What the Bible says about Psalms, Prophetic
(From Forerunner Commentary)
Psalm 22 begins with the exact words Jesus quoted when He was on the cross and all the sins of the world were put upon Him. The Father forsook Him because He cannot abide sin.
This was written about a thousand years before Christ died, and crucifixion was not practiced in the region at the time. The Romans brought this form of execution into prominence as a way to humiliate and dispose of their enemies. They would line the roads with stakes and crosses on which they would hang their enemies as an example for the rest of the world to see. Nevertheless, they did not start their murderous rush through the ancient Middle East and Europe until about the first century BC. So, roughly 900 years before it became common practice, David wrote about crucifixion.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Christ's Death, Resurrection, and AscensionRelated Topics: Crucifixion | Jesus Christ's Crucifixion | Psalm 22 | Psalms | Psalms, Prophetic | Roman Executions
One cannot read this Psalm without seeing clear parallels to Christ's crucifixion. It describes an experience of David, who recorded his reflections—which became a prophecy of Christ's final hours.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Prophets and Prophecy (Part Three)Related Topics: Crucifixion | Jesus Christ's Crucifixion | Psalm 22 | Psalms | Psalms, Prophetic | Roman Executions
Many of us know this psalm, written from the standpoint of a sheep, by heart. Have we ever considered it to be a Sabbath psalm? Or one of God's Kingdom or of Christ's life, death, and resurrection into His rest?
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Christ's Death, Resurrection, and AscensionRelated Topics: Psalms | Psalms, Prophetic | Sabbath Psalm | Sheep | Sheep as Metaphor | Shepherd | Shepherd as Metaphor | Twenty Third Psalm
Here is a summary of the lessons in this amazing psalm:
Verse 1: Do I really recognize God's right to me? Do I respond to His management?
Verse 2: Sheep must be free from tension within the flock, fear from the outside (e.g., pests, predators), and not hungry.
Verse 3: Though we may become cast down, our Shepherd will seek us out to save us from ourselves.
Verse 4:
- Instead of loving myself most, I am willing to love Christ best and others at least as much as myself.
- Instead of being one of the crowd, I am willing to be singled out and set apart from it.
- Instead of insisting on my own rights, I am willing to forgo them in favor of others.
- Instead of being boss, I am willing to be at the bottom of the heap and to eliminate the drive for self-assertion, self-determination, and self-pleasing.
- Instead of finding fault with life and always asking why, I am willing to accept every circumstance in life in an attitude of gratitude.
- Instead of asserting my will, I am willing to learn to cooperate with God's wishes.
Verse 5: The only way to the tablelands (our goal) is through testing and trial, but we learn through these that He is with us. His rod denotes correction and His staff denotes guidance.
Verse 6: He has gone on before us to prepare the tableland. He thoroughly identifies with us and ensures that we can make it. He anoints us, cares for us continually, and promises that we will be in His flock.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Psalm 23 (Part Three)Related Topics: God's Control | God's Involvement | God's Maintenance | God's Management | God's Manipulation of Events | Love for Christ | Love for God | Psalms | Psalms, Prophetic | Set Apart | Sheep | Sheep as Metaphor | Shepherd | Shepherd as Metaphor | Submission to God | Submission to God's Will | Twenty Third Psalm | Yielding to God | Yielding to God's Will
Though the scenes of the book take place in an atmosphere of romantic and even sexual encounters, this is only the first and most obvious level of understanding. On other levels, Jewish rabbis allegorize God and Israel from its poetry, and Christians see Christ and His Bride, the church. As an instruction manual regarding the intimacy of the relationship between God and the Christian, the Song of Songs is without peer.
Any understanding of the Song of Songs, however, must begin with the book's characters. A young woman, a shepherdess, called the Shulamite in some Bible versions, has fallen in love with a man, whom she calls "my beloved." Some think this man is Solomon, a king; others say he is a shepherd. Some go so far as to say there are two men vying for the Shulamite's affections. In addition, the daughters of Jerusalem act as a chorus, commenting on and reacting to the words of the Shulamite. Her brothers may also have a few lines (Song 2:15; 8:8-9).
