John Pople - Class 4: Standing Guard in Vain

Automatically transcribed. Accuracy is good but not perfect, and words are sometimes wrong. Trust the audio over the text.

1. 0:00

   This is second period class, day four of the 2019 Palm Springs Bible School. Our second period teacher is Brother John Popel. His general subject, the king who fell. Today's topic, standing guard in vain. Brother John. Good morning once again. Good morning. I hope you're keeping up with your requisite four hours sleep a night, as I am, and you feel fresher than I do.

2. 0:30

   But, where are we? We're looking at the song, of course, this week. And the song is a real mystery, and it's been a mystery for a long time, and I'm excited to suggest to you some ideas which I think help unlock that mystery. There's many mysteries in the Scripture. I still find Revelation largely opaque.

3. 0:51

   Some mysteries, of course, we will never solve. Some things will just remain a mystery, and we'll offer no solution at any time. It doesn't really matter how many people work on the problem. Brother Randy, Brother Chris, Brother Jeff. I think I missed the next six. Fire, service, ambulance. Some things just never have a solution.

4. 1:13

   But, luckily, the song might. And that's where we left off yesterday, isn't it? With a bit of a mystery. He is... King Solomon has come to the palace of his beloved, and he's beating on the door to come in, and she's finally got up and opened the door, and he's not there. And we're wondering, well, where did he go, and why did he leave at all?

5. 1:34

   Now, of course, if you're expecting me to supply the answer, I don't have any access to any information that you don't already have. And the real trick to the question is, guess what it says so in the text? If you actually look at the text, she opens the door, he's not there, but someone else is.

6. 1:58

   Who's there? The watchman. The watchmen are there. Now, how does that answer the question? It doesn't fully answer the question yet. And before we fully answer the question, let's just back up a step and consider the watchman as a general concept of Scripture. The chapter about which we'll learn most in the watchman is going to be Ezekiel 33.

7. 2:21

   I think you probably already know that. And it explains the duties of the watchman. It's to protect the city, of course. And the duties are sufficiently important. That sort of federal position is so important that their lives are on the line. If they fail to sound a warning when they should, and someone dies as a consequence of an attack that was not reported, then the watchman is deserving to die.

8. 2:45

   They are the protectors of a city. They are obligated to defend. Anyone who dies as a consequence of their negligence, their life is forfeit. It's a big deal. Now, Ezekiel 33 is the most comprehensive description of the watchman's task. It's pretty much what I just said. But it's not the first mention of watchman in the Scripture.

9. 3:06

   The first mention of watchman in the Scripture was written, who do you think wrote it? Maximum irony in the answer. Solomon. Excellent. Jeff knows how this works. Exactly, and it is. It's actually Psalm 127, which is a song of a sense written by Solomon. And he says this, Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labour in vain.

10. 3:31

    Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain. They're wasting their time unless the city is worshipping God. But who's going to determine whether or not the capital city worships God? It's going to be down to the king and the precedent that he sets. So, if the king has turned away from God and is chasing hedonism or fleshly delights or whatsoever, then all the watchmen are standing guard in vain.

11. 4:02

    Solomon himself has once said so, and those words are about to come back to bite him, because that's exactly what we're going to see happen. The watchmen have no power if the king is ungodly and leads worship astray from worshipping the Lord. Now, the watchmen and the bride already have some history. They've met once already.

12. 4:26

    They meet twice in the song. They've met once already in chapter 3. Let's just refresh our memories as to how that goes. All night long, says the bride, on my bed, I look for the one my heart loves. I couldn't find him. I will get up now and go about the city through its streets and squares.

13. 4:44

    The watchmen found me as they made their rounds in the city. Have you seen the one my heart loves? Scarcely had I passed them when I found him. Okay? So, the watchmen don't have a chance to do or say anything, because as she meets them, also the king is there to meet her for one of their nightly rendezvous.

14. 5:04

    But the watchmen are going to learn certain things from this encounter. First of all, they'll learn that the bride and the king rendezvous at night, right? Because that's what they've just witnessed. They will learn that this Lebanese bride, this foreigner, who is of the goddess Ashtoreth, is intent on union with the king, and that the king also is willing, that he's absolutely infatuated with her, and therefore, spiritually speaking, he's vulnerable, and worship in the city is about to turn away from God.

