“Among the early Christian writers and preachers to draw attention to this spiritual meaning are Athanasius, Basil, Chrysostom and Augustine. In the Middle Ages Bernard of Clairvaux not only preached many sermons from this book but composed a poem based on it … Luther lectured on the Song showing how Solomon speaks for all this people who are the bride of the Lord. The Puritans found great spiritual benefit from it and James Durham wrote a helpful exposition that was commended by John Owen. In the foreword to George Burrowes’ commentary on the Song of Songs, Dr Lloyd-Jones commends among other things the way in which the author helps Christians to appreciate the Song’s spiritual treasures. Spurgeon loved to preach Christ from this book and Hudson Taylor’s little study Union and Communion has become something of a classic” (Philip H. Eveson, “Foreword,” in Roger Ellsworth, He Is Altogether Lovely [Durham, England: Evangelical Press, 1998], p. 9).
Athanasius (c. 297-373): “[The Song of Solomon] is as John Baptist among the Prophets. Other Scriptures speak of Christ as coming, and afar off; this speaks of him, and to him, as already come, and near hand” (quoted in James Durham, Clavis Cantici or an Exposition of the Song of Solomon [London: Forgotten Books, 2018], p. 29).
Augustine (354-430): “The Song of songs is a spiritual delight of holy minds, in the nuptial union of that king and queen of the heavenly kingdom, which is Christ and the Church. But this pleasure is wrapped up in folds of allegory that it may be more ardently desired and may be unfolded with greater delight.”
“Some of the church fathers that taught the book [of Song of Solomon] allegorically are Jerome (347–420), Augustine (354-430), Gregory of Nyssa (335-394), Cyril of Alexandria (376–444), Gregory of Elvira (359-385), Aponius, Cyril of Jerusalem (313–386), Nilus of Ancyra (d. 430), Hippolytus (222-245), Theodoret of Cyr (393–466), and many more (J. Robert Wright, Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture Old Testament IX: Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, p. xxviii)” (Carlos Gonzalez, “The Allegory of the Song of Solomon”).
Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153): “But there is that other song which, by its unique dignity and sweetness, excels all those I have mentioned and any others there might be; hence by every right do I acclaim it as the Song of Songs. It stands at a point where all the others culminate. Only the touch of the Spirit can inspire a song like this, and only personal experience can unfold its meaning. Let those who are versed in the mystery revel in it; let all others burn with desire rather to attain to this experience than merely to learn about it. For it is not a melody that resounds abroad but the very music of the heart, not a trilling on the lips but an inward pulsing of delight, a harmony not of voices but of wills. It is a tune you will not hear in the streets, these notes do not sound where crowds assemble; only the singer hears it and the one to whom he sings-the lover and the beloved. It is pre-eminently a marriage song telling of chaste souls in loving embrace, of their wills in sweet concord, of the mutual exchange of the heart’s affections” (Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 1, VI.11).
Martin Luther (1483-1546): “Solomon … uses magnificent words—words that are worthy of so great a king—in describing his concerns. He makes God the bridegroom and his people the bride, and in this mode he sings of how much God loves that people, how many and how rich are the gifts He lavishes and heaps upon it, and finally how He embraces and cherishes the same people with a goodness and mercy with which no bridegroom has ever embraced or cherished his bride” (Lectures on the Song of Solomon).
“[The French translation of the Song of Songs by Pierre Robert Olivétan (c.1506-1538)] contains the heading ‘About the spiritual love between God and his faithful people, discussed in this divine Song.’ Then follows a list of verses from both testaments, showing the variety and frequency of bridal metaphors found in the Christian Scriptures: ‘God is love and whoever remains in love remains in God, and God in him (1 John 4:16); ‘I will betroth you to myself forever’ (Hos. 2:19); ‘As a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will God rejoice over you’ (Isa. 62:5); and so forth. When readers arrive at the French translation of the text of the Song of Songs, they are guided by marginal glosses: the title is glossed with the note, ‘A mystical dialogue of spiritual and divine love between the Lord as bridegroom and the church as bride’; the verse ‘Draw me, we will run after you’ (Song of Songs 1:4) is glossed, ‘God draws us to faith’; and the daughters of Jerusalem are identified as ‘lovers of God.’ Everywhere the reader is led to believe that the Song speaks naturally, biblically, and beautifully about the love between God and God’s people” (Erin Risch Zoutendam, “Reading the Song of Songs as Allegory with the Protestant Reformers,” Modern Reformation [Jan/Feb 2023]).
