Come with Me from Lebanon: A Study of the Song of Solomon

By Arnold H. Sturtevant

"Come With Me From Lebanon sheds exciting new light on the Song of Solomon. What has until now been considered but a beautiful portrayal of God's Love may also prove to be a 'sleeping giant' of end-time prophecy. This book is certain to stimulate a reappraisal of the Song."
[Harold Duff, Bible Teacher/Christian Education, Conference Speaker,
President, Christian Ministries, Inc.]
"Sturtevant's alIegorical representation may well be right! I remember in seminary hearing this general point of view ... but not with the precision and carefulness of (the author's) manuscript.
[ Kenneth N. Taylor, Author, The Living Bible Paraphrase Chairman of the Board, Tyndale House Publishers]

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: Aug 19, 2011
• ISBN: 9781426975011

Arnold H. Sturtevant

Sturtevant is author of eight published books, including two Bible commentaries, five histories and a volume about government intrusion into parents’ God-given right and responsibility to raise their children. He and his wife, Leda, own and operate a country inn at their farm in Fayette, Maine.

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Contents

Foreword

Preface

Author’s Introduction

CAST OF CHARACTERS

THE SONG OF SOLOMON

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

APPENDIX 1

APPENDIX 2

APPENDIX 3

APPENDIX 4

BIBLIOGRAPHY

About The Author

Foreword

Explanation of Procedures Employed

God’s message through the Apostle Peter is, We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed (2 Peter 1:19). This commentator believes The Song of Solomon shares prophetic significance with all other Scripture that together comprise the indivisible prophetic Word of God. As an integral part of the Word, it must be viewed as providing a unique and necessary ingredient in the plan of God, whose Word of testimony is itself "the Spirit of prophecy" (Revelation 19:10) that moved The Song into Scripture for our instruction in this day (2 Peter 1:21).

Knowing who is talking is critical to proper interpretation of The Song. What lines belong to whom? This study holds the key to proper attribution of dialogue lies in two little words, translated in the King James Version as my beloved. In the drama, a king and a shepherd employ very different love language and strategy in their pursuit of the Shulamite’s love. My beloved is a most unique term of endearment employed only 34 times in the Bible: once in Isaiah (5:1) referring to a prophetic (future) singing of a song and 33 times in The Song of Solomon. No question, my is simply a possessive pronoun; but its accompanying word beloved (Hebrew word dod) can only be understood as symbolically related to love, for it literally means water brought to boil … figuratively called by Jesus living water or eternal life. This unusual term is mutually employed by only the Shepherd (who has departed with his flock) and the Shulamite maid who chooses her unseen Shepherd’s love over that of Solomon; and when accompanied by the possessive my it recalls the Scripture "(He) is mine and I am his" (Song 2:16) … describing a secure, eternal relationship not available through mortal Solomon.

In this study, each verse of the Song is sequentially compared, scripture for scripture, with companion prophetic verses in other books of the Bible, in the belief that Scripture alone is our final authority in matters of faith and practice, including interpretation. The numbers appended to definitions of original languages of the Bible are those employed in the Hebrew and Greek dictionaries of James Strong’s The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (Nashville, Abingdon, 39th printing, 1980).

Bible quotes are italicized and identified by parenthetical citation of the source book, chapter and verse, so as not to be confused with non-italicized imagined conversations between principal characters of The Song of Solomon.

Preface

Come with Me from Lebanon treats The Song of Solomon as an allegorical dramatization of events that will take place in a brief period of time immediately before the time of Jacob’s trouble …. the prophesied 7-year period of Israel’s travail, when God will purify her through the crucible of his refining fire.

The Song is Messianic prophecy presented in poetic form. Its story line revolves about a love affair in which King Solomon and a Shepherd (Messiah) contend for the heart and soul of a Jew named Peaceful. This heroine pursues elusive peace in her home town of Jerusalem (city of peace), where no peace is to be found under proud Solomon’s reign. She is won over by the Shepherd: the Lord is her Shepherd and soon-coming Prince of Peace, Lord of Lords and King of kings. The Shepherd wins her heart and devotion, hands down!

