The Song of Songs: The Love Story of God and Israel (V)

“As a rose among the thorns, so is My beloved among the daughters!” (2:2)

Here the daughters represent the nations as negative traits and trends in consciousness, that are thorns against our purpose and mission in life to express and make prevail positive traits and actions among humankind. We can realize a connection between flower and beauty, thorns and pain.

Our good actions reflect beauty (flower) as completion and plenitude. Negative traits and actions reflect pain (thorns) as separation and lack of goodness. Israel is referred here as the goodness that is loved by God.

“Like an apple [tree] among the trees of the forest, so is my Beloved among the sons. In His shade I delighted and sat down. And His fruit [is] sweet to my palate.” (2:3)

Israel responds to God comparing His love to a fruit tree among fruitless trees. This means that only from God's love the world and all His creation receive their sustenance.

We can't be sustained from which there's no power to give life or be able to sustain it. Fruitless trees are also compared to idols with no life or means of sustenance.

“Among the sons” can be understood in two ways. God's creations that can be considered sons (sun, moon, stars, earth, wind, rain, etc.), and the sons as the trees that don't bear fruit.

“And His fruit sweet to my palate”, for everything coming from God is sweet. Even the darkness that is bitter in our eyes and palate conceals the sweetness of its hidden light that also comes from His love.

“And I shall give you the treasures of darkness, and the hidden riches of sealed places, that you shall know that I am the Lord, who call you by your name, yea, the God of Israel.” (Isaiah 45:3)

We can also understand the fruit tree as the Torah, for God, Israel, the Sabbath and the Torah are one.

“He has brought me to the house of wine, and His banner upon me is love.” (Song of Songs 2:4)

The house of wine is an allegory for the Temple of Jerusalem, and the Torah's delights and pleasures are compared to wine. Thus we realize that being brought by God to His house is engaging in the delights and pleasures coming from His ways and attributes as the material expressions of His love.

Wine is also the result of a transformation process that culminates in the delight and pleasure for the ones who drink it. Likewise, through God's ways and attributes we transform our consciousness by separating ourselves from the negative traits and trends of ego's fantasies and illusions. The latter are the idols that have no life, do not give life, and do not sustain life.

One of the first steps towards this transformation process is humbleness, which is one of the many lessons learned by Israel her slavery in Egypt. Oppression teaches us to be humble after being forced to live in the worst imaginable conditions. Matzah was one of the prerequisites to leave Egypt, and our sages teach that it represents humility.

This must be a motivation to be and do goodness in opposition to the negative expressions derived from arrogance. The latter creates separation and divisiveness, while humbleness invites closeness and unity.

In this sense humbleness keeps us united with traits and qualities that integrate and harmonize all aspects and dimensions of consciousness, as the starting point to get us closer to each other for the greater purpose inherent to goodness.

We honor goodness when we avoid negativity. Avoiding negative reactions and situations keep us in the goodness we essentially are, as our true identity from which we came and from which we are sustained every moment.

As we become fully aware of God's hand in His entire creation, we assimilate that “His banner over me is love”. God's love is the cause, and love is also the purpose and ultimate effect in His creation, all included.

In the context of God's relationship with Israel, her coming to His house is to receive the transcending and infinite quality of His love. This encompasses the redeeming divine promise to Israel, with the kind of love that transcends time and space to enter in divine realities beyond human comprehension. Here referred to the Messianic era.

We recall God's “banner” in the blessing of the gathering of the exiles, and the last of the three priestly blessings in the central Jewish daily prayers. In them we realize that God's banner is actually God's love.