Canticle of Canticles

Moreover, Song of Songs in Hebrew is the same as the most excellent and most sweet song, just as Holy of Holies is the same as the most holy temple. For this song far surpasses, not only all the songs and poems of Moses, Deborah, Anna, Hezekiah and Isaiah, as Origen explains, but also those of Solomon himself: for he composed five thousand songs, III Kings IV, 32. Hence the Chaldean translator renders it, ten songs were said in this age, and this Song is more praiseworthy than all of these. The first song was Adam's, the second Moses', the third the children of Israel's, the fourth Moses', the fifth Joshua's, etc.

Eusebius of Caesarea adds, whose words Cosmas the Gardener recites here, that this Song is called Song of Songs because it sings of the most excellent and sweetest thing, and as a prophet and bard predicts it by singing, namely the incarnation of the Word, "and through it the espousal of the Church with him." Hear Eusebius: "Just as the Lamb demonstrated by John, as it were by John's grace are the law and the prophets: so also those things which are signified in the Song of Songs are the end of all things which are signified in divine Scripture; and just as according to the law there were the Holy things, and after the Holy of Holies there was no other place: so also besides the Song of Songs, it pleases no one to expect any further or more recent promise."

St. Athanasius has almost the same thing word for word in the Synopsis, from which Eusebius drew it. Moreover, this espousal of the Word with our flesh was the miracle of benefits and the greatest prodigy of all ages. For in it man was associated with God, earth with heaven, flesh with the Word by the closest bond of hypostatic union, by which it comes about that man is God, and God is man. For Adam, hearing from the serpent: "You shall be as gods," had desired equality with God, but too proudly and wrongly. Christ therefore, in order to correct and fulfill this appetite for human excellence, immensely humbled and emptied himself: "Made in the likeness of men, and found in appearance as a man," Philip. II, so that he might exalt man and make him God. "Christ became man, so that man might become God," says St. Augustine.

Before I undertake the text, four things are to be premised in the usual manner: first, concerning the authority and author of the book; second, concerning the subject matter of the work; third, concerning the manner and style; fourth, concerning its division and parts.

Chapter First: The Authority and Author of the Song

Philastrius, lib. On Heresies, cap. CXXXII, and James of Christopolis, Preface on the Song, write that certain Jews and heretics assert that this Song is not canonical Scripture, nor was it written by the Spirit of God, but by the spirit of desire, because it sings of the loves of Solomon and his wife, namely the daughter of Pharaoh, and therefore it is profane and carnal. Whence God is never named in it. Theodore of Mopsuestia once held this view, and now the Anabaptists do. Beza attributes the same to Castellio in his Preface on Joshua.

But they err, because there are many things in the Song which indicate not the queen, Solomon's wife, but a rustic, the wife of a shepherd. Whence that passage in cap. I: "I have not kept my vineyard;" and: "Go forth after the footsteps of the flocks, and feed your kids;" and that passage in cap. V: "The watchmen that go about the city found me, they struck me and wounded me." For who would have dared to wound a queen? And many such things occur throughout.

Indeed, the Holy Spirit, so that he might show that by this Song through the bride he understands no certain woman, now introduces her as a rustic, now as the daughter of a prince, as in Song VII: "How beautiful are your steps in shoes, O daughter of a prince!" Now he calls her bride, now sister.

Finally, in order to show that this bride is spiritual, not corporeal, he gives her epithets which would disgrace a corporeal bride but adorn and ornament a spiritual one, such as that he gives her a head like Carmel, a nose like a tower, eyes like a pool, teeth like flocks of shorn sheep; finally, that he says she is entirely black, like the tents of Cedar. Wherefore it is certain that the bride here can be none other than the Church, and the bridegroom Christ, and their spiritual nuptials are sung here.

It is therefore of faith that this book is canonical Scripture, dictated by God with the spirit not of lust but of charity: hence this book has always been held as canonical both by the Hebrews and by Christians, as is evident from the Council of Florence, Trent, Carthage III and others, which drew up the catalogue of canonical books.

The author is Solomon; hence in Hebrew the title of the book is: Song of Songs, which is Solomon's, who on the occasion of his nuptials with the daughter of Pharaoh wrote this Song; wherefore he alludes to her grammatically, as when he calls her the daughter of a prince, and when he says in chapter I, 9: "I have compared thee to my horses in the chariots of Pharaoh." Hence also she is called by Solomon Sulamitis, that is to say Solomonia, or Solomon's wife; for that Solomon is to be understood here in the grammatical sense is evident from that passage in chapter III, verse 7: "Behold the bed of Solomon, threescore valiant men surround it;" and verse 9: "King Solomon made himself a litter of the wood of Libanus;" and verse 11: "Go forth, ye daughters of Sion, and see king Solomon in the diadem," etc.

