Read & explore together
The Bride and Her Beloved
Song of Solomon 5:1-16 is a poem of desire, loss, searching and praise. It uses rich images rather than plain description, so it helps to read it as poetry and song, noticing voices, repeated terms, emotions and comparisons.
Understanding the passage
Read these words in context
In this passage, the speaking voices include the beloved man, the beloved woman, and also the friends in Song of Solomon 5:1, with the daughters of Jerusalem addressed later. The poem moves from welcome and invitation, to delayed opening, to painful searching, and then to a detailed poetic praise of the beloved’s beauty and worth.
Song of Solomon 5:1–16Main takeaway
This poem expresses intense love through longing, distress and delighted praise, using carefully layered images rather than plain description.
Explore the poem and its images
Open a card to explore the full explanation and its Bible references.
01A joyful welcome and invitationThe passage opens with a voice speaking of coming into a garden and enjoying myrrh, spice, honey, wine and milk.
Explanation
The passage opens with a voice speaking of coming into a garden and enjoying myrrh, spice, honey, wine and milk. Then the friends speak and call others to eat and drink abundantly. These garden and feast images communicate delight and closeness through poetic language, not plain narrative description.
02A knock, hesitation and lossThe woman hears her beloved knocking and calling her by tender names such as my sister, my love, my dove and my undefiled.
Explanation
The woman hears her beloved knocking and calling her by tender names such as my sister, my love, my dove and my undefiled. She hesitates because she has taken off her robe and washed her feet. When she finally rises and opens, he has already gone away, and her search brings no answer.
03Pain while searchingAs she searches, the watchmen find her, beat her, bruise her and take away her cloak. The poem does not explain more here, but it plainly presents harm and humiliation during her search.
Explanation
As she searches, the watchmen find her, beat her, bruise her and take away her cloak. The poem does not explain more here, but it plainly presents harm and humiliation during her search. She then asks the daughters of Jerusalem to tell her beloved that she is faint with love if they find him.
04Why he is belovedWhen asked what makes her beloved better than another, she answers with a long poem of praise.
Explanation
When asked what makes her beloved better than another, she answers with a long poem of praise. She describes him with images of gold, doves, spices, jewels, ivory, sapphires, marble and cedars. She concludes that he is altogether lovely, and calls him both her beloved and her friend.
Questions to explore
Pause, look back at the verses and talk together.
01What changes between the beloved’s call and the woman’s opening of the door?
Follow the order in the poem: he knocks and calls, she hesitates, she rises to open, and then finds that he has already gone away.
02How does the poem show the woman’s distress during her search?
Notice the words about not finding him, not receiving an answer, being beaten and bruised, losing her cloak, and being faint with love.
03Which images are used to describe the beloved, and what effect do they create?
List the comparisons to gold, doves, spices, jewels, ivory, marble and cedars, then observe how they build a picture of beauty, worth and splendour.
Read the Bible passage
World English Bible ClassicScripture quotation · Public domain
Song of Solomon 5:1–16
1I have come into my garden, my sister, my bride. I have gathered my myrrh with my spice; I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey; I have drunk my wine with my milk. Friends Eat, friends! Drink, yes, drink abundantly, beloved. Beloved
2I was asleep, but my heart was awake. It is the voice of my beloved who knocks: “Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled; for my head is filled with dew, and my hair with the dampness of the night.”
3I have taken off my robe. Indeed, must I put it on? I have washed my feet. Indeed, must I soil them?
4My beloved thrust his hand in through the latch opening. My heart pounded for him.
5I rose up to open for my beloved. My hands dripped with myrrh, my fingers with liquid myrrh, on the handles of the lock.
6I opened to my beloved; but my beloved left, and had gone away. My heart went out when he spoke. I looked for him, but I didn’t find him. I called him, but he didn’t answer.
7The watchmen who go about the city found me. They beat me. They bruised me. The keepers of the walls took my cloak away from me.
8I adjure you, daughters of Jerusalem, If you find my beloved, that you tell him that I am faint with love. Friends
9How is your beloved better than another beloved, you fairest among women? How is your beloved better than another beloved, that you do so adjure us? Beloved
10My beloved is white and ruddy. The best among ten thousand.
11His head is like the purest gold. His hair is bushy, black as a raven.
12His eyes are like doves beside the water brooks, washed with milk, mounted like jewels.
13His cheeks are like a bed of spices with towers of perfumes. His lips are like lilies, dropping liquid myrrh.
14His hands are like rings of gold set with beryl. His body is like ivory work overlaid with sapphires.
15His legs are like pillars of marble set on sockets of fine gold. His appearance is like Lebanon, excellent as the cedars.
16His mouth is sweetness; yes, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, daughters of Jerusalem.