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The Song of Solomon – Part 19, The Body Built for the Word: Hair, Teeth, Lips, Neck, and Breasts
[Study Aired November 14, 2026]
The Appointment You Have Been Postponing
You know which tooth it is. You have known for a while.
You have become an expert in the architecture of avoidance. You chew on the other side. You smile with your hand lifted slightly toward your mouth. You tell yourself it stopped hurting, and the most dangerous thing about that sentence is that it is true. Pain stops when the nerve dies. The silence you have been calling healing is the sound of something going dark underneath, and the appointment you keep rescheduling is not postponing the diagnosis. It is only postponing your chance to be the one who walked in.
Israel’s priests were never permitted to do this with a sacrifice. Every offering that came to the altar was examined, outward and inward, before a single flame touched it. Nothing was spared the inspection, and nothing was accepted uninspected.
Now watch what the poet of the Song does. A man examines his Bride, member by member, the way a priest examines an offering: her hair, her teeth, her lips, her temples, her neck, her breasts. Every one of them is declared whole. He does not say this because he failed to look. He says it because of what was done to her before he looked.
Having established the essential understanding of beauty in the previous study, we may now consider how each part of the Bride’s body contributes to its spiritual work. We begin where we left off, with her hair.
Son 4:1…thy locks: thy hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from mount Gilead.
The Statement Made by a Haircut
Notice how people treat their hair. A woman changes it when she changes her life, and everyone who loves her can tell before she says a word. The dramatic cut after the breakup. In Babylonia, the colour that arrives with a significant birthday. A man pays for a haircut and tells the barber almost nothing, and the barber learns everything. Hair is the one part of the body we shape on purpose as a public statement, and the statement is rarely about hair. None of those cuts is a sin. Each is a sentence, and the most common sentence ever spoken in a mirror is, “I belong to myself.”
Scripture reads the same matter differently.
1Co 11:14 Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him?
1Co 11:15 But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given her for a covering.
A woman’s hair signifies glory and covering. Spiritually, it points to the Bride’s submission to her Head, Christ, and to her separation unto Him. It pictures a woman whose glory is found not in independence from her Bridegroom but in belonging wholly to Him.
Now the detail the poet will not let you skip. Her hair is like a flock of goats, and goats are not one colour. Israel’s twelve tribes did not centre on black skin, but branched into ethnicities with highly varied skin tones and, therefore, equally varied hair colour. Black hair was the standard and most common colour among ancient Near Eastern Semites. Paradoxically for a “ruddy” or fair complexion of his father, David, Solomon’s own hair is raven. Raven, H6158, seems to denote time of day more than colour, as even Jacob, with Leah on their estranged arranged wedding night, couldn’t tell she wasn’t Rachel.
Son 5:11 His head is as the most fine gold, his locks are bushy, and black as a raven.
David was singled out as different, and the Hebrew marks the difference.
Ruddy — H132 admoniy: red, ruddy; from H122 adom, red, the root of Adam’s own name.
1Sa 16:12 And he sent, and brought him in. Now he was ruddy, and withal of a beautiful countenance, and goodly to look to. And the LORD said, Arise, anoint him: for this is he.
Gen 25:25 And the first came out red, all over like an hairy garment; and they called his name Esau.
Red hair was notable on a land of dark heads. The Bride’s is more notable still, and the verb tells why: her locks appear. They are instantly noticeable, cascading in tendrils, one behind another, down the slope of a mountain. The strands are unlikely to be one colour. They could be brown with natural red or sun-blonded highlights. It hardly matters, because the point is the cascade: slightly wavy, like a goat’s coat, obviously without the smell.
Teeth Like Washed Sheep
Son 4:2 Thy teeth are like a flock of sheep that are even shorn, which came up from the washing; whereof every one bear twins, and none is barren among them.
Here is what people do with information. A friend says she heard something. A message arrives with a screenshot. A stranger’s review lands on a page. Most of us swallow it whole, and within the hour we have a view of a person we have never examined, built on one witness and a feeling. Rarely does anyone chew.
The mouth has an apparatus built to prevent exactly this, and the poet describes it with a precision no dentist could match. Every tooth is a twin. Each upper tooth meets its partner on the lower jaw, and a tooth without its twin cannot grind. It can only pierce. God requires perfection in His Bride, even as He is perfect, and perfection in the flesh is downright impossible. Nonetheless, He confers it, just as He confers His righteousness on sinners whose hearts are profoundly for Him. And perfection comes with a double witness. If her every tooth is a twin, then what she figuratively and doctrinally eats is chewed by multiple double witnesses: the flock, the Body of Christ, testifying together for Christ’s truth.