Wherefore Honorius of Autun says the literal sense is concerning the daughter of Pharaoh, the allegorical concerning the Church, where by the literal sense he understands the grammatical, by the allegorical the figurative and metaphorical, which however in parables is literal. Others understand by the bride the queen of Sheba, who came to Solomon to hear his wisdom, of whom the Ethiopians relate that she conceived a son by Solomon, who became king of the Abyssinians: hence their king, namely Prester John, even now writes himself the son of Solomon. But in the genuine literal sense, as will appear from what follows, by the bride neither of these nor any other women, but the Church herself is understood. From what has been said it seems to be gathered that Solomon wrote this Song not long after his nuptials with the daughter of Pharaoh, when, having been endowed by God with heavenly wisdom, he worshipped God chastely and piously. Hence he was called by him Ididia, that is beloved of the Lord, II Kings XII, 25; although Delrio, Hortulanus, Bacchiarius and others wish the book to have been written by Solomon after his fall, and assign it as a sign of his repentance; but that it was written before his fall is taught by Guidacerius, Almonacirius, Soto Major, Dionysius the Carthusian, Gislerius, Salmeron and Bellarmine, book I On the Word of God, chapter V, and others.

Moreover the Septuagint of the Complutensian and Royal editions give this book the title: Song of Songs, which is to Solomon, in the dative, namely truly dedicated to Solomon, that is to Christ the Lord, says the Christopolitan, and that which is to Solomon, that is befits Solomon the peaceful and free from passions; for he transferred all affections and his whole love to God, says Philo of Carpathus. The Vatican copies have: Song of Songs, which is Solomon, that is of Solomon; for the Septuagint seems to put τὸ Salomon as indeclinable, which therefore can be of any case. Hence Origen: "τὸ Salomon, he says, or Salomoni, shows that this work is entirely Solomon's." For the Hebrews, like the Greeks, often use the dative for the genitive, especially when they signify that a thing is proper to someone; hence they say: A villa, which is to me, that is which is mine; a book, which is to him, that is which is his: thus in the titles of the Psalms, for the Psalms of David the Septuagint renders Τῷ Δαβίδ, that is to David, in the dative, because the Psalms were inspired and dictated to David by God, just as the Song was to Solomon. Hence also in Arabic this book is inscribed: Song of songs, or praise of praises to Solomon the wise, that is, whose sole author is Solomon; for the Arabs use the dative of the person when they signify that a thing is proper and peculiar to someone.

Chapter Two: Argument

Solomon in Proverbs teaches the faithful the law of God and the common dogmas of virtue. In Ecclesiastes he demonstrates to them the vanity of the world and of life. In the Song he strives to draw those withdrawn from vanity wholly to truth and the love of God. In Proverbs therefore he instructs beginners, in Ecclesiastes those making progress, in the Song the perfect. Hence St. Jerome in the Helmeted Prologue (which is placed before the Scriptures like a helmet, of the three books of Solomon, namely Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Songs) gives this argument: "Solomon peaceful and beloved of the Lord corrects morals in Proverbs; teaches nature in Ecclesiastes; joins the Church and Christ in the Song, and sings the sweet epithalamium of holy nuptials." An epithalamium is a song over the bridal chamber, says Cassiodorus, Bede and Haymo. Origen wrote this first, and after him St. Gregory of Nyssa and three anonymous Fathers in Theodoret.

Wherefore Anselm says: "Solomon, he says, in Proverbs is an ethicist, because he treats of morals; in Ecclesiastes a natural philosopher, because he deals with nature; in the Song a theologian, because he is occupied with divine things." See the remarks in the Preface to Proverbs and Ecclesiastes; namely, most wisely God, in order to show His immense charity toward men, and how ardently Christ made man joined the Church to Himself, willed that Solomon should sing this nuptial song of Christ 1013 years before (for so many years elapsed from the first year of Solomon's reign until the year in which Christ was born). Therefore Solomon, as it were a type and father of Christ, describes by this epithalamium, that is, by this nuptial Song or poem, His espousal with the Church of the faithful through the incarnation, in which he accordingly graphically depicts Christ's preaching, passion, death, resurrection, ascension, the sending of the Holy Spirit, the preaching of the apostles and the conversion of the gentiles, the founding, propagation and perfection of the Church, and especially the reciprocal spiritual loves of Christ and the Church. Thus the Fathers and doctors both Greek and Latin with unanimous consent, indeed even the ancient Hebrews and Talmudists understood this Song literally of the Messiah, or of Christ and the Church, as Isidore Clarius testifies here. Wherefore it is rash to deny this and to feign another bridegroom and another bride here.

