A New View on the Love Song of Shir HaShirim

Shabbos Chol HaMoed: The Universal Message of Shir HaShirim (A Sermon) 

 Rabbi Avi Billet 

Shir Hashirim is often described as a love song between God and the Jewish people. Most of the commentaries view the book as an allegory, and interpret the book in that vein. It is put on such a pedestal that when the Yalkut Shimoni begins his comments on Shir HaShirim he says the following:

ילקוט שמעוני שיר השירים רמז תתקפ
+א+ שיר השירים, שיר המשובח והמעולה שבשירים, ראב"ע עבד לה מתלא לאחד שהוליך סאה של חטים לנחתום ואמר הוצא ממנו קמח ואחר כך הוצא לי ממנה סולת ואחר כך הוצא לי גלוסקא, כך מכל חכמתו של שלמה לא סילת אלא שיר השירים לישראל, , רבי עקיבא אומר אין העולם כדאי כיום שניתן בו שיר השירים,

It’s the greatest of songs. Consider the parable of Rabbi Elazar ben Azarya – comparing it to a person who brings some kernels of wheat to a baker saying, “Turn it into flour for me.” Then from the flour he says, “Produce סלת – an even finer flour.” Then from the סלת he says, “Make me a Gluska – the finest bread.” The great Tanna explained using a statement which is also often attributed to Rabbi Akiva, “This is what Shir hashirim is. It is the סלת of Solomon’s wisdom. Because all the songs are holy, כל השירים קדש ושיר השירים קדש קדשים – but Shir Hashirim is the holiest of holies.

The introduction continues with another statement of Rabbi Akiva – “that the world was essentially unfulfilled in its potential until Shir HaShirim was introduced to it. - אין העולם כדאי כיום שניתן בו שיר השירים”

There are a number of opinions regarding the authorship of Shir HaShirim. It is most famously attributed to King Solomon – Shlomo Hamelech wrote it, Rabbi Yonatan teaches us in Shir Hashirim Raba, as a young man. Then he wrote Mishlei and Koheles as he got older and looked at life a little differently.

However, Rashi notes on Baba Batra 14b that שיר השירים - נראה בעיני שאמרו לעת זקנתו.

Shir Hashirim was written when Shlomo was an old man. Which would suggest that Koheles – with all its cynicism and raised eyebrows – was written well before Shir Hashirim.

Rabbi Moshe Tendler suggested that Koheles has to be written by a young person. A young person raises all kinds of questions, a young person is trying to discover himself or herself. A young person sees all the contradictions in the world, and finds them troubling. A young person tries to find mentors, a young person clings to teachers, a young person has innocence stolen from beneath her feet, a young person wants to make sense of it all, but is confused, lost, not knowing what’s the proper path.

And, of course, the young person has very keen insight. Because the young person is looking at the world afresh, with a new pair of eyes that have not yet observed.

Of course, all that is in the ideal world. Nowadays we see – both in college campuses and even in yeshivos – a blind allegiance to the perspective shared by professors and, yes, even rebbeim.

The point of Koheles is to show that if I have real problems, and if I see contradictions, I ought to consider both sides of the equation, and not jump to conclusions based on only one perspective. A real investigation, especially a theological one and a philosophical one, is intellectually honest, and also intellectually curious. Taking anyone’s word for granted is an exercise in numbing and dumbing the brain, rather than strengthening it through real challenges, and real attempts at achieving a diversity of views that reflect a human being’s attempt to reconcile difficulties on the one hand, while forming and shaping one’s identity on the other.

And of course, an emunah-based system begins with basic assumptions and truths. But that does not mean that a person can’t or shouldn’t swing on some kind of proverbial pendulum through one’s life. One of my favorite lines that demonstrate this is from the Rashbam, Rashi’s grandson, who – in the beginning of his commentary on Parshas Vayeshev – quotes his grandfather Rashi, with whom he had been recently speaking, who told him that if he only had the time he would rewrite his entire Peirush on Chumash.

