henna

Henna Lawsonia inermis grew wild in the oases by the Dead Sea in Old Testament times. It is also known as “Egyptian privet” and is common in the hot, drier parts of Africa, southern Asia, and northern Australia. Although henna was, and is, primarily used because of its coloring properties derived from the dried leaves, in Song of Songs 1:14 the writer mentions its flowers, which are indeed pretty and fragrant. They are in a “cluster” (’eshkol in Hebrew), which could be taken as a woven object parallel to the little bag of myrrh in verse 13 or as a garland, or simply as a clump of flowers in the cultivated terraces above En-Gedi. The reference to henna in Song of Songs 4:13 is strange since it is in the plural form in Hebrew (kefarim), parallel to the yet stranger Hebrew word neradim (from nerd; see spikenard). Neither of these plants has significant fruit, so the verse can be taken as a glorious concoction of romantic images of spices and flowers.

Henna is a shrub that reaches 2‑3 meters (7‑10 feet) in height. It has opposite leaves and many fragrant white flowers. The leaves yield a red juice that people in many countries use for coloring the skin and hair.

The context is clearly metaphorical in both references to henna, so there is the possibility of substituting locally known equivalents. In places where henna is known only as an agent for coloring the hair, skin or fingernails, it may be important to substitute, or to create a note stating that the smell and beauty of the flowers are in focus. In Song of Songs 4:13 most translations ignore the plural, perhaps assuming that it is influenced by the word “fruits” earlier. Alternatively, a transliteration can be used based on a major language. The recent resurgence in skin decoration (“mehndi”) using henna may make it easier to find a known word.

Red henna flower, Wikimedia Commons

Source: Each According to its Kind: Plants and Trees in the Bible (UBS Helps for Translators)

spikenard / nard

The name “spikenard” seems to be gaining ground over “nard” in global English. The Hebrew and Greek words for spikenard could have referred to a variety of substances from a variety of plants. Zohary (Plants of the Bible. Cambridge University Press, 1982) takes the New Testament spikenard to be the same as the Old Testament one, namely Nardostachys jatamansi from India. Hepper (Baker Encyclopedia of Bible Plants: Flowers and Trees, Fruits and Vegetables, Ecology. Baker Book House, 1992) doubts the Indian origin of most biblical spices and suggests that the references in Song of Songs may be to the Camel Grass Cymbopogon schoenanthus, which grows in the deserts of Arabia and North Africa. Assyrians called it lardu. However, if the writing of Song of Songs is late, the Indian origin of spikenard mentioned there is quite possible. The Greek expression nardos pistikos in Mark 14:3 and John 12:3 is rendered “pure nard” by NRSVue, but the meaning of pistikos is debatable. It may in fact come from the Sanskrit picita, the local name of the spikenard plant. In Arabic spikenard is called sunbul Hindi (“Indian spike”).

The spikenard plant is a leafy bush less than a meter (3 feet) high, with fragrant-smelling, short stems and a tuft of three narrow leaflets at the tip of each stem. The pink flowers are umbrella-shaped. The rhizomes (tubers) are pounded to extract pungent, pale orange or yellow oil.

The two references to spikenard in Song of Songs 4:13 and 4:14 are metaphorical, the bride being referred to as a luxurious garden or park filled with all kinds of lovely spice plants and trees. The spikenard there is mentioned first in the plural in Hebrew, paired with a plural form of henna, as though they are plants or trees, or perhaps the fruit of trees. Then its singular form is paired with saffron, followed by calamus and cinnamon. Spikenard was a luxury item in ancient Egypt, the Near East, and Rome. A Chinese medical text written around 1100 A.D. notes the calming effect of spikenard incense. It is still used in incense sticks (senko) in China and as a medicine. It is also used in Japan as an ingredient of the incense used in the Plum Blossom Festival. In John 12:3 spikenard is cited as the “costly perfume” used by Mary, the sister of Lazarus, to anoint Jesus.

For the metaphorical references in Song of Songs a cultural equivalent of spikenard is appropriate. The references in Mark and John are of course non-rhetorical and should be translated with a local name for spikenard where possible or transliterated where translators feel it is important to be concordant throughout. A transliteration such as “naridi” is recommended.