Tooth — H8127 shen: tooth, ivory; from H8150 shanan: to point, to sharpen, to pierce; hence to inculcate.
The word for tooth is built from the verb for teaching. The same root commands what a parent does with a child.
Deu 6:7 And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.
To teach diligently is to sharpen the child, to make teeth in the mind. And Scripture legislates the practice of grinding twice, even for the strongest accusation.
1Ti 5:18 For the scripture saith, Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn. And, The labourer is worthy of his reward.
1Ti 5:19 Against an elder receive not an accusation, but before two or three witnesses.
1Ti 5:20 Them that sin rebuke before all, that others also may fear.Num 35:30 Whoso killeth any person, the murderer shall be put to death by the mouth of witnesses: but one witness shall not testify against any person to cause him to die.
Num 35:31 Moreover ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a murderer, which is guilty of death: but he shall be surely put to death.
Even for murder, one witness is not enough. And the Bride is not muzzled while she treads: the ox eats what it labours over. Many mouths set what she chews before her in agreement.
Jn 10:27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
Jn 10:28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.Mat 5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
The Bride’s teeth, indeed every aspect of her bodily members, her breasts included, are impossibly perfect. Spiritually, this means God will not accept anything resembling imperfect flesh into His Kingdom. This is why Israel’s priests inspected each blood sacrifice’s outward and inward organs for imperfection and (spiritual) disease.
Lev 1:2 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, If any man of you bring an offering unto the LORD, ye shall bring your offering of the cattle, even of the herd, and of the flock.
Lev 1:3 If his offering be a burnt sacrifice of the herd, let him offer a male without blemish: he shall offer it of his own voluntary will at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation before the LORD.
Now notice where the sheep have just come from.
Washing — H7364 rachats: to wash, to bathe, to lave.
Lev 1:6 And he shall flay the burnt offering, and cut it into his pieces.
Lev 1:9 But his inwards and his legs shall he wash in water: and the priest shall burn all on the altar, to be a burnt sacrifice, an offering made by fire, of a sweet savour unto the LORD.
The same verb that names the washing of the sheep names the washing of the inwards in the sacrifice. Washing, dividing, and burning: the sequence is the cleansing and judgment by which God prepares His people to become acceptable living sacrifices. The Bride is that offering, signified as burned and melted in the refiner’s fire. Her teeth are perfectly set, white as freshly washed and shorn sheep, each duplicating the other as a double witness of spiritual truth chewed and digested.
Lev 11:3 Whatsoever parteth the hoof, and is clovenfooted, and cheweth the cud, among the beasts, that shall ye eat.
Pro 16:28 A froward man soweth strife: and a whisperer separateth chief friends.
Ask yourself what you have swallowed whole this month: a whisperer’s accusation passed to you on one voice, the verdict you reached about a person on the strength of a single witness—maybe your own voice? And ask, quietly, whether anyone ever ground it against its spiritual twin. If you don’t know, keep chewing clean food.
A Thread of Scarlet
Son 4:3 Thy lips are like a thread of scarlet, and thy speech is comely: thy temples are like a piece of a pomegranate within thy locks.
Everyone has a sentence they wish they could pull back out of the air. Everyone knows the pause before the message is sent, and the other pause—the longer one—after it. And everyone has seen, or been, the person who is charming in public and cutting at home, whose voice drops by a whole register when the audience leaves. The mouth is where the heart gets caught.
Mat 15:11 Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man.
Mat 12:34 O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.
Luk 6:45 A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh.
Heb 13:15 By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name.
Her lips are where her godly speech is emitted. Red lips denote arousal and richness, not the ashen nature of death; to the spiritually unknowing, this is a most unattractive image. The word for thread carries more than decoration.
Thread — H2339 chuwt: thread, cord, line, fillet.
Jer 52:21 And concerning the pillars, the height of one pillar was eighteen cubits; and a fillet of twelve cubits did compass it; and the thickness thereof was four fingers: it was hollow.