“Against [Sebastian] Castellio, [John] Calvin [1509-1564] maintained that it was the unbroken consensus of the church that the Song was canonical and ought to be read as a holy text. Calvin’s view was representative of the broad agreement among the Reformers: the Song was canonical and holy, and it used figurative or allegorical terms to speak of God’s relationship to God’s people” (Erin Risch Zoutendam, “Reading the Song of Songs as Allegory with the Protestant Reformers,” Modern Reformation [Jan/Feb 2023]).
Theodore Beza (1519-1605): “Those instructed and advanced in the divine life, the writer of this song does, as it were, carry away with him beyond the regions of earth to the contemplation of heavenly things—as though being now citizens of heaven, they might knock for admission at its gates.”
Thomas Cartwright (c.1535-1603): “The book of the Canticles of Solomon, entreating of our spiritual conjunction with our Saviour Christ, and that in most chaste, and yet familiar speeches, is meet for all ages” (A Confutation of the Rhemists Translation, Preface, sect. 10-13).
John Harmar (c.1555–1613): “[The Song of Songs is] the most heavenly and excellent ditty, concluded in terms and phrases of speech altogether enigmatic and allegorical, and containing the great mystery, as the Apostle calls it, of our salvation, the mystical union of Christ with the faithful, his members” (“The Epistle Dedicatory,” in Master Bezaes Sermons Upon the Three First Chapters of the Canticle of Canticles [Oxford: Joseph Barnes, 1587], p. ii; spelling and language lightly modernized).
William Perkins (1558-1602): “The Song of Songs is an allegorical description of the relationship between Christ and the church in terms of the relationship between a bridegroom and his bride (or a husband and wife)” (The Art of Prophesying).
Richard Sibbes (1577-1635): “The Holy Ghost is pleased here to condescend to our infirmities; and, that we might help ourselves in our spiritual estate by our bodies, he speaketh here of heavenly things after an earthly manner, and with a comfortable mystery. As in other places the Holy Ghost sets out the joys of heaven by a sweet banquet, so here he sets out the union that we have with Christ by the union of the husband with the wife; and that we might the better understand what this union is, he condescends to our weakness, that we might see that in a glass which we through our corruptions cannot otherwise discern. This book is nothing else but a plain demonstration and setting forth of the love of Christ to his church, and of the love of the church to Christ ; so familiarly and plainly, that the Jews take great scandal at it, and would not have any to read this book till they are come to the age of thirty years, lest they thereby should be tempted to incontinency; wherein they would seem wiser than God himself. But the Holy Ghost is pleased thus by corporeal to set out these spiritual things, which are of a higher nature, that by thinking and tasting of the one they might be stirred up to translate their affections (which in youthful age are most strong) from the heat of natural love to spiritual things, to the things of God; and all those who are spiritually minded (for whom chiefly the Scriptures were written) will take special comfort and instruction thereby, though others take offence and scandal at it” (“The Spouse, Her Earnest Desire After Christ,” in Two Sermons [London: T. Cotes, 1638]).
John Cotton (1585-1652): “The first reason why this song is more excellent than others, is because this song speaketh not only of the chiefest matter, to wit, Christ and his church, but also more largely than any of David’s psalms, and with more store of more sweet and precious, exquisite and amiable resemblances, taken from the richest jewels, the sweetest spices, gardens, orchards, vineyards, wine-cellars, and the chiefest beauties of all the works of God and man” (A Brief Exposition of the Whole Book of Canticles or Song of Solomon [Edinburgh: James Nichol, 1868], p. 3).
