9 How 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
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Section 5:9-6:3: The bride's commendation of the beloved. In the allegorical interpretations of Jewish expositors all is here spoken by exiled Israel of the Holy One whose praise she sings "by the waters of Babylon" Psalm 137:1. Christian interpreters apply the description directly to the Incarnate Son, partly in His Eternal Godhead, but chiefly in His risen and glorified Humanity.
What is thy beloved more than another beloved - This question gives the bride an opportunity to break out into a highly wrought description of the beauty and perfections of her spouse.
(h) What [is] thy beloved more than [another] beloved, O thou fairest among women? what [is] thy beloved more than [another] beloved, that thou dost so charge us?
(h) Thus say they of Jerusalem.
What is thy beloved more than another beloved, O thou fairest among women?.... The same title Christ gives her, Song 1:8; and from whom these daughters seem to have taken it; and, in giving it to her, might be assured they were right, since he, who knew her perfectly well, so calls her; in what sense she was so fair; see Gill on Song 1:8, and this they used, to show their esteem of her, and that they were willing to do all the service they could for her; and what made them so attentive to her charge, and so desirous of knowing her beloved; since they concluded he must be some extraordinary person that one so fair and beautiful as she was should make the object of her love and choice: for this question they put, not in a scornful and disdainful way; nor to shift off any trouble from themselves, through the charge she gave them; nor as altogether ignorant of her beloved, for some knowledge they had, though but small; but as desirous of knowing more of him, and of hearing his excellencies set forth, and especially those which distinguished him from the beloveds of all others: with some, the world, its riches and grandeur, are their beloved; with others, the sinful lusts and pleasures of this life; with others, the praises and applause of men; and with others near and dear relations; and, with all, self: but with a true believer in Christ, he is preferable to them all; to riches, pleasures, honours; to all creatures, and creature enjoyments; and self, in every sense of it, is parted with for him; he is fairer, wiser, and richer, than all others. And this question is repeated by the daughters,
what is thy beloved more than another beloved? to show their surprise it the charge given them; the suspicion they had of peculiar excellencies in her beloved; and to declare their seriousness and earnestness to know more of Christ; and their importunity to have a speedy answer; and the rather for what follows:
that thou dost so charge us? so awfully and solemnly, so seriously and strictly, with so much warmth and vehemence.
Even those who have little acquaintance with Christ, cannot but see amiable beauty in others who bear his image. There are hopes of those who begin to inquire concerning Christ and his perfections. Christians, who are well acquainted with Christ themselves, should do all they can to make others know something of him. Divine glory makes him truly lovely in the eyes of all who are enlightened to discern spiritual things. He is white in the spotless innocence of his life, ruddy in the bleeding sufferings he went through at his death. This description of the person of the Beloved, would form, in the figurative language of those times, a portrait of beauty of person and of grace of manners; but the aptness of some of the allusions may not appear to us. He shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all that believe. May his love constrain us to live to his glory.
Her own beauty (Ezekiel 16:14), and lovesickness for Him, elicit now their enquiry (Matthew 5:16); heretofore "other lords besides Him had dominion over them"; thus they had seen "no beauty in Him" (Isaiah 26:13; Isaiah 53:2).
When, therefore, they put to her the question:
9 What is thy beloved before another (beloved),
Thou fairest of women?
What is thy beloved before another (beloved),
That thou dost adjure us thus?
the question thus asked cannot proceed from ignorance; it can only have the object of giving them the opportunity of hearing from Shulamith's own mouth and heart her laudatory description of him, whom they also loved, although they were not deemed worthy to stand so near to him as she did who was thus questioned. Bttch. and Ewald, secs. 325a, 326a, interpret the מן in מדּור partitively: quid amati (as in Cicero: quod hominis) amatus tuus; but then the words would have been מה־מדוד דודך, if such a phrase were admissible; for מה־דוד certainly of itself alone means quid amati, what kind of a beloved. Thus the מן is the comparative (prae amato), and דּוד the sing., representing the idea of species or kind; מדּודים, here easily misunderstood, is purposely avoided. The use of the form השׁבעתנו for השׁבעתּינו is one of the many instances of the disregard of the generic distinction occurring in this Song, which purposely, after the manner of the vulgar language, ignores pedantic regularity.
What is - Wherein doth he excel them? Believers might ask this, that they might be more fully informed of it.
*More commentary available at chapter level.