What Does Song of Solomon 6:8 Mean?
There are sixty queens and eighty concubines, and maidens without number.
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
There are threescore queens, and fourscore concubines, and virgins without number.THE KEY
The court’s women are ranked and counted, until the final group exceeds counting.
THE MEANING
The scene arrays queens, concubines, and an uncounted multitude of virgins. You see status and desire divided into ranks, while the final group exceeds measure.
THE ROOT
מִסְפָּר
mispar
GROWS FROM
ספר
s-p-r
to count, number, recount, or relate
“without number” in this verse is mispar. The root behind “number” also carries the sense of recounting, while its branch for a book or record preserves what is counted. The last group exceeds not only a tally but the limits of an account.
ALSO GROWS
sāphar: to count, recount, or tell
סָפַר
The shared root links a numerical tally with an account told aloud.
sēfer: book or written record
סֵפֶר
A count can be preserved in a record; this multitude is described as beyond counting.
מְלָכוֹת
melakhot
GROWS FROM
מלך
m-l-k
to rule or reign
“queens” in this verse is melakhot. The count begins with women whose status is bound to rule, then names concubines and an uncounted multitude. The root makes the first tier a position of power within the scene’s hierarchy.
ALSO GROWS
melekh: king
מֶלֶךְ
The related title names the ruler whose court the hierarchy evokes.
malkhut: kingship, reign, or kingdom
מַלְכוּת
This branch names the sphere or exercise of rule that gives the queens their rank.
THE PATTERN
Scripture uses what exceeds counting to make abundance visible at the edge of human measure.
And he led him outside, and said, Look up toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them. And he said to him, So will your seed be.Many are the works you make, O LORD my God, the wonders, and your plans toward us. They cannot be laid in rows before you. If I would recount them and speak them, they are more than can be numbered.After this I see, and look, a great crowd that no one can number, from every nation and tribe and people and tongue, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, wrapped in white robes, with palm branches in their hands.THE THREAD
One is she, my dove, my whole one; she is one to her mother, the clear one to the one who bore her. The daughters see her and call her flourishing, and the queens and concubines praise her.Verse 8 multiplies the court by rank and number; verse 9 answers it with one beloved, then names the queens and concubines again as witnesses to her singularity. The contrast shows that the list measures the crowd, while the beloved stands apart.
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