Where Solomon proudly boasts he is a great lover, the Shepherd unashamedly declares himself to be greater! Jesus, having revealed he is the long-awaited Messiah and Good Shepherd, speaks in the Gospel of Matthew about his contest with Solomon for the hand of his chosen spouse, the Jews …reminding scribes and Pharisees how a love-sick queen (the Queen of Sheba) traveled from a far country to pursue her attraction to Solomon: the Lord warns that, in the coming Day of Judgment, Sheba will rise in condemnation of the ungodly ways of Solomon’s kingdom and turn her love wholly to Messiah, as she accepts the truth, "behold a greater (Love) than Solomon is here!" (Matthew 12: 42)

In the Song, Israel has invaded Lebanon, with defensive and territorial intent that is at odds with the larger design of an unseen spirit combatant, named after the loftiest (proudest) of Lebanon’s cedars. Israel fails to see her spirit antagonist has himself undertaken a preemptive attack, invading the very heart of Judaism, Jerusalem. The nation Lebanon is but a pawn in the dark plan of her higher power. Confrontation between Lebanon’s antagonists is about to precipitate a world war that will unleash a long-dreaded nuclear holocaust, and usher in the day of vengeance of our God (Isaiah 61:2). The winds of war are being only temporarily held back by the Lord until a group of Jews — (represented by the book’s heroine, Peaceful) — is sealed by the Holy Spirit. This company of end-time evangelists, filled with the Spirit and power of Elijah, will serve God in bringing many souls out of the fiery trials that will soon come upon all the earth. The Good Shepherd invites all who will to Come with Me from Lebanon (Song 4:8). Lebanon is both a physical, geographic field of contest and a spiritual metaphor for ungodly Jerusalem.

The church flock has already been removed from the earth by the Shepherd. Desiring to one day be united with the departed flock, Peaceful responds to the Shepherd’s instructions to follow its way … go thy way forth by the footsteps of the flock (Song 1:8). The flock’s trail follows the footprints of the Shepherd. The Shepherd is the Way! Thus, as the early flock, Peaceful makes her choice … the love of her Shepherd over the love of her competing suitor, King Solomon. She hastens to enjoin others to do the same. Time is running out! If they are to be preserved from the fire baptism to come, they must move quickly!

God has chosen Peaceful, a lowly keeper of his vineyard Israel, through whom to speak by dreams and visions. Peaceful convinces many of her sister Daughters of Jerusalem that King Solomon is the wrong choice for king. He will soon be consumed by the flames of God’s wrath. The Shepherd (not Solomon!) is God’s choice for king. When Peaceful relates her vision of Solomon coming out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke (Song 3:6) .she is fulfilling the prophecy of Joel … upon handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit. And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire and pillars of smoke… before the great and terrible day of the Lord come (Joel 2:29-31).

Peaceful gives the world a timely warning. Her Shepherd only awaits her readiness. She will soon invite the winds of the end to blow on the coals of fire, saying, Awake, O north wind (Song 4: 16), inviting God to kindle the fires in her garden that purity may melt forth from her people. Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars. (Zechariah 11:1)

God has directed a timely message for all who share the precious hope in the coming return of Messiah, God’s choice for King to rule a world of peace from the throne of David. Surely, the stage seems nearly set for the end of the kingdom of darkness and the advent of the Kingdom of Light.

Author’s Introduction

An Old Invitation Heard With New Ears

Prior to Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, I never made place in my Bible reading for The Song of Solomon. I considered it more ‘recreation’ than revelation: more for frivolous entertainment than for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, though 2 Timothy 3:16 says all Scripture is inspired of God for just those purposes.

