No longer does the singer of yesteryear have to wonder “who wrote the book of love?” because the book answers it itself. “The song of songs, which is Solomon’s” (Song of Solomon 1:1). No more fitting description can be given to this book because love is the very core of it. Solomon presents as the object of his affection a young Shulamite maiden whom he loves deeply and devotedly. The book is a poem (song) that Solomon wrote to court and woo her in hopes of making her his bride. However, mind you, this is not older Solomon with his multitudinous harem of seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines. This rather was a young Solomon probably seeking his first true love in the early days of his kingly reign. The text comprising the book is a back and forth dialogue between the maiden and her suitor, in which the affectionate love from wife to husband and husband to wife is picture in its ideal form. The book ends with the now married couple living in happy bliss and devote husband and wife.
The Song of Solomon, otherwise called “the song of songs” (1:1), is the epitome of Solomon’s writings. The Jews viewed hi canonized writings as such: Proverbs—the tabernacle court; Ecclesiastes—the holy place; and the Song of Solomon—the most holy place. Solomon had in his life produced 1,005 songs (I Kings 4:32), but this one preserved is distinguished as THE Song of Solomon. It, though, comparable only to Esther, does not mention the name of God, and does not even have a historically or spiritually significant theme, supposedly. Many then would question the validity of its placement in preserved Holy Writ. The answer lies in the fact that it touches a theme that is otherwise only briefly mentioned elsewhere in the Bible and that is the intimacy of physical love as it is intended in godly marriage. When this fact is established, the purpose of the Song of Solomon becomes very clear.
Likewise is the need for this book realized when one notices about society what McClish did:
“God created human sexuality and ordained sexual attraction and love in the realm of eligible marriage partners. The Song of Songs does not glorify sexual love as an end in itself nor under any and all circumstances, but it does glorify the beauty of human behavior in the context of a husband and his wife. Evil men and women have dragged the sexual and its fulfillment in the slime and dirt of their own perverted thoughts and deeds. They have made of men and women nothing more than brute beasts at liberty to cavort at will with partners of their own choosing, thus cheapening, corrupting, and all but destroying the concept of the pristine purity of God-ordained sexual behavior. The Song of Solomon at the same time demonstrates the thrill and the purity of the deepest sexual attraction and passion by placing it in and limiting it to the one sphere in which God has placed it—marriage!”
Such is the desperate need of the Song of Solomon, to illustrate the proper placement of sexual love and attraction as being in a godly marriage: “Marriage is honorable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge” (Hebrews 13:4).
As mentioned already, the Song of Solomon is to be interpreted literally as Solomon’s courtship of the Shulamite maiden. Many, though, try to apply a non-literal interpretation to it saying it is really only an allegory for God’s love toward Israel or Christ’s love for His church to come. While it is personally believed that this text is literal, likewise is it conceded that there is a principle regarding the love that Christ has for His church. In fact this would be the means through which Christ is pictured in this book. Christ, as the bridegroom, looks upon the church with the same adoration as Solomon looks upon his bride. The church is the beautiful and glorious bride of Christ, and is to be celebrated in its purity just as Solomon celebrated the physical purity of the maiden. Likewise does Christ anticipate the time in which His church will be presented to Him “a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:27). Great care, though, must be administered in applying the principle because of the physical nature of Solomon’s intended theme.
The ability of this book to handle such a sensitive subject on a high plain of decency sets this book apart as distinct in value. It is a guidebook to the engaged couple upon how to approach their marriage, it is a handbook to the recently married couple upon how to fulfill their passion, and it is a manual to the long since married couple to help them remember the love they still can and should have in their marriage. Let the Song of Solomon be a reminder of the purity, sanctity, and passion that is to be found in marriage.