Note here that Christ in the incarnation entered into, as it were, a twofold marriage: first a physical one with His humanity, which He united to Himself physically and really; second an ethical one with the Church and the whole human nature, which He joined to Himself through the humanity assumed by Him; the latter follows from the former. For because Christ united His humanity to Himself and, as it were, espoused it, hence in it and through it He likewise espoused the whole human nature and the Church to Himself. For this reason He assumed humanity, that through it He might join and bind all men and the faithful to Himself as members, and that He might be their head and prince; a head, I say, of the same kind, of the same genus and nature as men. In the former marriage the bridegroom is Christ, the bride is the humanity assumed by Christ, to which accordingly first and properly can be adapted almost all things which are said of the bride in the Song; in the latter the bridegroom is Christ, the bride is the Church: the latter is the end and term of the former: for the end of the incarnation of the Word from God's condescension was the institution and sanctification of the Church: wherefore in the institution of the Church is included and presupposed the incarnation of the Word, as the means in the end, and as it were the cause in the effect. Wherefore in the first sense, which I shall assign to Christ and the Church in each verse, I leave it to the reader to understand that the same is to be adapted to Christ and to the humanity assumed by Him, with the name changed, as I shall declare expressly in their places, especially in chapter I, verse 1. Moreover the former marriage is far more noble than the latter; hence also the former bride is far more noble than the latter. For the humanity of Christ is far more worthy, beautiful and holy than the whole Church, because it far excels all men and angels even joined together and taken together in every virtue, grace and glory; because it is hypostatically united to the Word, and of itself first touches God, and from Him draws all gifts, virtues and graces, which befit the Word, and which it is fitting and proper for the humanity hypostatically united to the Word to have. Wherefore whatever is said here both in the first sense of the bride the Church, and in the second of the bride the soul, and in the third of the bride the Mother of God, attribute before all to the humanity of Christ: for as it is the head of the Church, so also it is the head of all holy souls and of the Mother of God herself; wherefore it is the first bride of the Word, which makes holy souls and the Mother of God brides and espouses them to God. For this reason the humanity of Christ is the first bride, if it be compared with the Word as bridegroom; but if it be compared with the Church, a holy soul and the Mother of God, then it is now not so much a bride as a bridegroom. For Christ not only as God but also as man espouses the Church, souls and the Mother of God to Himself as bridegroom, as the Apostle teaches in Ephesians IV, 30, and II Corinthians XI, 2: "I have espoused you, he says, to one man to present you a chaste virgin to Christ." Thus teach Cassiodorus, Origen, Theodoret, Bede, Gregory of Nyssa, Philo of Carpathus, Aponius, Rupert, St. Bernard, and others throughout this book, but especially in chapter VI, 8, at those words: "One is my dove, my perfect one," etc.

Therefore Christ's first spouse is His most sacred humanity, the second is the Church, the third is the Mother of God, the fourth is a holy soul. Theodoretus gives the reason in this place, when he says: "This is the head of good things, the sum of divine benevolence, ineffable goodness, incredible mercy, immense clemency, inexpressible charity, that the Author Himself, and Maker, and Creator, and Lord, and God, and Prince, and the same always this yellow mortal and corruptible animal, and ungrateful, and useless, has snatched from death and the servitude of the devil, and thus has bestowed freedom, so that He has not only constituted us free, but has adopted us as sons; nor only has He granted the gift of adoption, but has both called us spouse and made us so, and has held us as spouse in the same rank, and has given innumerable nuptial gifts, and has adorned the bridal chamber and the bedchamber, and has clothed the naked, and finally has become Himself to the spouse both friend, and bread, and drink, and way, and door, and life, and light, and resurrection."

Moreover, because individual faithful and especially the just are members of Christ and the Church, hence the Song can be understood of them individually in a sense not so much mystical as literal, but inadequate and partial. Whence St. Justus of Orgelitanus, John of Jesus Mary the Carmelite and others explain the Song literally of the soul of the just, indeed Bellarmine holds that this epithalamium is not so much of Christ and the Church as of Christ and a holy soul, especially one eminent and perfect: for this has companions which are frequently introduced here, whereas the Church does not have companions, but subjects and daughters.

