8:5 Like the important aside in Job 28—which stops to ask “From where, then, does wisdom come?” (Job 28:20) and to answer “The fear of the Lord, that is wisdom” (Job 28:28)—these verses in the Song, for the first and only time, take a step back from the action of the drama in order to define love. In two poetic styles (Song 8:5; 8:6–7) two images are provided. The first image is that of the bride “leaning on her beloved” as they return to his childhood home (v. 5; cf. her home mentioned in 3:4; 8:2). The “who” in verse 5 is the bride, “her beloved” is her husband, and those asking the question “Who is that coming up from the wilderness, leaning on her beloved?” are likely the daughters of Jerusalem. Like King Solomon (the first five words in Hb. are the same as in 3:6), this ordinary bride and groom return home in royal fashion. And, like Israel’s coming out of Egypt into Canaan, their love has brought them to their own land flowing with milk and honey, as well as mandrakes, pomegranates, apples, and spiced wine. We do not know if they are newlyweds returning home from their honeymoon or an old couple back from their thousandth stroll in fifty years of marriage. The timing is not important, for the image is what matters: she is leaning on him. Such leaning (we can picture her head resting on his chest) is a symbol of closeness and security.

After his climbing her like a palm tree and her drinking in his kisses like sips of wine, this image is striking. It is nonsexual. Since her plea in 1:2, every scene has ended with images of sexual union. Here, however, in the final section of the Song, the images are not highly erotic but simply affectionate. This is a window into the world of mature intimacy, one that celebrates friendship (“This is my beloved . . . my friend”; 5:16) as much as it does sex (“Be drunk with love”; 5:1).

Next, the mention of the “apple tree” and his birth (“There your mother was in labor with you”) reintroduces the theme that the union of one man and one woman is more than one couple. It is a family affair. The “apple tree” might merely refer to the tree of their first meeting, date, kiss, or more (“I awakened you”; cf. the word “awaken” with the chorus, 2:7; 3:5; 8:4, where one is not to awaken sexual desires), or it could represent the “family tree,” the sense being:

    ’neath the shades of family tree,

    branches of maternal pedigree.38

Whatever symbolism we should attach to the tree, the lines about the groom’s mother in labor “there” and giving birth to him highlights a flow of family history. There was love, arousal, sex, conception, and babies before them. Now this couple gladly carves their names into the family tree and looks forward to adding their children’s names. They do not stand outside their family genealogies. Their publicly inaugurated and community celebrated covenant love is bigger than their personal and private love for each other.

8:6–7 A person’s personal “seal”—sometimes called a “signet ring” (Gen. 41:42; Hag. 2:23)—was an ancient way of proving identity and granting approval. The bride’s request then (“Set me as a seal upon your heart . . . [and] arm”) is an expression of their covenant commitment. This would be similar to a wedding ring today. Deeply and inwardly (“heart”) and publicly and externally (“arm”), they are bound together.

The reasons for this commitment follow. Two images of permanence are given: “death” and the “very flame of the Lord.” The first image is presented with poetic parallelisms, in which “love” and “jealousy” are parallel, as are “death” and “the grave.” The second two images make the first two more concrete. That is, the single-minded loyalty of “love” is like godly “jealousy,” and the power of love is as strong as that place no one digs himself out of: “the grave.” The second image is the “flame of the Lord.”39 That God-fire is described as something that even the “waters” (parallel “floods”) cannot put out (“quench”/“drown”). This extraordinary and Almighty flame of divine love “never ends” (1 Cor. 13:8).

Because such love has a permanence about it, it follows that “if a man offered for love all the wealth of his house, he would be utterly despised” (Song 8:7). This is perhaps a critique of King Solomon, who collected whatever his “eyes desired”: pools and places, wine and women, gardens and gold (Eccles. 2:1–10; Song 8:11–12). Love is not only much better than gold; it cannot be sold for any price or compared to any material possession. Money has no bearing on love because money is temporary while God-sealed love lives on.

8:8–12 It is difficult to know whose voice is heard in Song of Solomon 8:8–9. It could be that of the daughters of Jerusalem, who appear and reappear at the author’s purposeful whim. More likely, it is the bride’s brothers (who were displayed in a negative light in Song 1:6, and now in a positive one) who are speaking.40 Verse 8 presents a serious and literal question: they want to know what to do when some suitor asks to marry their prepubescent (“She has no breasts”) sister. Their reply is straightforward. If she is a “wall” (a virgin), she will be rewarded with their blessing and support (they “will build on her a battlement of silver”). They will honor, celebrate, and adorn her self-protection with military splendor. She will be rewarded for her victory. However, if she is a “door” (has lost her virginity, been promiscuous, or perhaps just been overly flirtatious), they will make her a cedar chastity belt (“enclose her with boards of cedar”).

