Song of Solomon 4:1

Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair; thou hast doves’ eyes within thy locks: thy hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from mount Gilead.

King James Version · Read in your translation · Open the Explore console

Word by word — the Hebrew

Word	Hebrew	Strong’s	Meaning
fair	יָפָ֤ה ya.Fah	H3303	beautiful (literally or figuratively) · adjective, feminine singular absolute
love	רַעְיָתִי֙ ra'.ya.Ti	H7474	a female associate · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix
fair	יָפָ֔ה ya.Fah	H3303	beautiful (literally or figuratively) · adjective, feminine singular absolute
doves’	יוֹנִ֔ים yo.Nim	H3123	a dove (apparently from the warmth of their mating) · noun, common masculine plural absolute
eyes	עֵינַ֣יִךְ 'ei.Na.yikh	H5869	an eye (literally or figuratively) · noun, common feminine dual construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
within	מִבַּ֖עַד mi.Ba.'ad	H1157	in up to or over against · preposition + cardinal number, both genders singular absolute
locks	לְצַמָּתֵ֑ךְ le.tza.ma.Tekh	H6777	a veil · preposition + noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
hair	שַׂעְרֵךְ֙ sa'.reKh	H8181	hair (as if tossed or bristling) · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
flock	כְּעֵ֣דֶר ke.'E.der	H5739	an arrangement · preposition + noun, common masculine singular construct
goats	הָֽעִזִּ֔ים ha.'i.Zim	H5795	a she-goat (as strong) · definite article + noun, common masculine plural absolute
appear	שֶׁגָּלְשׁ֖וּ she.gal.Shu	H1570	probably to caper (as a goat) · relative particle + verb, qal perfect, 3rd person common plural
mount	מֵהַ֥ר me.Har	H2022	a mountain or range of hills (sometimes used figurative… · preposition + noun, common masculine singular construct
Gilead	גִּלְעָֽד gil.'Ad	H1568	Gilad · proper noun, a place name

Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).

Cross-references

Song of Solomon 1:15 Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair; thou hast doves’ eyes.
Song of Solomon 6:5 Turn away thine eyes from me, for they have overcome me: thy hair is as a flock of goats that appear from Gilead.
Song of Solomon 6:7 As a piece of a pomegranate are thy temples within thy locks.
Song of Solomon 2:14 O my dove, that art in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs, let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice; for sw…
Song of Solomon 4:9-10 Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse; thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine eyes, with one chain of thy neck.
Song of Solomon 7:5 Thine head upon thee is like Carmel, and the hair of thine head like purple; the king is held in the galleries.
Micah 7:14 Feed thy people with thy rod, the flock of thine heritage, which dwell solitarily in the wood, in the midst of Carmel: let them feed in Bash…
Numbers 32:1 Now the children of Reuben and the children of Gad had a very great multitude of cattle: and when they saw the land of Jazer, and the land o…

Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).

Commentary

John Gill on Song of Solomon 4:1

Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair,.... The same as in Sol 1:15; here repeated by Christ, to introduce the following commendation; to express the greatness of his love to his church; and show that he had the same opinion of her, and esteem for her, notwithstanding what had passed between that time and this; thou hast doves' eyes within thy locks; the same comparison; see Gill on Sol 1:15; only with this difference, here her eyes are said to be "within her locks": which, whether understood of the ministers of the Gospel; or of the eyes of the understanding, particularly of, the eye of faith, as has been observed on the above place; do not seem so much to design the imperfe…

Read the whole note in the console

Tyndale Open Study Notes on Song of Solomon 4:1–end

The consummation of the marriage is now expressed. • This poem is the first “descriptive poem” in the book (see also 5:10-16; 6:4-6; 7:2-8). Scholars commonly refer to these poems by the Arabic term wasf (“description”); these poems are similar in form to songs sung at modern Arabic weddings. These sensuous poems are preludes to sexual intimacy. In their descriptions of physical beauty, they often move—as this one does—from the head downward. 4:1 my darling (literally companion): The man is about to consummate his love with the one who is his friend as well as lover (see also 4:7). • like a flock of goats winding down the slopes of Gilead: Middle Eastern goats are very dark, if not black. T…

Read the whole note in the console

Rashi on Song of Solomon 4:1

Behold you are beautiful my beloved. He praised them and appeased them, and their sacrifices pleased Him. Until the sun spreads. When they sinned before Me,1The captioned text of Rashi belongs to Verse 6 below; Rashi comments here to inform us until when did the sacrifices please God. in the days of Chofni and Pinchas.2See I Shmuel 2:12-17. Your eyes are like doves. Your hues, appearance and characteristics3I.e., עיניך here does not mean your “eyes” but your “characteristics,” i.e., appearance, as in כעין הבדלח, meaning, “as the appearance of crystal,” in Bamidbar 11:7. (Sifsei Chachomim) are like those of a dove, which cleaves to its mate, and when they slaughter it, it does not struggle…

The Church Fathers

[The church] mourns in its eyes, that is in its faithful, because it is written, "Your eyes are as doves apart from your reticence," because they see spiritually and know how to keep silent about the mysteries which they have seen.
— Ambrose of Milan, CONSOLATION ON THE DEATH OF EMPEROR VALENTINIAN 7

So they say that these eyes have fainted after the Lord's salvation, because of the holy coming of the incarnation, which they bore with such longing that it could allow them no rest. So they were right to faint, because they had no period of leisure.
— Cassiodorus, EXPOSITION OF THE PSALMS 119:123

For if goats and the hair or skins of goats always signified the foulness of sinners and never the humility of penitents, that animal would by no means have been reckoned among the clean [animals], nor would it have been said in praise of the bride: "Your hair is like a flock of goats."
— Bede, On the Tabernacle 2:3

The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).

Dictionary and topics

Forest — Heb. ya’ar, meaning a dense wood, from its luxuriance. Thus all the great primeval forests of Syria (Eccl. 2:6; Isa. 44:14; Jer. 5:6; Micah 5:8). The most extensive was the trans-Jordanic forest of…
Gilead · 2. A mountain — 2. A mountain
Goat · General references — General references
Goat, The · Illustrative: (Flock of,) of the church — Illustrative: (Flock of,) of the church
Mountains · Mentioned in scripture: Gilead — Mentioned in scripture: Gilead

Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).