Spikenard Wikimedia Commons

Source: Each According to its Kind: Plants and Trees in the Bible (UBS Helps for Translators)

fat, oil

The different Hebrew and Greek terms that are translated as “(olive) oil” and “(animal) fat” in English are translated in Kwere with only one term: mavuta. (Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)

pomegranate

The Hebrew and Greek that is translated as “pomegranate” in English was translated in the 1900 Kalaallisut (Greenlandic) translation (a newer version was published in 2000) as kingmernarssûp or “big lingonberry.” “The Greenlandic word kingmernarssûp (modern kimmernarsuup) derives from kingmernaĸ (modern kimmernaq) ‘lingonberry’ (Vaccinium vitis-idaea ). The lingonberry is the fruit of a shrub from the heath family which is native to the boreal forest and tundra in the Arctic regions of North America, Europe, and Siberia, including western and southern Greenland. The term for ‘lingonberry’ has been modified with the suffix –ssuaĸ (modern –suaq ‘big’), resulting in a descriptive term meaning ‘big lingonberry.’ (Modern Greenlandic uses the Danish loanword granatæble.)” (Source: Lily Kahn & Riitta-Liisa Valijärvi in The Bible Translator 2019, p. 125ff.)

 

The pomegranate Punica granatum has been grown from ancient times across the Middle East over to Iran and into northern India. It is widely cultivated throughout India and the drier parts of Southeast Asia, Malaya, the East Indies, and tropical Africa. Pomegranates are now found throughout the warm parts of southern Europe and across North Africa and Asia all the way to Nepal. Images of pomegranate fruits have been found in Pharaoh’s temple in Karnak, Egypt, dating from around 1480 B.C. In classical Latin the species name was malum punium (apple of Puni) or malum granatum (seedy apple). This has influenced the common name for pomegranate in many languages (for example, German Granatapfel, “seed apple”). The English word “pomegranate” itself comes from Latin pomum (fruit, apple) via Old French. The Arabic rummân (رمان) passed into some other languages, including Portuguese romã.

The pomegranate is a small tree, growing to about 3-5 meters (10-17 feet) tall, with narrow, dark green leaves and many thorny branches. It has a lovely red flower. The fruit is a bit smaller than an orange and has a hard skin, which must be cut open to get at the tightly-packed pockets of seeds inside, each seed enclosed in a little bag of juicy pulp. The end of the fruit has a distinctive flower-like shape. The hard skin, which turns from green to red as it ripens, is used as a tanning agent, for medicine, and for ink. The seeds were sometimes made into wine. Pomegranate trees live up to two hundred years.

The pomegranate was one of the seven “special” foods mentioned in Deuteronomy 8:8 that the Israelites would find in Canaan. The fruit was one of several brought back to the camp of the Israelites by the men who scouted out Canaan (Numbers 13:23). In Song of Songs 4:3 the bride of the king is said to have cheeks like halves of a pomegranate, a reference, probably, to their red color. The flower-shaped end of the pomegranate fruit made it an attractive decoration, for example on the fringe of the priests’ robes (Exodus 28:33f. and on the columns and furniture of the Temple (2 Kings 25:17).

In Jewish tradition the pomegranate stands for righteousness, because it is said to have 613 seeds, corresponding to the 613 commands of the Torah. For this reason and others many Jews eat pomegranates on the Jewish New Year Festival (Rosh Hashanah). Jewish tradition also holds that the pointed calyx of the pomegranate is the original “design” for a royal crown.
The Babylonians believed chewing pomegranate seeds before battle made them invincible. The Qur’an mentions pomegranates three times, twice as examples of the good things God creates, once as a fruit found in the Garden of Paradise.

The pomegranate is only recently being grown outside of the Mediterranean area. In West Africa it has not yet become a popular fruit. Where it is known at all, it is called rummân (from Arabic). In Song 4.3 and 6.7 the refer-ences to the pomegranate are rhetorical. There a cultural equivalent representing redness or beauty could be used. Elsewhere in the Bible transliteration is advised, following a major language. The word pome simply means “fruit,” so the basic word to transliterate from is granate (compare granada in Spanish). A possible expression is “garinada fruit.” The Latin phrase Punica granatum for pomegranate means the “grenade” of Punica (= Carthage), a city in present-day Tunisia. The Latin word granatum means “filled with many grains or seeds.” Reflecting this, Bambara of Guinea uses “karanati fruit.” One could also use the Hebrew rimmon as a base. Areas influenced by Arabic may find a word like rummân, for example, roomaanoo in Mandinka. A footnote could describe the fruit as similar to a guava, red and seedy.

Although the pomegranate has been introduced recently throughout Africa, it is not well-known, so the name will most likely need to be transliterated. As the English name is quite long, the translator is advised to translate from another source or look for ways to shorten it, such as “granata fruit.”

Pomegranate, Wikimedia Commons

Source: Each According to its Kind: Plants and Trees in the Bible (UBS Helps for Translators)

Translation commentary on Song of Songs 4:13

The young man again addresses his love directly.

