The Song of Songs (Canticles)

On the Song of Songs: Part 1, the Allegory (Yahweh and Israel)

Here we are going to endeavor a commentary on the Song of Songs, which is also sometimes, and erroneously, referred to as the Book of Canticles. The work is attributed to King Solomon, and we have good reason to accept the attribution. Hopefully our effort shall correct at least some misgivings concerning the Song, as we shall call it here. Before we begin, we shall examine what early Christian writers thought of the Song, as we were also encouraged to do when we examined more modern references, namely the article discussing the Song found at Wikipedia.

Not every old adage is true. There is a popular saying, or at least it was popular in generations past, that warns us to “never look a gift horse in the mouth.” The common interpretation of the adage is correct, as it is saying that one should not criticize a gift. But even Solomon warned, in Proverbs chapter 19, that “6 Many will intreat the favour of the prince: and every man is a friend to him that giveth gifts.” In other words, the favor of a prince can be bought with gifts, which is bribery. So Solomon wrote later, in Proverbs chapter 29, that “4 The king by judgment establisheth the land: but he that receiveth gifts overthroweth it.” So a king who accepts such bribes may ultimately bring his own kingdom to ruin.

This is the problem with Wikipedia: access is free, so essentially, it is a gift to all who use it. But it is free because nobody is truly responsible for it, since its editors are mostly anonymous volunteers, and practically anyone can become an editor. Yet millions of people turn to it daily, and imagine it to be some fount of knowledge.

On the Song of Songs: Part 2, the Metaphor (Sex in the Garden)

In our opening commentary on the Song of Songs of Solomon, titled The Allegory, we made the assertion that the poem itself is an allegory which represents the love which Yahweh God has for the children of Israel as a nation, His bride, and which the bride is portrayed as having for her husband, which is Yahweh her God. We shall see further evidence of that allegory as the poem commences. However in spite of that underlying meaning, the work is also a love poem between an actual husband and wife, Solomon and his bride, and its metaphors represent their love and desire for one another as well as their describing acts of love-making. So here we shall assert that the metaphors employed in the description of those acts shall also give us greater insight into the meanings of similar metaphors and allegories which are found in other portions of the Biblical literature.

Up to this point, the dialogue between the husband and the bride grows in intensity as it progresses from its beginning in verse 7 of chapter 1. After the husband begins to extol the beauty of the bride, she in turn describes him as sitting at his table, as the King James Version has it, as her own bodily scent fills the air and she confesses that his odor is appealing to her. Then she exclaims that “he shall lie all night betwixt my breasts”, whereupon we should realize that the table is a metaphor, and not a literal table, and she compares her lover to something which can burn intensely, which is camphire or asphalt, in the vineyards, a place where one may not expect to find camphire. So then she once again declares her lover’s appeal and begins to speak of their bed and its surroundings before she describes herself with flowery metaphors.

On the Song of Songs: Part 3, the Conclusion (Two Seedline is Biblical Truth)

Throughout the last few chapters of this Song of Songs, we have seen several allegories which describe sexual activity between lovers as the eating of fruit from trees, and also from a garden. In Song chapter 2, the bride described her husband as an apple tree and professed eating of his fruit, where it was explicit that the couple had been in the act of embracing one another in a bed, the husband having fallen asleep. Then, in a subsequent encounter in Song chapter 4, the husband described the bride as his garden, he described the wonder of her fruits, and the bride explicitly invited him to eat of them. Here, at the beginning of Song chapter 5, that encounter is not yet finished.

With that, we made assertions that the identification of these similes and metaphors as euphemisms for romantic sexual activity is irrefutable. Therefore, further comparing the similar metaphors which are found in the Epic of Gilgamesh, a work which is approximately contemporary to the time of Abraham and which was still known to Judaeans at the time of Christ, and which also explicitly employs such metaphors in reference to sexual activity, and then also comparing the account of the temptation in Genesis chapter 3, it clearly becomes manifest that Genesis chapter 3 is describing an illicit act of sex in the garden of Eden as having been the cause of the fall of man. So we may conclude that here in this romantic and even erotic love poem, the wisdom of Solomon gives us the understanding by which we may honestly interpret the otherwise enigmatic allegories of trees and fruit in Genesis chapter 3, as Solomon had also done in different ways in his other writings, in Wisdom and in Proverbs. There has long been debate in Christian Identity circles over the language and allegories of Genesis chapter 3, and in the Song of Songs, the debate is settled.

On the Song of Songs: Part 4, the Consequences (White is Beautiful, and White is Godly)

We titled our presentation of chapters 5 and 6 of the Song of Songs as The Conclusion, adding the assertion in the parenthetical subtitle that Two Seedline is Biblical Truth. The statement may be puzzling to some who may not be fully acquainted with all of the ideological differences among Identity Christians, but it is meant to indicate that the Song supports, and even corroborates, our interpretations of the idioms of Genesis chapter 3, which we have often explained portrays an account of sexual seduction and resulting fornication. However while that is one conclusion we made from our study of the text of the Song it is not the conclusion of the Song itself. Now, as we do present the final two chapters of the Song, we will see even further corroboration for the veracity of our interpretation.

Throughout our presentation of the Song, we were also able to make conclusions which are important to a proper understanding of Biblical anthropology, that the subjects of the Song must have been of the White or Caucasian race. We will also see further evidence of that here in chapter 7. Properly, only White people can be described as being ruddy, or as having skin like ivory, or legs like pillars of marble, as we saw in the Bride’s description of the Husband in Song chapter 5 in reference to his belly and his legs. These same descriptions also further reinforce the assertion that the Song contains allegories describing sexual relations, where the Husband speaks of eating fruit from a garden, the garden being the Bride herself, or where the Bride celebrated the eating of fruit from an apple tree, which in turn was a reference to the Husband. That is evident where in the the physical descriptions the lovers are portrayed as comparing parts of one another’s nude bodies to those various natural elements, such as ivory or marble.

On the Song of Songs: Part 5, Reflections (Solomon as Prophet)

This evening I am going to do something different. Having completed our presentation of the Song of Songs, there are still further observations which we can make, and which we should make, regarding the Song in general, and especially the impact of its interpretation on various other Scriptures from Genesis through the New Testament. While we have explained or alluded to some of these aspects of the Song throughout our commentary, it may be useful to have them all in summary, and also so that we may expand on some of them to a much greater degree, further probing the depths of their meanings.

The wisdom of Solomon is evidently far greater than many men may even have the ability to perceive. The Song of Songs is not a mere love song, although it is often dismissed as such. Both Jews and Churches have offered allegorical explanations of the Song which suit themsleves, and they all fail. In opposition to them all, but similarly to the claims of some, we would assert that the Song is an allegory representing the love which Yahweh God has for the children of Israel, and the love which the children of Israel, both individually and collectively, should have for Yahweh their God, as they are His Bride, and He Himself has promised to betroth them both once again and forever. I refer primarily to Hosea chapter 2: “19 And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in mercies. 20 I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know the LORD.” That promise being made to Israel in the Assyrian captivities, the betrothal is certainly fulfilled in Christ. So at the same time, the Song offers some prophecy concerning Christ, which only Christians, and not Jews, can even begin to understand.