Song of Solomon 5:10-16 – Part 10, The Bride Praises Her Beloved
Song of Solomon 5:10-16 – Part 10, The Bride Praises Her Beloved
2Sa 1:26 “… thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.
[Study Aired January 14, 2023]
While not claiming to have been inspired to tease out every spiritual understanding in the Song of Solomon, chapter 5, I hesitate to say, and for the most part of the entire book, doesn’t appear to present startlingly new revelations. As I’ve insinuated in its previous studies, the Shulamite frequently speaks in the third person from the standpoint of her assured election above her sisters of physical Jerusalem. From her humble God-given eminence, she often “charges” them with moral (spiritual) cautions. Her sisters in Jerusalem today are Egypt, Sodom and Babylon, and are not yet alerted to the shocking difference between them and her. Her passionate praises for her beloved in the verses to be studied (Son 5:10-16) are only spiritually understood by her and her Husband.
All stops are out, and nobody more enthusiastically believes every word than the Shulamite as she adventurously praises her Lord.
So, we continue with Shulamite’s “primary theme” of “protracted” and enthusiastic anticipation for her wedding since (Lord willing) every joint hearing this study is Her.
Son 5:10 My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand.
Son 5:11 His head is as the most fine gold, his locks are bushy, and black as a raven.
Son 5:12 His eyes are as the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, washed with milk, and fitly set.
Son 5:13 His cheeks are as a bed of spices, as sweet flowers: his lips like lilies, dropping sweet smelling myrrh.
Son 5:14 His hands are as gold rings set with the beryl: his belly is as bright ivory overlaid with sapphires.
Son 5:15 His legs are as pillars of marble, set upon sockets of fine gold: his countenance is as Lebanon, excellent as the cedars.
Son 5:16 His mouth is most sweet: yea, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem.
Since most of those reading this series of the Song of Solomon are hopefully the Bride, there is no room to edge towards dreariness for understanding the many familiar spiritual meanings of repetitive shadows.
Son 5:10 My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand.
Christ is the Bride’s beloved and is the chiefest God above all gods who will spiritually put the entirety (10 x 1,000) of fleshy humanity to death. White is Christ’s righteousness given to the Saints who have come out of the ruddiness of the earth they represent, particularly the ruddiness of blood from overcoming their sins as the first fruits. To the rest of humanity, there will be an unexpected glorious ending from their gnawing of tongues for mental pain at the conclusion of the Eighth Day.
Isa 46:9 Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me,
Isa 46:10 Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:
The Elect of God is learning to happily take the sword to condemn sin in their ruddy earth in this age and the rest of humanity in the age to come. Peter had yet to learn to take his sword to himself before judging those whose time was not for judgment.
Mat 26:52 Then said Jesus unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.
Rev 19:7 Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready.
Rev 19:8 And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.
For the resurrection to judgment, the (white) Elect of God under Christ will cause the main harvest of souls to be “ruddy” by the sword of His word.
Rev 14:20 And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs.
What delights the Bride and her Lord are the hidden things of God, where even she, the spiritually rich, sometimes has oversight for spiritual discernment and is overjoyed for correction. In them there is no deceit to hide the truth nor bitterness for correction as they happily die daily for life eternal.
The number 10 (10,000) also represents the fullness of the Shulamite’s sisters of Old Jerusalem, whom she frequently conjures up to respond in the third person to her dreaming. She is overwhelmed with joy for her inheritance which she knows they vaguely see. Her sisters are unwittingly powerless, like the rich man to Lazarus, to bridge the massive chasm between those in the first resurrection and the resurrection to judgment ~ after all, they are in Solomon’s court of 1,000 wives and consider themselves, as does Babylonian Christianity, to be the Lord’s chosen.
1Pe 4:17 For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, [the Bride] what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?
Of course, the Bride painfully knows, as did Joseph to his ten brothers, the ultimate outcome for all of Israel and her Camp without. After all, she is of the ten, yet is the eleventh symbolically hired at the eleventh hour and is instrumental in the ruin and disintegration of their flesh and their yet-to-be-realised infamy and shock of being the man of perdition as she once was. (Man! Talk about the “hidden things of Christ”! If a person is not given to see, he won’t see, period!)