Your shoots: an unusual word, it has led to much discussion of its meaning. In Isa 16.8 the same root word appears to mean “branches”; but the form of the word there is different from that in the Song. What significance does it have here? Revised English Bible view it as “your cheeks,” under the influence of verse 3; Good News Translation thinks it means “plants.” Many other suggestions will be found, but from a basic sense “canal [for irrigation]” it is probably a reference to part of the woman’s body. This is what we find in NRSV, “your channels.” Its relation to the word “spring” in the previous verse is clear; both describe the young woman. Translators can choose a term that links with the reference to a “covered spring.” The major problem with retaining this figure is that its meaning remains unclear. Another solution may be to reduce the entire figure to the pronoun “you,” since it is obvious the woman herself is being described.

An orchard of pomegranates: the orchard is parallel to the “garden,” though the Persian term used here, pardes, or “paradise”, may have a closer connection to pleasure.

On pomegranates see notes on verse 3. Pomegranates are commonly symbolic in love poetry.

With all choicest fruits: with all can be given as “full of.” The adjective choicest is rendered variously in translation: “rarest” (Jerusalem Bible); “rare fruits” (New English Bible); “luscious” (Fox); “pleasant” (King James Version). The meaning may be close to “sweet.”

Henna with nard: the terms are both referred to in 1.12, 14. There is no reason for omitting this phrase, as some suggest, claiming that it does not seem to fit in the general context. The real problem of course is that these spices are not found in orchards, especially a pomegranate orchard. It is best then to see this phrase as another separate metaphor. Revised English Bible omit it; Good News Translation expands to read “there is no lack of henna, nard….” If these terms are not known in the local context, then we need to add that they are spices and fragrances. For translation comments see 1.12, 13.

Suggested translations are:

• You are an orchard of pomegranates, full of sweet fruits, of henna and nard.

• You are like a garden paradise full of delightful fruits and fragrant spices.

Quoted with permission from Ogden, Graham S. and Zogbo, Lynell. A Handbook on the Book of Song of Songs. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1998. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .

SIL Translator’s Notes on Song of Songs 4:13

4:13a

Your branches are an orchard: Here the author again compares the woman to a garden. The Hebrew word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as Your branches occurs only here in the OT, and its meaning is uncertain. It seems to refer in general to what comes out from something else, like the shoots of plants, the streams of a river, or the legs and arms of a person. Because of its general meaning, it must be translated in different ways in different contexts.

The phrase Your branches are an orchard is a metaphor. Some other ways to translate it in this context are:

Keep the metaphor. For example:

You are paradise that produces… (God’s Word)

Use a simile. For example:

You are like a private garden (New Living Translation (1996))

When you translate this metaphor, be careful that what it communicates is beautiful, and not ugly, humorous, or shocking. It should imply that the woman was refreshing and lovely like a garden. In some languages it may be more natural to speak of the woman herself instead of using the metaphor of branches. For example:

You are like a lovely orchard (New Living Translation (1996))
-or-

You are paradise that produces pomegranates (God’s Word)

an orchard: The Hebrew word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as orchard also means “paradise,” and some versions translate it this way. orchard or “paradise” is parallel to “garden” in 4:12a.

of pomegranates: The word pomegranates refers to the fruit that grows on small bush-like trees that are also called “pomegranate trees.” The pomegranate fruit is smooth and red on the outside. Inside, its seeds are surrounded with a jelly-like pulp. Its juice is sweet and refreshing and was sometimes made into syrup or wine. The pomegranate fruit symbolized beauty. For more information and a picture of the fruit, see the note on 4:3c.

4:13b

with the choicest of fruits: The phrase with the choicest of fruits introduces a list of the finest fruits and spices. The Hebrew word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as with is used several times in the list to introduce another fruit or spice.

In some languages (as in English), a connector like with may be confusing here. It may wrongly imply that pomegranate trees produce many kinds of fruit besides pomegranates. However, the meaning here is “along with” or simply “and.” Other ways to translate the connection between 4:13a and 4:13b are:

pomegranates along with many other choicest fruits…
-or-
pomegranates and the best fruits (God’s Word)

For the list in 4:13–14 use natural connectors in your language.

the choicest of fruits: The Hebrew word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as fruits is a general word for fruit. The phrase the choicest of fruits indicates a variety of the best and most delicious kinds of fruit. Some other ways to translate the phrase are:

the best/finest fruits
-or-
rare spices (New Living Translation (2004))
-or-
as well as many other wonderful fruits

4:13c

In 14:13c the list of orchard plants continues.

with henna and nard: The phrase henna and nard refers to two plants that smell sweet. Some other ways to translate the phrase are:

henna ⌊bushes⌋ and nard ⌊plants
-or-
henna and nard

henna: The word henna refers to a shrub (bush) with very fragrant flowers.