But a lifelong pursuit of answers, of thought leading to knowledge and wisdom and understanding needs to lead somewhere.

And so Rabbi Tendler’s point is – by the time a person is older, the way he wants to look back on life and a relationship with God is one of Shir HaShirim. That after a life filled with all kinds of experiences, one wants to be able to reflect and say, “I am in love with the Master of the World.”

That’s all fine and good if one accepts Shlomo as the author. However, even Yalkut Shimoni is not satisfied with that

ילקוט שמעוני שיר השירים רמז תתקפ
 תני בשם רבי נתן הקדוש ברוך הוא אמרו שנאמר שיר השירים אשר לשלמה למי שהשלום שלו, ר"ג אומר מלאכי השרת אמרוהו שיר שאמרו אותו שרים של מעלה 

So now who are the possible authors? The one Who is the Master of Peace – HKBH Himself. Or the angels.

And this question gives us pause to consider another way to look at Shir HaShirim.

Meaning, if the author is Shlomo – it seems very simple. It’s a love story between every Jew and our Creator. And those of us who want to love God can learn from it.

But if it’s God Who wrote it or dictated it, or if it’s the angels who wrote it or dictated it, what does this say about the love story? God’s going to tell us to love Him? He needs this whole book? He told us in the Shema – we know this. We don’t need more than ואהבת את ה' א-לקיך.

So I think it’s important to understand something about Shir HaShirim. Adina Yael Sternberg wrote an article in Megadim 36, in which her conclusion includes a viewpoint that the lover, the דוד is the searcher and the seeker, while the beloved, the רעיה, is the admired and the sought. This is a little different than calling the דוד Israel and the רעיה God. But she analyzes the pursuit of this relationship on three levels.

The first is the Shlomo (the presumed author’s) personal life.

The second is the nationalistic pursuit of Shlomo’s time period.

The third is the eternal nationalistic pursuit of Am Yisrael – which spans time and generations. 

There isn’t time to go through each of these approaches now. But the idea that there are layers to Shir HaShirim as a love-story is quite compelling, which actually leads me to take one more passage from Yalkut Shimoni to a direction we don’t discuss enough in our community in general.

Shir Hashirim Asher LiShlomo – to the one to whom Peace is His. He navigates peace ונוהג שלום עם בריותיו through all of His creatures. And then Yalkut Shimoni gives examples.

The sun shines on the righteous and on the wicked. It doesn't discriminate.

עושה שלום במרומיו – in all of His realms. Water in clouds doesn’t stop lightning from functioning. Lightning doesn’t burn up the water-filled-clouds. Sun and moon and stars are all heavenly luminaries – stars are made out of gas and fire – but there is peace in the heavens. They don’t destroy one another.

In the plague of hail there was fire and ice mixed together, but they were able to coexist. At Sinai, there was a cloud, and there was smoke. And the two didn’t destroy one another or wipe the other away.

And in the heavens as well, in the Maaseh Merkavah – Yechezkel’s vision, the lion and the bull are together, while on earth it seems such a relationship is not so simple.

And I think that the different levels of a love story in Shir HaShirim ought to teach us a profound lesson. God can manage his heavenly creatures. The question is why can’t we do it here?

There was a cute story in the news 10 days ago, concerning a little girl in South Carolina, recently toilet trained, who was brought to a store to get a gift for her accomplishment.

As the article put it, this was her short term goal. And her long term goal is to become a doctor. Her mother posted a picture of Sophia and her new doll, who is a doctor doll, with labcoat, and other accoutrements.

Now I’m quoting from the article directly.

