Song of Solomon 4

Easy-to-Read Version

He Speaks to Her

4 My darling, you are so beautiful!
    Oh, you are beautiful!
Your eyes are like doves
    under your veil.
Your hair is long and flowing,
    like little goats dancing down the slopes of Mount Gilead.
²Your teeth are white like ewes^[a]
    just coming from their bath.
They all give birth to twins;
    not one of them has lost a baby.
³Your lips are like a red silk thread.
    Your mouth is beautiful.
Your cheeks under your veil
    are like two slices of pomegranate.
⁴Your neck is long and thin
    like David’s tower.
That tower was built to be decorated^[b]
    with a thousand shields on its walls,
    with the shields of powerful soldiers.
⁵Your breasts are like twin fawns,
    like twins of a gazelle,
    feeding among the lilies.
⁶I will go to that mountain of myrrh
    and to that hill of frankincense
while the day breathes its last breath,
    and the shadows run away.
⁷My darling, you are beautiful all over.
    Every part of you is perfect.
⁸Come with me, my bride, from Lebanon.
    Come with me from Lebanon.
Come from the peak of Amana,^[c]
    from the top of Senir^[d] and Hermon,
    from the lion’s caves,
    from the mountain of the leopards.
⁹My darling,^[e] my bride, you excite me!
    You have stolen my heart with just one quick look from your eyes,
    with just one of the jewels from your necklace.
¹⁰Your love is so beautiful, my darling, my bride!
    Your love is better than wine.
The smell of your perfume
    is better than any kind of spice!
¹¹My bride, your lips drip honey.
    Honey and milk are under your tongue.
Your clothes smell as sweet as perfume.^[f]
¹²My darling, my bride,
    you are pure like a locked garden.
You are like a locked pool,
    a closed fountain.
¹³Your limbs are like a garden
    filled with pomegranates and other pleasant fruit,
with all the best spices:
    henna,^[g]

¹⁴nard, saffron,^[h] calamus,^[i] and cinnamon.^[j]

Your limbs are like a garden
    filled with trees of frankincense, myrrh, and aloe.
¹⁵You are like a garden fountain—
    a well of fresh water—
    flowing down from the mountains of Lebanon.

She Speaks

¹⁶Wake up, north wind.
    Come, south wind.
Blow on my garden.
    Spread its sweet smell.
Let my lover enter his garden
    and eat its pleasant fruit.

Footnotes

Song of Solomon 4:2 ewes Female goats.
Song of Solomon 4:4 Your neck … decorated Or “Your neck is like David’s tower, built with rows of stone.” This would mean she wore many necklaces, one above the other, which looked like rows of stone in a tower.
Song of Solomon 4:8 Amana The name of a mountain in Lebanon.
Song of Solomon 4:8 Senir The Amorite word for “Snow Mountain.” This means Mount Hermon.
Song of Solomon 4:9 darling Literally, “sister.” Also in verses 10, 11; 5:1, 2.
Song of Solomon 4:11 perfume Or “Lebanon.”
Song of Solomon 4:13 henna A plant with sweet-smelling, blue-yellow flowers that grows in clusters (groups) like grapes.
Song of Solomon 4:14 saffron A kind of yellow flower used in making perfume.
Song of Solomon 4:14 calamus A kind of reed plant used in making perfume.
Song of Solomon 4:14 cinnamon A kind of plant used as a spice and in making perfume.