Franz Delitzsch

“ Now begins the discourse. The exordium summons general attention to it with the emphasis of its absolute truth: 4 “To you, ye men, is my discourse addressed, And my call is to the children of men! 5 Apprehend, O ye simple ones, what wisdom is; And, ye fools what understanding is. 6 Hear, for I will speak princely things, And the opening of my lips is upright. 7 For my mouth uttereth truth, And a wicked thing is an abomination to my lips. 8 The utterances of my mouth are in rectitude, There is nothing crooked or perverse in them. ”

“ Her words and her silence, her doing and suffering, her enjoyment and self-denial, her conduct as betrothed, as a bride, and as a wife, her behaviour towards her mother, her younger sister, and her brothers, - all this gives the impression of a beautiful soul in a body formed as it were from the dust of flowers. Solomon raises this child to the rank of queen, and becomes beside this queen as a child. The simple one teaches the wise man simplicity; the humble draws the king down to her level; the pure accustoms the impetuous to self-restraint. ”

“ And there is no more charming and majestic sight than the palm of the oasis, this prince among the trees of the plain, with its proudly raised diadem of leaves, its attitude peering forth into the distance and gazing full into the face of the sun, its perennial verdure, and its vital force, which constantly renews itself from the root - a picture of life in the midst of the world of death. ”

“ Or He who formed the eye, ought He not to see ? 10 He who chastiseth the nations, ought He not to reprove, He who teacheth men knowledge ? 11 Jahve knoweth the thoughts of men That they are vanity. 12 Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, Jah, And teachest out of Thy Law ; 13 To give him rest from the days of adversity, Until the pit be digged for the evil-doer. 14 For Jahve doth not thrust away His people, And He doth not forsake His inheritance. 15 But right must turn unto righteousness, And all the upright in heart shall follow it. ”

“ That which attached her to him is not her personal beauty alone, but her beauty animated and heightened by nobility of soul. She is a pattern of simple devotedness, naive simplicity, unaffected modesty, moral purity, and frank prudence, - a lily of the field, more beautifully adorned than he could claim to be in all his glory. We cannot understand the Song of Songs unless we perceive that it presents before us not only Shulamith's external attractions, but also all the virtues which make her the idea of all that is gentlest and noblest in woman. ”

“ That the intercourse of the sexes out of the married relationship is the commencement of the ruin of a fool is now proved. 21 For the ways of every one are before the eyes of Jahve, And all his paths He marketh out. 22 His own sins lay hold of him, the evil-doer, And in the bands of his sins is he held fast. 23 He dies for the want of correction, And in the fulness of his folly he staggers to ruin. ”

“ Right and righteousness hast Thou executed in Jacob. 5 Exalt ye Jahve our God, And prostrate yourselves at His footstool — Holy is He. 6 Moses and Aaron among His priests, And Samuel among those who call upon His name — They called unto Jahve and He answered them ; 1 In a pillar of cloud He spoke to them ; They kept His testimonies, And the law which He gave them. 8 Jahve our God, Thou hast answered them ; A forgiving God wast Thou unto them, And one taking vengeance of their deeds. 9 Exalt ye Jahve our God, And prostrate yourselves at His holy mountain, For holy is Jahve our God. ”

“ Solomon was in truth a righteous, benign, God-fearing ruler; he established and also extended the kingdom; he ruled over innumerable people, exalted in wisdom and riches above all the kings of the earth; his time was the most happy, the richest in peace and joy that Israel has ever known. The words of the Psalm were all fulfilled in him, even to the one point of the universal dominion that is wished for him. But the end of his reign was not like the beginning and the middle of it. ”

“ Go with us, we will lurk for blood, Lie in wait for the innocent without cause; 12 Like the pit we will swallow them alive And in perfect soundness like them that go down to the grave. 13 We find all manner of precious treasure, Fill our houses with spoil. ”

“ Let not his device prosper, that they may not be lifted up. (Sela.) 10 The head of those who compass me about — let the trouble of their lips cover them ! 11 Let burning coals be cast down upon them, let them be cast into the fire, Into abysses out of which they may never rise up ! 12 Let not the man of the tongue be established on the earth, The man of violence — let wickedness hunt him in violent haste ! 13 I know that Jahve will carry through the cause of the afflicted, The right of the poor. ”

“ Solomon praises only the personal beauty of the woman; the shepherd, the sweet voice, the enchanting look, the warm love, the incorruptible chastity of his beloved; - in short, the former reveals the eye and the sensuousness of the king; the latter, the heart of a man who is animated by the divine flame of true love.” We only ask, meanwhile, whether words such as Sol 4:13 are less sensuous than Sol 4:5, and whether the image of the twin gazelles is not more suitable in the mouth of the shepherd than the comparison of the attractions of Shulamith with the exotic plants of Solomon's garden? ”

“ As in Sol 4:9 the same power of impression is attributed to the eyes and to the necklace, so here is intermingled praise of the beauty of her person with praise of the fragrance, the odour of the clothing of the bride; for her soul speaks out not only by her lips, she breathes forth odours also for him in her spices, which he deems more fragrant than all other odours, because he inhales, as it were, her soul along with them. ”

“ Up to Him the poet raises his eyes, and to Him the church, together with which he may call Him “Jahve our God,” just as the eyes of servants are directed towards the hand of their lord, the eyes of a maid towards the hand of her mistress; for this hand regulates the whole house, and they wait upon their winks and signs with most eager attention. Those of Israel are Jahve's servants, Israel the church is Jahve's maid. In His hand lies its future. At length He will take compassion on His own. ”

“ The city with its noisy display does not please her; and she knows, indeed, that her beloved is a king, but she thinks of him as a shepherd. Therefore she praises the fresh green of their future homestead; cedar tops will form the roof of the house in which they dwell, and cypresses its wainscot. ”