15. 5:35

    So, it makes sense that the watchmen are on alert. Their lives are on the line. If they don't report or act on a matter which could destroy the city, then their own lives would be forfeit. So, realize all this has come into their mind on this first meeting in chapter 3, and they meet again right here in chapter 5.

16. 5:55

    I opened for my lover, she said, but my lover had left. I looked for him but did not find him. I called him. He didn't answer. The watchmen found me as they made their rounds in the city. So, where has he gone? Or what's happened? Why isn't he there? Yeah, the police, the watchmen, are trying to defend the city, absolutely right, Tony, and they've basically whisked him away.

17. 6:22

    No, no, sir, sir, come with us, come with us. On some pretense or on some pretext or whatever, they have taken him away because they realize this union is disastrous for Jerusalem. She opens the door, the king is not there but the watchmen are. The watchmen have entreated or whisked Solomon away. I believe they are trying to save the city and trying to save Solomon himself, therefore, from this relationship that will otherwise destroy him.

18. 6:48

    And that now makes sense. Then the next verses, which make no sense at all in any form of love song, is of course then physical violence. Now, whether this is physically true or whether this is a metaphor or a poem of what happened, I don't know, it doesn't matter. But the watchmen beat the bride.

19. 7:04

    They beat me, she said. They bruised me. They took away my cloak. Very interesting word, that, the red did. They beat those watchmen of the walls. Now, in our culture, in fact, probably in any culture, the idea that you're going to sympathize with a group of men beating up a woman in the streets is a pretty hard step to take.

20. 7:22

    And culturally, for me, that's extremely difficult. But looking at this, we have to say, it is the woman who, though innocent, is the risk of death for the city, and the watchmen are executing their duties to do the right thing to eliminate that risk. That's kind of a hard sell. And if you're looking sceptical, I don't blame you, but that's what I've had to try and treat myself.

21. 7:45

    And there's some encouragement here from the Scriptures that we'd be going the right way. Let me show you. In that day, the Lord will snatch away Judah's finery, because Judah was prostituting herself with other religions. The linen garments, the tiaras, and the shawls. This is the only other use of this word in the whole Bible.

22. 8:08

    It only occurs twice. Once there in the Song of Songs, and once here, where it is actually the shawl of the prostitute. Judah is actually behaving like a prostitute, and God describes her as a prostitute and says, well, I'm going to beat you, and I'm going to strip away your prostitute's shawl, which is the same shawl that the woman is seen to wear.

23. 8:27

    Okay? So the watchmen actually do what God does. And once you see that from Isaiah, it becomes a lot easier to say, okay, well, then I guess they're doing the right thing. And this may not be a physical reality. This may just be a kind of a poetic rendition of what's going on.

24. 8:43

    So the watchmen are attempting to save the city. They forfeit their lives otherwise. That's from Ezekiel 33. But they're powerless. Because the king will obviously overrule them. And say, well, yeah, but I'm going back to the girl. And so they're standing guard in vain. They're powerless to actually save the city. Because the king can overrule them.

25. 9:05

    But do you notice something? There's no punishment, is there? From the king. I mean, if they've actually beaten up his beloved. Let's say, let's anoint King Shane here and make him all-powerful. Okay? And as an Australian, he probably thinks that anyway. But we'll make him an all-powerful ruler in the land. Now, if I'm the chief of police and I've got my band of merry men and we've physically beaten his beloved, what happens to me, Shane?

26. 9:34

    It's more than just cricket balls, right? It's more than just fast cricket balls, yeah. Bad news. I die. So, why didn't the watchman get punished? It doesn't say, so we have to speculate. Sorry.

27. 9:48

    Yeah. I believe that's true. It's only a speculation, but I agree with you. At the end of the day, Solomon deep down knows, I shouldn't be doing this. And so, you've just got this kind of awkward silence. The chief of police has, you know, just been beating the bride. But he's not going to get punished.

