Song of Songs 1:3-5
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
3 better than the fragrance of your perfumes.[a]
Your name is a flowing perfume—
therefore young women love you.
4 (A)Draw me after you! Let us run![b]
The king has brought me to his bed chambers.
Let us exult and rejoice in you;
let us celebrate your love: it is beyond wine!
Rightly do they love you!
Love’s Boast
5 W I am black and beautiful,
Daughters of Jerusalem[c]—
Like the tents of Qedar,
like the curtains of Solomon.
Footnotes
- 1:3 Your perfumes: shemen (perfume) is a play on shem (name).
- 1:4 Another change, but from second to third person (cf. 1:2). The “king” metaphor recurs in 1:12; 3:5–11; 7:6. Let us exult: perhaps she is addressing young women, calling on them to join in the praise of her lover.
- 1:5 Daughters of Jerusalem: the woman contrasts herself with the elite city women, who act as her female “chorus” (5:9; 6:1). Qedar: a Syrian desert region whose name suggests darkness; tents were often made of black goat hair. Curtains: tent coverings, or tapestries. Solomon: it could also be read Salma, a region close to Qedar.
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