The same Hebrew word names the line that compassed the Temple’s pillars, a cord that held them to their measure. In the reading this study follows, that cord measured the equidistant spacing of the twelve pillars, and so her speech is measured against her Lord’s word. Her mouth is held to a line, and the line is His.
Thread does not mean a thin strand, either. Remember whose escape route it was.
Jos 2:15 Then she let them down by a cord through the window: for her house was upon the town wall, and she dwelt upon the wall.
Jos 2:18 Behold, when we come into the land, thou shalt bind this line of scarlet thread in the window which thou didst let us down by: and thou shalt bring thy father, and thy mother, and thy brethren, and all thy father’s household, home unto thee.
Jos 2:19 And it shall be, that whosoever shall go out of the doors of thy house into the street, his blood shall be upon his head, and we will be guiltless: and whosoever shall be with thee in the house, his blood shall be on our head, if any hand be upon him.
If Rahab had dangled a wisp out of her window in the wall of Jericho, Joshua’s men, coming by the Lord’s hand to destroy the city, would never have seen it. Since it had to bear the weight of grown men let down the wall, it was a substantial rope. From a distance, against the vast walls of Jericho, it still looked like a thread, and even a threefold cord is a thread beside a wall. The Bride’s lips are the same: they look slender against the great walls of Babylon, and they are the rope by which her household is let down alive.
Scarlet or red is the colour of corruptible man. To the immense glory and joy of her Husband, its presence on her lips signifies the death of her old man within, in total harmony with Him. And the white of her teeth stands in the same mouth as the red of her lips.
Isa 1:18 Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.
Scarlet made white as wool, and wool washed from the pool: one mouth, both colours, the same Word. When that unity withers, the relationship shrivels.
Joe 1:12 The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men.
The Pomegranate Behind the Veil of Hair
Temples — H7541 raqqah: the temple of the head.
Her lips shape the words, but words are formed in a mind behind the temples, and the mind is unified with her Husband. A comely wife’s presentation results from what happens beneath locks that represent her most profound honour and respect for her Husband as her covering.
1Co 11:13 Judge in yourselves: is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered?
The same word appears only once more in a place you would not expect, in the hands of a woman with a tent peg.
Jdg 4:21 Then Jael Heber’s wife took a nail of the tent, and took an hammer in her hand, and went softly unto him, and smote the nail into his temples, and fastened it into the ground: for he was fast asleep and weary. So he died.
The temple of the head is where the old mind is pinned. In Sisera it was fixed to the ground by a peg from the very tents the wilderness was made of. In the Bride, it is instead covered by locks and ornamented with jewels. Ancient Egyptian and Hebrew writings describe jewelled headpieces, forehead bands, and dangling ornaments worn by Near Eastern women. When rubies and other stones are draped elegantly across the temples, they look like the crescent of a cut pomegranate.
Deu 8:8 A land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil olive, and honey;
The pomegranate is one of the seven fruits of the Promised Land, and its many seeds represent spiritual abundance, fruitfulness, prosperity, God’s generous provision, and the blessings of our inheritance in Christ. It was stitched into the priest’s own robe.
Exo 28:33 And beneath upon the hem of it thou shalt make pomegranates of blue, and of purple, and of scarlet, round about the hem thereof; and bells of gold between them round about:
Exo 28:34 A golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and a pomegranate, upon the hem of the robe round about.
A bell and a fruit, a sound and a seed, alternating all round the hem: speech and fruitfulness, never separated. Anyone who has opened a pomegranate knows its character. You cannot eat it quickly. It stains whoever opens it, and every mouthful is earned. And it holds, ruby upon ruby, more seeds than a hand can count, a picture of the vast cluster of billions of people transformed in the Resurrection to Judgment, the Lake of Fire. The jewels across her temples are the whole harvest of the world, carried in her mind.
The Tower of the Beloved
Son 4:4 Thy neck is like the tower of David builded for an armoury, whereon there hang a thousand bucklers, all shields of mighty men.
Tower — H4026 migdal: tower; from H1431 gadal: to grow up, to be great.
David — H1732 David: beloved; from H1730 dod, the same word the Song uses for “my beloved”.
Buckler — H4043 magen: shield; from H1598 ganan: to defend, to cover.
Read the lexicon before the verse. The tower of David is the tower of the Beloved, the tower that makes great. The bucklers are covers, defences, and this is the word God used when He spoke to a frightened man at the start of the covenant.