Again, this Song aptly suits Christ and the Blessed Virgin, both because she herself stands out among the just, as the moon among the stars; and because the Incarnation of the Word, and consequently the espousal of the Church in her and through her is perfected; and because the flesh of Christ assumed by the Word was the flesh of the Blessed Virgin: wherefore, when Christ espoused flesh to Himself, He espoused, as it were, the Blessed Virgin to Himself. Whence Rupertus, William, Harvus, Honorius of Autun, Hailgrinus, Cardinal Alanus, Placidus Insulanus, Nigidius, and John Picus the Carthusian explain this entire Song of the Blessed Virgin.

Now indeed by the Church, with Theodoretus, Aponius, Bede and others, understand here the assembly of the faithful believing in Christ, gathered together both from the Gentiles and from the Hebrews, which began from Abel and Adam, was propagated through Abraham, formed through Moses, and was perfected through Christ. For all the ancient patriarchs and saints, who served God holily in the law both of nature and of Moses, believed in Christ coming, and were justified and saved by this faith: wherefore they belong to the Church of Christ, as I have shown elsewhere from St. Augustine. Hence it is clear that some wrongly restrict this Song to Christians born after Christ; others to Jews born before Christ, as the Chaldean, R. Solomon and Aben-Ezra restrict it to the Synagogue, as if here the espousal of the Synagogue with Christ is described, which was made through Moses; but pardon must be given to them, because, since they are Jews, they judaize.

Therefore in this Song are recounted the loves, graces and benefits bestowed by God through Christ upon the Church, from the first just man Abel not only until the resurrection of Christ, as Cassiodorus, Angelomus, Bede, Hailgrinus, Alcuin and St. Thomas wish, but until the end of the world, when the triumphant Church shall be joined to Christ in heavenly glory, shall be blessed and shall reign for all eternity. Thus Theodoretus, Aponius and others.

Therefore this entire book breathes divine loves, so much so that love itself seems to speak here, namely in Solomon God, and the Holy Spirit—who is true charity, speaks. Whence St. Augustine in the Mirror asserts that the Song is nothing other than a song of love and a jubilation of charity: "But concerning that (Song)," he says, "in this work because we are able to transfer it, since the whole of the holy loves of Christ and the Church it commends in figurative speech, and pronounces in prophetic height: except that in it, although it is most difficult to understand; we can nevertheless easily perceive how much that divine and divinely infinite charity is to be desired, and of how much account to be held, since there it is not said once, but in one place and another, again and a third time it is repeated: I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes and the harts of the fields, that you stir not up, nor awake my beloved till she please. I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, by the virtues and by the powers of the field, if you stir up, or awake charity till she please. The Church indeed, in which we certainly are, exhorts by these words her daughters, that is, herself constituted in many. She herself is the most fruitful field of God, whose virtues and powers are great, to which by loving Christ the martyrs have attained."

Wherefore the Hebrews permitted no one to read this Song before the age of thirty years, which was the age of the priesthood, as Origen testifies here, and St. Jerome, Preface to Ezekiel. Origen requires its reader to be sober and temperate, hom. 1 of two, whose passions have already cooled, and whose thought and love have been torn away from earthly desires and cleave to the desire of heavenly things. The Nyssenus, hom. 1, requires those who have girded their loins with a certain impassibility, and have put off the old man of concupiscence, and put on the new man of innocence. For we must strip off bestial affections (says Richard of St. Victor in the Preface), lest approaching this sacred mountain as beasts, we be buried under a hail of stones, or consumed by heavenly fire. Most especially, moreover, this book requires its writer, equally as its reader, to be fervent in charity and inflamed with the love of God. For who that is cold or lukewarm would feel or grasp these fires of love? Truly Origen, hom. 4: "Blessed," he says, "is he who enters the Holy Place. More blessed is he who enters the Holy of Holies, etc. Blessed is he who understands the songs and sings them, but far more blessed is he who sings the Song of Songs." Gerson adds, in the Preface to the Song: "Love," he says, "set forth in the Canticles is most aptly called the enjoyment of God, or the kiss of the mouth, not merely habitual and lukewarm, but actual, fervent and ecstatic, and especially seraphic, whose nature it is to be borne immediately toward God, although from the part of the soul there concurs a multitude of habits and influences. Moreover, every good gift given, and every perfect gift descending from the Father of lights, etc. All which things, as a univocal virtue (as Dionysius teaches), fill and restore the soul, and turn it toward the unity of the gathering Father, and toward Deific simplicity, where then the apex, or seraph of the mind is joined ineffably and unknowably to God ineffably and unknowably, unknowably indeed, because indefinitely and immensely, since the power of the knower and the act, as it is nature, are finite." Hence Plato, who drew much from Moses and Solomon, and is therefore called by Eusebius and others "the Attic Moses," add also "the Attic Solomon," seems to have imitated these Songs in the Symposium, which is entirely about love, where he begins thus: "Great is God love, and among gods and men wonderful;" and he adds from Hesiod: "After Chaos these two came into being, the earth and love," and he cites that saying of Parmenides: Before all gods first love was conceived.

