Old/New Testament
Title
1 The Most Beautiful Song by Solomon.
The Loved One
2 Let him kiss me over and over again![a]
Your love is better than wine.
3 The fragrance of your perfumed oil is wonderful.
Your name is perfume poured out.
Therefore the young women love you.
4 Take me with[b] you! Let’s run away!
Let the king bring me into his private chambers.
The Young Women
The daughters[c] of Jerusalem[d] will rejoice and be happy for you.
We will value your love more than wine.
They love you appropriately.
The Loved One
5 The daughters[e] of Jerusalem, I’m dark and lovely
like the tents of Kedar,
like the curtains of Solomon.
6 Don’t stare at me because I’m dark;
the sun has tanned me.
My mother’s sons were angry with me.
They made me the caretaker of the vineyards,
but I didn’t take care of my own vineyard.
7 Tell me, you whom I love,
where do you graze your flock?
Where do you make your flock lie down[f] at noon?
Why should I be considered a veiled woman[g]
beside the flocks of your companions?
The Lover
8 If you don’t know, most beautiful of women,
go out after the flock and graze your young goats beside the shepherd’s tents.
9 My darling, I compare you to a[h] mare
among Pharaoh’s chariots.
10 Your cheeks are lovely with ornaments,
your neck with strings of jewels.
The Young Women
11 We will make ornaments of gold for you,
accented with silver.
The Loved One
12 While the king was sitting at his table,
my perfume sent forth its fragrance.
13 My beloved is to me a pouch of myrrh[i]
that lies between my breasts all night.
14 My beloved is to me a cluster of henna[j] blossoms
in the vineyards of En-gedi.
The Lover
15 Look at you! You are beautiful, my darling.
Look at you! You are so beautiful.
Your eyes are doves.
The Loved One
16 Look at you! You are handsome, my beloved, truly lovely.
How lush is our couch.
17 The beams of our house are cedar,[k]
our rafters are pine.
2 I’m a flower[l] from Sharon,
a lily of the valleys.
The Lover
2 Like a lily among thorns,
so is my darling among the young women.
The Loved One
3 Like an apple[m] tree among the trees of the forest,
so is my beloved among the young men.
In his shade I take delight and sit down,
and his fruit is sweet to my taste.[n]
4 He has brought me to the banquet hall,
and his banner over me is love.
5 Sustain me with raisin cakes,
refresh me with apples,[o]
for I’m weak with love.
6 I wish that his left hand were under my head,
and that his right hand were embracing me!
7 Swear to me, young women of Jerusalem,
by the gazelles or by the does of the field,
that you won’t awaken or arouse love
before its proper time![p]
8 The voice of my beloved!
Look! He’s coming,
leaping over the mountains,
bounding over the hills.
9 My beloved is like a gazelle or a young stag.
Look, there he stands behind our wall,
looking through the windows,
gazing through the lattice.
The Lover
10 My beloved spoke to me:
“Get up, my darling, my beautiful one, and come on.
11 Look! Winter is past.
The rain is over and gone.
12 Blossoms have appeared in the land.
The season of songbirds[q] has arrived,
and cooing of turtledoves is heard in our land.
13 The fig tree has produced its fruit,[r]
the grapevines have blossomed and exude their fragrance.
“Get up, my darling, my beautiful one, and come on.
14 My dove, in the hidden places of the rocks,
in the secret places of the cliffs,
show me your form, and let me hear your voice.
For your voice is pleasant,
and your shape is lovely.
15 Catch the foxes for us,
the little foxes that destroy the vineyards,
our vineyards that are in bloom.”
The Loved One
16 My beloved belongs to me and I belong to him.
He is the one who shepherds his flock among the lilies.
17 Until the day breaks[s] and the shadows flee,
turn around, my beloved,
and be like a gazelle or a young stag
on the rugged mountains.[t]
The Loved One
3 Night after night on my bed,
I sought the one I love;
I sought him, but didn’t find him.
2 I’ll get up and go all around the city,
throughout the streets, and in the squares.
I’ll seek the one I love.
