The Daughters of Jerusalem

6 Where has your beloved gone,O fairest among women?Where has your beloved turned aside,That we may seek him with you?

The Shulamite

² My beloved has gone to his garden,To the beds of spices,To feed his flock in the gardens,And to gather lilies.³ I am my beloved’s,And my beloved is mine.He feeds his flock among the lilies.

Praise of the Shulamite’s Beauty

The Beloved

⁴ O my love, you are as beautiful as Tirzah,Lovely as Jerusalem,Awesome as an army with banners!⁵ Turn your eyes away from me,For they have overcome me.Your hair is like a flock of goatsGoing down from Gilead.⁶ Your teeth are like a flock of sheepWhich have come up from the washing;Every one bears twins,And none is barren among them.⁷ Like a piece of pomegranateAre your temples behind your veil.

⁸ There are sixty queensAnd eighty concubines,And virgins without number.⁹ My dove, my perfect one,Is the only one,The only one of her mother,The favorite of the one who bore her.The daughters saw herAnd called her blessed,The queens and the concubines,And they praised her.

¹⁰ Who is she who looks forth as the morning,Fair as the moon,Clear as the sun,Awesome as an army with banners?

The Shulamite

¹¹ I went down to the garden of nutsTo see the verdure of the valley,To see whether the vine had buddedAnd the pomegranates had bloomed.¹² Before I was even aware,My soul had made meAs the chariots of my noble people.^[a]

The Beloved and His Friends

¹³ Return, return, O Shulamite;Return, return, that we may look upon you!

The Shulamite

What would you see in the Shulamite—As it were, the dance of the two camps?^[b]