John Owen (1616-1683): “Then may a man judge himself to have somewhat profited in the experience of a mystery of a blessed intercourse and communion with Christ, when the expressions of love in that holy Dialogue, the Song, do give light and life unto his mind, and efficaciously communicate unto him an experience of their power. But because these things are little understood by many, the book itself is much neglected, if not despised.”
Thomas Manton (1620–1677): “[Song of Solomon 1] is a sweet dialogue between Christ and the church, wherein they interchangeably express their mutual love to each other” (“A Sacrament Sermon,” Works, vol. 15, p. 427).
James Durham (1622-1658): “The divine mystery intended, and set forth here, is the mutual love, and spiritual union and communion that is betwixt Christ and his Church, and their mutual carriage towards one another, in several conditions and dispensations” (Clavis Cantici or an Exposition of the Song of Solomon [London: Forgotten Books, 2018], p. 9).
John Collinges (1623-1690): “In the first place, Let me speak to all of you, who shall hear my further discourses concerning any part of this Book, (as once God spake to Moses at the Burning Bush) Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground … Saint Paul (to Titus) saith, Unto the pure all things are pure; but unto them that are defiled, and unbelieving; there is nothing pure but even their minds, and consciences are defiled. I am sure it may be said so of every line of holy writ, to the pure heart, every line there is pure: not so to the impure, the reason is because their own minds, and consciences are filthy, and impure. Here is no wantonness in these sacred lines, they contain indeed discourses of loves, but altogether Divine and Spiritual (though under carnal disguises.) Oh let not your wanton hearts bring hither any unclean thoughts” (The Intercourses of Divine Love Betwixt Christ and His Church [London: Printed by T. Snowden for Edward Giles, 1683], p. 34).
Matthew Poole (1624-1679): “[The Song of Solomon] is to be understood mystically or allegorically, concerning that spiritual love and marriage which is between God, or Christ, and his church, or every believing soul … God compares himself to a bridegroom, and his church to a bride, Isaiah 62:5, and calls and owns himself the Husband of his people, Isaiah 54:5; Hosea 2:16, 19-20. In which places, by comparing these. with many other texts of Scripture, by God, or the Lord, is meant Christ, the second person in the Godhead, who then was to come down, and since did come from heaven to earth, for the consummation of that eternal project of marriage between God and his people; which also is fully confirmed by the writings of the New Testament which were designed for the explication of the Old, in which Christ is expressly declared to be the Bridegroom or Husband of his church, as Matthew 9:15; 22:2; John 3:29; II Corinthians 11:2; Ephesians 5:23; Revelation 19:7; 21:2; 22:17.”
“The Scripture proofs of the Westminster Confession of Faith include verses from the Song of Solomon concerning Christ and the church in the sections 10.1, 18.4, 17.3. They are also found in the [Westminster] Larger Catechism in questions 81 and 175. In the [Westminster] Assembly’s commentary of the Bible, the song is explained this way: ‘… look upon it, as generally it is acknowledged, that is, not as an history, or prophecy (as some conceive it) but as a divine Parable, wherein naturall and visible things allegorize things supernaturall, and under the figures of Solomon and his Love, is shadowed the true Prince of peace, and his rich affections to his Church and people’ (The Westminster Annotations and Commentary on the Whole Bible [1657])” (Carlos Gonzalez, “The Allegory of the Song of Solomon”).