Before June of 1982 I believed any ‘serious’ Bible scholar would always elect to forego The Song in favor of searching for supposed ‘deeper truths’ in other Scripture. And then, of course, there was the very explicit love language … intimate to the point of embarrassment for most ‘good’ people, I thought … especially to be avoided in group Bible studies. In my imagination, the ultimate painful confrontation ran like this: a friend (perhaps even my Pastor!) asks, What scriptures are you reading today, Arn? Surmounting waves of reticence, I softly respond, with coloring cheeks, The Song of Solomon, to which my friend’s only reaction is a ‘knowing’ grin, accompanied by a raised eyebrow. Pride dictated that to be thus ‘caught’ once would perhaps be forgivable, but to be repeatedly discovered immersed in that little book over any prolonged period of time would adversely reflect upon my spiritual condition. So, why chance it? Such was the shallowness of my pre-1982 thinking!

My whole mind-set about The Song was abruptly transformed with Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon. A shocked world directed its eye with fixed-focus horror upon that pathetically wasted nation in the Middle East: a land whose very name was once considered synonymous with unexcelled natural beauty, with its magnificent mountains, its lush vegetation, vintage forests and its lofty cedars; but, a land whose name has now become synonymous with the sum total of man’s ‘natural’ ugliness. My eyes were no exception: along with the world’s they were fixed on Lebanon when I picked up my bible and thumbed open its pages in search of an inspirational thought for the day. Randomly cracking the pages, my eyes riveted upon a completely unexpected five- word phrase … Come with me from Lebanon. I wondered, What in the world is that doing in Scripture? Then, I was even more astounded to discover it was in The Song of Solomon! I had looked for a brief proverb and suddenly found myself wrapped up in a whole book. In view of the day’s headlines, I couldn’t believe it coincidental. It seemed as if God was supernaturally calling attention to a personal heart- engraved invitation:

Come with me from Lebanon! (The Song of Solomon 4:8)

From that day to this, I find my scripture readings regularly referencing back to this little book and its relevancy to all Scripture: no excuses needed; no embarrassment; a better understanding of God’s love … and a compelling desire to tell others about it. For upwards of a year, anyone at Fayette Baptist Church asked what Arn Sturtevant was teaching would quickly reply, The Song of Solomon, perhaps with some good-natured humor expressed over my confessed passionate preoccupation, yet not accompanied by any of the once-feared ‘knowing’ grins or raised eyebrows . for they, too, had heard the Song with new ears, and they encourage me to ‘sing’ it to you.

A Shepherd’s Invitation versus the World’s Demand

Peoples of the world are transfixed with horror over the prospect. A shadowing specter of the unthinkable holocaust .nuclear war .draws threateningly closer. Syria and Israel are in a face-to-face confrontation over Lebanon. Other countries are sucked into the vortex of an ever-expanding conflagration: the U. S., with its commitments to Israel; Russia, with its commitments to Syria and Iran; the Muslim nations in league to destroy Israel; Iran’s quest for nuclear power; Israel with its nuclear arsenal, and the guts to use it under a declared preemptive first strike policy.

In The Song, a shepherd invites Israel to Come with me from Lebanon while the gentile world demands it "get out of

Lebanon … and get out now!"

Israel’s Preemptive Strike against Lebanon

Israel’s preemptive strike strategy is based upon its assessment of the inherent risk it perceives in its small size: a risk that renders a defensive military posture impractical, for it could be quickly overrun with modern warfare means and methods. She holds that the key to survival in any serious military confrontation is a viable policy of offense based on effective intelligence-gathering as its early warning system: the old adage that the best defense is a good offense! To avoid destruction she believes she must strike any expected aggressor first, thus ‘preempting’ the first strike position from her enemies.

Repelled by the prospect, humanistic society’s fearful and fervent outcry from the grandstand is much more of a demand than it is an invitation: Get out of Lebanon … and get out now!

But, from the field of conflict comes the calm and assured invitation of the one Good Shepherd who is in the midst of the fracas: Come with me.