Chapter Three: The Manner and Style

Origen, St. Gregory of Nazianzus and others assert that this Song is a spousal or nuptial drama. Whence St. Basil, on that passage of Isaiah V: I will sing to my beloved a song of my beloved, says: "The Song of Songs is a nuptial song woven through with dramatic work." A drama is a representation of a thing, the action of comedies or tragedies. For the entire book is a continuous metaphor or allegory written in comic and bucolic style, which after Solomon was followed by Theocritus in the Idylls, and Virgil in the Bucolics. For here, as it were in a drama, a bride is introduced, as a virgin tending sheep, who, betrothed to her shepherd of the same lot, loves him with chaste love, and converses with him in the manner of a dialogue, as is wont to happen in comedy and tragedy. But the person of the shepherd is assumed here before others, both because the work and life of shepherds is most ancient, most simple and most innocent. Whence Abel, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses were shepherds of sheep, as were also Rachel and the other wives of these men; indeed, formerly kings and princes were shepherds and farmers, as was Job, Romulus, Remus, Camillus, and the ancient Romans; and also because shepherds represent Christ, who, born in the country, namely in the Bethlehem manger among shepherds, first called the shepherds of flocks to himself through an angel. Finally, Christ is the shepherd of shepherds. Whence he himself says of himself: "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep," John X. Wherefore he loves good shepherds intensely, who feed their subjects with prayer, word and example; for these not only benefit themselves alone, but also many others, and most closely imitate the life of Christ, and in teaching others and inflaming them with charity, they inflame it more in themselves, just as fire kindling fire inflames itself more. Whence Christ says to Peter: "Peter, do you love me? etc., feed my sheep," John XXI. Therefore this entire book is prophetic, and so it is nothing other than a continuous prophecy concerning Christ and the Church, and therefore it is obscure, enigmatic and symbolic.

Hence it follows that, as in parables, metaphors and allegories, so also in this Canticle there is, as it were, a twofold literal sense: one grammatical, which the bark itself presents, and the very surface of the letter, namely the words; the other real and profound, which concerns things signified by metaphorical words, as when St. John says, Apocalypse V: "The lion of the tribe of Juda hath prevailed." Lion grammatically signifies a strong and unconquered animal which is called a lion; but really it signifies Christ, whose strength the lion represents. These two senses are related to each other, and mutually regard each other, and are subordinated to each other, as the sound of words and their meaning, as bark and kernel, as shadow and body, as surface and marrow, as body and soul, as garment and man, whence they are called by these names by some. See the fifth Canon, which I prefixed to Isaiah. Thus in this Canticle, the bride is described grammatically as a pastoral virgin, the bridegroom as a shepherd; but really through these are understood the Church and Christ: the Church consists of the faithful, who are joined to Christ as to a bridegroom through faith and love, the bridegroom's companions are the apostles and perfect men, especially because they gain souls for Christ and betroth them, such as St. Paul was, saying: "I have espoused you to one husband, a chaste virgin to present to Christ," II Corinthians XI. The companions of the bride are souls imperfect in faith, virtue and love, so much so that they cannot yet be called brides of Christ, but only companions of the bride, as it were preparing themselves and beginning the way of virtue, so that they may gradually be advanced to the nuptials of Christ. Thus the Abbot of Avila learned wrote five paradoxical emblems or riddles, namely: the first, "A Wonderful Vessel;"; the second, "A Gentle Lion;"; the third, "An Inseparable Lamb;"; the fourth, "A Harmless Serpent;"; the fifth, "A Heavenly Eagle," of which the first he explains at length and learnedly concerning the Blessed Virgin, the other four concerning Christ.