Son 5:11 His head is as the most fine gold, his locks are bushy, and black as a raven.
Most of us quickly correlate our Lord’s headship with the shadow imagery of Nebuchadnezzar’s image in Daniel’s dream.
Dan 2:31 Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible.
Dan 2:32 This image’s head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass,
Dan 2:33 His legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay.
Dan 2:34 Thou sawest till that a stone [Christ, the twelfth of the numbers above] was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces.
Dan 2:35 Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.
Of course, just as Christ is, so are we during our transition to being recreated. Negatively, in our self-righteousness, we think we have a head of fine gold, not realising that we are a terrible beast with iron teeth that gnashes God’s word and the laity to pieces. (Dan 7:1-8)
As discussed in a previous Song of Solomon study, a man who is white with an ivory-coloured belly, a ruddy complexion with black curly locks would be startlingly unusual indeed. “Bushy” locks seem incongruous, though not necessarily long, to the apparent Roman coiffuring (Phonetic – quof-fur) of the day and to our culture, quite unruly, yet possibly typical since barbers, at least to commoners outside of the King’s court, wouldn’t have been easily accessed.
With those above poetic credentials, and since the Shulamite is most certainly not thinking of having a glass of wine with roast lamb and retiring alone to her room, the possibly least coiffured “curly” part of her Husband’s anatomy leaves only the witless in wonderment. Yet, to the spiritually shrewd, the entire imagery focuses on her lover’s head, just as Christ (number 12) is the head of the Bride.
Her husband’s bushy locks are described as “black as a raven”, which I expect is innocent poetry with possibly no connection to unclean birds. Spiritual contortions could justify its symbolism as Christ’s dead flesh and the blackness of death before he was glorified with white hair.
In his vision while on the Isle of Patmos, John speaks of Christ. The following verses lead in perfectly for the rest of chapter five as the Bride continues to focus on her husband in the “natural”.
1Co 15:46 Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual.
Rev 1:12 And I turned to see the voice that spake with me. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks [the Bride];
Rev 1:13 And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle.
Rev 1:14 His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire;
Son 5:12 His eyes are as the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, washed with milk, and fitly set.
The Lord is the master of detail to perfectly create deep emotions in people. Not all dove’s and pigeon’s eyes are dove or doe-like for their depth of softness since some have fleshy knobs surrounding their eyes and nose. I once accidentally came in very close range with an Australian female Bronzewing Pigeon sitting on eggs, and I don’t know if brooding temporarily changed her looks, as does happen in the bird and animal kingdoms; however, my breath was taken by this dove’s tender ‘liquid’ eyes. She was the poetic epitome of human femininity. A girl’s eyes with those qualities instantly make a man’s heart skip a beat to foolishly fall in love.
Since the woman was taken from man, Christ is the aggregate of the two, with gentle, peaceful eyes that only have pure thoughts toward his Bride ~ and the rest of humanity. Pure snow-fed streams cascade ‘milk’ as He looks arousingly with animated eyes upon his Bride.
Son 4:9 Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse; thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine eyes, with one chain of thy neck.
A king and priest ruling with Christ are to be perfect in the body, representing the Lord’s spirit. Conversely, a harlot has dull, dove eyes of deceit, coolly calculating her next move that doesn’t cascade white as milk with anticipation. Her doltish eyes are blemished and symbolically not “fitly set”. Some of the credentials for a priest in the temple are…
Lev 21:20 Or crookbackt, or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken;
Son 5:13 His cheeks are as a bed of spices, as sweet flowers: his lips like lilies, dropping sweet smelling myrrh.
The cheeks of a priest are the outer structure of the jawbone; in Moses’ time, a sacrifice’s cheeks were the priest’s portion. The Bride is honoured to receive her Lord’s cheeks which are instrumental in her arousal.
Deu 18:3 And this shall be the priest’s due from the people, from them that offer a sacrifice, whether it be ox or sheep; and they shall give unto the priest the shoulder, and the two cheeks, and the maw [belly].