Matthew Henry (1662-1714): “It must be confessed, on the other hand, that with the help of the many faithful guides we have for the understanding of this book it appears to be a very bright and powerful ray of heavenly light, admirable fitted to excite pious and devout affections in holy souls, to draw out their desires towards God, to increase their delight in him, and improve their acquaintance and communion with him. It is an allegory, the letter of which kills those who rest in that and look no further, but the spirit of which gives life, II Cor. 3:6; John 6:63. It is a parable, which makes divine things more difficult to those who do not love them, but more plain and pleasant to those who do, Matt. 13:14, 16. Experienced Christians here find a counterpart of their experiences, and to them it is intelligible, while those neither understand it nor relish it who have no part nor lot in the matter. It is a song, an Epithalamium, or nuptial song, wherein, by the expressions of love between a bridegroom and his bride, are set forth and illustrated the mutual affections that pass between God and a distinguished remnant of mankind. It is a pastoral; the bride and bridegroom, for the more lively representation of humility and innocence, are brought in as a shepherd and his shepherdess.”
John Gill (1697-1771): “The whole is figurative and allegorical, abounding with a variety of lively metaphors, and allusions to natural things; and so may be illustrated by the various things of nature, from whence the metaphors are taken, and to which the allusions be, and by the language and behaviour of natural lovers to each other and which are to be observed in love-poems, though here expressed more decently and beautifully. This divine poem sets forth in a most striking manner the mutual love, union, and communion, which are between Christ and his church; also expresses the several different frames, cases and circumstances which attend believers in this life; so that they can come into no state or condition, but here is something in this song suited to their experience: which serves much to recommend it to believers, and discovers the excellency of it” (An Exposition of the Song of Solomon [Marshallton, DE: The National Foundation for Christian Education, n.d.], pp. 9-10).
Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758): “The whole book of Canticles used to be pleasant to me, and I used to be much in reading it about that time, and found from time to time an inward sweetness that would carry me away in my contemplations.”
Joseph Benson (1749-1821): “The most excellent of all songs. And so this might well be called, whether we consider the author of it, who was a great prince, and the wisest of all mortal men; or the subject of it, which is not Solomon, but a greater than Solomon, even Christ, and his marriage with the church; or the matter of it, which is most lofty, containing in it the noblest of all the mysteries contained either in the Old or the New Testament; most pious and pathetical, breathing forth the hottest flames of love between Christ and his people, most sweet and comfortable, and useful to all that read it with serious and Christian eyes” (Commentary on the Old and New Testaments).
Thomas Chalmers (1780-1847): “It would bespeak not only a more pious but a more philosophic docility, to leave that book in undisturbed possession of the place which it now enjoys, where it might minister, as in ages heretofore, to the saintly and seraphic contemplations of the advanced Christian, who discovers that in this poem a greater than Solomon is here, whose name to him is as ointment poured forth, and who, while he luxuriates with spiritual satisfaction over pages that the world has unhallowed, breathes of the ethereal purity of the third heavens, as well as their ethereal fervour.”
Henry Law (1797-1884): “… the Song of Solomon is a bright jewel. From the day when first the Holy Spirit gave it to the world, it has rightfully received co-equal rank with kindred books. From its birth its sacred origin has been indubitably maintained. The pen which wrote the Proverbs and Ecclesiastes gave this likewise to the sacred Canon. Our Church, also, has without hesitation enrolled it in this heaven-born company. Moreover, to outward authority internal evidence adds its assuring weight. Believers’ hearts in every age and place have recognized in it the voice of God speaking in terms indubitably divine. Such streams of consolation, comfort, and instruction, could only flow from the throne of God and of the Lamb.”
E. W. Hengstenberg (1802-1869): “An important link in the chain of the Messianic hopes is formed by the Song of Solomon. It is intimately associated with Ps. 72, which was written by Solomon, and represents the Messiah as the Prince of Peace, imperfectly prefigures by Solomon as His type. As in this Psalm, so also in the Song of Solomon, the coming of the Messiah forms the subject throughout, and He is introduced there under the name of Solomon the Peaceful One” (Christology of the Old Testament, vol. 1, p. 112).
C. F. Keil (1807-1888): “The Song of Songs … depicts in dramatico-lyrical responsive songs, under the allegory of the bridal love of Solomon and Shulamith, the loving communion between the Lord and His Church” (Manual of Historico-Critical Introduction to the Canonical Scriptures of the Old Testament, trans. George C. M. Douglas [Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1869], vol. 1, p. 503).
