Why is your lover better than all others, O woman of rare beauty? What makes your lover so special that we must promise this?
Parallel translations
- WEB How is your beloved better than another beloved, you fairest among women? How is your beloved better than another beloved, that you do so adjure us?
- KJV What is thy beloved more than another beloved, O thou fairest among women? what is thy beloved more than another beloved, that thou dost so charge us?
- BSB How is your beloved better than others, O most beautiful among women? How is your beloved better than another, that you charge us so?
- NKJV What is your beloved More than another beloved, O fairest among women? What is your beloved More than another beloved, That you so charge us? The Shulamite
- NASB ¶“What kind of beloved is your beloved, O most beautiful among women? What kind of beloved is your beloved, That you make us swear in this way?”
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The daughters of Jerusalem ask what makes her beloved so superior to others. It invites her to declare his unmatched worth.
Overview
Struck by her earnest plea, they ask how her beloved excels any other, prompting her famous praise of him that follows. The question opens the way for a testimony to his surpassing excellence. It pictures the moment when others, seeing a believer's devotion, ask what makes the Lord so worthy, an invitation to commend Him (1 Pet. 3:15).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Song 1:8If you don’t know, most beautiful among women, follow the tracks of the sheep. Graze your young goats beside the shepherds’ tents.
- Song 6:1Where has your beloved gone, you fairest among women? Where has your beloved turned, that we may seek him with you?
- Song 6:9–10My dove, my perfect one, is unique. She is her mother’s only daughter. She is the favorite one of her who bore her. The daughters saw her, and called her blessed; the queens and the concubines, and they praised her.
- Ps 87:3Glorious things are spoken about you, city of God. Selah.
- Ps 45:13The princess inside is all glorious. Her clothing is interwoven with gold.
- Isa 53:2For he grew up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no good looks or majesty. When we see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.
- Matt 16:13–17Now when Jesus came into the parts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, “Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?”
- Matt 21:10When he had come into Jerusalem, all the city was stirred up, saying, “Who is this?”
- 2 Cor 4:3–6Even if our Good News is veiled, it is veiled in those who perish;
- John 1:14The Word became flesh, and lived among us. We saw his glory, such glory as of the one and only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
The poetry of covenant love between bride and bridegroom pictures, at its highest, the love of Christ for his church — the Bridegroom who gave himself for his bride.
How Song of Songs 5:9 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.