Q. How should a Catholic read the Song of Songs? Is it a poetic commentary on marriage that isn’t afraid to get explicit, or is there more to it?
A. The Song of Songs is a beautiful book of marital imagery, and its overt romance should not scare away Catholic readers. Sexuality and marriage are the crowning beauty of the love of man and woman. It is good to read the Song as an exaltation of human marriage, but there are deeper ways to read it as well. In the tradition of the Church, the Lover and the Beloved—the main characters of the book—have often been interpreted as Christ and the human soul, or Christ and the Church. The two characters may also symbolize the Holy Spirit and His spouse, the Blessed Virgin.
The romance between Christ and the soul is discernible throughout the book. This interpretation is supported by Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335-394) in his Commentary on the Song of Songs: “The text says that the bride is the soul; God is called a bridegroom whom the soul loves with her whole heart, soul and strength.” This metaphor of Christ and the soul most poignantly appears in the paraklausithyron (Grk: “lament beside a door”) of chapter 5:
Hark! my beloved is knocking.
“Open to me, my sister, my love. . . .”
I opened to my beloved,
but my beloved had turned and gone. . . .
I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
if you find my beloved,
that you tell him
I am sick with love (vv. 2, 6, 8).
At first this scene might appear to be a simple play between human lovers, but chapter 5 creates an image of the soul thrilling at the approach of God and wasting away when it does not feel His presence. Later in the chapter, the Beloved tells her friends: “[My Lover’s] speech is most sweet, // and he is altogether desirable” (5:16).
The phrase “altogether desirable” makes one think of the infinite beauty of divinity. It is easy to read nearly every verse of the Song as a dialogue between the soul’s recognition of God’s worth and God’s passionate pursuit of the soul.
But while the Beloved can be the soul, she can also represent the Church, the Bride of Christ (see Ephesians 5:28-29). Origen (c. 186-253) says: “The appellations of Bride and Bridegroom denote either the Church in her relation to Christ, or the soul in her union with the Word of God.” The Song displays this marriage with dramatic passion. The Lover says: “You are beautiful as Tirzah, my love, // comely as Jerusalem, // terrible as an army with banners” (6:4).
Jerusalem was the capital of the Old Covenant and, in Scripture, a metaphor for the Church (cf. Galatians 4:21-31; Hebrews 12:22-24; Revelation 21:2). By calling his Beloved “Jerusalem” in the Song 6:4, the Lover hints that He is Christ speaking of His all-beautiful Church. And the following line, “terrible as an army with banners,” confirms this Church imagery. The Crusades come to mind.
The Song of Songs holds at least one more mystical interpretation: the Lover as the Holy Spirit and the Beloved as Mary. This reading is more difficult to see in the text, but the Lover speaks of His Beloved as the only perfect woman, suggesting the Immaculate Conception: “You are all fair, my love; // there is no flaw in you” (4:7). Again, “My dove, my perfect one, is only one, // the darling of her mother, // flawless to her that bore her” (6:9).
Chapter 4 also implies that the Beloved is an inviolate virgin, further developing the Song’s Marian imagery: “A garden locked is my sister, my bride, // a garden locked, a fountain sealed” (4:12). Just as the Beloved is “sealed,” so also was Mary perpetually “sealed” from the advances of men.
Additionally, the Church has interpreted the white lily, which image appears eight times in the Song, as a symbol of Mary’s virginal purity. This Marian imagery appears most strongly when the Lover says: “As a lily among brambles, // so is my love among maidens” (2:2). Not only is the Beloved compared to a lily (suggesting immaculate purity), but the mention of brambles emphasizes her superiority among all women on the earth (see Luke 1:42).
These verses are only partial examples of this interpretation; in fact, the whole book can be read with an eye towards this Marian metaphor.
Christ and the soul, Christ and the Church, and the Holy Spirit and Mary are all beautiful readings of the ardent love poetry of the Song of Songs. Regardless, Catholic readers should remember that the Song of Songs is, first and foremost, the ultimate love letter of God to the whole human race. The crucial message of this book is found in the woman’s words: “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine” (6:3).
This question was answered by Andrew Winter, summer intern with the Emmaus Institute for Biblical Studies in Lincoln. For more information, visit www.emmausinstitute.net.
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