Song of Solomon 1:7

“Tell me, O you whom my soul loves, Where you feed your flock, Where you make it to rest at noon, For why should I be as one who is veiled, Beside the flocks of your companions?”

She calls on her beloved, the one whom her soul loves, to tell her where he is feeding his flocks, and where he takes his noonday rest. For she does not want to be wandering around the different encampments of his fellow-shepherds, veiled against their gaze while looking for him, in the meanwhile being mistaken for a loose woman. And especially not when she would rather be with him and open to his gaze. Shepherd kings were not unknown in those days and we must remember that Moses was a shepherd prince. Most kings did have large flocks of royal sheep and would sometimes no doubt, especially as young men, be found living in tents and ‘tending' them along with their ‘companions', as well as their under-shepherds. It would be a change from life in the palace, and would no doubt make them feel that they were being useful and manly. It would not seem unusual to the young maiden because she was probably of minor aristocratic stock of a type who may well have tended their own sheep.

Israel too were being called on to seek out their God and not be led astray by other shepherds (Jeremiah 25:36; Jeremiah 50:6; Ezekiel 34:5; 1 Kings 22:17), and looked forward to one day seeing her shepherd king (Ezekiel 34:23; Ezekiel 37:24), but sadly when He did come she was to be found wandering around the tents of other shepherds. That was why she missed out on His love. On the other hand there were, of course, always some who, like this young maiden, sought out ‘Him Whom their soul loved' (1 Kings 19:18; Isaiah 8:16). And in the same way today the heart of His true people is called on to continually seek Him in His ‘tent' (Hebrews 8:1), desiring to look at Him with unveiled face so that they may behold His glory and be made like Him as they are in process of being changed from glory into glory (2 Corinthians 3:18; 2 Corinthians 4:6).

We too may want to know where we can find Him. But if we are really His we should know where we can find Him, for He is in our hearts (Ephesians 3:17), and nearer than hands and feet, and we know that we can approach Him constantly in prayer in the inner room (Matthew 6:6), and that where two or three gather in His Name He is there among us (Matthew 18:20). So we too should be desiring to be in His innermost tent, learning of Him (Matthew 11:28), and not be wanting to be found wandering among other tents, loving the world and the things that are in the world (1 John 2:15). The question that we must therefore ask ourselves is this. Do we have the same urgency in seeking Him Whom our soul loves as this young maiden had as she sought for her beloved? And only we can know the answer to that question.

THE YOUNG WOMEN now call to the maiden in her thoughts, in what is probably ironic advice. They are probably jealous of her. The description ‘fairest among women' is also found in Song of Solomon 5:9; Song of Solomon 6:1, and indicates who the speakers are. They are the young women of the land.