The Song of Songs 5:1

The Lover to His Beloved:

5:1 I have entered my garden, O my sister, my bride;

I have gathered my myrrh with my balsam spice.

I have eaten my honeycomb and my honey;

I have drunk my wine and my milk!

The Poet to the Couple: ¹ 

Eat, friends, and drink! ² 

Drink freely, O lovers!

The Song of Songs 8:12

8:12 My vineyard, ³  which belongs to me, ⁴  is at my disposal alone. ⁵ 

The thousand shekels belong to you, O Solomon,

and two hundred shekels belong to those who maintain it for its fruit.

Matthew 26:10

26:10 When ⁶  Jesus learned of this, he said to them, “Why are you bothering this woman? She ⁷  has done a good service for me.

Matthew 26:12

26:12 When ⁸  she poured this oil on my body, she did it to prepare me for burial.

John 5:8

5:8 Jesus said to him, “Stand up! Pick up your mat ⁹  and walk.”

Romans 15:16

15:16 to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles. I serve ¹⁰  the gospel of God ¹¹  like a priest, so that the Gentiles may become an acceptable offering, ¹²  sanctified by the Holy Spirit.

Romans 15:28

15:28 Therefore after I have completed this and have safely delivered this bounty to them, ¹³  I will set out for Spain by way of you,

Romans 15:1

Exhortation for the Strong to Help the Weak

15:1 But we who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak, and not just please ourselves. ¹⁴ 

Romans 2:5

2:5 But because of your stubbornness ¹⁵  and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourselves in the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment is revealed! ¹⁶ 

Romans 2:9-10

2:9 There will be ¹⁷  affliction and distress on everyone ¹⁸  who does evil, on the Jew first and also the Greek, ¹⁹  2:10 but ²⁰  glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, for the Jew first and also the Greek.

[5:1]  ¹ sn There is no little debate about the identity of the speaker(s) and the audience addressed in 5:1b. There are five options: (1) He is addressing his bride. (2) The bride is addressing him. (3) The wedding guests are addressing him and his bride. (4) He and his bride are addressing the wedding guests. (5) The poet is addressing him and his bride. When dealing with this issue, the following factors should be considered: (1) the form of both the exhortations and the addressees are plural. This makes it unlikely that he is addressing his bride or that his bride is addressing him. (2) The exhortation has an implicitly sexual connotation because the motif of “eating” and “drinking” refers to sexual consummation in 5:1a. This makes it unlikely that he or his bride are addressing the wedding guests – an orgy is quite out of the question! (3) The poet could be in view because as the writer who created the Song, only he could have been with them – in a poetic sense – in the bridal chamber as a “guest” on their wedding night. (4) The wedding guests could be in view through the figurative use of apostrophe (addressing an audience that is not in the physical presence of the speaker). While the couple was alone in their wedding chambers, the wedding guests wished them all the joys and marital bliss of the honeymoon. This is supported by several factors: (a) Wedding feasts in the ancient Near East frequently lasted several days and after the couple had consummated their marriage, they would appear again to celebrate a feast with their wedding guests. (b) The structure of the Song is composed of paired-dialogues which either begin or conclude with the words of the friends or daughters of Jerusalem (1:2-4, 5-11; 3:6-11; 5:9-16; 6:1-3, 4-13; 7:1-10) or which conclude with an exhortation addressed to them (2:1-7; 3:1-5; 8:1-4). In this case, the poetic unit of 4:1-5:1 would conclude with an exhortation by the friends in 5:1b.

[5:1]  ² sn The physical love between the couple is compared to eating and drinking at a wedding feast. This is an appropriate figure of comparison because it would have been issued during the feast which followed the wedding and the consummation. The term “drink” refers to intoxication, that is, it compares becoming drunk on wine with enjoying the physical love of one’s spouse (e.g., Prov 5:19-20).