In Christian circles, the Shulamite and the Beloved are easily identified as types of the church and Christ. The daughters of Jerusalem and the Shulamite's brothers are harder to pinpoint as specific groups of people, but we can deduce a general identification from Song of Songs 2:2-3:
[The Beloved]
Like a lily among thorns,
So is my love among the
daughters.[The Shulamite]
Like an apple tree among the
trees of the woods,
So is my beloved among the
sons.In contrast to the Shulamite, the "daughters" are compared to "thorns." The Beloved is similarly contrasted with the "sons" (see Song 1:6), who are like "the trees of the woods." Thorns are obviously negative symbols (see Matthew 13:7, 22), but "the trees of the woods" does not seem to be. A better translation would be "the wild wood," and thus, it becomes another negative type.
Thus, the daughters and the sons are opposites to the main characters. If the Shulamite is a type of the true church, the daughters are false "Christian" churches that Christ will not even consider as suitable brides (see Song 6:8-9; Ezekiel 16:44-46; Revelation 17:5). Some think they are simply the unconverted.
If the Beloved is a type of Christ, the Good Shepherd (John 10:1-16), the sons are false shepherds or hirelings, who abuse the church (see Song 1:6; Ezekiel 34; Acts 20:28-31). Some believe they stand for the leaders or governments of men. Remember, though, these are general interpretations, so we should check the context of each section to refine the meaning.
It is not necessary to assign a particular identity to every character, image, or symbol in the book. Because of our unfamiliarity with the language and setting of the Song of Songs, this would be highly speculative and tedious. Generally, if we grasp the sense of a section, the symbolism falls into place on its own, or other scriptures explain it more plainly.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Prophecy in SongRelated Topics: Allegory | Canticles | Christ as Bridegroom | Church as Bride of Christ | Church as Woman | Prophecy | Prophecy in Song | Psalms, Prophetic | Shulamite | Song as Prophecy | Song of Solomon | Song of Songs | Song of Songs as Prophecy | Type/Antitype | Wisdom Literature | Wisdom of Solomon
We do not know for sure if the book is arranged chronologically or just in short, timeless vignettes. Some say that certain sections are dreams or flashbacks to previous scenes. However, a basic story can be seen in the flow of the text.
Song of Songs opens with the Shulamite in the blush of first love; it is so new to her that she must ask where her Beloved works (Song 1:7). The couple is separated, and each yearns to be reunited. The Beloved asks her to come away with him (Song 2:10), and the Shulamite seeks and finds him in the city (Song 3:2-4). Later, again separated, she looks for him again, only to be beaten by the city watchmen (Song 5:6-7). In the end, after praising each other's beauty and constancy, they are together again, and the Shulamite proclaims that "love is as strong as death" (Song 8:6).
However we arrange the various parts, the main story concerns the courtship of the Shulamite and the Beloved. In most of the book's verses, they vividly praise the other's excellence and express their deepest feelings. This human sexual imagery, rather than being erotic, simply pictures the depth of love and pleasure in a Christian's relationship with God. In a sense, the sexual union of man and wife is the closest human parallel to God's relationship with us.
Jesus Himself endorses this concept in John 17:3, "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent." This knowledge of God is intimate, similar to the relationship between a man and his wife (see Genesis 4:1; Luke 1:34). The apostle Paul calls the church's relationship with Christ, likened to a marriage partnership, "a great mystery" (Ephesians 5:32). Later, John is shown that the church is indeed the Bride of Christ (Revelation 19:7-9).
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Prophecy in SongRelated Topics: Allegory | Bride Making Herself Ready | Bride of Christ | Bride of Christ, Preparation for Marriage | Bride/Bridegroom Analogy | Canticles | Christ as Bridegroom | Church as Bride of Christ | Church as Woman | Courtship Analogy | First Love | Marriage Analogy | Prophecy | Prophecy in Song | Psalms, Prophetic | Relationship with God | Sexual Imagery | Sexual Intimacy Analogy | Shulamite | Song as Prophecy | Song of Solomon | Song of Songs | Song of Songs as Prophecy | Wisdom Literature | Wisdom of Solomon
Jesus quoted His own words, which He had inspired His servant David to put into writing a thousand years before this day, when He cried, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" (Psalm 22:1). By repeating it as He hung on the stake, He declared this prophecy to be fulfilled at that very moment; the absolute peak of the agony that He and His Father had planned and foreknew had arrived. Even in His delirium, the utterances of the Logos were solidly based upon His own Word!