Lebanon’s Preemptive Strike against Israel

Scripture defines Lebanon as a physical place on earth. There is no denying it remains today a geographic place with territorial bounds. It will soon be embroiled in war with Israel in a final struggle before Messiah’s return to restore peace and to rule over the earth.

While Lebanon is a physical place, in the Song it is treated as a borderless spiritual ‘kingdom’ of this world that contends for the soul of man in realms not limited by geographic bounds. Lebanon’s spirit king launched his own preemptive strike thousands of years ago, occupying the very heart of Judaism, Jerusalem. That spirit is in control of Israel’s ruler (Solomon) and it lusts after the heart of her subjects (the Daughters of Jerusalem). Israel lost the battle and still pays for it today. Her best preemptive strategy would have been to have remained a faithful lover of Jehovah, which would have protected her from the enticements of Lebanon. In the Bible, God consistently portrays his chosen people as his alienated, unfaithful, but still loved ‘wife’ with whom he seeks to become reunited. In The Song, Jehovah is seeking to restore true love; he has sent his shepherd son (Messiah) to woo her back.

By reason of its infection of the Jews’ religion, Lebanon is a figure, a symbol of the fallen idolatrous Jerusalem: a metaphor used in the same manner as God calls the once holy city by such derogatory nicknames as Sodom, Egypt and Babylon: (refer to the author’s book, The Great Mystery City for a more complete exegesis).

Lebanon’s Topography

Lebanon (meaning a lofty snow-capped mountain) is prominently well located at Israel’s northern border. Its most important landmark is Mount Hermon, a massive range of peaks offering strategic advantage over Israel.

The region of Lebanon in Solomon’s day encompassed what we know today as the nation of Lebanon, plus much of Syria and Israel. Mount Hermon, with its highest peak in the Anti-Lebanon Range, reaches an elevation of 9,232 feet and

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marks the border of present day Syria, Lebanon and Israel, the three countries controlling different sectors of the mountain. The Israeli controlled sector was only annexed in the Six-Day War of 1967 … then expanded in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, when Israeli Defense forces (IDF) overcame a large part of the Syrian sector … (which Israel later, after the war, returned to Syria). Hermon’s foothills include the Golan Heights, also wrested from Syria, but not returned as it was deemed necessary for Israel’s strategic defense, having played a critical part in the nearly successful Syrian attempt to

destroy Israel. Thus, this portion of the Lebanon range has been hotly contested over in modern times as well as in ancient Bible days.

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Caesarea Philippi lies at the southern base of Mount Hermon: the city where Jesus revealed his purpose to build his Church and to go on to Jerusalem to his death and resurrection. Here Jesus confirmed his deity not only before disciples but in the very presence of the panoply of Canaan’s gods that were worshipped at dozens of surrounding altars, including the magnificent temple erected there by Herod the Great, whose son Herod Philip the Tetrarch built up the city

called by his name. As Christ stood on this shoulder of Mt. Hermon, he posed the challenging question, But whom say ye that I am? Disciples thrilled and demons trembled at the answer, Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God (Matthew 16: 15-16). Those massive white marble pillars of the Herodian temple proved far from eternal in light of such Truth; (they were toppled to earth by a major earthquake in 363 A.D). The Word of God, however, remains alive and well . and its prophecy is that the entire dark kingdom of this world, along with its deceiving King, will soon be toppled, and those evil high places (the habitations of devils) will be laid low!

Scholars hold it was on one of the nearby peaks of the Hermon range that the Transfiguration occurred. So, these heights are of great historical consequence to both Jews and Christians. One can only imagine how infuriated Satan must have been when Jesus chose to invade ‘his’ mountain domain … when the carpenter from Nazareth was transfigured and glorified with a brilliance far exceeding the sun’s reflection on Hermon’s snowfields.