[8:12]  ³ sn The term כֶּרֶם (kerem, “vineyard”) is used literally in 8:11 in reference to Solomon’s physical vineyard, but in 8:12 it is used figuratively (hypocatastasis) in reference to the Beloved: כַּרְמִי (karmi, “my vineyard”). Throughout the Song, the term כֶּרֶם (“vineyard”) is used figuratively (Song 1:6; 2:15; 8:12). In 8:12 it is used in reference to either (1) herself, (2) her choice of whom to give herself to in love, or (3) her physical body. In contrast to Solomon’s physical vineyard, whose fruit can be bought and sold (8:11), she is not for sale: She will only give herself freely to the one whom she chooses to love.

[8:12]  ⁴ tn Each of the three terms in this line has the 1st person common singular suffix which is repeated three times for emphasis: כַּרְמִי (karmi, “my vineyard”), שֶׁלִּי (shelli, “which belongs to me”), and לְפָנָי (lÿfana, “at my disposal”). In contrast to King Solomon, who owns the vineyard at Baal-Hamon and who can buy and sell anything in the vineyard that he wishes, she proclaims that her “vineyard” (= herself or her body) belongs to her alone. In contrast to the vineyard, which can be leased out, and its fruit, which can be bought or sold, her “vineyard” is not for sale. Her love must and is to be freely given.

[8:12]  ⁵ tn Heb “[it is] before me.” The particle לְפָנָי (lÿfana) can denote “at the disposal of” (e.g., Gen 13:9; 20:15; 24:51; 34:10; 47:6; Jer 40:4; 2 Chr 14:6) (HALOT 9 s.v. פָּנֶה 4.f; BDB 817 s.v. פנה 4.a.f). Similar to Akkadian ana pan “at the disposal of” (AHw 2:821.a, paragraph 20), the term is used in reference to a sovereign (usually a land-owner or king) who has full power over his property to dispose of as he wishes, e.g., “The whole country is at your disposal [לְפָנֶיךָ, lÿfaneka]” (Gen 13:9). In Song 8:12 the form לְפָנָי has the 1st person common singular suffix: “My vineyard, which belongs to me, is at my disposal.”

[26:10]  ⁶ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[26:10]  ⁷ tn Grk “For she.” Here γάρ (gar) has not been translated.

[26:12]  ⁸ tn Grk “For when.” Here γάρ (gar) has not been translated.

[5:8]  ⁹ tn Or “pallet,” “mattress,” “cot,” or “stretcher.” Some of these items, however, are rather substantial (e.g., “mattress”) and would probably give the modern English reader a false impression.

[15:16]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “serving.” This is a continuation of the previous sentence in the Greek text, but in keeping with contemporary English style, a new sentence was started here in the translation.

[15:16]  ¹¹ tn The genitive in the phrase τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ θεοῦ (to euangelion tou qeou, “the gospel of God”) could be translated as either a subjective genitive (“the gospel which God brings”) or an objective genitive (“the gospel about God”). Either is grammatically possible. This is possibly an instance of a plenary genitive (see ExSyn 119-21; M. Zerwick, Biblical Greek, §§36-39). If so, an interplay between the two concepts is intended: The gospel which God brings is in fact the gospel about himself.

[15:16]  ¹² tn Grk “so that the offering of the Gentiles may become acceptable.” This could be understood to refer to an offering belonging to the Gentiles (a possessive genitive) or made by the Gentiles (subjective genitive), but more likely the phrase should be understood as an appositive genitive, with the Gentiles themselves consisting of the offering (so J. D. G. Dunn, Romans [WBC 38], 2:860). The latter view is reflected in the translation “so that the Gentiles may become an acceptable offering.”

[15:28]  ¹³ tn Grk “have sealed this fruit to them.”

[15:1]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “and not please ourselves.” NT Greek negatives used in contrast like this are often not absolute, but relative: “not so much one as the other.”

[2:5]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “hardness.” Concerning this imagery, see Jer 4:4; Ezek 3:7; 1 En. 16:3.

[2:5]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.”

[2:9]  ¹⁷ tn No verb is expressed in this verse, but the verb “to be” is implied by the Greek construction. Literally “suffering and distress on everyone…”

[2:9]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “every soul of man.”

[2:9]  ¹⁹ sn Paul uses the term Greek here and in v. 10 to refer to non-Jews, i.e., Gentiles.

[2:10]  ²⁰ tn Grk “but even,” to emphasize the contrast. The second word has been omitted since it is somewhat redundant in English idiom.