I sought him, but didn’t find him.
3 The watchmen who go all around the city found me.
I asked,[u] “Have you seen the one I love?”
4 I had just passed them
when I found the one I love.
I held him and wouldn’t let him go
until I brought him to my mother’s house,
to the room of the one who conceived me.
5 Swear to me, young women of Jerusalem,
by the gazelles or by the does of the field,
that you won’t awaken or arouse love
before its proper time![v]
The Lover Arrives
6 What[w] is this coming up from the desert
like columns of smoke,
perfumed with myrrh[x] and incense[y]
from all the fragrant powders of the merchant?
7 Look! It’s Solomon’s sedan chair,[z]
with 60 of the best soldiers in Israel[aa] surrounding it.
8 All of them are wearing swords and are
experienced in battle.
Each has his sword on his thigh,
ready for the terror of the night.[ab]
9 King Solomon made the sedan chair for himself
from the trees of Lebanon.
10 He made its posts of silver,
its back of gold.
Its seat was purple,
and its interior was lovingly inlaid
by the young women of Jerusalem.
11 Come out, young women of Zion,
and see King Solomon with the crown
with which his mother crowned him
on his wedding day—
his day of great delight.[ac]
How Paul Was Accepted by the Apostles in Jerusalem
2 Then fourteen years later, I again went up to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus with me. 2 I went in response to a revelation, and in a private meeting with the reputed leaders, I explained to them the gospel that I’m proclaiming to the gentiles. I did this because I was afraid that[a] I was running or had run my life’s race[b] for nothing. 3 But not even Titus, who was with me, was forced to be circumcised, even though he was a Greek. 4 However, false brothers were secretly brought in. They slipped in to spy on the freedom we have in the Messiah[c] Jesus so that they might enslave us. 5 But we did not give in to them for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might always remain with you.
6 Now those who were reputed to be important added nothing to my message.[d] (What sort of people they were makes no difference to me, since God pays no attention to outward appearances.) 7 In fact, they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel for the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel for the circumcised. 8 For the one who worked through Peter by making him an apostle to the circumcised also worked through me by sending me to the gentiles. 9 So when James, Cephas,[e] and John (who were reputed to be leaders)[f] recognized the grace that had been given me, they gave Barnabas and me the right hand of fellowship, agreeing that we should go to the gentiles and they to the circumcised. 10 The only thing they asked us to do was to remember the destitute, the very thing I was eager to do.
Paul Confronts Cephas in Antioch
11 But when Cephas[g] came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly wrong.[h] 12 Until some men arrived from James, he was in the habit of eating with the gentiles, but after those men[i] came, he withdrew from the gentiles[j] and would not associate with them any longer, because he was afraid of the circumcision party. 13 The other Jews also joined him in this hypocritical behavior, to the extent that even Barnabas was caught up in their hypocrisy. 14 But when I saw that they were not acting consistently with the truth of the gospel, I told Cephas[k] in front of everyone, “Though you are a Jew, you have been living like a gentile and not like a Jew. So how can you insist that the gentiles must live like Jews?”
Jews, Like Gentiles, are Saved by Faith
15 We ourselves are Jews by birth, and not gentile sinners, 16 yet we know that a person is not justified by doing what the Law requires,[l] but rather by the faithfulness of Jesus[m] the Messiah.[n] We, too, have believed in the Messiah[o] Jesus so that we might be justified by the faithfulness of[p] the Messiah[q] and not by doing what the Law requires, for no human being[r] will be justified by doing what the Law requires. 17 Now if we, while trying to be justified by the Messiah,[s] have been found to be sinners, does that mean that the Messiah[t] is serving the interests of sin? Of course not! 18 For if I rebuild something that I tore down, I demonstrate that I am a wrongdoer. 19 For through the Law I died to the Law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with the Messiah.[u] 20 I no longer live, but the Messiah[v] lives in me, and the life that I am now living in this body I live by the faithfulness of the Son of God,[w] who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I do not misapply God’s grace, for if righteousness comes about by doing what the Law requires, then the Messiah[x] died for nothing.
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