Song of Songs 5:2-8
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
A Fruitless Search
2 W(A) I was sleeping, but my heart was awake.[a]
The sound of my lover knocking!
“Open to me, my sister, my friend,
my dove, my perfect one!
For my head is wet with dew,
my hair, with the moisture of the night.”
3 I have taken off my robe,[b]
am I then to put it on?
I have bathed my feet,
am I then to soil them?
4 My lover put his hand in through the opening:
my innermost being[c] trembled because of him.
5 I rose to open for my lover,
my hands dripping myrrh:
My fingers, flowing myrrh
upon the handles of the lock.
6 I opened for my lover—
but my lover had turned and gone!
At his leaving, my soul sank.
I sought him, but I did not find him;
I called out after him, but he did not answer me.[d]
7 The watchmen[e] found me,
as they made their rounds in the city;
They beat me, they wounded me,
they tore off my mantle,
the watchmen of the walls.
8 (B)I adjure you, Daughters of Jerusalem,
if you find my lover
What shall you tell him?
that I am sick with love.
Footnotes
- 5:2–8 An experience of anticipation and loss similar to that in 3:1–5. The lover’s abrupt appearance resembles that in 2:8–9.
- 5:3 Robe: knee-length undergarment worn by men and women. Am I then…?: the woman’s refusal is a form of gentle teasing; that she does not really reject her lover is shown by her actions in vv. 5–6. See 1:7–8; 2:14–15, for other teasing interchanges.
- 5:4 My innermost being: lit., “innards.” In Gn 25:23, Is 49:1; Ps 71:6, the word appears to carry the meaning of “womb.”
- 5:6 The motif of the locked-out lover is common in classical Greek and Latin poetry.
- 5:7 The watchmen: they do not know the reason for the woman’s appearance in the city streets; cf. 3:2–4.
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