The doll Sophia picked out is black and Sophia happens to be white, and the cashier at the store asked Sophia if she picked out the wrong doll. "Sophia continued to stare blankly as I let the cashier know that she was a prize for Sophia being fully potty trained,” her mother wrote.
The cashier responded, "Are you sure this is the doll you want, honey?"
Sophia said, "Yes, please!"
When the cashier said, "But she doesn't look like you. We have lots of other dolls that look more like you," Sophia's mother became angry
But Sophia said: "Yes, she does. She's a doctor like I'm a doctor. And I'm a pretty girl and she's a pretty girl. See her pretty hair? And see her stethoscope?" 

Of course this is a story about a cute little girl who completely gets that people are people, and about a bigoted cashier who sees things only in black and white.

I am a very big believer that Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream that people “should be judged not by the color of the skin but by the content of their character” is a heaven sent truism.

But how many of us truly accept it? How many of us have an inherent prejudice?

How many of us have used a certain derogatory Yiddish term to describe an aid, medical assistant, or household help? I won’t even repeat the word here because I find it abhorrent.

L’havdil – it’s not exactly the same, but it’s similar: I have a friend in Hollywood who was born and grew up, until his late teens in the former Soviet Union. He told me once, “It’s funny. In Russia, I was ‘Jew.’ Here I’m ‘the Russian.’”

I’ve spoken to people in this community and elsewhere who have sidled over to me, thinking for some God-knows-what reason, that making a comment about someone they encountered on the street and including the person’s skin color in the conversation is something I might relate to. And I call them on it, every time. How dare someone’s skin color come into the conversation? Do you want to be judged for being a racist?

As a mohel I am called every now and then to perform the ritual of Hatafas Dam Bris – it’s the drawing of Blood of the Covenant from a male who is already circumcised, who is about to complete his conversion.

Sometimes it’s just one person – the last two times I did this were when an entire family was converting, and when a middle-aged couple were converting – though my role was limited to the husband in both cases (the family had two daughters). In both cases, after the adults went through the mikveh, they got married again under a chuppah. Very beautiful – very special experience.

The family was from Puerto Rico. The middle aged couple were black Americans. In this latter case, as the converting rabbi was going through all the questions one asks at this time – the Jewish people are hated across the globe, are you sure you want to join us, etc? Do you accept that an Orthodox Jewish lifestyle might be a little more expensive, where you live, the food you buy – are you committed to it, etc? – one of the rabbis present said to me “we should also say ‘are you aware that you might experience racism in the Orthodox community?’”

And naïve me – I said “What are you talking about?”

And I’ve since found out that I am very naïve. Because I thought everyone thought and believed that “people are to be judged ONLY by the content of their character.”

I sincerely hope that what I am alluding to here does not exist among our people. We tell our children that the only thing we hope you absolutely share with a potential spouse is values and religion – because those are the ingredients for a happy life and marriage. What the person looks like does not matter.

The message of God being the author or the one who dictated Shir HaShirim is that things which seem opposite are not in conflict. Because it’s not about color – it’s about content of character. The sun and the moon – very opposite in looks. But they both illuminate and contribute so much to the world.

Lightning and rain – very different in looks! But lightning powers the world and water powers the world.

Smoke on a mountain and a cloud on a mountain – very different molecular structure! But they both prove God’s presence at Sinai, and herald the giving of the Torah.

Shir HaShirim demonstrates that there are two components to a love relationship. The pursuer and the one who agrees to be pursued.

Just look at God and the Jewish people – could anything be more opposite in looks? And yet what do we share? An eternal love for one another that spans every generation and every horrible thing we’ve done and that God has done.

All of our sins and turnings away from God, and all the devastation God has allowed to take place. From Churbans to Crusades to massacres and a Holocaust.

What binds us is much deeper – בני בכורי ישראל and ואהבת את ה' אלקיך.

That’s the easy definition of Shir HaShirim. The difficult one is for humans to love one another because of all we have in common, and as long as we can coexist (because the other human isn’t trying to kill me), we take the lesson from Shir HaShirim and see people for who they are – between the balance of their Neshama and their goodness – and never never never based on what they look like.