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Song of Songs 7:10-13
Six times in the Song of Songs, Solomon refers to pomegranates in describing his beloved. 添our temples are like a slice of a pomegranate behind your veil,・he says, and 土our shoots are an orchard of pomegranates with choice fruits.・ When he searches out his beloved, he goes to an orchard 鍍o see whether the vine has budded or the pomegranates had bloomed.・ At the beginning of the final chapter, the beloved offers herself to her husband, saying 的 would give you spiced wine to drink from the juice of my pomegranates.・
In 7:12, pomegranates are explicitly associated with love. The beloved says, 鏑et us see whether the vine has budded and its blossoms have opened, and whether the pomegranates have bloomed. There I will give you my love.・ The place of the ripening pomegranates, that is the place for love. Pomegranates are the food of love.
In this morning痴 sermon we looked at the two monumental pillars that Hiram of Tyre cast to stand at the door of the temple, and noted that the capitals were each decorated with 200 pomegranates. The Song of Songs points to one aspect of the symbolism: The pillars at the door of the temple stand like giant pomegranate trees, bearing fruit, and marking the temple as the place of love, the place where Yahweh meets with His bride, the love garden for Israel and her husband, the place for the marriage supper of Israel and Yahweh.
We are the temple. We are a place of ripening pomegranates. Here in our assembly as the church, the bride and body of Christ, we are the trysting place for God and His beloved. And this table is the marriage banquet of the Lamb, the lovers feast. Here, our Husband feeds us; here He declares that we are His and He is ours; here He gives His love, displaying every week the love that was manifested when He gave Himself for His bride.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Sunday, September 19, 2004 at 07:55 AM
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