The Song of Solomon includes a beautiful revelation for us. Jonathan Edwards explains that the very title, “Song of Songs,” creates in us high expectations of its content:
The name Solomon gives to this song reinforces my idea that it is more than an ordinary love song, and that it was designed to be a divine song, and of divine authority, because we we read in 1 Kings 4.32, that Solomon “composed a thousand and five songs”. This he calls the Song of Songs ( Ca 1.1 ), which means that it is the most excellent of all his canticles, which seems to me to be very probable because of this title because it was a song on the most excellent subject, that of love, union, and communion between Christ and his bride, of which marriage and conjugal love are but a shadow 1.
There are two main characters in the Song of Solomon: the lover and the beloved. The lover is a shepherd king, like David ( Ca 1:4, 7 ), but he is the Son of David ( Ca 3:7 ). He stands at the door and knocks ( Ca 5:2 , 3 ). In chapter 3, his litter resembles the tabernacle, the temple, and like the Lord in Exodus, he comes from the desert in a pillar of smoke ( Ca 3:6 ), and his fragrance resembles the smells in the temple. The beloved is described as Israel in the exodus, arriving from the wilderness, “leaning on her beloved” ( Ca 8:5 ). Like Israel in Isaiah 5:1-S7, she is repeatedly compared to a vineyard and Jerusalem ( Ca 8:10-12 ). The wife is also a sister ( Ca 4:9 ): Christ is the husband and brother, but since marrying a sister is taboo according to Leviticus 18:9, it is very unlikely that this could describe an ordinary Jewish romance.
Song of Songs and Christ Jesus
Death usually separates lovers, but the love of these two lovers is as strong as death. Not even floods could wash it away ( Ca 8:6, 7 ). It is as if the Song of Solomon was written primarily to describe this unique love story between Christ and the Church. And the similarity of the book as a whole to Psalm 45, which the New Testament cites about Christ, is surprising. It is therefore not surprising that the Song of Songs, like Revelation, ends with the wife calling the bridegroom.
How beautiful you are, oh my friend, like Tirtsa. You are superb like Jerusalem and formidable like the soldiers arrayed under their banner… Who then is she who appears like the dawn and who is beautiful as the moon, bright as the sun, and formidable as the soldiers arrayed under their banner? ( Ca 6.4, 10, BDS.)
The wife is like an army. And it is as bright as the sun, with the reflected beauty of the moon. At first a shy young girl ( Ca 1.5-7 ), she is now formidable. As the face of Moses reflected the glory of the Lord, the Church reflected the awesome magnificence of the Bridegroom. The apostle Paul taught that through the Spirit believers are transformed into the image of Christ “from glory to glory” ( 2 Cor 3:18 ). But here we read that the Song of Solomon specifies that this transformation consists of growing by reflecting the awesome aspect of Christ.
A transformed Church
Led by the Spirit in conformity with Christ, the Church begins to manifest to the world the awesome divine qualities: holiness, blessedness, happiness, fullness, and beauty. Thus, the Church shines like the moon in the darkness, arousing both wonder and fear. Believers become like the solid people who live in paradise in CS Lewis’s The Great Divorce: their wholeness and loving joy are fearsome in the eyes of others. This mixture is deeply attractive and inexplicable, but at the same time disturbing to unbelievers because of the way it reveals their corruption and grumpiness. In the fear of God, believers become, like their God, happily and magnificently formidable.
