Song of Solomon 2: His Banner Over Me Is Love
Song of Solomon 2 is the lyrical heart of the Hebrew love poem attributed to Solomon, composed between 960-920 BC. The chapter opens with the Beloved’s self-description as a rose of Sharon and a lily of the valleys, moves through the Lover’s answering praise and the shared intimacy of the embrace, and closes with one of the most recognizable springtime passages in all of Scripture. Winter is past, the rain is over and gone, the flowers appear on the earth, the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in the land. Jewish tradition reads the Song as a picture of God’s covenant love for Israel. Christian tradition reads it as Christ’s love for the Church, a reading present in the Church fathers and carried forward through Bernard of Clairvaux, Thomas Aquinas, and Charles Spurgeon. The phrase “His banner over me is love” has shaped three thousand years of devotional poetry, wedding liturgy, and mystical theology.
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Quick Answer
Song of Solomon 2 is the chapter of the rose of Sharon and the banner of love, where two voices exchange intimate praise and the Lover calls the Beloved into the renewed spring.
About Song of Solomon 2
Song of Solomon 2 sits at the center of the most lyrical book in the Hebrew Bible. The chapter is structured as an exchange between two voices: the Beloved speaks first, describing herself as a rose of Sharon and a lily of the valleys; the Lover responds by setting her apart from all others as a lily among thorns. The imagery escalates into the famous lines of verse 4: he brought her to the banquet hall, and his banner over her is love.
The “banner” image draws on ancient Near Eastern military culture, where a standard or flag over a camp declared whose army you belonged to and whose protection you were under. The Beloved’s declaration - that love is the flag over her life - is one of the most striking inversions in the Old Testament. The warrior’s banner becomes love itself. She is claimed not by conquest but by devotion.
Verses 5 through 7 form an intimate pause: faint with love, resting in the embrace of left hand under head and right hand holding close, the Beloved charges the daughters of Jerusalem by the roes and the hinds of the field - creatures known for their gentleness - not to stir up or awaken love before its time. The charge recurs three times across the book (2:7, 3:5, 8:4), functioning as a structural refrain about the sacred timing of love.
The chapter closes with the Lover’s great springtime invitation (verses 10-13), a passage frequently cited as the most evocative description of seasonal renewal in Scripture. The invitation is concrete and sensory: winter’s rains are over, the fig tree is ripening, the vines are in blossom, and the turtledove - a migratory bird whose return to the land of Israel marks the arrival of spring - is singing in the land. This is a summons back into a world made new, addressed to the one the Lover calls “my love, my beautiful one.”
Full Chapter Text
Song of Solomon 2 (World English Bible)
- I am a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys.
- As a lily amongst thorns, so is my love amongst the daughters.
- As the apple tree amongst the trees of the wood, so is my beloved amongst the sons. I sat down under his shadow with great delight, his fruit was sweet to my taste.
- He brought me to the banquet hall. His banner over me is love.
- Strengthen me with raisins, refresh me with apples; for I am faint with love.
- His left hand is under my head. His right hand embraces me.
- I adjure you, daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes, or by the hinds of the field, that you not stir up, nor awaken love, until it so desires.
- The voice of my beloved! Behold, he comes, leaping on the mountains, skipping on the hills.
- My beloved is like a roe or a young deer. Behold, he stands behind our wall! He looks in at the windows. He glances through the lattice.
- My beloved spoke, and said to me, “Rise up, my love, my beautiful one, and come away.
- For behold, the winter is past. The rain is over and gone.
- The flowers appear on the earth. The time of the singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.
- The fig tree ripens her green figs. The vines are in blossom. They give out their fragrance. Arise, my love, my beautiful one, and come away.”
- My dove in the clefts of the rock, in the hiding places of the mountainside, let me see your face. Let me hear your voice; for your voice is sweet and your face is lovely.
- Catch for us the foxes, the little foxes that plunder the vineyards; for our vineyards are in blossom.
- My beloved is mine, and I am his. He browses amongst the lilies.
- Until the day is cool, and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be like a roe or a young deer on the mountains of Bether.
World English Bible. Public domain.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the main message of Song of Solomon 2?
Song of Solomon 2 celebrates mutual devotion between the Beloved and the Lover. She rests under the Lover’s banner of love and his protecting embrace while he calls her into a renewed world where winter is past and the season of singing has begun. The chapter presents love as the defining flag over a life - not conquest, not obligation, but declared and public devotion.
Who wrote Song of Solomon?
Song of Solomon is traditionally attributed to King Solomon of Israel and dated to approximately 960-920 BC during the united monarchy period. The book identifies Solomon by name in multiple places (1:1, 1:5, 3:7, 3:9, 3:11, 8:11-12). Modern scholars describe it as an anthology of Hebrew love poetry with possible composite authorship; Solomonic authorship or sponsorship of the collection is the dominant traditional view in both Jewish and Christian interpretation.
What does “His banner over me is love” mean?