The Lebanon region’s gentile occupants were known in Solomon’s day as Canaanites. Attempting to occupy Canaan Land according to God’s command, early Jews found the coastal plain along the Mediterranean sprinkled with strong city states which they initially chose to by-pass. These commercially profitable settlements fell under the hegemony of the most powerful city of Tyre, governed in Solomon’s time by King Hiram. Present day Tyre lies on the Mediterranean Sea, about fifteen miles north of Israel’s northwestern border.

Mount Hermon’s Physical Importance

Militarily, the mountains of Lebanon offer strategic high ground for both defensive positions and platforms from which to stage assault. Muslim legions led by Syria provided a wake- up-call for Jews in both 1967’s Six-Days War and 1973’s Yom Kippur War, as the enemy launched heavily armed attacks on Israel from the Golan Heights flank of Mount Hermon. Had it not been for miraculous intervention by God, Israel would have been wiped off the map. Recognizing the absolute need for control of high ground, the IDF, against all odds, was astonishingly successful in wresting from formidable enemies control of both the Golan and other strategically important sectors of the Mount Hermon Range.

This mountain, once known as The Mountain of Snow, is today called by the Jews, Eyes of the Nation . because it provides Israel’s primary early warning system.

Of added importance, Mount Hermon is Israel’s prime source of fresh water. The mountain’s snow melt, water shed and springs feed the Jordan River and the Sea of Galilee. In a plan to cut the Jews off from life-sustaining water, Syria sought to dig canals to divert water from Israel into Syrian territory; but the Jews’ great military successes in repeated struggles for survival have so far served to abort or delay the effort.

Little wonder Israel has often found itself involved in military excursions on or about the mountains of Lebanon! It seems the region can only be ignored at risk of destruction. It is certainly not a geographic area the Jews would be easily convinced to abandon, even in light of a God-engraved invitation to Come with me from Lebanon.

Mount Hermon’s Spiritual Importance

Not only is Mount Hermon of military importance to Israel in its struggle to survive in a very hostile political environment, it is also of great spiritual importance.

Baal (meaning Lord) was chief god of the Canaanites, who sacrificed at altars to Baal’s array of lesser sub-deities as their priests faced the snow-capped peak of Hermon, thought to be Baal’s habitation. The ancient name for Hermon is Baal Hermon … the mountain thought to be Lord of all.

In Tyre, King Hiram erected a magnificent temple to Baal Melkart, whose specific attribute of Baal was life-giving power. An annual celebration to Melkart took place in spring, when winter is past and the rain is over and gone (Song 2:11). At this significant season, the idol Melkart was burned, buried and resurrected as a life/death/rebirth deity (a perverse Satanic copy of Christ). In another part of the ceremony, Tyre’s King entered into a ritual marriage to a priestess of the Queen, symbolizing the marriage of Baal and Astarte (or Ashtoreth), who Baal had supposedly rescued from the Moon. Solomon built altars to Ashtoreth and Baal around Israel’s Holy City, incurring the wrath of Jehovah’s prophets. Baal is translated in Hebrew, Molech (or Moloch); and worship of this horrible deity involved child sacrifice by fire throughout Lebanon and Israel (Jeremiah 7:30-32).

Archeologists have unearthed great numbers of earthenware jars containing the remains of first-born children sacrificed to Baal. When a house was built, a child would often be sacrificed and its body built into the new structure’s wall to supposedly bring good luck to the rest of the family. These practices were starkly contrary to God’s command in Deuteronomy (30:19) to always act in protection of life. Child sacrifice especially incurs God’s wrath: James 5:6 harshly condemns those who murder the innocent. This evil religion of the Canaanites caused God to prohibit his Chosen People from interfaith marriages with such idolatrous people. The seven tribes collectively comprising Lebanon’s Canaanite populace were deemed so irredeemably evil that Jehovah even commanded,

smite them, utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor show any mercy unto them: neither shalt thou make marriages with them. (Deuteronomy 7: 2-3)

Too bad Solomon chose not to follow God’s command! He spared those God condemned, covenanted with the King of Tyre, and even condoned and practiced interfaith marriage: choices that soon infected and defiled his subjects, polluted the Temple and wreaked havoc upon his realm. Bad choices lead to bad consequences!