Moreover Solomon in this Canticle imitates David who, Psalm XLIV and XLVII, wrote a similar drama and epithalamium of bridegroom and bride, that is of Christ and the Church; each therefore was a sacred bard and poet. For formerly a poet was called one who composed not just any songs, but comic, tragic, dramatic ones; for from ποιέω, that is I make, I feign, is derived ποιητής, that is maker, feigner, creator; whence that saying of Horace, On Art: "To painters and poets, the power of daring anything has always been equal," etc. "As painting, so poetry will be, which, if you stand nearer, will captivate you more, and some things, if you stand farther away." And Cicero, On the Best Kind of Oration: "Tragic, comic, epic, lyric, and dithyrambic poem." The same, book III On Oratory: "Painted with bright colors by poets." And Tusculan Disputations IV: "The poetry of Anacreon indeed is wholly amatory."

Chapter Four: Division and Parts

Bede divides the Canticle into forty sections or chapters; St. Thomas divides it into three states of the Synagogue, namely of Israel or the Jews: first believing in Christ in the apostles and early Christians, who were Jews, from chapter I to chapter III, 10; then from there it begins to be treated of Jews blinded and persecuting Christians, up to chapter VI, verse 10; from there to the end of the book it is treated of Jews who will believe in Christ at the end of the world. Titelmann thinks that in alternating chapters the bridegroom and bride speak alternately.

Our Delrio divides it into three parts, so that the first treats of the faithful beginning, the second of those making progress, the third of the perfect. Others think that here are described the faithful of the active, contemplative and mixed life, and finally the heavenly.

George Eder in his Biblical Economy divides this Canticle into ten dramas, which he attributes all not to the Church, but to the Synagogue of Moses and the Jews.

Gaspar Sanchez is of the opinion that the order has been disturbed; for the fifth chapter ought to be placed before the first, because the bride cannot say to the bridegroom: "Let him kiss me with the kiss of his mouth," unless she is called forth by the bridegroom, and she is called forth in chapter V. Therefore he thinks that in this Canticle the ancient rites of nuptials are depicted, and accordingly he divides it as a nuptial drama into five scenes. The first scene, the bridegroom, chapter V, invites, courts and calls forth the bride. The second, the bride called forth diligently seeks the bridegroom, chapter VI and chapter I, saying: "Let him kiss me with the kiss of his mouth." The third, the nuptials are celebrated, chapter II, under the genial bridal chamber of which he says: "Under his shadow." The fourth, the bride, chapter III, arranges herself on a litter, that is a movable and genial bed, and moves the procession and the nuptial chariot to the bridegroom's house. The fifth scene, which is chapter VIII, places the bride at the bridegroom's doors, and there with a holy embrace of love the marriage is contracted with solemn rite. But in this distribution there is great transposition of chapters and confusion of order.

More clearly and properly, along with others, you divide the Canticle into five parts, which are: first, the nuptials of Christ with humanity through the Incarnation, and thence with the Church of faithful men through faith and charity, namely the infancy of the Church: he treats this from the beginning of chapter I up to verse 8 of chapter II: "Behold he comes leaping upon the mountains;"; second, the propagation and increase of the Church: he treats this from verse 8 of chapter II up to chapter VI, verse 6: "Who is she that ascends?"; third, the fullness of the Church, and its highest exaltation and perfection as if placed at the summit: he describes this from chapter III, verse 6, up to chapter IV, verse 2: "I sleep, and my heart watches;"; fourth, the inclination of the aging Church into old age: he represents this from chapter V, verse 2, up to chapter VI, verse 3: "Thou art beautiful, O my love;"; fifth, the renewal of the Church and its restoration to the highest perfection, and its glorification in the heavens: he sets this before the eyes from chapter VI, verse 3, to the end of the book.

These five ages and states of the Church this book of the Canticles represents dramatically through five dramas, or acts, as if on a stage.

The infancy of the Church was from the birth and preaching of Christ up to Pentecost; adolescence from Pentecost up to the Emperor Constantine; manhood in the time of Constantine; old age began thereafter, with Arians, Nestorians, Eutychians, and Pelagians raging. Renewal began to be made by Basil, Chrysostom, Cyril, Augustine, Ambrose, and Jerome. It is continued by their successors continuously up to the end of the world, who guard the faith and sanctity of the Church against heretics, Jews, Turks, schismatics, tyrants and any persecutors whatsoever, and will defend it up to the end of the world, when on the day of judgment there will be made the full renewal, consummation and glorification of the Church.