28. 10:05

    The watchmen are not punished by Solomon. He can't actually justify the union. He knows the watchmen were doing the right thing. And that he's not. So, you just have this awkward, no consequence relationship after this incident takes place. Remember, of course, there were 60 warriors. 60 watchmen, if you like. And there were 60 queens.

29. 10:27

    60 brides. She wasn't the only one. But the song is trying to show us. This was the terrors of the night. The girls by whom he was infatuated. And spiritually, who would cause his downfall and his disaster. We've seen that slide before. Let's also move on and introduce ourselves to the daughters of Jerusalem, who are the citizens of Jerusalem, the city.

30. 10:50

    And we've said before, they are described with male grammar because it's doubtless supposed to be both the men and the women of the city. But they're also given the label daughters because, necessarily feminine, because that's whom the king should have wedded. Literally, he should have taken a bride that was of the same religion.

31. 11:08

    Or converted someone else. That's equally good. And he should have been, as king, married to the needs of the city, the people that he served. That's what a godly king would do. That's what his father had done. But he hadn't. They're represented as daughters, I just said, to emphasize them as the correct bride for the king.

32. 11:29

    So, we can anticipate, therefore, that there will be a hostile relationship, not a friendly relationship, between the daughters of Jerusalem, who should have been the bride of the king, or the brides of the king, and the brides, particularly this bride, that he has chosen instead. Do we see that? You can have chapter 5 and whatnot open in front of you if you want, but I'll put the verses up here on the screen.

33. 11:54

    Now, this is the bride speaking. I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved as to what you'll tell him, for I am lovesick. Now, you notice that verb, and all of the modern versions kind of cop out by having some sort of more diluted form. That's an adjure, an adjuration.

34. 12:13

    Where have we met that before? With Christ. With Christ. In what context, Mark? Are you quite right? I'm asking him if he's the son of the very bride. That's right, and he was being silent, so it was actually illegal for them to do this, but they adjured him, which meant that he had to answer by oath.

35. 12:30

    It is when you compel someone to give an oath, which was available in the Jewish system. So, here's my point. You don't adjure your friends, right? It's a hostile relationship automatically, if you're saying, I compel you to tell an oath. And clearly, she wants to control the conversation. What are you saying about me to the king?

36. 12:51

    I'm in love with him. Don't tell him anything else. I am in love with him. And adjure is to compel an oath when not freely given. This dynamic is hostile. And then, in response, do you notice what the daughters say in the very next verse? What kind of beloved is your beloved that you thus adjure us?

37. 13:14

    In other words, how would we translate that into modern speech? You don't have the right. Or I'd put it this way. Who do you think you are? Right? Who do you think you are that you can compel us to give an oath as to what we're going to say to the king? Our king, thank you very much.

38. 13:31

    We're the citizens of Jerusalem. Who do you think you are? And so, she replies, in a way, kind of innocently, and she replies with this big, long description of how beautiful she finds him. And then, at the very end, the verse says, she caps it off by saying, this is my lover. This is my friend, oh daughters of Jerusalem.

39. 13:53

    So, how do you translate that into modern language? I like it. Yeah, that's what I saw. Back off. He's beautiful, and he's mine. Back off. Right? And that doesn't make any sense in a love song, but in the interpretation that we've taken here, it makes perfect sense why the dynamic would be that way.

40. 14:16

    She's compelling them not to wreck the relationship. They're not, they're completely unhappy that she's asserting this authority that they don't think she should have, and she says, well yeah, well either way, at the end of the day, he's mine. Get lost. Okay? So, it is the hostile relationship we would have anticipated. In fact, here's a verse that must be important because it shows up three times in chapters 2, 3, and 8, daughters of Jerusalem, I adjure you by the gazelles and the does of the field.

41. 14:45

    We looked at that before, swearing an oath by the gazelles because there's no recognition of God. Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires. So, what does that actually mean? The traditional reading of that, it says, don't start love before it is ready. And that's good advice in any event, but I don't think that's what, that's what the verse is actually saying.

42. 15:06

    I think this arouse or awaken, awaken particularly that Hebraeus tell us is to do with interrupting. Right? Don't interrupt. Awaken something. Don't interrupt something that's going on. Do not disturb our love or do not disturb, do not awaken us from our activities. That's what she's actually telling repeatedly, telling the daughters of Jerusalem, do not break up our relationship.