Gen 15:1 After these things the word of the LORD came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.
The thousand shields hanging on her neck are the Lord Himself, in His thousand-fold covering. The framework of her beautiful body is built upon her Husband’s foundation. Atop it is her head, the keystone of the arch of her being, holding her every thought and character and governing her every word and action from collapse, and He glories in mirroring the image of the Father in it. Beneath that keystone stands her elegant neck, a symbol of beauty, nobility, and dignity. In Son 7:4, the tower returns, mentioned twice as a double witness to her qualities.
Son 7:4 Thy neck is as a tower of ivory; thine eyes like the fishpools in Heshbon, by the gate of Bathrabbim: thy nose is as the tower of Lebanon which looketh toward Damascus.
Notice what people do with their necks. The chin goes up when we are about to defend ourselves. The muscles knot under the weight of something we are refusing to put down. Scripture names the posture, and it is the harshest portrait the Lord ever paints of a people.
Exo 32:9 And the LORD said unto Moses, I have seen this people, and, behold, it is a stiffnecked people:
Stiff-necked: the one who cannot nod, who has not once in twenty years of marriage said you were right, who would sooner lose the argument’s whole point than lower his head a single inch. The proud neck is rigid. The noble neck is supple, bearing a thousand shields without losing its grace, and it turns toward her Husband as a neck turns toward a voice it loves.
The tower stands in a vineyard, and Isaiah’s song describes what the Lord built.
Isa 5:1 Now will I sing to my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: [First within her, and then her children of the world in the mighty Mountain of God’s Kingdom]
Isa 5:2 And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.
Isa 5:3 And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard.
The tower of Isaiah’s vineyard is God’s protective presence, temple, and leadership, established to keep the nation safe. In Christ’s own telling, the landowner supplied everything needed for success.
Mat 21:33 Hear another parable: There was a certain householder, which planted a vineyard, and hedged it round about, and digged a winepress in it, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and went into a far country:
Old Israel, the Lord’s first wife, is still alive and doing business today in Babylon’s churches. She is betwixt Christ and His Wife’s vineyard: she stands outside the Heavenly Jerusalem of the Bride. She, too, will drink the cup from her Husband’s and the Bride’s vineyard, but only in the Resurrection to Judgment.
Rev 14:18 And another angel came out from the altar, which had power over fire; and cried with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe.
Rev 14:19 And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.
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.
Without the city: the same place. Wine represents blood and the death of the old man within.
The thousand bucklers are ornaments, and they are armour. Women in royal courts wore heavy, ornate necklaces and collars that highlighted their poise, strength, and royal standing. All of it signifies her spiritual strength and integrity, and the honour and unity of her King and Husband’s authority. For the Elect, they protect the Body from false doctrine that could flow in and damage a righteous understanding of the Word. An armoury is where weapons of war are stored, and it marks the Bride’s impervious resistance to returning to her sisters’ former self-serving seductions.
Eph 6:10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
Eph 6:11 Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
Eph 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
Eph 6:13 Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.
Eph 6:14 Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness;
Eph 6:15 And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace;
Eph 6:16 Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.
Eph 6:17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God:
And the covering ends the matter, because contention has no place in this house.
1Co 11:16 But if any man seem to be contentious, we have no such custom, neither the churches of God.
Twin Fawns Among the Lilies
The beauty described so far, emanating from her eyes, hair, and lips, points distinctly to the protection of her heart beneath her breasts. That power she abides by is not hers. It is her Lord’s spirit, a double witness in two perfectly formed virginal breasts.
Son 4:5 Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins, which feed among the lilies.
Roe — H6643 tsebiy: gazelle; also beauty, splendour, glory; from a root meaning to be prominent.
Twins — H8380 te’owm: twin.
Both words are worth holding. The Hebrew name of the gazelle is the Hebrew word for glory. The King James translators in 1611 used roe, because the small European deer was the graceful wild animal most familiar to British readers, and later translations correctly render it gazelle. Specifically, the Dorcas gazelle and the mountain gazelle: small, slender antelopes of the hills and deserts of Israel, standing about two feet at the shoulder, sandy-brown with a white underside, with ringed, lyre-shaped horns.
One feature of the gazelle explains more of the verse than any commentary. Unlike deer, which shed their antlers every year, gazelles are true antelopes with permanent, hollow horns. A horn is not shed. The Bride’s strength is not seasonal. It is the indefectibility this series has traced since the previous study, an animal incapable of becoming otherwise.