In the first drama Solomon is introduced in Lebanon, a mountain nearby and most pleasant and fertile, wandering about there or indulging in hunting, having come upon a noble maiden, but in the pastoral manner of that age, whom on account of her remarkable beauty both of body and of mind he took as his bride: whence the newly married woman aspiring to the nuptials and marriage bed of so great a king says: "Let him kiss me with the kiss of his mouth; thy name is as oil poured out;"; soon she complains that she is darkened by the sun, because she was forced by her brothers to be a keeper in the vineyards; the bridegroom Solomon comforts and encourages her, promising her the horsemen of Pharaoh, then as it were to his new bride he promises her bracelets and necklaces; hence she says the bridegroom is to her as a bundle of myrrh and a cluster of cypress, and she recounts that she was brought by him into the wine cellar, where, as if drunk with the wine of love, falling asleep, and as if in a swoon, she asks to be supported with flowers and surrounded with apples, and the bridegroom forbids her to be awakened, which all things represent a tender and young bride and the infancy of the Church. For the Church being born, Christ being born, seeks his kiss, that is union and embrace through the Incarnation of the Word, in which he himself was as healing oil, poured out in circumcision and passion, and therefore Jesus, that is Savior, is called; soon she, having suffered persecution from the Jews her brothers, was armed by Christ with horsemen, that is with the arms and protection of the apostles, and from him received bracelets of the laws and counsels of the Gospel, and a bundle of myrrh, that is the passion of Christ, and a cluster of cypress, that is his resurrection, and the wine cellar, that is the institution of the Eucharist in his last supper, by the taste of which as if in a swoon, she desires to be supported with the flowers of sacred Scripture and surrounded with apples of good examples, and sleeping sweetly in these she is forbidden by Christ to be awakened. This happened when the disciples from the Ascension of Christ up to Pentecost, shut up in the cenacle, were wholly devoted to prayer, the Eucharist, and pleasant contemplation, nor were the Jews permitted by Christ to disturb this their rest.

According to the second drama, which begins at chapter II, verse 6, the bride is called forth by the bridegroom as spring begins, into the fields and vineyards, so that each may feed on the grossness of figs and flowering vines; soon he commands that foxes be caught, which will destroy the vineyards; the bridegroom withdraws himself, the bride seeks him anxiously in her bed, and soon by the watchmen, but in vain; wherefore, leaving them behind, going about the streets and squares, she finally finds him, and does not let him go until she brings him into the house of her mother. All these things represent the adolescence of the Church, which began at Pentecost, when the apostles, having received the Holy Spirit, began to preach the Gospel, first to the Jews, then to the Gentiles, and everywhere to establish Churches; hence then it makes, as it were, the spring of the Gospel. The foxes were the first heresiarchs, namely Simon Magus, Ebion, Menander, Basilides, Carpocrates, etc., who devastated the Church, whom St. John and the other apostles resisted. The Church sought Christ in her bed, that is in Judaea, where she was at leisure devoted to God, and by the watchmen, that is by the priests and scribes, preaching the Gospel to the Jews, and seeking the Messiah born in them from them; but in vain: for few of the Jews believed in Christ; wherefore, leaving them behind, she went to the Gentiles of the whole world, and there, in their faith and obedience found Christ, and established the Church everywhere, until she brought Christ to her, that is all Christian nations.

The third drama begins at chapter III, verse 6, where it is said that the bride ascends through the desert, like a column of smoke from all spices exhaling a sweet odor; again the bridegroom's bed is surrounded by sixty mighty men from Israel. His litter, or golden bearing-frame, is also described, and the diadem with which she is crowned. Finally the bride's form is celebrated by her dove-like eyes, her goat-like hair, her sheep-like teeth, her scarlet lips, her turreted neck, her goat-like breasts, etc., by which she attracts the inhabitants of the mountains of Lebanon, Amana, Sanir and Hermon, and calls them forth to Sion, as it were into an enclosed garden, and a paradise abounding in spikenard, cypress, saffron, and every aromatic fruit. All these things foreshadow the mature age of the Church, when from the faith of all nations, like a column of smoke, it grew and ascended most high. The bed of the bridegroom, that is of Christ, is the Roman Church, in which, as it were in a bed, it rests firmly and pleasantly. The litter is the magnificence of the Roman Church, representing the magnificence of Christ and his fivefold diadem. The dove-like eyes denote the Prelates of the Church, watchful and solicitous; the Nazarite hair, or religious; the teeth, Doctors; the lips, Preachers; the neck, Roman Pontiffs; the breasts, priests and deacons. These call forth the peoples of the Gentiles from Lebanon, Amana, Sanir and Hermon, which were mountains of the Gentiles, that is, they call them forth from paganism, so that they may come to Sion, namely to the Church of Christ, where all kinds of aromatics, that is spiritual virtues, germinate, and exhale the most sweet flower of holiness. This was done under the Emperor Constantine.

