MARY'S PRAYER CONNECTION

The Song of Songs is a love poem, which portrays a beautiful love story. It is the story of Solomon, a son of King David and his bride whose married life was a time of true discovery. Their love from the first meeting revealed their respect and admiration for the good qualities within each of them. The fulfillment of their personal needs, and wants, were secondary to the needs of each other; mutual love defined, lies within the stanzas of this poem. If read carefully one can discover the qualities of a Christian marriage, the same qualities which sustain any relationship built on mature love. Solomon and the Shulammite woman, a Jewish maiden desired to love rather than to be loved.

Solomon saw a beautiful woman working in a vineyard, probably one of his own vineyards and saw her dark skin as beautiful. The other young women were light, skinned and mistreated her because of her dark skin. She spent long hours in the sun caring for the vines in the grape vineyard. She defended her skin condition by saying, "My mother's sons …made me take care of the vineyards; and my own vineyard I have neglected." (1:6) Meaning she was unable to care for her skin properly because she worked in the sun, for many hours each day.

Love at first sight touched the heart and soul of Solomon, and eventually he returned to the vineyard to find her. He had many wives, but the beauty of this young maiden penetrated the depths of his heart. He saw her as lovable and this love brought forth the inner beauty of the young, Jewish woman who was also, love struck by her first encounter with Solomon. Love brings forth the beauty lying beneath the skin of the one loved.

The Song of Solomon contains five main themes love, sex, commitment, beauty and ordinary problems married couples face. The Song of Songs is a tribute to marriage describing the purity and sacrednessof a love shared between man and woman. Christian marriage is a marriage union in which God, the epitome of love, places His seal of approval upon the couple.

The Song of Songs has often been, suggested as the story of God's relationship with Israel, the story of the relationship between Jesus and His Church, the union between Christ and an individual soul and some believe parts of the poem to be symbolic of the relationship between Jesus and his Mother Mary. Yet it is also a story of the sacredness of human love, a love between man and woman, one of mutual respect, care and concern of the loved for the beloved. The true meaning of this poem does not come from the individual exchanges of expressed love but from the poem as a whole.

The words of explicit sexual intimacy reveal the depths to which unselfish love can flower and grow. It is not hard to imagine the love between Adam and Eve, which must have existed prior to their fall into sin. Adam was lonely and we can only imagine his reaction to his first sight of Eve. His words were probably very similar to the words of Solomon.

After their sin, sex became,often motivated by lust rather than commitment and love, which happens too often within many relationships. Somewhere along the way, sex has ceased to be a gift of love for the beloved and become something to seek for one's self.

Each section of Song of Songs is a separate poem within a poem. The first poem provides the details of their Wedding Day during which friends spoke of their own love for this young maiden. "We rejoice and delight in you; we will praise your love more than wine." (1:4b) How, beautiful and yet how opposite from today's world; friends often seek the wine and forget; love is the reason they were invited to the Wedding. Solomon says to her after hearing her friends' comment, "How right they are to adore you." (1: 4)

He is a man rejoicing as his bride is praised in a beautiful expression of love by her friends. Secure in the knowledge of her love for him, Solomon bears no jealousy his love is too deep for this. What a compliment to him as friends express their love for the woman he has chosen for his bride.

Solomon: "How beautiful you are, my darling! Oh, how beautiful! Your eyes are doves.

Bride: "How handsome you are, my lover! Oh, how charming! And our bed is verdant.

Solomon: "The beams of our house are cedars; our rafters are firs."

Bride: "I am a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys."

Solomon: "Like a lily among thorns is my darling among the maidens." (1:15-17,2:1, 2)

This conversation between the newly married lovers is so similar to conversations of many couples in love, at the beginning of their marriage. Some are able through daily renewal of their commitment, to keep this love alive for many years. Some loose the luster of the early experience of loving and being loved and cease to communicate their love. The flames of love, the feeling of being, loved and the emotional,feelings which come with loving another grow lukewarm, and in some cases cease to exist. This was not the case with Solomon, and his bride, their love persevered