George Burrowes (1811-1894): “In the glorious temple of revelation, a place which the Lord our God has chosen to cause his name to dwell there, even in brighter glory than in the temple of the material world, does this book stand, like one of the apartments in the temple on Mount Zion, small indeed, but exquisitely finished, the walls and ceiling of something richer than cedar, richer than bright ivory overlaid with sapphires, and filled with specimens of truth brought down from heaven by the Holy Spirit, and here deposited for the comfort and delight of those who love the habitation of God’s house, and the place where his glory dwelleth” (A Commentary on the Song of Solomon [London: Forgotten Books, 2012], pp. 85-86).
Robert Murray McCheyne (1813-1843): “No book furnishes a better test than does the Song of the depth of a man’s Christianity. If his religion be in his head only, a dry form of doctrines; or if it hath place merely in his fancy, like Pliable in Pilgrim’s Progress, he will see nothing here to attract him. But if his religion have a hold on his heart, this will be a favourite portion of the word of God.”
Franz Delitzsch (1813-1890): “Solomon is a type of him of whom it can be said, ‘a greater than Solomon is here’ (Matt. 12:12). Referred to Him the antitype, the earthly contents receive a heavenly import and glorification. We see therein the mystery of the love of Christ and His church shadowed forth, not, however, allegorically, but typically.”
Andrew Robert Fausset (1821-1910): “She by turns is a vinedresser, shepherdess, midnight inquirer, and prince’s consort and daughter, and He a suppliant drenched with night dews, and a king in His palace, in harmony with the various relations of the Church and Christ. As Ecclesiastes sets forth the vanity of love of the creature, Canticles sets forth the fullness of the love which joins believers and the Saviour. The entire economy of salvation … aims at restoring to the world the lost spirit of love. God is love, and Christ is the embodiment of the love of God. As the other books of Scripture present severally their own aspects of divine truth, so Canticles furnishes the believer with language of holy love, wherewith his heart can commune with his Lord; and it portrays the intensity of Christ’s love to him; the affection of love was created in man to be a transcript of the divine love, and the Song clothes the latter in words; were it not for this, we should be at a loss for language, having the divine warrant, wherewith to express, without presumption, the fervour of the love between Christ and us … Love to Christ is the strongest, as it is the purest, of human passions, and therefore needs the strongest language to express it: to the pure in heart the phraseology, drawn from the rich imagery of Oriental poetry, will not only appear not indelicate or exaggerated, but even below the reality” (Critical, Experimental and Practical Commentary).
“[In] Patrick Fairbairn’s Bible Dictionary … Professor Duncan H. Weir [1822-1876], one-time Professor of Hebrew in the University of Glasgow … sums up his position as follows, ‘Shelomo [Solomon] is the peace-bestower. It is in his love that Shulammith [Song of Solomon 6:13] finds peace. He may be regarded, therefore, either as the representative of Jehovah, the Covenant-God and King of Israel, or as a type of the Messiah, the Prince of peace” (F. S. Leahy, “The Song of Solomon in Pastoral Teaching,“ The Evangelical Quarterly 27.4 (1955), pp. 207, 209-210).
Adelaide Newton (1824-1854): “The general character of this book in contrast to Ecclesiastes is very striking. Ecclesiastes from beginning to end tells of the vanity of the creature—Canticles of the sufficiency of the Beloved … One verse in St. John’s Gospel gives the contrast perfectly. Ecclesiastes is the first half of the verse ‘Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again’; Canticles is the latter half of the verse ‘Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst.’ Thus the book is full of Jesus. But it is Jesus in a special character. He is not seen here as ‘Saviour,’ nor as ‘King,’ nor as ‘High priest,’ nor as ‘Prophet.’ … No! It is a dearer and closer relation than any of these—it is Jesus as our ‘Bridegroom’; Jesus in marriage union with His Bride, His Church” (quoted in A. M. Hodgkin, Christ in All the Scriptures [London: Pickering & Inglis, Ltd., 1973], p. 127).