43. 15:31

    Do not break up our relationship or even literally more physically, do not disturb our love making. The bride is aware that the King of Jerusalem is mesmerized by her and she's adjuring the citizens of Jerusalem not to disrupt them, not to split them up. That's what this will actually come out to mean.

44. 15:49

    There's some evidence for this because it occurs in 2, 7, 3, 5 and 8, 4 and the evidence supporting that is to look at the verse before and in each case in 2, 6, 3, 4, 8, 3 you'll see the beginnings of the description of a sexual scene. For each oath the verse before speaks of the onset of an intimate encounter.

45. 16:12

    Two of them are identical. His left arm is under my head and his right arm is coming round to embrace me and the middle one is different but it's still when I found him whom my soul loves I held on to him and would not let him go until I brought him to my mother's house and into the room of her who conceived me.

46. 16:31

    Which sounds like he's going home for tea and biscuits and cucumber sandwiches with the family but it actually has a very different rendition in Hebrew which I'll happily explain to you privately if you ask me. It's pretty R-rated but I'll just leave that one there. So even I have boundaries. Astonishing, isn't it?

47. 16:49

    Daughters of Jerusalem then, in summary, what do we find? The bride adjures the daughters to disclose comments to Solomon that she loves him. In other words, she's trying to control the conversation. There's a hostile relationship between the bride and the daughters. It's competitive over wanting the attentions of the king, the daughters of Jerusalem for the godly reasons that they're supposed to be led by him to God and of course he's pursuing her instead meaning the watchmen just don't have any power to do anything useful and the bride adjures the daughters three times not to disrupt the relationship whether in terms of their physical activity or in terms of actually destroying the relationship per se.

48. 17:26

    So that's all we have learned it's all fitting in with the interpretation that we have. We looked at the major symbols remember that yesterday? We saw beauty we saw that the song is constructed with lilies, myrrh, doves and gardens and vineyards and we saw that that meant the symbols translated by the Bible itself were beauty, death a new path and a fertile woman which fit very well as an independent proof with our assertion that this book is describing Solomon's deadly new path chasing beautiful women.

49. 17:56

    That's the major symbols that show up many times we looked at those but even in the minor symbols in the little symbols that just show up once or maybe twice we can see the same dynamic. Let's have a look at them. For example a mare among stallions I liken you my darling to a mare among Pharaoh's chariot horses we've looked at that verse before and we've seen that that's helpful it helps us identify the male character as Solomon because he's the one who knew about Egyptian horses but actually now look at what the verse says.

50. 18:28

    If you've got Pharaoh's chariot horses which are stallions and you stick a mare in the middle what do you think happens? Yeah, it's chaos right? It actually would be a good military tactic. Does anyone think to do that? Yes they did. In the battle of Kadesh when the Hittites fought the Egyptians that's precisely what they did 1274 BC they sent a whole bunch of mares in heat out onto the battlefield and Pharaoh's cavalry was just obviously was otherwise engaged and was disrupted.

51. 19:06

    I'll leave that there. Again I don't have I didn't put a photograph up for that one I thought we'd just have a nice old drawing. Now Ramesses II who was at that battle still won the battle as it turned out but his cavalry was utterly neutralized by the presence of the mayors. So what does this really say?

52. 19:25

    It says he's trying to say she's beautiful but maybe he doesn't realise what he's saying is you will disrupt a king's campaign which of course is exactly what she did. So you know the lesson was there right in his own words as to what she was going to do for him. She was going to absolutely derail him.

53. 19:43

    She's enticing but she will derail a king's campaign as he himself has spoken. If only he could hear his own words he's in such a flush of lust and excitement that he's not even listening to the words coming out of his own mouth in his own song. My lover is to me a cluster of henna blossoms from the vineyards of En Gedi.

54. 20:04

    Now En Gedi is a very beautiful place I've never been there. Has anyone been to En Gedi? Can you testify it's a beautiful place? Does that seem reasonable? I know the I'm sorry little pockets are. I know the Israeli tourist board I've seen the website advertises it and puts up lots of pictures of it saying it's gorgeous you've got to go there.

