Title: 13
Author: Joe G
Last saved by: Auth User
Company: GDC

© 2005 Joe Griffin		05-10-30-A.CC02-520 /

Solomon Fires Pick-Up Line #4 but the Shulammite Closes Her Eyes, SOS 1:15; Soul Rapport, the Marital Bed, & Future Home, 1:16-17; the Misplaced Verse, 2:1

SOS 1:15 -		[KS: Pick-Up Line #4]  “How beautiful you are my love, how beautiful you are.  Your eyes are like doves.”
1.	Solomon is obviously taking a visual trip around the Shulammite’s face complimenting every aspect of her beauty in his efforts to beguile her.  He twice refers to her as “beautiful,” the feminine adjective hp*y* yaphah which describes the physical attractiveness of a woman.
2.	However, she considers his line trite, silly poetry.  To her it sounds like, “Honey Bun, Honey Bun, eyes like a dove / Come over, come over and let us make love.”
3.	The Shulammite is not interested in Solomon.  She is mentally united with the Shepherd, a union that ignores the advances of any and all others as if she were blind to their efforts.
4.	The right man-right woman realization causes both the man and the woman to become disinterested in the romantic advances of others and find the physical assets of anyone other than their right person to no longer intrigue them.
5.	These concepts are expressed in the song “I’ll Close My Eyes,” written in the 1947 by Buddy Kaye and Billy Reid and recorded by many popular singers and orchestras of that period: Vic Damone, Sarah Vaughn, Dinah Washington, Connie Francis, Dinah Shore, Peggy Lee, Ray Anthony, Percy Faith, George Shearing, Ted Heath, and Tommy Newsom.  Here is the lyric to:
“I’ll Close My Eyes”
 (© 1947 by Buddy Kaye & Billy Reid.  All rights reserved.)
	Heaven sends a song through its doors / Just as if it seems to know I'm exclusively yours.
	Knowing this I feel but one way / You will understand too in these words that I say.
	I'll close my eyes to everyone but you / And when I do I'll see you standing there.
	I'll lock my heart to any other caress / I'll never say yes to a new love affair.
	Then I'll close my eyes to everything that's gay / If you are not there, oh, to share each lovely day.
	And through the years in those moments when we're far apart / Don't you know I'll close my eyes
	and I'll see you with my heart.
6.	Solomon can croon his love tune to the Shulammite but her eyes are closed to him as her soul concentrates only on the Shepherd.
7.	The savoir faire of the Shulammite now comes into play.  Rather than saying, “Hey, Loving Man, don’t try that poetry jive on me,” she instead remains occupied with the Shepherd and continues with more commentary about him and their future together.
8.	In doing so she very subtly mocks the king by paraphrasing his Pick-Up Line #4 but directs it to the Shepherd:
SOS 1:16 -		[SW]  “How handsome you are, my beloved.  How delightful you are.  Indeed, our bed is green.”
1.	Solomon had the temerity to say in verse 15, “How beautiful you are, my love.”  His possessive pronoun in front of “love” is most presumptuous.  He may imagine her as his love but she is not.
2.	The Shulammite directs her melody to her right man: “How handsome you are my beloved.”  She can use the possessive pronoun legitimately since the Shepherd has given his soul to her and she has done the same to him.
3.	She describes the Shepherd as “handsome.”  This is the same word used by Solomon in verse 15 that described her as “beautiful.”
4.	Here the Shulammite uses the masculine gender of the adjective hp#y* yapheh which is translated “handsome.”
5.	Solomon is handsome but he is not the man the Shulammite addresses.  She continues by adding, “How delightful you are.”
6.	The word “delightful” is the adjective <yu!n* na‛iym and is defined by:
Baker, Warren and Eugene Carpenter.  The Complete Word Study Dictionary: Old Testament.  (Chattanooga: AMG Publishers, 2003), 739:
5273 <yu!n* na‛iym: Used of persons who are pleasing, a joy to be around.  It refers to those who are delightful to enjoy.  It describes the bridegroom as delightful, pleasing (SOS 1:16).
7.	Here the Shulammite switches from the physical to the soulish.  First she expresses her appreciation for the physical attractiveness of the Shepherd and then mentions his soul and the rapport they both enjoy with each other.
8.	She then emphasizes the fact that they are right man-right woman but not yet married in her comment, “Indeed, our bed is green.”
9.	Beds were made of wood and it was customary that a new bed be made for the bride and groom.  That the wood for their marital bed is green indicates that the wood that will be used to construct it is still growing in the forest and thus their marriage union is still future.
10.	This translation is supported by the adjective “green” /n*u&r~ ra‛^anan which refers to living, flourishing flora in their natural environment.  She elaborates on this point in the next verse:
SOS 1:17 -		[SW]  “The beams of our house are cedars, our rafters, cypresses.
11.	God knows the trees that will be felled to provide the wood that will be used to build the house in which the Shulammite and Shepherd will live.  But at the moment they remain growing in the forests.  Some are cedars which will provide its beams while some are cypresses which will provide its rafters.
12.	The next verse is the first verse of chapter 2 but the third line in this particular aria by the Shulammite.
13.	The division of biblical books into chapters and verses is a human convention developed around the thirteenth century that makes it easy for us to locate passages efficiently.  This system works much like a mailing address: the name of the book is the city, the chapter number is the street, and the verse is the house number.
14.	This system works just fine for locating a passage quickly but on occasion the placement of chapter and verse interrupts the context of a passage and such is the case here.  Song of Solomon 2:1 belongs with chapter 1 and should have been verse 18 since it is a continuation of the Shulammite’s aria that began in verse 16:
Song of Solomon 2:1 -		[SW]  “I am the rose of Sharon, the lily of the valleys.”

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