Israel’s consorting with powers of evil caused God to destroy the Temple and send the Jews into Babylonian captivity. Solomon had erected idols and altars to Ashtoreth (Baal’s wife) and other false gods of Lebanon. Worse, Israel’s kings even promoted child sacrifice, especially prevalent under Lebanon-infected Ahaz and Manasseh . only to be briefly terminated by King Josiah, who tore down the idols that inspired their detestable practices (2 Kings 23) of making "the children they bore me (God) pass through fire" (Ezekiel 23:36-37). Jesus proclaimed, I am the Life. Killing innocent children is tantamount to doing violence unto the Lord of Life, for the children are the Lord’s. (Take notice, America, abortion capital of the world! What became Jerusalem’s undoing may yet be ours!)

Solomon Made Covenants with Lebanon’s King

Appendix 1 details how Solomon not only failed to cleanse the land of Canaanites, he spared their lives and even formed alliances with Hiram, King of Tyre, to build a temple God said he didn’t want in the first place. He bartered land, armaments and treasure in exchange for a Lebanese architect (another Hiram), Lebanese cedar, marble and other materials needed, together with skilled Lebanese workers to erect the temple . even Lebanese wood to build the royal chariot desired to transport Israel’s King in proper splendor back and forth between Jerusalem and Tyre.

Is Lebanon just a Pawn? … If so, Pawn of whom?

In the game of chess, a chessman called the pawn is of lowest value .expendable . used only to advance the cause of another. When Israel is repeatedly attacked from Lebanon, who is its true adversary? Is Lebanon perhaps just a pawn for another? (Keep in mind the chief chessman is the king.)

Lebanon’s government is a shambles! A supposed pluralistic democracy, her charter (ostensibly out of fairness to minority Christians) calls for the president to be a Christian, though the vast majority of its populace is Muslim. The office of president is a sham: perhaps best thought of as a powerless prince, ruled by an undefined mystery king. If a Lebanese Christian leader attempts to thwart the will of Islamists, he is assassinated; and the secular world immediately suspects the bully-pulpit throne of Islam is the Lebanese terrorist group called Hezbollah (literally meaning party of God), which rules the roost through effective use of overwhelming killing tools and money. But where do the weapons and the money come from to empower Hezbollah in its quest to exterminate the Jews in order to make way for the Caliphate (worldwide Islamic rule) through a long-awaited Mahdi, Islam’s supposed redeemer? Answer: the money and the weapons come from other anti-Jewish nations . (presently from Iran . most often through Syria).

If an outside Islamic nation is thus pulling the strings of Lebanon’s anti-Zionism, then isn’t Lebanon just a pawn? Another possibility (now, here is a difficult proposition for non-religious secularists to comprehend!): there could be a mysterious would-be king spirit jockeying for the throne, using aj] nations and all religions as pawns? World intelligence analysts hold to the dictum, follow the money, to find the culprit. God has more reliable advice, warning we should best follow his Word. Indeed, Scripture clearly identifies the true king of Lebanon as the god of this fallen world: the culprit is none other than Satan, who doesn’t favor any religion but his own. His plan is to be worshipped by all mankind in a reconstructed

Temple. All nations and religions are but pawns of the great deceiver who is fallen man’s true king.

All the proof we need to frame the solid case is to be found in Ezekiel and Isaiah. Chapter 28:1-19 of Ezekiel tells us Lebanon’s government (the prince of Tyre) is a pawn, a man and not god ruled by the fallen cherubim angel, Satan, who is rightly called King of Tyre. The prophet Isaiah addressed Lebanon’s dark power.

"How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning? How art thou cut down to the ground (Mount Hermon of Lebanon?) which did weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God.