55. 20:23

    But when we look at it both physically and when we look at it in scripture we see something really rather interesting. There's a river there it's got two names and I forget what it is and so the river water goes straight into the Dead Sea over the cliff. So living water goes splot into literally water so salty it is called the Dead Sea right there at En Gedi which is interesting and what's more interesting because that's just physical is scriptural.

56. 20:51

    En Gedi shows up twice in the Bible. What's happening? David is running for his life where the man of God was in mortal peril on both occasions. 1 Samuel 24 David is fleeing Saul he's hiding out in En Gedi and 2 Chronicles 20 which is straining my memory it's actually Jehoshaphat I think not Duncan Jehoshaphat Kenzie but the other Jehoshaphat and he expresses himself in great fear and distress because there's the sound of a huge army coming towards him from which God will end up delivering him however En Gedi is not a happy place for the man of God on either of the occasions that it's used.

57. 21:33

    The Song of Songs vineyards are beautiful therefore beautiful but they are perilous by scriptural precedent they are perilous to the man of God. So you know that's interesting that Solomon would choose En Gedi of all places where his father nearly died to say this is the this is the way that he sees the location of his bride.

58. 21:54

    Beautiful but deadly. Seen that a lot haven't we? A bit more. The Mandrakes send out their fragrance and at our door is every delicacy. Mandrakes goodness me it's strange isn't it? Where's the only mention of Mandrakes in the whole Bible other than here? Yeah and what's going on? It's kind of a bit of a tawdry scene isn't it?

59. 22:15

    Yeah purchasing sex for a night. The Hebrew word is actually almost exactly the same word as dodim the word for love making today so I don't know whether the idea that Mandrakes are an aphrodisiac comes because of that name or the name comes because of that belief I'm not sure which is the chicken and which is the egg either way it's clearly something that's believed to be related to sexual activity the sole biblical appearance is that Leah buys a night with Jacob with her Mandrakes when Jacob came in from the fields that evening Leah went out to meet him you must sleep with me she said because I've hired you with my son's Mandrakes so he slept with her that night do you see what he says?

60. 22:58

    yeah absolutely right silence nothing the man has no power at all in this interaction he wanders in from the field that bed tonight right and that's the fragrance that we have associated with the story of Mandrakes and Solomon says yeah that's what's going on here like really are you hearing yourself you're absolutely right Solomon that's exactly what's going on she is leading you by the nose and you're not having a say in anything at all you're just being obediently led around again if Solomon could hear his own words he'd know that the Mandrake precedent the female controls the sexual encounter and that's what this is the fragrance that's come back in the song come with me from Lebanon my bride from the lion's dens and the mountain haunts of leopards difficult zoological question for you what do you find in a lion's den a lion the occasional misplaced prophet okay but generally it's lions what do you find in a haunt of leopards it's not difficult is it and how strange that he's saying this is this is your home this is where you come from make haste my beloved she says this is the closing verse and be like a gazelle or like a young stag okay great he's a gazelle or a young stag she's a lion or a leopard can you can you think of a picture that has those two together well that's that's the picture before yeah that's right that's the earlier just about PG picture beforehand okay she's the leopard he's the gazelle or the young stag and he's saying this and she's saying this they just listen to

61. 24:47

    themselves she's the predator not intentionally she loves him but this relationship is ultimately predatory and he's the prey repeated emphasis from En Gedi from the mandrakes and the leopards and the lions and the gazelles and the stags repeated emphasis that she's deadly I belong to my lover his desire is for me you might say oh come on don't try and turn that one sour that's as innocent as to belong in a hallmark greeting card isn't it you've probably seen that it probably is used I haven't seen it myself but it probably is but this it's not the right word there's a word there's a Hebrew word for desire which is used a couple hundred times I was supposed to tell you what it is but I forgot never mind you can look it up but this one is a very special word only occurs three times in the whole Bible this is the third time the first two are extremely instructive they're right at the beginning of the Bible by chapter four of Genesis the second time has been used and it's an interesting desire because it's the desire it can be the desire of a man for a woman or of a beast to devour its prey let me show you the uses God is speaking if you do what is right Cain will you not be accepted but if you do not do what is right sin is crouching at your door it desires to have you but you must master it this is the desire that sin has for Cain what is the relationship that sin wants with Cain it's not dinner

