the Week of Proper 26 / Ordinary 31
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World English Bible
Song of Solomon 1:12
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Young Woman
The king is lying on his couch, enchanted by the fragrance of my perfume.While the king sat at his table, My spikenard sent forth its fragrance.
The smell of my perfume spreads out to the king on his couch.
The Beloved about Her Lover:
While the king was at his banqueting table, my nard gave forth its fragrance.While the king [sitteth] at his table, my spikenard sendeth forth its smell.
"While the king was at his table, My perfume (Solomon) sent forth [his] fragrance [surrounding me].
She
While the king was on his couch, my nard gave forth its fragrance.Whanne the kyng was in his restyng place, my narde yaf his odour.
While the king sat at his table, my spikenard sent forth its fragrance.
While the king was at his table, my perfume spread its fragrance.
She Speaks: My king, while you were on your couch, my love was a magic charm.
While the king sat at his table, My spikenard sent forth its fragrance.
While the king is seated at his table, my spices send out their perfume.
[She]
As the king reclines at table, my nard gives forth its perfume:While the king is at his table, My spikenard sendeth forth its fragrance.
The smell of my perfume reaches out to the king lying on his couch.
While the king sat at his table, my spikenard sent forth its fragrance.
While the king sitteth at his table, my spikenard sendeth foorth the smell thereof.
"While the king was at his table, my perfume gave out its smell.
While the king was on his couch, my nard gave forth its fragrance.
Whiles the King was at his repast, my spikenard gaue the smell thereof.
While you are seated with the king upon his cushion, spikenard sends forth its fragrance.
The Woman
My king was lying on his couch, and my perfume filled the air with fragrance.SHEBy the time the king is in his circle, my nard, will have given out its fragrance:
(1-11) While the king was at his repose, my spikenard sent forth the odour thereof.
While the king was on his couch, my nard gave forth its fragrance.
When the king sitteth at the table, he shall smell my Nardus:
So long as the king was at table, my spikenard gave forth its smell.
While the king is on his couch,my perfume releases its fragrance.
While the king sat at his table, My perfume spread its fragrance.
While the king sitteth at his table, my spikenard sendeth forth the smell thereof.
While the king was on his couch, my nard gave its fragrance.
While the King is in His circle, my spikenard gives its fragrance.
While the king [is] in his circle, My spikenard hath given its fragrance.
When the kynge sytteth at the table, he shal smell my Nardus:
The Woman When my King-Lover lay down beside me, my fragrance filled the room. His head resting between my breasts— the head of my lover was a sachet of sweet myrrh. My beloved is a bouquet of wildflowers picked just for me from the fields of Engedi.
"While the king was at his table, My perfume gave forth its fragrance.
While the king is at his table, My spikenard sends forth its fragrance.
"While the king was at his table, My perfume gave forth its fragrance.
"While the king was at his banqueting table,My perfume gave forth its fragrance.
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
the king: Song of Solomon 7:5, Psalms 45:1, Matthew 22:11, Matthew 25:34
sitteth: Song of Solomon 4:16, Matthew 22:4, Matthew 26:26-28, Luke 24:30-32, Revelation 3:20
my: Song of Solomon 4:13-16, John 12:3, Philippians 4:18, Revelation 8:3, Revelation 8:4
Reciprocal: Psalms 45:11 - So shall Song of Solomon 4:10 - the smell Ezekiel 41:22 - This is Matthew 26:20 - he
Cross-References
God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters he called Seas. God saw that it was good.
God said, "Let the earth put forth grass, herbs yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit after their kind, with its seed in it, on the earth," and it was so.
God said, "Let the earth bring forth living creatures after their kind, cattle, creeping things, and animals of the earth after their kind," and it was so.
God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."
For as the earth brings forth its bud, and as the garden causes the things that are sown in it to spring forth; so the Lord Yahweh will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all the nations.
For the earth bears fruit: first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear.
For each tree is known by its own fruit. For people don't gather figs from thorns, nor do they gather grapes from a bramble bush.
Now may he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food, supply and multiply your seed for sowing, and increase the fruits of your righteousness;
Don't be deceived. God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that will he also reap.
