15. The Song of Solomon
The book of the Hebrew Bible known as both the Song of Songs and the Song of Solomon is unusual in that it is the only book of what Christians refer to as the Old Testament that is not directed toward the God of Israel, law, prophecy, nor wisdom. It is in its entirety a paean to love and intimacy. Jewish tradition describes it as reflecting the relationship between God and his chosen people; Christian tradition holds it as describing the relationship between Christ and his church. The book is largely a dialogue between lovers, initiated by a woman who asks her lover to meet, only to receive a flirtatious reply. The second verse of the book begins its promiscuous references, “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy love is better than wine.
The seventh chapter of the Song of Solomon includes a man’s description of his lover. “Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor: thy belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies” it proclaims, after first praising her feet and thighs as “the work of the hands of a cunning workman”. The male lover proclaims of her, “This thy stature is like to a palm tree, and thy breasts to clusters of grapes”. The man then announces his intention to ascend the palm tree and seize the grapes, “I will go up to the palm tree, I will take hold of the boughs thereof, now also thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine…” The description of the woman is in response to hers of her lover in a preceding chapter of the Song of Solomon.