The fourth drama begins at chapter V, verse 2, where the bride, sleeping, the bridegroom knocking at the door wet with nocturnal dew, when she delayed to open to him, she paid the penalty for this delay; for seeking him as he departed, she is wounded by the watchmen of the city and stripped of her garment. Soon her companions, seeking the bridegroom, ask her who and what kind the bridegroom is? to whom she answers that he is white and ruddy, with a golden head, black hair, aromatic cheeks, lily-like lips, hyacinthine hands, an ivory belly, marble legs. All these things denote the decline and old age of the Church, when namely through the peace given to her by Constantine, some of her prelates and faithful gave themselves to idleness, gluttony, sloth; on which occasion the Arians and other heretics, with their heresies and blasphemies, assailed in the East the divinity or humanity of Christ. Wherefore Christ transferred his faith from the East to the West. Hence the Eastern Church, seeking Christ and the true faith of Christ from the watchmen, that is from the princes and heretical prelates, such as were Valens, Huneric, Dioscorus, Nestorius, was wounded and lacerated, and stripped of the garment of integral faith; wherefore her companions, that is the souls of holy angels and men, so that they may seek Christ, and bring him back from the West to the East, ask of the bride, namely of the Eastern Church, what kind Christ is: to whom she answers that he is white through innocence, ruddy through passion and patience; his head is golden through divinity, his hair, that is his counsels, are black, that is strong, manly and as if toasted by charity; he has two aromatic cheeks, that is through mercy and justice he breathes forth all holiness; lily-like lips, that is most chaste eloquence; hyacinthine hands, that is heavenly operations, and turned and versatile to all good; an ivory belly, that is most pure and strongest passions and affections; marble legs, that is most strong in the journey, by which through himself and the Apostles, evangelizing the whole world, he subjects it to himself.

The fifth drama begins at chapter VI, verse 3, where the bride, beautiful, strong and perfect, is described, and as it were an army arrayed in camps. Soon the bridegroom descends into the garden of nuts: the bride is troubled on account of the chariots of Aminadab; but the bridegroom comes to meet her, and says: "What will you see in the Sulamite, except the choirs of camps?" and again he paints and praises the same woman's thighs, breasts, neck, eyes, head, stature, throat, etc. Finally in chapter VIII, the bride wishes to lead the bridegroom into the house of her mother, and to be joined to him intimately and always. To whom the bridegroom says: "Put me, he says, as a seal upon thy heart, as a seal upon thy arm." Soon the bride, striving to provide for her little sister, receives counsel from her companions: "If it is a wall, they say, let us build upon it silver battlements: if it is a door, let us enclose it with cedar boards." To which the sister thus responds: "I am a wall: and my breasts are like a tower, since I have become before him as one finding peace." He then describes the vineyard of each sister, and its fruit and price. Finally the bridegroom hears the last voice and wish of the bride from her: "Flee, my beloved, and be like to a roe, or to a young hart upon the mountains of spices." All these things represent the renewal of the Church made in the age of the Fathers, namely when the Greek doctors flourished, St. Basil, Nazianzen, Chrysostom, Cyril; and the Latin, St. Augustine, Jerome, Ambrose, Gregory, and their successors, who thus adorn and strengthen the Church, so that she herself like an army resists all enemies unconquered. Wherefore Christ descended into the garden of nuts, that is into the Church composed of two peoples, namely the Gentiles and the Jews; this is troubled on account of the chariots of Aminadab, that is on account of the conversion of the Gentiles, or on account of the schisms of the Saracens, antipopes, and impious emperors and princes. But Christ comes to meet them, and opposes to them the choirs of camps, that is pontiffs, kings and orthodox and warlike emperors; likewise ecumenical and national Councils; to these academies, which as it were nurses and defenders of faith and piety he instituted in individual provinces; moreover the religious orders of St. Benedict, Romuald, Bernard, Dominic, Ignatius, as it were the most powerful camps of true religion.