Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Song of Solomon: 1-8.
I have a love/hate relationship with this Bible in a Year plan.
On one hand, it is good in that it provides a track to familiarize oneself with the whole of the Bible.
On the other hand, the speed at which we must travel leaves precious little time to meditate on what we are reading. Even the roughly two hours each day that I devote to this leaves me greatly wanting.
I found this frustration once again as we approached this enigmatic Song of Solomon.
Evidently, this book is perhaps the most debated book in the Bible as to its interpretation. Here's this from the ESV Study Bible notes:
"The Song of Solomon, or Song of Songs (1:1), contains beautiful and sensuous poetry expressing romantic love between a young man (a shepherd, 1:7) and a young woman (a shepherdess, 1:8) in ancient Israel. On this point there is general agreement; but agreement ends once the discussion moves to how the Song of Solomon works to convey its theme. The Song of Solomon has in fact been subject to a broader range of interpretation probably than any other book in the Bible. Thus the Song of Solomon was first understood by early Jewish interpreters as an allegory of God's love for Israel; and then, through many centuries of Christian interpretation, as primarily an allegory of Christ's love for the church, or as Christ's love for the soul. In contrast to this, most Christian interpreters since the nineteenth century have understood the Song of Solomon as a beautifully crafted love poem describing either: (1) the relationship between King Solomon and his Shulammite bride, or (2) the relationship between a simple shepherd and the Shulammite shepherdess, or (3) a three-character relationship involving Solomon, a shepherd boy, and the Shulammite shepherdess. Still many others, since the beginning of the twentieth century, have understood the Song of Solomon as simply a collection of sensuous love poems on a common theme, rather than the unfolding of a single poetic love story."
As I have previously stated, the Bible is not afraid to be very forward in its language, and at sometimes even shocking.
I didn't find this poetry shocking, but enjoyed the fact that God is very much in favor of a profound, and satisfying sexual relationship for his creation.
Beyond that, with the given time constraints, I'm afraid we're off to the book of Proverbs.