage of love is not without its share of problems. However, the king and his bride worked through them, and these chapters provide insight into dealing effectively with basic marriage difficulties.
"Here we are given the beloved’s perspective. Of the 111 lines, 80 in this section are the words of the girl. This is really her book." [Note: Carr, The Song . . ., p. 130.]
Again the woman dreamed (cf. Son 3:1-4). In her dream, her husband came to her-having been outdoors in the evening. His mind appears to have been on making love in view of what follows.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible
Fuente: Discovering Christ In Selected Books of the Bible
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)