Song 4:1-7

Poem and Man

There are no problems finding the theme in 4:1-7. The man’s theme is the beauty of his bride (v1). Perhaps her teeth are like a ‘flock of shorn ewes…and not one among them has been lost,’ (v3) because they are all there. Probably a rare thing when most tooth problems would have been dealt with by simply taking them out! If there ever was a ‘Tower of David,’ (v4) it’s been totally lost to us today. It’s probably used to communicate grandeur and importance, again beauty, rather than anything else. There were no ‘mountains of myrrh’ or ‘hills of frankincense,’ they had to be imported. We assume from the general progression down the bride’s body that this refers either to the stomach or the ‘modestly covered’ parts of the body (2 Cor 12:23). We notice though that the poet shies away from overt sexual references, because the theme  is beauty. The man loves his bride, sings over her, delights in her (Zeph 3:17). He’s not ashamed of the physicality of his attraction.

God and Man

The voice of the man must be the direct address of God, if we follow an allegorical reading. But this poses a difficult question, ‘does, or to what extent does, God desire us, or His Church?’ We agree with the New Testament’s teaching that God loves us even as we are sinners. Filthy and with nothing to attract us to Him. He justifies (beautifies) us even though He knows we are neither just nor beautiful. Does this reading of the Song suggest then that God loves us because of something in us He finds lovely? If we read it that way we must either throw away the allegory, or throw away the Song.

So what is the answer? Well, the answer is the God is not a lump of divine stuff. He is Trinity. There is no difference between what God thinks and what God says. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was God. We hear a difference between the beauty attributed to us, and the beauty we do not have and we hear a problem. God’s Word, however, is both with the creator and is the creator. There is a deep, rich, wise complexity in God. God’s very Word tells us that His Bride is good and beautiful and righteous, and if we struggle to comprehend that, then the problem is not with God. The Church wears white to her wedding, not because she is pure and sinless, but she has been mad, pure and sinless. Jesus labours to present us spotless and without blemish having washed us with His Word! (Eph 5:26-27). We are very dark but invited to the pasture (Song 1:5, 8). We are simul iujust et peccator.

Christian friend, see the church, with all her problems, all her difficulties, all her failings, as God does, as beautiful. See the church as the bride perfect for her big day. It’s easy, and trendy, to bash the church and talk down to her and on her. Imagine how you’d feel if someone talked about your wife in that way? They love Jesus but not the Church? Impossible.

Woman and Man

The human body is beautiful. Ah, but we only think that because we are human. Really? Show me a non human and his discourse on the ugliness of the human body. Even when the connection between beauty and sex is broken, ignored and disfigured, we must not follow the ‘baleful hermeneutic’ of much modern and post modern thought that trashes the human body. This is just blasphemy, and most of that intentional. God looked at man and woman and said it was very good. How dare we disagree? Disfigured by sin? Yes. Sinful to the core? Yes. But created beautiful.

Beauty, according to Immanuel Kant is ‘the unlaborious coincidence of the actual and the ideal.’ Beauty is a kind of realized eschatology. It shows us what it ought to be by what it is, it gives us a glimpse of the ‘present glow of the sheer goodness that will be present at the end.’ Much like CS Lewis’ ‘stabs of joy,’ when we see and (almost) feel beauty, it’s as if for a moment we’ve been transported, and the only way we realize it’s happening is when it’s over. One day it will never end. Regarding human beauty for it’s own sake is at the same time a rest from, and a refreshment, of sexual desire. Sexual attraction is a gift from one spouse to another and from God to both. It is sacred and pure. Sex can be used in a multitude of ghastly, sinful, life destroying packages, but we must never shy away from what it actually is, and who thought of it first.

Jenson concludes: ‘if God can find us beautiful, that is the least we can do for the one we love.’

To conclude, we must note that this application between husband and wife actually hangs on the allegorical reading, and say with all our hearts ‘amen!’