The hair of Christ’s beard being violently torn from his face would have made his cheeks “ruddy” with blood, symbolic of His countenance being more marred than any man’s, and thus by his Bride seeing His torture, connecting them with spices and sweet as flowers.
Isa 50:6 I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting.
“Lips like lilies” doesn’t require much imagination for its puckered imagery for her to receive the sweetness of his word.
Son 5:14 His hands are as gold rings set with the beryl: his belly is as bright ivory overlaid with sapphires.
Every part of our physical body represents a wealth of spiritual correlations, with the work of our hands mirroring the mind of our Lord and husband, the King of Kings. Beryl is a crystal coming in many beautiful and mesmerising colours. It is easy to see in the accompanying link the colour of cut beryl is reminiscent of polished brass (a mixture of copper and zinc).
https://www.gemselect.com/graphics/beryl-large_info.jpg
Beryl is one of the precious stones set in the Mosaic priest’s garments that collectively point to Christ.
Speaking of Daniel’s vision representing God:
Dan 10:6 His body also was like the beryl, and his face as the appearance of lightning, and his eyes as lamps of fire, and his arms and his feet like in colour to polished brass, and the voice of his words like the voice of a multitude.
Her Lord’s belly is as bright ivory overlaid with sapphires. The Bride’s imagination is unashamedly earthy. Possibly her Lord’s belly is ‘ripped’ (highly toned), with veins of sapphire blue adding to his outstanding masculine elegance.
Son 5:15 His legs are as pillars of marble, set upon sockets of fine gold: his countenance is as Lebanon, excellent as the cedars.
As we are familiar, every one of the Bride’s depictions of her Lord’s body in the flesh is the Temple from Moses’ time to Solomon and represents Christ. The cedars of Lebanon prominently featured in Solomon’s temple, as did sockets of gold in both Moses’ and Solomon’s temples. Its overall beauty was the talk of the known world of the time as will Christ and His word in the ages to come.
Son 5:16 His mouth is most sweet: yea, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem.
It requires a little private musing, yet, there is something beautiful in the simplicity of being on the receiving end of another person referring to us as his “friend”. Liking another spoken from the heart is loving him, and the Bride voraciously saying in verse 16 that her man is “most sweet” and “altogether lovely” says that she likes him, and is a love expression. Saying to another person that you “like” them somehow seems more personal; authentically impactful than “I love you”.
Joh 15:12 This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.
Joh 15:13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
Joh 15:14 Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you.
Joh 15:15 Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.
Joh 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.
Joh 15:17 These things I command you, that ye love one another.
One of the primary reasons this Woman is chosen to be the Bride is because she is given to bring forth much fruit. She regularly, often in tears, asks to be included in the hope of the first resurrection.
There is neither male nor female in the Kingdom of God, and the Shulamite, from her heart, can say that her Lord’s love (his wine) is better than an earthly husband could ever have for a most outstanding wife. Her sisters in Jerusalem were always clothed in scarlet by the sword, never leaving the house of David, and so was she, spiritually, slain in high places.
2Sa 1:24 Ye daughters of Israel, weep over Saul, who clothed you in scarlet, with other delights, who put on ornaments of gold upon your apparel.
2Sa 1:25 How are the mighty fallen in the midst of the battle! O Jonathan, thou wast slain in thine high places.
2Sa 1:26 I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan: very pleasant hast thou been unto me: thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.
Our Lord to us, and we to our Lord in spirit, surpasses the shadowed love of the Shulamite, fulfilling the last part of 2 Samuel 1:26.
Other related posts
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- The Song of Solomon - Introduction (October 8, 2022)
- The Husband is The Head of The Wife (June 15, 2020)
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- A Mystery Hidden from the Ages and Generations: How Not to be Bitter against One’s Wife and How not to Make a Husband Bitter – Part 4 (August 5, 2023)
- A Mystery Hidden from the Ages and Generations: How Not to Be Bitter Against One’s Wife and How not to Make a Husband Bitter - Part 2 (July 22, 2023)