to know (properly · verb, qal perfect, 1st person common singular
soul
נַפְשִׁ֣יnaf.Shi
H5315
properly · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix
made
שָׂמַ֔תְנִיsa.Mat.ni
H7760
to put (used in a great variety of applications · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person feminine singular + pronominal suffix
chariots
מַרְכְּב֖וֹתmar.ke.Vot
H4818
a chariot · noun, common feminine plural construct
Amminadib
עַמִּי נָדִיבʻAmmîy Nâdîyb
H5993
Ammi-Nadib
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
Hosea 11:8-9 How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee, Israel? how shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboim? mine he…
Luke 15:20 And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his…
Jeremiah 31:18-20 I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus; Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke: turn…
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 6:12
Or ever one was aware, my soul made me like the chariots of Amminadib. These are either the words of the church or of Christ, saying, "I know not" (y) as the first clause may be rendered: if the words of the church, the sense may be, that though she knew not where her beloved was gone, when he went from her, yet she ran about in search of him as swiftly as the chariots of Amminadib; and when she did know that he was gone down into the garden, immediately, on a sudden, at an unawares, such was the strength of her love and affection to him, the she moved as swiftly after him as if she had been in one of those chariots; and this may signify also her courage and resolution, that, notwithstanding…
to the chariot of a noble man: Desire leads to the union of the man and the woman. There may be support here for Solomon being the husband, though this description could be a metaphor for the joys of romance (cp. 1:16-17).
Rashi on Song of Solomon 6:12
I did not know. The congregation of Yisroel laments, “I did not know how to be aware of sin, that I should retain my glory and my greatness, and I erred over groundless hatred and controversy, which intensified during the reign of the Chashmonai kings, Horkenus and Aristoblus,23They were brothers who battled one another for the throne. until one of them brought in the Roman Empire and received the kingship from its hand and became its vassal. Since then, “my soul set me” to be “like chariots,” to let the nobility of other nations ride upon me.
A noble people. עַמִּי נָדִיב means] the same as עַם נָדִיב[=a noble people]. The yud is superfluous like the yud of, “the One Who took up His abode…
I did not know, my soul was troubled within me, etc. I did not know the gifts of spiritual grace with which you were illuminated by the Lord to bring forth the fruits of faith among all nations. The internal anxiety of my mind troubled me because of the sudden introduction of the New Testament in place of the old, while the proclamation of the gospel suddenly filled the whole world instead of the books of the prophets and the law, which I knew to be divine and written by the Holy Spirit. Like swift chariots, it quickly traversed not only Judea and Samaria, but also the borders of all nations, to my amazement and astonishment. I rightly compare it not just to chariots, but to quadrigas; for indeed the authority of four writers commended it to memory, but the mind and hand to write were directed by one Spirit of God through Jesus Christ, like if you see one quadriga prepared for the course by the harmonious speed of four horses, but governed by the guidance of one charioteer, so that they run on the right path. Indeed, I had heard for a long time that four authors would write about Jesus with equal consent, but what spirit drove them, what utility and truth, how much glory and salvation their scripture contained, alas, I deserved to realize and know so late! Moreover, that the quadrigas are called the heralds of the New Testament in the name of Aminadab, signifies the Lord Savior, who, presiding over the chariot, filled the hearts of the preachers with the grace of His Spirit, through whom, by the preceding notion of the saving doctrine, He would reach the peoples about to believe in Him. For Aminadab, who was the great-grandson of the patriarch Judah, in both his person and name indicates the Lord Savior: namely, by his person, because the genealogy of the Lord's incarnation descends from Abraham to King David, from David to Joseph and Mary, in the same manner as the names of Judah and David, and Solomon, and other fathers, from whom Christ descended according to the flesh, are sometimes taken by the prophets to signify Him; as in the phrase, "Judah is a lion's cub. To the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down, he crouched as a lion, and as a lioness; who shall rouse him up?" (Gen. XLIX). And again: "And I will cleanse them; and they shall be My people, and I will be their God, and David My servant shall be king over them" (Ezek. XXXVII). And in…
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
Amminadib — A person mentioned in Cant. 6:12, whose chariots were famed for their swiftness. It is rendered in the margin “my willing people,” and in the Revised Version “my princely people.”
Chariots · Illustrative of: Christ’s love to his church — Illustrative of: Christ’s love to his church
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).