William Henry Green (1824-1900): “ … we cannot but believe that the writer of this divine song recognized the symbolical character of that love, which he has here embellished … The typical character of Solomon’s own reign was well understood by himself, as appears from Psalm lxxii. That the Lord’s relation to his people was conceived of as a marriage from the time of the covenant at Sinai, is shown by repeated expressions which imply it in the law of Moses. That, under the circumstances, the marriage of the king of Israel should carry the thought up by a ready and spontaneous association to the covenant-relation of the King par excellence to the people whom he had exposed himself, is surely no extravagant supposition, even if the analogous instance of Psalm xlv did not remove it from the region of conjecture to that of established fact. The mystical use made of marriage so frequently in the subsequent scriptures, with evident and even verbal allusion to the song, and the constant interpretation of both the Synagogue and the Church, show the naturalness of the symbol, and enhance the probability that the writer himself saw what the great body of his readers have found in his production” (quoted in Milton, S. Terry, Biblical Hermeneutics: A Treatise on the Interpretation of the Old and New Testaments [Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, n.d.], p. 326).
James Hudson Taylor (1832-1905): “Well may this book be called the Song of Songs! There is no song like it. If it is read aright, it brings a gladness to the heart far beyond the joy of earthly things as heaven is higher than the earth. It has been well said that this is a song which grace alone can teach, and experience alone can learn. Our Saviour, speaking of the union of the branch with the vine, adds, ‘These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full’ (John 15:11). And the beloved disciple, writing of Him who ‘was from the beginning,’ who ‘was with the Father, and was manifested unto us,’ in order that we might share the fellowship which He enjoyed, also says, ‘These things we write unto you, that your joy may be full’ (I John 1:1-2, 4)” (Union and Communion, or Thoughts on the Song of Solomon [Edinburgh: R. & R. Clark Ltd, repr. 1929]).
Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892): “This book of the Canticles seems to us to belong to the secret place of the tabernacle of the Most High. We see our Saviour’s face in almost every page of the Bible, but here we see his heart and feel his love to us.”
George M. Ophoff (1891-1962): “It can be proved that the Song was designed by the Holy Spirit under whose inspiration it was written, to shadow forth the heavenly, the love of Christ to His bride, the Church. Throughout the Old Testament and especially in the writings of Jeremiah and Hosea the idea of a marriage union between God and His people occurs. The Baptist describes the coming of the Messiah as the bridegroom, and Christ appropriated the title for Himself. St. Paul contemplates the union of husband and wife as an earthly replica of the union of Christ and His Church. The marriage of the Lamb is one of the features of the Book of Revelation … The writer in these passages and thus throughout the entire Song presents Solomon as king and lover, better said, as king-lover. In his person, king and lover or husband are so united as to be inseparable. It proves that in this Song he is presented as type of Christ in his capacity of king not merely (it is not disputed that in this capacity he typified Christ) but of king-husband. This is the canonical significance of the Song” (“The Canonical Significance of the Song of Songs,” Standard Bearer, vol. 18, issue 11 [1942]).
Roger Ellsworth (1948-): “On the surface the Song of Solomon seems to be nothing more than a celebration of romantic love between a king and a humble maiden—appropriate enough in its way, but what does it have to do with the Lord Jesus? The answer might seem to be a flat, ‘Nothing!’ But then we remember that the Lord Jesus Christ himself has a bride he dearly loves (Eph. 5:25). What we have here, then is as follows: firstly, Christ explicitly claimed to be the subject of all the Old Testament; secondly, we have in the Song of Solomon the celebration of love between a man and his bride; thirdly, the Lord Jesus has a bride. We may, therefore, legitimately take the bridegroom in the Song of Solomon as a picture of Christ and the bride as a picture of the church” (He Is Altogether Lovely [Durham, England: Evangelical Press, 1998], p. 16).