Gill's Notes on the Bible
While the King [sitteth] at his table,.... These are the words of the church, relating what influence the presence of Christ, her Lord and King, had upon the exercise of her graces, while he was keeping the nuptial feast, on account of his marriage with her. He was anointed King of saints from eternity, before his incarnation, when he was rejoicing before God his Father, as if at a feast; and while he was thus distant, the faith, hope, desire, and expectation of the saints, were exercised on him, as their Lord and King, that was to come: when he did come, he came as a King, as was foretold of him, though his kingdom was not of this world; and while he was here, the Gospel of the kingdom of heaven was preached, and emitted a sweet savour in Judea: and when he went up to heaven, after his resurrection, he was declared Lord and Christ, and sat down at the right hand of God, "in his circuit" f, or at his round table; alluding to such the ancients used, and great personages fed on, peculiar to themselves g; being encircled by angels and glorified saints: and in the mean while, before his second coming as King, when he will appear as such in a more glorious manner, he sits down at his table, in the ordinance of the supper, feasting with, entertaining, and welcoming his church and people. When as follows, she says,
my spikenard sendeth forth the smell thereof: or "nard", of which there are many sorts; but that which grows in spikes is reckoned the best, and from thence is called "spikenard": it was a chief ingredient in ointments, as Pliny says h; see John 12:3; and was much used at festivals, to anoint guests with; and with which their head and hair being anointed, gave a fragrant smell, and therefore used to make them acceptable i: in Syria, at royal banquets, as this here was, it was usual to go round the guests, to sprinkle them with Babylonian ointment k. This may have respect to the grace of the Spirit in the church, comparable to the most excellent ointment; and which grace being in exercise in her, both before and after the incarnation of Christ, and since his ascension to heaven, and while he grants his presence in Gospel ordinances, is very delightful and acceptable to Christ; or this spikenard, according to some l, may be meant of Christ himself, just as he is said to be "a bundle of myrrh" in Song of Solomon 1:13, and "a cluster of camphire", in Song of Solomon 1:14; and as ointments were used at feasts, and the church was at one with Christ, and as he was both master and feast, so he was the ointment of spikenard to her; and it is as if she should say, my beloved is at table with me; he is my food, and he is my spikenard m I need no other; he is instead of spikenard, myrrh, cypress, or any unguents made of these: his person is exceeding precious; his graces, of ointments, have a delightful savour in them; his sacrifice is of a sweet odour; his garments of righteousness and salvation smell of myrrh, aloes, and cassia; he is all in all.
f במסבו "in circuitu suo", Montanus, Piscator, Michaelis. g Vid. Cuperi Observ. l. 1. c. 2. p. 13. h Nat. Hist. l. 12. c. 12. i "Illius puro destillant tempora nardo", Tibullus, l. 2. Eleg. 2. v. 7. & 1. 3. Eleg. 7. v. 31. "Madidas nardo comas", Martial. l. 3. Ep. 56. "tinge caput nardi folio", ibid. "Assyriaque nardo potemus uncti", Horat. Carmin. l. 1. Ode 11. v. 16, 17. Vid. Ovid. de Arte Amandi, l. 3. k Athenaei Deipnosoph. l. 15. c. 13. p. 692. l Theodoret, Sanctius, and Marckius. m "Tu mihi stacte, tu cinnamomium", &c. Planti Curculio, Act. 1. Sc. 2. v. 6.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
This and the next Song of Solomon 1:15-7 sections are regarded by ancient commentators (Jewish and Christian) as expressing “the love of espousals” Jeremiah 2:2 between the Holy One and His Church, first in the wilderness of the Exodus, and then in the wilderness of the world Ezekiel 20:35-36.
Song of Solomon 1:9
Or, to a mare of mine in the chariots of Pharaoh I liken thee, O my friend. (The last word is the feminine form of that rendered “friend” at Song of Solomon 5:16.) The comparison of the bride to a beautiful horse is singularly like one in Theocritus, and some have conjectured that the Greek poet, having read at Alexandria the Septuagint Version of the Song, may have borrowed these thoughts from it. If so, we have here the first instance of an influence of sacred on profane literature. The simile is especially appropriate on the lips, or from the pen, of Solomon, who first brought horses and chariots from Egypt 1 Kings 10:28-29. As applied to the bride it expresses the stately and imposing character of her beauty.
Song of Solomon 1:10, Song of Solomon 1:11
Rows ... borders - The same Hebrew word in both places; ornaments forming part of the bride’s head-dress, probably strings of beads or other ornaments descending on the cheeks. The introduction of “jewels” and “gold” in Song of Solomon 1:10 injures the sense and destroys the climax of Song of Solomon 1:11, which was spoken by a chorus (hence “we,” not “I,” as when the king speaks, Song of Solomon 1:9). They promise the bride ornaments more worthy and becoming than the rustic attire in which she has already such charms for the king: “Ornaments of gold will we make for thee with studs (or ‘points’) of silver.” The “studs” are little silver ornaments which it is proposed to affix to the golden (compare Proverbs 25:12), or substitute for the strung beads of the bride’s necklace.
Song of Solomon 1:12-14
The bride’s reply Song of Solomon 1:12 may mean, “While the king reclines at the banquet I anoint him with my costliest perfume, but he has for me a yet sweeter fragrance” Song of Solomon 1:13-14. According to Origen’s interpretation, the bride represents herself as anointing the king, like Mary John 12:3, with her most precious unguents.
Spikenard - An unguent of great esteem in the ancient world, retaining its Indian name in Hebrew, Greek and Latin. It is obtained from an Indian plant now called “jatamansi.”
Song of Solomon 1:13
Render: A bag of myrrh is my beloved to me, which lodgeth in my bosom.
Song of Solomon 1:14
Camphire - Rather, כפר kôpher,” from which “cyprus” is probably derived (in the margin misspelled “cypress “),the name by which the plant called by the Arabs “henna” was known to the Greeks and Romans. It is still much esteemed throughout the East for the fragrance of its flowers and the dye extracted from its leaves. Engedi was famous for its vines, and the henna may have been cultivated with the vines in the same enclosures.
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
Verse 12. While the king sitteth at his table — במסבו bimsibbo, in his circle, probably meaning the circle of his friends at the marriage festivals, or a round table.