“ But who can the poet express the purpose of praising God's Name for ever? Because the praise of God is a need of his inmost nature, he has a perfect right to forget his own mortality when engaged upon this devotion to the ever-living King. Clinging adoringly to the Eternal One, he must seem to himself to be eternal; and if there is a practical proof for a life after death, it is just this ardent desire of the soul, wrought of God Himself, after the praise of the God of its life (lit., its origin) which affords it the highest, noblest delight. ”

“ It knows that its experiences have a central and universal significance for the whole life of creation; that the loving-kindness which has fallen to its lot is worthy to excite joy among all beings in heaven and on earth. And it calls not only upon everything in heaven and on earth that stands in fellowship of thought, of word, and of freedom with it to praise God, but also the sun, moon, and stars, water, earth, fire, and air, mountains, trees, and beasts, yea even such natural phenomena as hail, snow, and mist. ”

“ If cold and heat, coolness and sultriness, interchange at the proper time, then growth is promoted. And if the wind blow through a garden at one time from this direction and at another from that, - not so violently as when it shakes the trees of the forest, but softly and yet as powerfully as a garden can bear it, - then all the fragrance of the garden rises in waves, and it becomes like a sea of incense. ”

“ But for that reason the meaning of the poet cannot be that given by Elster: “he who exercises benevolence toward others creates within himself a determination which penetrates his whole being with generous and fruitful warmth, as on the other hand the feeling of hatred deprives the heart of him who cherishes it of the true fountain of life.” ”

“ His style is like the view he takes of the world, which in its course turned to him only its dark side. He holds fast to the fear of God, and hopes in a final judgment; but his sceptical world-sorrow remains unmitigated, and his forced eudaemonism remains without the right consecration: these two stars do not turn the night into day; the significance of the book, with reference to the history of redemption, consists in the actual proof that humanity, in order to its being set free from its unhappiness, needs to be illuminated by the sun of a new revelation. ”

“ The figure of the poet is therefore as true to nature as it is beautiful. When brethren bound together in love also meet together in one place, and in fact when brethren out of the north unite with brethren in the south in Jerusalem, the city which is the mother of all, at the great Feasts, it is as when the dew of Mount Hermon, which is covered with deep, almost eternal snow, [21] descends upon the bare, unfruitful - and therefore longing for such quickening - mountains round about Zion. In Jerusalem must love and all that is good meet. ”

“ The future is dark to him, but lighted up by the one hope that the end of his earthly existence will be a glorious solution of the riddle. Here, as elsewhere, it is faith which breaks through not only the darkness of this present life, but also the night of Hades. At that time there was as yet no divine utterance concerning any heavenly triumph of the church, militant in the present world, but to faith the Jahve-Name had already a transparent depth which penetrated beyond Hades into an eternal life. The heaven of blessedness and glory also is nothing without God ”

“ Yet we confine ourselves to the nearest sense, in which Solomon relates a self-experience. Shulamith, the lightly esteemed, cannot boast that she is so ruddy and fair of countenance as they who have just sung how pleasant it is to be beloved by this king; but yet she is not so devoid of beauty as not to venture to love and hope to be loved: “Black am I, yet comely.” ”

“ But it cannot become a rule of morals not to accept of counsel that we may not go astray; on the contrary, it is and remains a rule of morals: not stubbornly to follow one's own heart (head) , and not obstinately to carry out one's own will, and not in the darkness of wisdom to regard one's own plans as unimproveable, and not needing to be examined; but to listen to the counsel of intelligent and honest friends, and, especially where weighty matters are in hand, not affecting one's own person, but the common good, not to listen merely to one counsellor, but to many. ”

“ For when it is said of generous wine, that it makes the lips of sleepers move, a movement is meant expressing itself in the sleeper speaking. But generous wine is a figure of the love-responses of the beloved, sipped in, as it were, with pleasing satisfaction, which hover still around the sleepers in delightful dreams, and fill them with hallucinations. ”

“ The opinion as to the state of the world will, from a pantheistic point of view, rise to optimism; just as, on the other hand, from an atheistic point of view, it will sink to pessimism. The commanding power of goodness even the atheist may recognise by virtue of the inner law peculiar to man as a moral being, but the divine consecration is wanting to this goodness; and if human life is a journey from nothing to nothing, then this will be the best of all goodness: that man set himself free from the evil reality, and put his confidence in nothing. ”

“ If the darkness of earth must be enlightened, then a New Covenant must be established; for heavenly love, which is at the same time heavenly wisdom, enters into human nature and overcomes sin, death, and Hades, and removes the turning-point of the existence of man from this to the future life. The finger of prophecy points to this new era. And Koheleth, from amid his heaps of ruins, shows how necessary it is that the heavens should now soon open above the earth. ”

“ After Solomon has thus called to remembrance the commencement of their love-relation, which receives again a special consecration by the reference to Shulamith's parental home, and to her mother, Shulamith answers with a request to preserve for her this love. 6 Place me as a signet-ring on thy heart, As a signet-ring on thine arm! For strong as death is love; Inexorable as hell is jealousy: Its flames are flames of fire, A flame of Jah. 7 Mighty waters are unable to quench such love, And rivers cannot overflow it. ”

“ In what now follows the discourse of Wisdom is continued; wherefore she directs her invitation to the simple, i.e., those who have not yet decided, and are perhaps susceptible of that which is better: 7 “He who correcteth a scorner draweth upon himself insult; And he who communicateth instruction to a scorner, it is a dishonour to him. 8 Instruct not a scorner, lest he hate thee; Give instruction to the wise, so he will love thee. 9 Give to the wise, and he becomes yet wiser; Give knowledge to the upright, and he gains in knowledge.” ”