The Song of Songs 8:3-5

Double Refrain: Embracing and Adjuration

The Beloved about Her Lover:

8:3 His left hand caresses my head,

and his right hand stimulates me. ¹ 

The Beloved to the Maidens:

8:4 I admonish you, O maidens ²  of Jerusalem:

“Do not ³  arouse or awaken love until it pleases!”

The Awakening of Love

The Maidens about His Beloved:

8:5 Who is this coming up from the desert,

leaning on her beloved?

The Beloved to Her Lover:

Under the apple tree I aroused you; ⁴ 

there your mother conceived you,

there she who bore you was in labor of childbirth. ⁵ 

Isaiah 54:5-10

54:5 For your husband is the one who made you –

the Lord who commands armies is his name.

He is your protector, ⁶  the Holy One of Israel. ⁷ 

He is called “God of the entire earth.”

54:6 “Indeed, the Lord will call you back

like a wife who has been abandoned and suffers from depression, ⁸ 

like a young wife when she has been rejected,” says your God.

54:7 “For a short time I abandoned ⁹  you,

but with great compassion I will gather you.

54:8 In a burst ¹⁰  of anger I rejected you ¹¹  momentarily,

but with lasting devotion I will have compassion on you,”

says your protector, ¹²  the Lord.

54:9 “As far as I am concerned, this is like in Noah’s time, ¹³ 

when I vowed that the waters of Noah’s flood ¹⁴  would never again cover the earth.

In the same way I have vowed that I will not be angry at you or shout at you.

54:10 Even if the mountains are removed

and the hills displaced,

my devotion will not be removed from you,

nor will my covenant of friendship ¹⁵  be displaced,”

says the Lord, the one who has compassion on you.

Isaiah 62:4-5

62:4 You will no longer be called, “Abandoned,”

and your land will no longer be called “Desolate.”

Indeed, ¹⁶  you will be called “My Delight is in Her,” ¹⁷ 

and your land “Married.” ¹⁸ 

For the Lord will take delight in you,

and your land will be married to him. ¹⁹ 

62:5 As a young man marries a young woman,

so your sons ²⁰  will marry you.

As a bridegroom rejoices over a bride,

so your God will rejoice over you.

Jeremiah 32:41

32:41 I will take delight in doing good to them. I will faithfully and wholeheartedly plant them ²¹  firmly in the land.’

Zephaniah 3:17

3:17 The Lord your God is in your midst;

he is a warrior who can deliver.

He takes great delight in you; ²² 

he renews you by his love; ²³ 

he shouts for joy over you.” ²⁴ 

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 ²⁵  when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. This then is my joy, and it is complete. ²⁶ 

Ephesians 5:25-29

5:25 Husbands, love your ²⁷  wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her 5:26 to sanctify her by cleansing her ²⁸  with the washing of the water by the word, 5:27 so that he ²⁹  may present the church to himself as glorious – not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. ³⁰  5:28 In the same way ³¹  husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 5:29 For no one has ever hated his own body ³²  but he feeds it and takes care of it, just as Christ also does the church,

[8:3]  ¹ tn See the notes on 2:6, which is parallel to this verse.

[8:4]  ² tn Heb “daughters of Jerusalem.”

[8:4]  ³ tn Heb “Why arouse or awaken …?” Although the particle מָה (mah) is used most often as an interrogative pronoun (“What?” “Why?”), it also can be used as a particle of negation. For example, “How (מָה) could I look at a girl?” means “I have not looked at a girl!” (Job 31:1); “What (מַה) do we have to drink?” means “We have nothing to drink” (Exod 15:24); “What (מַה) part do we have?” means “We have no part” (1 Kgs 12:16); and “Why (מַה) arouse or awaken love?” means “Do not arouse or awaken love!” (Song 8:4). See HALOT 551 s.v. מָה C.

[8:5]  ⁴ sn The imagery of v. 6 is romantic: (1) His mother originally conceived him with his father under the apple tree, (2) his mother gave birth to him under the apple tree, and (3) the Beloved had now awakened him to love under the same apple tree. The cycle of life and love had come around full circle under the apple tree. While his mother had awakened his eyes to life, the Beloved had awakened him to love. His parents had made love under the apple tree to conceive him in love, and now Solomon and his Beloved were making love under the same apple tree of love.

[8:5]  ⁵ tn Or “went into labor.” The verb חָבַל (khaval, “become pregnant”) is repeated in 8:6b and 8:6c, and has a two-fold range of meaning: (1) transitive: “to conceive [a child]” and (2) intransitive: “to be in travail [of childbirth]” (HALOT 286 s.v. IV חבל). In 8:6b it denotes “to conceive,” and in 8:6c it is “to be in travail [of childbirth].”

