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Song of Songs 6

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1 ἀδελφιδός μου κατέβη εἰς κῆπον αὐτοῦ εἰς φιάλας τοῦ ἀρώματος ποιμαίνειν ἐν κήποις καὶ συλλέγειν κρίνα 2 ἐγὼ τῷ ἀδελφιδῷ μου καὶ ἀδελφιδός μου ἐμοὶ ὁ ποιμαίνων ἐν τοῖς κρίνοις

1 Where should he be, my true love, but among the spices; where but in his garden, gathering the lilies? 2 All mine, my true love, and I all his; ever he would choose the lilies for his pasture-ground.[1]

1

Sponsa. Dilectus meus descendit in hortum suum ad areolam aromatum,
ut pascatur in hortis, et lilia colligat. 2
Ego dilecto meo, et dilectus meus mihi,
qui pascitur inter lilia.

3 καλὴ εἶ ἡ πλησίον μου ὡς εὐδοκία ὡραία ὡς Ιερουσαλημ θάμβος ὡς τεταγμέναι 4 ἀπόστρεψον ὀφθαλμούς σου ἀπεναντίον μου ὅτι αὐτοὶ ἀνεπτέρωσάν με τρίχωμά σου ὡς ἀγέλαι τῶν αἰγῶν αἳ ἀνεφάνησαν ἀπὸ τοῦ Γαλααδ 5 ὀδόντες σου ὡς ἀγέλαι τῶν κεκαρμένων αἳ ἀνέβησαν ἀπὸ τοῦ λουτροῦ αἱ πᾶσαι διδυμεύουσαι καὶ ἀτεκνοῦσα οὐκ ἔστιν ἐν αὐταῖς 6 ὡς σπαρτίον τὸ κόκκινον χείλη σου καὶ ἡ λαλιά σου ὡραία ὡς λέπυρον τῆς ῥόας μῆλόν σου ἐκτὸς τῆς σιωπήσεώς σου 7 ἑξήκοντά εἰσιν βασίλισσαι καὶ ὀγδοήκοντα παλλακαί καὶ νεάνιδες ὧν οὐκ ἔστιν ἀριθμός 8 μία ἐστὶν περιστερά μου τελεία μου μία ἐστὶν τῇ μητρὶ αὐτῆς ἐκλεκτή ἐστιν τῇ τεκούσῃ αὐτῆς εἴδοσαν αὐτὴν θυγατέρες καὶ μακαριοῦσιν αὐτήν βασίλισσαι καὶ παλλακαὶ καὶ αἰνέσουσιν αὐτήν 9 τίς αὕτη ἡ ἐκκύπτουσα ὡσεὶ ὄρθρος καλὴ ὡς σελήνη ἐκλεκτὴ ὡς ὁ ἥλιος θάμβος ὡς τεταγμέναι

3 Fair thou art and graceful, my heart’s love; for beauty, Jerusalem itself is not thy match; yet no embattled array so awes men’s hearts.[2] 4 Turn thy eyes away, that so unman me! Hair dazzling as the goats have, when they come flocking home from the Galaad hills; 5 teeth white as ewes fresh from the washing, well matched as the twin lambs that follow them; barren is none; 6 thy cheeks shew through their veil rosy as skin of pomegranate! 7 What are three score of queens, and eighty concubines, and maids about them past all counting? 8 One there is beyond compare; for me, none so gentle, none so pure! Only once her mother travailed; she would have no darling but this. Maid was none that saw her but called her blessed; queen was none, nor concubine, but spoke in her praise. 9 Who is this, whose coming shews like the dawn of day? No moon so fair, no sun so majestic, no embattled array so awes men’s hearts.

3
Sponsus. Pulchra es, amica mea;
suavis, et decora sicut Jerusalem;
terribilis ut castrorum acies ordinata. 4
Averte oculos tuos a me,
quia ipsi me avolare fecerunt.
Capilli tui sicut grex caprarum
quæ apparuerunt de Galaad. 5
Dentes tui sicut grex ovium
quæ ascenderunt de lavacro:
omnes gemellis fœtibus,
et sterilis non est in eis. 6
Sicut cortex mali punici, sic genæ tuæ,
absque occultis tuis. 7
Sexaginta sunt reginæ, et octoginta concubinæ,
et adolescentularum non est numerus. 8
Una est columba mea, perfecta mea,
una est matris suæ, electa genetrici suæ.
Viderunt eam filiæ, et beatissimam prædicaverunt;
reginæ et concubinæ, et laudaverunt eam. 9
Quæ est ista quæ progreditur quasi aurora consurgens,
pulchra ut luna, electa ut sol,
terribilis ut castrorum acies ordinata?

10 εἰς κῆπον καρύας κατέβην ἰδεῖν ἐν γενήμασιν τοῦ χειμάρρου ἰδεῖν εἰ ἤνθησεν ἡ ἄμπελος ἐξήνθησαν αἱ ῥόαι ἐκεῖ δώσω τοὺς μαστούς μου σοί 11 οὐκ ἔγνω ἡ ψυχή μου ἔθετό με ἅρματα Αμιναδαβ

10 But when I betook me to the fruit garden, to find apples in the hollows, to see if vine had flowered there, and pomegranate had budded, 11 all unawares, my heart misgave me … beside the chariots of Aminadab.[3]

10
Sponsa. Descendi in hortum nucum,
ut viderem poma convallium,
et inspicerem si floruisset vinea,
et germinassent mala punica. 11
Nescivi: anima mea conturbavit me,
propter quadrigas Aminadab.

12 ἐπίστρεφε ἐπίστρεφε ἡ Σουλαμῖτις ἐπίστρεφε ἐπίστρεφε καὶ ὀψόμεθα ἐν σοί τί ὄψεσθε ἐν τῇ Σουλαμίτιδι ἡ ἐρχομένη ὡς χοροὶ τῶν παρεμβολῶν

12 Come back, maid of Sulam, come back; let us feast our eyes on thee. Maid of Sulam, come back, come back![4]

12
Chorus. Revertere, revertere, Sulamitis!
revertere, revertere ut intueamur te.

[1] Verses 1, 2 evidently continue the thought of the preceding chapter.

[2] vv. 3-9: The allusions in verses 4-6 (cf. 4.1-3 above) suggest that the village girl is being addressed; but this time, it would seem, by king Solomon (cf. vv. 7, 8). That he should hit upon the same terms of comparison is perhaps a stroke of deliberate art.

[3] vv. 10, 11: There is no clue to the speaker; naturally we assume that it is still king Solomon. A comparison of the words used with verse 1 above and 7.8 below suggests that it was his intention to make the village girl his bride. At this point, the text seems to play us false; the statement (both in the Hebrew and in the Septuagint Greek), ‘My soul made me into the chariots of Aminadab’ (or, of my noble people), is one which gives no tolerable sense. It is probably implied that the speaker swooned away, but the exact meaning of the verse is irrecoverable, and it is not even certain that there may not be a serious gap in the text of the poem.

[4] This verse, in which the world ‘Sulamite’ occurs for the first time, belongs in its context to the succeeding chapter.

Knox Translation Copyright © 2013 Westminster Diocese
Nihil Obstat. Father Anton Cowan, Censor.
Imprimatur. +Most Rev. Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster. 8th January 2012.
Re-typeset and published in 2012 by Baronius Press Ltd