Following the consummation of their marriage the bride conversed with her friends saying, "I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste. He has taken me to the banquet hall, and his banner over me is love. Strengthen me with raisins; refresh me with apples for I am faint with love. His left arm is under my head, and his right arm embraces me. Daughters of Jerusalem,I charge you by the gazelles and by the does of the field: Do not arouse or waken love until it so desires." (1:15-2:7)

The bride reveals the secret, of the sanctity of the marriage bed, "do not arouse or waken love until it so desires." (2:7) Her warning to the Daughters of Jerusalem, her friends, is simple and straight forward. Her meaning lies within the joy of her first intimate encounter, in which two bodies unite as one. The afterglow was worth the wait! Save your virginity for the wedding bed is a message of warning she gives to the other maidens. She preserved her virginity, which increased the love of Solomon for his beloved.

The deep feelings of love can be stilted, when those feelings of love are permitted to grow out of control and the commitment to love becomes a commitment to lust. Too often the tragedy of young love! The feelings of love and the commitment to loving must grow together to build a mature relationship prior to marriage or the marriage will not continue as one which can withstand the tides of time.

Saint Paul sums up the voice of immature love in these words, "If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love. I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal." (1 Cor.13:1) Professions of love from the mouth of immature love, is like a resounding gong and a clanging cymbal."

A Christian marriage finds its stability in a mature love, a committed love,which includes such qualities as compassion, mutual support and respect, understanding, honesty, moral integrity, courage of conviction. A Christian marriage is marriage based upon mutual mature love. It is a marriage in which both man and woman, adhere to the principles of right reason and willingly forgive and allow the hurts to heal. Both man and woman must have the ability and be willing at all times to forgive and to accept forgiveness.

However, not all marriages begin with mature love and in some cases one spouse or both spouses may be incapable, of making a lifetime commitment at the time of the marriage. We seem surrounded today by the tragedy of broken marriages, some which result in divorce or separation and others in which partners live separate lives under the same roof, incapable of conflict resolution. They lack either the desire or the ability to cope honestly with the reality of their relationship.

There are also marriages in which the absence of moral integrity of one spouse demands the dissolution of a marriage in order for the other spouse and children in some cases to rebuild a life of love, peace and harmony. Tragically, the basic cause; a marriage based on immature love is too often, undiscovered by the man and or woman. Sometimes the partners simply are incapable of resolution and dissolution is the end-result. If we ask young people who are about to be married, "Why do you want to get married?" Many will answer to be loved and the answer should be, to love. To marry because one wants to be loved is an unhealthy reason.

The Power of Love is one of the themes within this love poem revealed in the words, of the Shulammite maiden,"Place me as a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave. It burns like a blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot wash it away, If, one were to give all the wealth of his house for love, it would be utterly scorned." (8:6-7)

Saint Paul describes the qualities a mature love in following manner, "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails,…When I was child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child, When I became a man  I put childish ways behind me. …And now these three remain; faith, hope and love.  But the greatest of these is love." (1Cor. 13: 4-8, 11, 13)

Paul's description of love is the definition of a mature love, a love, which perseveres and holds a marriage together in those times when tragedy,  misunderstandings, illness, unintended slights and other problems strike at the heart of a marriage. In the marriage of Solomon and the Shulammite woman loneliness, indifference, isolation, fatigue, in attention to love, and other barriers, which turn love cold, created a lapse of communication within the marriage. The young woman turned away from Solomon and did not open her door to him when he knocked. Hurt by her actions, he turned and walked away from their home.

Realizing her actions resulted in Solomon leaving their home, she began to examine her own conscience and then to accept responsibility for her own behavior. She did not become angry and blame her husband, but went out to search for him, to seek forgiveness and his return. Her love is a mature love and while there was a brief lapse in her focus on her beloved, she took the necessary steps to resolve their conflict.

Faith, hope and love and the greatest of these is love! She had faith in herself, in her husband and in their marriage. She kept her hope alive by being honest, letting go of pride and holding onto the belief in her husband's love for her. Her love for herself and for Solomon gave her the courage to admit her failure to love and to seek his forgiveness. The sanctity of their marriage was preserved, deep in her heart she believed, "I am my lover's and my lover is mine," to me a lasting symbol of God's love for us and what our love for God should be.

May God bless and keep you and those you love, in the palm of His hand all the days of your life.