[54:5]  ⁶ tn Or “redeemer.” See the note at 41:14.

[54:5]  ⁷ sn See the note on the phrase “the Holy One of Israel” in 1:4.

[54:6]  ⁸ tn Heb “like a woman abandoned and grieved in spirit.”

[54:7]  ⁹ tn Or “forsook” (NASB).

[54:8]  ¹⁰ tn According to BDB 1009 s.v. שֶׁטֶף the noun שֶׁצֶף here is an alternate form of שֶׁטֶף (shetef, “flood”). Some relate the word to an alleged Akkadian cognate meaning “strength.”

[54:8]  ¹¹ tn Heb “I hid my face from you.”

[54:8]  ¹² tn Or “redeemer.” See the note at 41:14.

[54:9]  ¹³ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “For [or “indeed”] the waters of Noah [is] this to me.” כִּי־מֵי (ki-me, “for the waters of”) should be emended to כְּמֵי (kÿmey, “like the days of”), which is supported by the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a and all the ancient versions except LXX.

[54:9]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the waters of Noah” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).

[54:10]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “peace” (so many English versions); NLT “of blessing.”

[62:4]  ¹⁶ tn Or “for”; KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV “but.”

[62:4]  ¹⁷ tn Hebrew חֶפְצִי־בָהּ (kheftsi-vah), traditionally transliterated “Hephzibah” (so KJV, ASV, NIV).

[62:4]  ¹⁸ tn Hebrew בְּעוּלָה (bÿ’ulah), traditionally transliterated “Beulah” (so KJV, ASV, NIV).

[62:4]  ¹⁹ tn That is, the land will be restored to the Lord’s favor and once again enjoy his blessing and protection. To indicate the land’s relationship to the Lord, the words “to him” have been supplied at the end of the clause.

[62:5]  ²⁰ tc The Hebrew text has “your sons,” but this produces an odd metaphor and is somewhat incongruous with the parallelism. In the context (v. 4b, see also 54:5-7) the Lord is the one who “marries” Zion. Therefore several prefer to emend “your sons” to בֹּנָיִךְ (bonayikh, “your builder”; e.g., NRSV). In Ps 147:2 the Lord is called the “builder of Jerusalem.” However, this emendation is not the best option for at least four reasons. First, although the Lord is never called the “builder” of Jerusalem in Isaiah, the idea of Zion’s children possessing the land does occur (Isa 49:20; 54:3; cf. also 14:1; 60:21). Secondly, all the ancient versions support the MT reading. Thirdly, although the verb בָּעַל (ba’al) can mean “to marry,” its basic idea is “to possess.” Consequently, the verb stresses a relationship more than a state. All the ancient versions render this verb “to dwell in” or “to dwell with.” The point is not just that the land will be reinhabited, but that it will be in a relationship of “belonging” to the Israelites. Hence a relational verb like בָּעַל is used (J. N. Oswalt, Isaiah [NICOT], 2:581). Finally, “sons” is a well-known metaphor for “inhabitants” (J. de Waard, Isaiah, 208).

[32:41]  ²¹ tn Heb “will plant them in the land with faithfulness with all my heart and with all my soul.” The latter expressions are, of course, anthropomorphisms (see Deut 6:5).

[3:17]  ²² tn Heb “he rejoices over you with joy.”

[3:17]  ²³ tc The MT reads, “he is silent in his love,” but this makes no sense in light of the immediately preceding and following lines. Some take the Hiphil verb form as causative (see Job 11:3) rather than intransitive and translate, “he causes [you] to be silent by his love,” that is, “he soothes [you] by his love.” The present translation follows the LXX and assumes an original reading יְחַדֵּשׁ (yÿkhaddesh, “he renews”) with ellipsis of the object (“you”).

[3:17]  ²⁴ tn Heb “he rejoices over you with a shout of joy.”

[3:29]  ²⁵ tn Grk “rejoices with joy” (an idiom).

[3:29]  ²⁶ tn Grk “Therefore this my joy is fulfilled.”

[5:25]  ²⁷ tn The Greek article has been translated as a possessive pronoun (ExSyn 215).

[5:26]  ²⁸ 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]  ²⁹ 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]  ³⁰ tn Grk “but in order that it may be holy and blameless.”

[5:28]  ³¹ tn Grk “So also.”

[5:29]  ³² tn Grk “flesh.”