The Song of Songs 4:8-11

The Wedding Night: Beautiful as Lebanon

4:8 Come with me from Lebanon, my bride,

come with me from Lebanon.

Descend from the crest of Amana,

from the top of Senir, the summit of Hermon,

from the lions’ dens

and the mountain haunts of the leopards.

4:9 You have stolen my heart, ¹  my sister, ²  my bride!

You have stolen my heart with one glance of your eyes, ³ 

with one jewel of your necklace.

4:10 How delightful is your love, my sister, my bride!

How much better is your love than wine;

the fragrance of your perfume is better than any spice!

4:11 Your lips drip sweetness like the honeycomb, my bride,

honey and milk are under your tongue.

The fragrance of your garments is like the fragrance of Lebanon.

John 3:29

3:29 The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands by and listens for him, rejoices greatly ⁴  when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. This then is my joy, and it is complete. ⁵ 

Ephesians 5:26-27

5:26 to sanctify her by cleansing her ⁶  with the washing of the water by the word, 5:27 so that he ⁷  may present the church to himself as glorious – not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. ⁸ 

Revelation 19:7

19:7 Let us rejoice ⁹  and exult

and give him glory,

because the wedding celebration of the Lamb has come,

and his bride has made herself ready.

Revelation 21:2

21:2 And I saw the holy city – the new Jerusalem – descending out of heaven from God, made ready like a bride adorned for her husband.

Revelation 21:9

The New Jerusalem Descends

21:9 Then ¹⁰  one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven final plagues came and spoke to me, ¹¹  saying, “Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb!”

[4:9]  ¹ tn The Piel denominative verb לבב is derived from the noun לֵבָב (levav, “heart”), and occurs only here. Its meaning is debated: (1) metonymical sense: “you have encouraged me,” that is, given me heart (BDB 525 s.v. לֵב; AV, RSV); (2) intensive sense: “you have made my heart beat faster” (KBL 471 s.v. I לבב); and (3) privative sense: “you have ravished my heart” or “you have stolen my heart” (HALOT 515 s.v. I לבב; GKC 141-42 §52.h) (NIV). While the Niphal stem has a metonymical nuance (cause for effect): to get heart, that is, to get understanding (Job 11:12), the Piel stem may have a privative nuance: to take away heart, that is, to take away the senses. Her beauty was so overwhelming that it robbed him of his senses (e.g., Hos 4:11). This is paralleled by a modern Palestinian love song: “She stood opposite me and deprived me of reason (literally, “took my heart”), your dark eyes slew me while I was singing, your eyebrows drove shame from me…the darkness of your eyes have slain me; O one clad in purple clothes, it is worthwhile falling in love with you, for your eyes are black and sparkle, and have slain me indeed.” Less likely is the proposal of Waldeman who relates this to Akkadian lababu (“to rage, be aroused to fury”), suggesting that Song 4:9 means “to become passionately aroused” or “to be aroused sexually.” See S. H. Stephan, “Modern Palestinian Parallels to the Song of Songs,” JPOS 2 (1922): 13; R. Gordis, Song of Songs and Lamentations, 85-86; N. M. Waldman, “A Note on Canticles 4:9,” JBL 89 (1970): 215-17; H. W. Wolff, Anthropology of the Old Testament, 40-58.

[4:9]  ² sn It is clear from Song 8:1 that the young man and his bride were not physical brother and sister, yet he addresses his bride as אֲחֹתִי (’akhoti, “my sister”) several times (4:9, 10, 12; 5:1). This probably reflects any one of several ancient Near Eastern customs: (1) The appellatives “my sister” and “my brother” were both commonly used in ancient Near Eastern love literature as figurative descriptions of two lovers. For instance, in a Ugaritic poem when Anat tried to seduce Aqhat, she says, “Hear, O hero Aqhat, you are my brother and I your sister” (Aqhat 18 i. 24). In the OT Apocrypha husband and wife are referred to several times as “brother” and “sister” (Add Esth 15:9; Tob 5:20; 7:16). This “sister-wife” motif might be behind Paul’s perplexing statement about a “sister-wife” (1 Cor 9:5). (2) In several Mesopotamian societies husbands actually could legally adopt their wives for a variety of reasons. For instance, in Hurrian society husbands in the upper classes sometimes adopted their wives as “sisters” in order to form the strongest of all possible marriage bonds; a man could divorce his wife but he could not divorce his “sister” because she was “family.” At Nuzi a husband could adopt his wife to give her a higher status in society. See M. Held, “A Faithful Lover in Old Babylonian Dialogue,” JCS 15 (1961): 1-26 and S. N. Kramer, The Sacred Marriage Rite, 103-5; T. Jacobsen, “The Sister’s Message,” JANESCU 5 (1973): 199-212; E. A. Speiser, “The Wife-Sister Motif in the Patriarchal Narratives,” Oriental and Biblical Studies, 15- 28; G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 111.

[4:9]  ³ tn Alternately, “eye-stone [of your necklace].” The term עִינַיִךְ (’inayikh, “your eyes”) probably refers to her physical eyes (e.g., 4:1). However, in Sumero-Akkadian literature the term “eye” sometimes refers to the eye-stone of a necklace. Agate-stones were cut so that white stripes appeared around the black or brown core to look like the pupil on the eye. M. H. Pope (Song of Songs [AB], 482-83) suggests that the parallelism between the A and B lines suggests the following: “with one of your eye-stones” and “with one jewel of your necklace.” See W. G. Lambert, “An Eye Stone of Esarhaddon’s Queen and Other Similar Gems,” RA 63 (1969): 65-71.

[3:29]  ⁴ tn Grk “rejoices with joy” (an idiom).

[3:29]  ⁵ tn Grk “Therefore this my joy is fulfilled.”

[5:26]  ⁶ tn The direct object “her” is implied, but not found in the Greek text. It has been supplied in the English translation to clarify the sense of the passage.

[5:27]  ⁷ tn The use of the pronoun αὐτός (autos) is intensive and focuses attention on Christ as the one who has made the church glorious.

[5:27]  ⁸ tn Grk “but in order that it may be holy and blameless.”

[19:7]  ⁹ tn This verb and the next two verbs are hortatory subjunctives (giving exhortations).

[21:9]  ¹⁰ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence within the narrative.

[21:9]  ¹¹ tn Grk “with me.” The translation “with me” implies that John was engaged in a dialogue with the one speaking to him (e.g., Jesus or an angel) when in reality it was a one-sided conversation, with John doing all the listening. For this reason, μετ᾿ ἐμοῦ (met’ emou, “with me”) was translated as “to me.” See also v. 15.