What Does Song of Solomon 1:1 Mean?
The song of songs, which is Solomon's.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
The song of songs, which is Solomon’s.THE KEY
The title crowns this as the song above every song, and Solomon’s name quietly roots it in wholeness.
THE MEANING
You meet an intimate song named in the highest register of song, under Solomon’s name, which carries the root of wholeness. Desire is given the book’s central voice, not treated as a decorative aside.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that intimate love is a lesser subject than the highest themes of song; this title places it at the summit.
THE ROOT
שִׁיר
shir
GROWS FROM
שיר
sh-y-r
To sing; to give voice in song.
The title repeats the same Hebrew word in “song of songs,” a superlative way of naming the song above all songs. English makes “song” sound like a finished object; the root also carries the act of singing that gives it voice.
ALSO GROWS
shar: Sings; one who is singing.
שָׁר
The noun and the act of singing grow from the same root: this title names a song that is meant to be voiced.
shirah: A song; singing.
שִׁירָה
This related form keeps the root’s sense of voiced song audible beneath the English title.
לִשְׁלֹמֹה
lishlomo
GROWS FROM
שלם
sh-l-m
To be whole, complete, or intact.
Solomon’s Hebrew name, Shelomo, comes from the root also heard in שָׁלוֹם (shalom, wholeness). The title therefore places this song under a name that carries wholeness within it.
ALSO GROWS
shalom: Wholeness; completeness.
שָׁלוֹם
This branch makes the wholeness carried in Solomon’s name explicit.
shalem: Whole; complete; intact.
שָׁלֵם
This form shows the root’s direct sense of completeness, resonating with the title’s claim to be the song above songs.
THE PATTERN
A song gives inward experience a voice that can be shared.
He sets a new song in my mouth, praise to our God. Many see and stand in awe, and lean their weight upon the LORD.Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and songs of breath, singing and plucking the strings in your heart to the Lord.And they sing a new song, saying, Worthy are you to take the scroll and to untie its seals, for you were slaughtered and bought us for God with your blood, out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation.THE THREAD
Ask for the wholeness of Jerusalem; those who love you are at ease.“Solomon’s” carries the root שלם (sh-l-m), also heard in שָׁלוֹם (shalom, wholeness), rendered “peace” here. The shared root opens the title’s resonance: a song named under wholeness meets a verse that speaks of wholeness joined to love.
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