62. 26:27

    and a movie okay sin is not going to romance Cain sin is desiring to consume and kill Cain so whichever way it's pointing she's still saying this is the desire that we have in our relationship the other one is even earlier God is talking to Eve cursing Eve notice I will greatly increase your pain in child bearing and your desire will be for your husband that sounds like a fun relationship doesn't it and he will rule over you in other words because of your desire your husband will have power over you okay so what's she saying she's saying aha Genesis 3 I've turned it around I don't think she knows enough of the Bible to say that but that's essentially what the song is saying you think he's going to rule over me because of my female tashukah desire I know it's the other way around now oops she says I've reversed this he has the desire in such a way that now I will rule over him and it's all there in the song it's right in front of our eyes I'm not this isn't something I've said this is something right out of the verse it's absolutely beautiful deadly beautiful it's a deadly beauty but it's still beautiful to see that this contract that God has constructed between man and woman and she the bride says yeah and I've turned it right around you know not much to interpret here our love is as strong as death it's jealousy unyielding as the grave do you write that to your beloved that one probably doesn't appear in a hallmark greeting card anyway does it

63. 28:08

    it's not in a valentine's day card it's I mean I get it's the strength of death which is being spoken of but the point is why would you pick such an analogy our love is as strong as the grave my dear oh great thanks thanks for that but that's what it says and it's pretty simple repeated emphasis this love will be deadly so whether it's the mares in Egypt or the language we've seen used for walking the streets the leopard the gazelles the prostitute shawl the predatory desire 60 warriors for 60 queens all around us we're actually being bombarded if we just pay attention to the text we're actually being bombarded with exactly the same theme every time there are subtle infusions of deadly concepts throughout this song once you realize once you see one you see ten you see them all and it's beautiful to see the song just coming out of the text in its own terms and seeing it as such so I'm very excited about things like this there's only one more set of characters in the song and that's the witnesses !

64. 29:12

    they don't say a lot but they're commenting here come back come back oh Shulamite come back come back that we may gaze on you and this is speaking of the bride why would you gaze on the Shulamite as on the dance of Mahanaim I remember when I first read that and I was trying to interpret the song and I literally laughed out loud I said ha I'll never understand that never mind you know because you don't have to interpret every single verse I can't but astonishingly I now find myself in a situation where I believe I could well be deluded but I believe that I understand what this is what this comment means now because the normal rules of exposition don't apply because you say Shulamite great I'll look it up where else is it in the Bible oh it's one other place great oh it's the same verse oops and that's it and that's all you've got dance of Mahanaim no chance that's it Mahanaim yes you've got that in various places and we'll use that but we don't have a dance of Mahanaim anywhere I don't really know what that is but we'll see we'll see what we can do let's take the first couplet come back come back oh Shulamite come back come back that we may gaze

65. 30:39

    use the french term deja vu this is deja vu deja vu deja vu Shulamite we've seen this before deja vu vision it's just one word really again the economy of Hebrew it's subi subi Shulamite subi subi Hazar that's it what's this vision that they see this word is not the usual word for gaze it's a rare one again Isaiah 21 will show you a dire vision is shown to me that's the vision they see in seeing this Shulamite again we've seen this before this is deja vu we've seen this Shulamite somewhere before and it's a dire vision that's what the witnesses are saying what do they mean where have they seen it before and it's somewhat hard to translate what does Shulamite mean given we've got no clues it's not the feminine of Solomon which would be

66. 31:39

    interestingly in the Septuadint they actually have Salome now who's Salome and Josephus will tell us even though she's not named in the scripture that's Herodias' daughter what did Herodias' daughter do dance you've got something to do it was some sort of erotic dance that led a king's destruction ultimately got John the Baptist killed so that again is the spirit of the song and some suggest that since the letters L

