(At first glance, we may think that the Song of Solomon is about a love story between Solomon and the Shulamite woman.

However, it appears that there is another, a shepherd, whom she really loves.

Solomon grew up in a palace, not as a shepherd like his father did.

Also, Solomon had 700 wives, and it is not a love story to be trapped in a harem with 700 other women, in the same situation.)

 

Song 1:7 Tell me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou feedest, where thou makest thy flock to rest at noon: for why should I be as one that turneth aside by the flocks of thy companions?

  8 If thou know not, O thou fairest among women, go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock, and feed thy kids beside the shepherds’ tents.

 

(Her shepherd lover does not live in the palace, but out in the field with the flocks.

He apparently was a shepherd way up in the north, in the Lebanon area.

He compares her to the precious things in his life, the sheep and the flocks, like our great Shepherd, Jesus, does with us:)

 

Song 4:1 Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair; thou hast doves’ eyes within thy locks: thy hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from mount Gilead.

  2 Thy teeth are like a flock of sheep that are even shorn, which came up from the washing; whereof every one bear twins, and none is barren among them.

  8 Come with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with me from Lebanon: look from the top of Amana, from the top of Shenir and Hermon, from the lions’ dens, from the mountains of the leopards.

 

(When she ended up away from her shepherd lover, she knew that she had to search for him.

The world knew Solomon and where he was, in the palace, but the world doesn’t know the shepherd or where he is:)

 

Song 3:1 By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loveth: I sought him, but I found him not.

  2 I will rise now, and go about the city in the streets, and in the broad ways I will seek him whom my soul loveth: I sought him, but I found him not.

  3 The watchmen that go about the city found me: to whom I said, Saw ye him whom my soul loveth?

  4 It was but a little that I passed from them, but I found him whom my soul loveth: I held him, and would not let him go, until I had brought him into my mother’s house, and into the chamber of her that conceived me.

 

(One of the wives of the harem wouldn’t bring Solomon from the palace to her mother’s house.

But we have the privilege to bring the good Shepherd to our families, and to share the gospel with them.)

 

(Again, when she found herself away from her shepherd, she searched for him, and was mistreated by the world for this:)

 

Song 5:7 The watchmen that went about the city found me, they smote me, they wounded me; the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me.

 

(Still, she knows that that she must return to her shepherd, and when asked, she tells them that he is chiefest among then thousand:)

 

Song 5:8 I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my beloved, that ye tell him, that I am sick of love.

  9 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?

  10 My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand.

 

(She knows, as we do of our good shepherd, that one day he will say to us:)

 

Song 2:10 My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away.