Song of Solomon 5:9—What is thy beloved more than another beloved, that thou dost so adjure us? (R.V.)
The daughters of Jerusalem, each of whom had her beloved, could not understand the urgency of this maiden who had lost her beloved. Her anguish at her loss was so extreme, her heart-sickness was so agonizing, her frenzy so bewildering, that they were startled into feeling that he of whom she was bereft was no common lover. There had been times when each of them had been temporarily forlorn; but they knew that they had never suffered like this! The greatness of her pain was the mirror in which they caught a glimpse of the ineffable beauty of the Bridegroom.
Speak of Christ, so that men and women around may be constrained to cry, "Your Beloved excels our beloveds. We cannot speak of them as thou dost of Him. To gain them does not fill us with the same ecstasy, or to lose them with the same woe."
What are the beloveds that men seek after? There is the beloved of worldly success, of human adulation and applause, of art, science, and war. They intoxicate their admirers, but fail to satisfy. Who can say of them that they are chief, and outshine the gold of Ophir, beryl, sapphires, ivory, and cedar, the rarest products of earth, as synonyms for priceless worth? But all these gathered together are poor and unworthy emblems of the peerless beauty of Emmanuel. White in purity, ruddy with the bloodstain, his bushy locks emblematical of immortal youth, his eyes like water-brooks reflecting the deep azure of the sky and telling of eternal love. Ransack earth for metaphors, and they fall short of the truth. Words fail to express his beauty, his grace, his loveliness: let us try to reflect his glory.