67. 32:09

    that it's a reference to Abishag the Shunammite Shulammite the beloved it's either a variant of Shunammite possibly in ancient Semitic languages the letters L and N were sometimes interchanged now that's just out of a study Bible so that doesn't mean you should trust it but there is actually a proper academic reference to suggest that that is indeed the case okay fine why would we be concerned with Abishag the Shunammite there's a Hebrew culture of word play you know about this they don't use puns in Hebrew pun is where you have one word with two different meanings and you use it in one sense and allude to the other but Hebrew employs irony through similar sounding words remember this picture from the picture Bible this is Jeremiah chapter 1 what do you see Jeremiah I see the branch of the almond tree you've seen correctly for I am watching says God to see that my word is fulfilled nonsense in English but when you realize almond is shaked and watching is shaked you can see the game that's being played God shows Jeremiah shaked what do you see I see shaked yes because I am shaked and that's how the Hebrew works doesn't make any sense in

68. 33:28

    you know the Hebrew Micah is cursing a bunch of people and says tell it not in gath in Beth ophrah roll in the dust those who live in sanan will not come out okay but tell is gad and dust is efer and come out is tsar so what he's saying is gad it not in gath in Beth ophrah roll in the efer and those who live in Tzarnan will not Tzah. And it goes on and on. And it's just, you know, it's a Hebrew game throughout. In English, again, it's pretty meaningless. And so I think that helps us see what's going on. This is Solomon's Shunammite. The conflation of Shalemit Shunammite will give us that Hebrew word game Shulammite, i.e. this is Solomon's Abishag. They've seen Abishag, and this one's Solomon's Abishag. We've seen this before. This didn't end well.

69. 34:24

    What are they referring to? In Solomon's early reign, he was righteous. He was just. He did the right things, briefly. And one thing he did do was he executed his half-brother Adonijah. Why did Adonijah get executed? He was trying to usurp the throne. He tried it once by actually declaring himself king. And then David overturned that while David was still alive, just before David died. And Adonijah begged for forgiveness from Solomon. And Solomon forgave him very graciously and said, okay, you may live. But then Adonijah just couldn't let it go. Please ask King Solomon, he says to Solomon's mother, Bathsheba, he won't refuse you, you're his mom, to give me Abishag the Shunammite as my wife. Now, not only was that his father's former wife, which makes it wrong for that reason alone, but really, he's after the throne. She was a queen. She was the last queen. And he's trying to usurp the throne. And Solomon knows it. King Solomon swore by the Lord, may God deal with me, be it ever so severely, if Adonijah does not pay with his life for this request. So, King Solomon gave orders to Benaiah, the son of Jehoiada, and he struck down Adonijah and he died. Okay? So, Adonijah was killed because he'd chosen an inappropriate bride. You see that? The precedent, a royal prince is executed for choosing a forbidden bride. Do you see now why the witnesses in the song are saying, deja vu, deja vu, Shulamite, deja vu, deja vu, dire vision. You see what they're saying?

70. 36:01

    Deja vu, deja vu, Shulamite, deja vu, deja vu, a dire vision. It's an indictment of hypocrisy against Solomon. It's like, you killed your half-brother for doing this. You executed him. He wasn't just killed. He was like, legally pronounced worthy of death and killed. Solomon executes Adonijah for attempting to marry Abishag the Shunammite. And then Solomon marries his own Shunammite, the Shulamite, the Shulamite, i.e. a bride that should have been forbidden to him. Someone he should never have touched. Come back, come back, Shulamite, come back, come back, that we may gaze on you. Why would we gaze on the Shulamite as on the dance of Mahanaim?

71. 36:44

    Why would we see the same thing we've just seen in the Shulamite also in the dance of Mahanaim? What on earth that is. Let's have a look. How is the dire vision of the Shulamite the same view or the same vision as the dance of Mahanaim? What do we know about Mahanaim? The legacy of Mahanaim, it means two armies or a divided company, is a house divided. When Jacob first was there, he felt that he'd been in the presence of God and there was a company of God and a company of men, so he called it two camps, Mahanaim, which had a very positive outlook, but right away, it turned negative and stayed that way. Because then he heard Esau was coming and he was very, very fearful, so in great fear and distress, Israel divided the people who were with him into two groups. If Esau attacks one, at least half my family will survive. Okay? So it's about dividing the people. After Saul dies, Abner divides the kingdom of Israel by anointing Saul's son, Ish-bosheth. Okay? Where did he choose to do it? At the place called House Divided.