The Greek New Testament uses the same animal for a woman’s name.
Act 9:36 Now there was at Joppa a certain disciple named Tabitha, which by interpretation is called Dorcas: this woman was full of good works and almsdeeds which she did.
Dorcas — G1393 Dorkas: gazelle.
Tabitha is the Aramaic for gazelle, and Dorcas the Greek. A disciple named for the animal, named for glory.
The portrait is of a young, mature Bride who has never nursed a child: shapely, uniform breasts, virginally discovered in marriage, like the breath-taking discovery of a pair of young fawns. This series has noted that the Hebrew word for breast shares a root with ruin, and what ruined Old Israel is on record.
Eze 23:3 And they committed whoredoms in Egypt; they committed whoredoms in their youth: there were their breasts pressed, and there they bruised the teats of their virginity.
Pressed, bruised: Aholah and Aholibah. Here, the same members are fawns at pasture. And what protects a fawn is alertness. Watch anyone who has been badly hurt walk into a new room. The scan of the exits, the half-second before the smile. We call it damage. It can also be wisdom, the posture of a small, fast animal that has learned its only effective defence is to flee both physical and spiritual corruption before it reaches her. This verse protects the heart beneath. Whatever a person’s biography, the heart—the seat of passion—is what is being guarded.
Two defences appear in this one chapter. The armoury is for standing. The gazelle is for running. Scripture knows both.
1Co 6:16 What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh.
1Co 6:17 But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.
1Co 6:18 Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.
1Co 6:19 What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?
1Co 6:20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.
A pitete gazelle fawn, as are the Bride’s breasts, are hidden by the seemingly towering lilies. Stand where the Word has armed you, and flee where it has not. Feeding among the lilies is her safety, and the lilies are the ones this Song has already named.
Son 2:1 I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys.
Son 2:2 As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters.
Feeding among the lilies pictures Christ nourishing and working within His people. The lilies represent Christ in us, and the feeding is the spiritual life and growth that come from Him. A husband phenomenally delights in his wife’s unified spirit, lying beneath her breasts and reserved only for him.
Closing: The Appointment You Keep Cancelling
Return to the chair, because this study has been leading you back to it.
There is an inspection you have been postponing, and you know the tooth. It is the Word held against some part of you that you have decided not to examine. You have learned to chew on the other side. You have learned to smile with your hand a little raised. And like all avoidance, it has been working: it no longer hurts. Be clear about what that means. Conscience, left unexamined long enough, goes quiet the same way a nerve does.
Three examinations are scheduled, and you know which one you have been cancelling.
The first is the teeth: what you have swallowed. Name the last accusation you passed on, or believed, or built a view on, from a single voice. A text. A story. A look you interpreted. You gave a person a verdict and never ground it against its twin. That is the quiet habit of a certain man, and the habit of a sure woman, and it has cost somebody a reputation they never knew was on trial.
Pro 17:9 He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; but he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.
The second is the lips: what comes out. Think of the voice you use on a stranger on the telephone, and the one you use on the person you love at the end of the day. Which is the true one? A tongue measured against nothing is measured against your mood, and your mood decides your marriage, your children’s memory of you, and your own opinion of your faith.
The third is the neck: where you refuse to bow. Name the person to whom you have not, in years, said you were right. The chin has been up for so long it no longer feels like a decision.
Nothing here is a verdict on your worth. It is a verdict on a habit, and habits can be broken in the specific, concrete way that repentance always breaks them: by doing differently, starting this week. Do not repeat an accusation until it has a second witness, Christ’s spirit first within. Before you send the next message, hold it against His word, and send it only if it would survive being read aloud to Him. Go to the one person and say it: you were right, and I was slow to say so. Confess to Christ, in so many words, the specific verdict you passed unexamined, and repair what Christ gives you to repair.
Because the inspection does not go away. Every sacrifice was washed before it was burned. The Bride is the one who walked into the examination, and so she is the one who comes out white as wool and red as the colour she has agreed to die. The offering that declines the appointment is not excused from it. It only forfeits the washing, and the same hands, the same knife, and the same fire arrive in their own time.
You may stay in the waiting room until the nerve is quite dead, or you may walk in while it can still feel the light.
End of Part 19
Next: Son 4:6-7