In ancient Near Eastern culture, a military banner or standard (Hebrew: degel) was raised over an encampment to declare whose army was gathered there and whose protection was in force. For the Beloved to say “His banner over me is love” is to say she lives under that declaration - love is the flag over her life, the publicly announced claim the Lover has made. Christian exegetes from Origen forward read this as the Church living under the declared love of Christ.
Is Song of Solomon 2 appropriate for a wedding?
It is one of the most-read passages at Christian weddings. The mutual-covenant declaration “My beloved is mine, and I am his” (v. 16) captures the bilateral nature of the marriage covenant. The springtime imagery - winter past, flowers appearing, the voice of the turtledove in the land - frames new love as a God-given season of flourishing. The “do not stir up love before its time” charge also speaks to the proper season and ordering of love’s awakening.
What is the rose of Sharon?
Sharon is the fertile coastal plain of ancient Israel stretching roughly from Joppa to Carmel. The “rose of Sharon” is most likely a meadow flower common to that plain - possibly a narcissus, tulip, or crocus - rather than a cultivated garden rose. The Beloved uses the phrase to describe herself as an ordinary wildflower, not a prized garden variety. The Lover then takes the wildflower image and elevates it: even as a common lily, she stands out among other women the way a lily stands among thorns.
What does “Do not stir up or awaken love” mean?
The charge to the daughters of Jerusalem recurs three times in the Song (2:7, 3:5, 8:4) and functions as a structural refrain about the sacred timing of love. It warns against forcing or hurrying love into being before its right season - before the conditions (the winter past, the blossoming vines, the singing turtledove) are in place. The gazelles and does invoked in the charge are creatures associated in Hebrew poetry with grace and swiftness, appropriate witnesses to a love that must come freely and in its own time.
How does Song of Solomon 2 connect to the New Testament?
Christian interpretation from Origen onward reads the Song allegorically as Christ’s love for the Church. The Lover calling the Beloved from winter into spring maps onto the resurrection narrative: death is past, the new creation has come. Revelation 19:7-9 explicitly frames the consummation of history as the marriage of the Lamb to the Bride. The springtime imagery in Song of Solomon 2 runs forward into Paul’s language of new creation in 2 Corinthians 5:17 and backward into the covenant-love language of the Psalms and prophets.
How many verses are in Song of Solomon 2?
Song of Solomon 2 contains 17 verses.
Related Chapters
- Song of Solomon 1 - https://50days.io/bible/song-of-solomon/1 - The opening exchange of the poem; the Beloved’s first self-description and the Lover’s first praise.
- Song of Solomon 8 - https://50days.io/bible/song-of-solomon/8 - The poem’s close; “I am my beloved’s and he is mine” restated as the book’s final declaration.
- Psalm 45 - https://50days.io/bible/psalms/45 - The royal marriage psalm; the messianic bridegroom and his bride addressed directly.
- Ephesians 5 - https://50days.io/bible/ephesians/5 - Paul grounds the husband-wife covenant in Christ’s love for the Church; direct NT echo of the Song’s theological reading.
- Revelation 19 - https://50days.io/bible/revelation/19 - The Marriage Supper of the Lamb; the consummation of the bridal imagery running through the whole Bible.
Reading Plans Featuring This Chapter
- 50 Days Through Wisdom Literature - Day covering Song of Solomon
Sources and Further Reading
- Bible Project - Song of Songs Overview - https://bibleproject.com/explore/video/song-of-songs/
- Bible Gateway - Song of Solomon 2 (multiple translations) - https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Song+of+Solomon+2&version=WEB
- Got Questions - Song of Solomon overview and interpretation - https://www.gotquestions.org/Song-of-Solomon.html
- Tremper Longman III, “Song of Songs” (New International Commentary on the Old Testament, Eerdmans) - standard scholarly commentary on the Hebrew text and interpretive history.
About Psalm Selah
Psalm Selah is the cinematic indie-folk project of Psalmody Press, a male and female duo bringing Scripture into the sonic world of contemporary indie - fingerpicked acoustic guitar, cello-led strings, brushed drums, mandolin shimmer, and two voices used as a per-song lever (a raw male lead, an ethereal female lead, harmony, duo, or solo). The duo works in the tradition of Ed Sheeran’s “I See Fire,” Hozier, Bon Iver, Sleeping at Last, Sandra McCracken, and Andrew Peterson, with Hans Zimmer’s intimate-to-cinematic dynamic range. Their signature compositional move is build choreography - every song-structure transition is locked 1:1 to an instrumentation event, so the song’s shape is its instrumentation order. Their signature lyric move is the structural Selah - a held silence inside the song, sonic and lyrical, where the listener is asked to pause and consider what was just said. They are setting every chapter of the Bible to song, with particular attention to the wisdom literature, the parables of Jesus, the Sermon on the Mount, the apocalyptic books, and the chapters of Scripture where careful, lyrical attention rewards close listening.
Published: 2026-05-23 · Last updated: 2026-05-23 Written by: Reid Wender, Editorial Director, Psalmody Press
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Published 2026-05-23 · Last updated 2026-05-23
Written by Reid Wender, Editorial Director at Psalmody Press