Bible Strands
Song of Solomon 4:3
Your lips are like a scarlet ribbon, and your mouth is lovely. Your brow behind your veil is like a slice of pomegranate.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The speaker addresses the Shulammite woman, continuing a physical description that moves from her teeth in the preceding verse to her neck in the following verse.
The words — The text uses chut (thread) and shani (scarlet) to describe her lips as a scarlet thread, while midbarekh (your mouth) is called na'veh (lovely). The phrase pelach (slice) of rimmon (pomegranate) describes her ra'qatekh (temple) behind the veil, not her brow.
The thread — The pomegranate slice comparison reappears in Song of Solomon 6:7, while the scarlet thread motif echoes the scarlet cord tied in Joshua 2:18. The description of a lovely mouth also parallels the speaker's declaration in Song of Solomon 5:16.
Why it lands — The verse demands attention to precise anatomical imagery rather than abstract beauty, framing the beloved's features as crafted objects. It asks the reader to observe how physical description functions as a record of deliberate, measured praise.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Thy lips are like a thread of scarlet, and thy speech is comely: thy temples are like a piece of a pomegranate within thy locks.
Cross-references
- Song of Solomon 6:7 Your brow behind your veil is like a slice of pomegranate.
- Joshua 2:18 unless, when we enter the land, you have tied this scarlet cord in the window through which you let us down, and unless you have brought your father and mother and brothers and all your family into your house.
- Song of Solomon 5:16 His mouth is most sweet; he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem.
- Genesis 32:10 I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness You have shown Your servant. Indeed, with only my staff I came across the Jordan, but now I have become two camps.
- Leviticus 14:4 the priest shall order that two live clean birds, cedar wood, scarlet yarn, and hyssop be brought for the one to be cleansed.
- Leviticus 14:6 And he is to take the live bird together with the cedar wood, scarlet yarn, and hyssop, and dip them into the blood of the bird that was slaughtered over the fresh water.
- Leviticus 14:49 He is to take two birds, cedar wood, scarlet yarn, and hyssop to purify the house;
- Numbers 4:8 And they shall spread a scarlet cloth over them, cover them with fine leather, and insert the poles.
- Numbers 19:6 The priest is to take cedar wood, hyssop, and scarlet wool and throw them onto the burning heifer.
- Ezra 9:6 and said: “O my God, I am ashamed and embarrassed to lift up my face to You, my God, because our iniquities are higher than our heads, and our guilt has reached the heavens.