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Song of Solomon

Song of Songs

About this book
Chapter 4

1 The Lover to His Beloved: Oh, you are beautiful, my darling! Oh, you are beautiful! Your eyes behind your veil are like doves. Your hair is like a flock of female goats descending from Mount Gilead.⁠ 2 Your teeth are like a flock of newly shorn sheep coming up from the washing place; each of them has a twin, and not one of them is missing. 3 Your lips are like a scarlet thread; your mouth is lovely. Your forehead behind your veil is like a slice of pomegranate. 4 Your neck is like the tower of David built with courses of stones; one thousand shields are hung on it—all shields of valiant warriors. 5 Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of the gazelle grazing among the lilies. 6 Until the dawn arrives and the shadows flee, I will go up to the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense.⁠ 7 You are altogether beautiful, my darling! There is no blemish in you! 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. 9 You have stolen my heart, my sister, my bride!⁠ You have stolen my heart with one glance of your eyes, with one jewel of your necklace. 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! 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. 12 The Lover to His Beloved: You are a locked garden, my sister, my bride; you are an enclosed spring, a sealed-up fountain. 13 Your shoots are a royal garden full of pomegranates with choice fruits:⁠ henna with nard,⁠ 14 nard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon⁠ with every kind of spice, myrrh and aloes with all the finest spices. 15 You are a garden spring, a well of fresh water⁠ flowing down from Lebanon. 16 The Beloved to Her Lover: Awake, O north wind; come, O south wind! Blow on my garden so that its fragrant spices may send out their sweet smell.⁠ May my beloved come into his garden and eat its delightful fruit!

Texts in conversation

Compare Song of Solomon 4:1 and 1Q20 20:3

Hebrew Bible · Dead Sea Scrolls, Biblical Retellings

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Summary

In Song of Solomon, a lover praises a woman one feature at a time, from her eyes and hair to her breasts. In the Genesis Apocryphon from the Dead Sea Scrolls, Pharaoh’s courtiers praise Sarai the same way, listing her face, hair, eyes, nose and breasts.

Passages

Song of Solomon 4:1

Hebrew Bible · Song of Songs
1 The Lover to His Beloved: Oh, you are beautiful, my darling! Oh, you are beautiful! Your eyes behind your veil are like doves. Your hair is like a flock of female goats descending from Mount Gilead. 2 Your teeth are like a flock of newly shorn sheep coming up from the washing place; each of them has a twin, and not one of them is missing. 3 Your lips are like a scarlet thread; your mouth is lovely. Your forehead behind your veil is like a slice of pomegranate. 4 Your neck is like the tower of David built with courses of stones; one thousand shields are hung on it—all shields of valiant warriors. 5 Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of the gazelle grazing among the lilies.
300–201 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Song of Solomon

1Q20 20:3

Dead Sea Scrolls, Biblical Retellings · Genesis Apocryphon
2 … […] how … and beautiful is the form of her face, and how 3 lovely and how fine is the hair of her head. How fair are her eyes, and how pleasing is her nose, and all the radiance of 4 her face … How lovely is her breast, and how beautiful is all her whiteness. Her arms, how beautiful! And her hands, how 5 perfect! And how desirable is the whole appearance of her hands. How fair are her palms, and how long and slender are all the fingers of her hands. Her feet, 6 how beautiful! And how perfect are her legs. No virgins or brides who enter the bridal chamber are more beautiful than she. Above all 7 women her beauty is beautiful, and her beauty is high above them all. And with all this beauty there is much wisdom in her, and the work of her hands 8 is lovely.” And when the king heard the words of Hyrcanus and the words of his two companions, for the three of them spoke with one mouth, he desired her greatly, and he sent
160–60 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in 1Q20

References

“... The Apocryphon also features a few passages which appear to be modelled more extensively on secondary scriptural material. Daniel Falk raises the possibility that the song of Hirqanos and the Egyptians extolling Sarai’s beauty (1QapGen 20:2-8) is ‘a midrash on the ideal Israelite wife from Prov. 31.10-31 combined with Song of Songs, inspired by Gen. 12.11 (“I know well that you are a beautiful woman”)’. As in Canticles, Hirqanos’ song praises Sarai’s face (1QapGen 20:2, 4; cf. Song 2:14), hair (1QapGen 20:3; cf. Song 4:1; 6:5), eyes (1QapGen 20:3; cf. Song 4:1; 6:5), nose (1QapGen 20:3; cf. Song 7:4), breasts (1QapGen 20:4; cf. Song 4:5; 7:3, 7-8) and thighs (1QapGen 20:6; cf. Song 7:1). ...”
Nathanael Vette, Writing with Scripture: Scripturalized Narrative in the Gospel of Mark, LNTS 670 (London: T&T Clark, 2022), 68.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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