In verse 10 the bride’s solo rises above the voices of her sibling’s virginity vigilance. She sings (even boasts!) of her purity. In two lines she recalls the story of the Song. She “was a wall” even though she was sexually mature and well developed (“My breasts were like towers”).41 Though alluring, she was impregnable. “Then” she got married and made love, and her beloved saw that she found “peace.” The word “peace” fits well the context of the earlier military metaphors—wall, towers, battlements of silver. Her prince of peace has conquered her. Her wall is penetrated, and her towers have fallen into his hands. His banner of love (cf. 2:4) now flies over the city fortress. His victory has brought peace (Hb. shalom) to her, him, and the whole community (mother, siblings, and daughters of Jerusalem).

From the purity-leads-to-peace theme, a second motivation for waiting for marriage is explored: freedom. This idea is conveyed clearly with the contrast between King Solomon’s vineyard (“vineyard at Baal-hamon”) and the bride’s “vineyard.” Solomon’s vineyard might be an actual vineyard he owned, which was so large that he had to rent it out (“let out”) to tenant farmers to make for him an astronomical sum (each one paying him a “thousand pieces of silver”; 8:11). He owned it, but because it was a distance from Jerusalem, he never had the pleasure of watching it being cultivated or of eating directly from the fruit of its vines. Solomon’s vineyard could also symbolize his harem (6:8–10), comprising seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines (1 Kings 11:3).

Whether the “vineyard” in Song of Solomon 8:11 is some vast land Solomon owned or, more likely, an allusion to his harem, in verse 12 the bride compares his vineyard to hers. Pretending to address Solomon, she taunts the king who knows nothing of the peace and freedom of one man/one woman/one marriage. His sexual exploits with “many concubines” (Eccles. 2:8) have bought him brokenness, not wholeness. While the Song’s couple knows something of love in a fallen world—for example, the sadness of separation and the sorrow of selfishness—they model a marriage far removed from Solomon’s accumulation of wives as a means of political security and financial advancement. Their love celebrates genuine sexual liberation.

8:13–14 Still working within the theme of freedom and the contrast of Solomon, the bride and the beloved speak directly to each other. He invites her to speak (Song 8:13), and she speaks. She invites him to intimacy (v. 14). Her “mountains” (breasts; cf. 2:17; 4:6) are his to climb; her vineyard (body) is his alone to explore and enjoy. The “wall,” through which no men were allowed (8:10), has now become a vineyard (v. 12; cf. 2:15; 7:9; cf. 4:12–5:1), a place of pleasure for only one man—her “beloved” (8:14). In essence she says, “No need to travel seven days up north. Make haste, you swift, graceful, potent, and passionate animal (my stag!). Come now into this vineyard. Taste freely these spiced mountains.” Solomon, who seemingly has all the freedom in the world, has been enslaved by his own overindulgence. He has too much land and too many ladies for one man to handle. His vineyard is at Baal-hamon—which literally means “lord of wealth,” or perhaps even “husband of a crowd.” Here Solomon’s polygamy, with its expenses and complications, is contrasted with the couple’s monogamous love. Their love is simple, direct, beautiful, pure, and free. They are free to travel to each other and to eat of each other’s fruit whenever they want.

The Song ends with two last lines from each lover. He invites her to speak: “O you who dwell in the gardens [the symbol of their bodies, but here the sphere of their lovemaking], with companions listening for your voice; let me hear it” (v. 13). She invites him to intimacy:

    Make haste [“hasten towards me” is the sense],42 my beloved,

    and be like a gazelle

    or a young stag

    on the mountains of spices. (v. 14; cf. 2:17)

We can notice two important details. First, we see (again!) the expression of unquenchable passion. “She is calling on him to make love to her,” as Duane Garrett frankly phrases it.43 We wonder if they will ever give it a break. Second, the Song ends with eschatology! That is, when we read these final two verses, we are left with longing. This is a surprise ending to the drama. After all we have seen and heard, we might have expected another consummation conclusion (“I went into my garden”), a final declaration of mutual love (“Now and finally, my beloved is mine and I am his”), or even the refrain one last time (“Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires”). But instead the book ends with arms stretched out to each other—two lovers wanting to touch but not yet touching.