72. 37:50

    And he divided the house and company of Israel. And when Absalom rebelled, revolts and divided Israel's kingdom into those who followed David and those who followed Absalom, once again, David flees first and the first place he goes is the place called House Divided, Mahanaim. House Divided, House Divided, House Divided. That's the legacy of Mahanaim.

73. 38:13

    And this is the reason that Shimei was executed. David says to Solomon, these are his last words, and remember, you have with you Shimei who called down bitter curses on me the day I went to Mahanaim. You will know what to do to him. Bring his grey head down to the grave in blood.

74. 38:35

    For Shimei was executed because of what happened at Mahanaim. And that's what Solomon says to him, you know in your heart all the wrong you did to my father David. Then the king gave the order to Benaiah the son of Jehoiada and he went out and struck Shimei down and killed him. So another execution. For the bloodier scenes we use Lego, it's a little bit more palatable.

75. 38:57

    What happened? Shimei's death sentence came at Mahanaim. This is Mahanaim, the road to Mahanaim. Shimei pelted David and all the king's officials with stones. So David and his men continued along the road while Shimei was going along the hillside opposite, cursing as he went and throwing stones at him and showering him with dirt. So much so that the warriors with David were much incensed. Do you remember Abishai? His best quote in the whole Bible in my opinion, why should this dead dog curse my lord the king? Let me go over I pray thee and take off his head. And David let Shimei live for his whole, the whole rest of his life. But I think he felt that Solomon wasn't going to be wise enough, wasn't going to be shrewd enough to be able to control people like Joab, to control people like Shimei and said, okay, time no longer, you haven't repented, you need to be executed. I wonder whether Mahanaim, Israel's house divided. It was all about dividing the house of Israel and that's what Solomon has done because now he's gone off and married the woman who belongs to Ashtoreth, goddess of the Lebanese and it's divided from Yahweh, okay? I wonder, David's fleeing retinue, dodging the rocks that are constantly being pelted. I wonder if that's what they refer to ironically as the dance of Mahanaim.

76. 40:19

    I don't know, I don't have anything else. It's interesting to think about, they certainly didn't stand still or walk in a straight line that had been tagged, worse than the English batsmen. You'll see them dance around, they often, what do they call it? Chin music, that's it, when you bounce the ball so hard it comes zooming up at the batsman's head. A little bit of chin music for you to dance to is what they say. And that's what's going on here and worse, rocks hurled at them, so they would have been dancing around. It's an indictment of hypocrisy. Solomon has denigrated David's throne and divided Israel, Mahanaim, by marrying the Shulamite beauty. He's done what Shimei did. And so what we're seeing is that this is a double indictment of hypocrisy. Shulamite was the forbidden bride which Prince Adonijah improperly tried to marry. Solomon executed Adonijah for his crime.

77. 41:12

    Mahanaim was where the kingdom was divided by Absalom, by Absalom's rebellion and the throne was abused by Shimei's attack and pelting with rocks. Solomon executed Shimei for his crime and then Solomon did both of them. Solomon duplicates the crimes of Adonijah and of Shimei and I think that's what the witnesses are saying. Deja vu, deja vu, this is the Shulamite again, only Solomon's Shulamite, the Shalemit Shulamite. Deja vu, deja vu, dire vision. And why would we see the same dire vision in the Shulamite as we see in the dance of Mahanaim? How can you righteously execute men for committing the crimes that you then go on to commit? Adonijah tried to marry how many improper brides? One.

78. 42:03

    How many improper brides did Solomon have? He committed the sin of Adonijah one thousand times and yet he's not going to execute himself. That's why the witnesses speak. And that brings us, I'm on time.

79. 42:22

    Like I said, exactly, 12 noon and we've actually pretty much finished the Song of Solomon but the last class I think is certainly my favourite because we're going to start seeing the Song as it belongs in the broader pattern of Scripture and there are much bigger patterns to appreciate. So I sincerely hope you can be here tomorrow when we look at the last stage called Hear There Be Giants. Thank you.