“There are sixty queens and eighty concubines / And virgins without number. / My dove, my perfect one, is but one; / She is the only one of her mother; / She is the choice one of her who bore her. / The daughters saw her, and they called her blessed; / The queens and the concubines, / They also praised her” (6:8-9). Here we see that her Beloved (Solomon, typifying Christ in a positive sense) is loved by many different believers, some as queens, some as concubines, and some as virgins (all in the positive sense in poetry), but her Beloved, considering her as His love and perfect one, praises her as the only one lover of Him, the only and choice one regenerated by grace.
“Who is this woman who looks forth like the dawn, / As beautiful as the moon, / As clear as the sun” (v. 10a). Her Beloved praises her as the dawn, being beautiful as the moon and clear as the sun, bringing and shining the light on others.
In verse 10b the Beloved again says that she is as terrible as an army with banners. The meaning here is the same as that in verse 4b.
“I went down to the orchard of nuts / To see the freshness of the valley, / To see whether the vine had budded, / Whether the pomegranates were in bloom” (v. 11). Here we see the lover’s work. She works on herself as a garden which is growing as the valley growing the fresh green things, as the vine budding, and as the pomegranates blossoming. She works on herself as a particular garden to grow nuts, to grow strong, hard food. She considers herself not only a garden of soft things but an orchard growing particular nuts for Christ.
Verses 12 and 13 describe the lover’s progress and victory.
“Before I was aware, / My soul set me among the chariots of my noble people” (v. 12). She is not aware that she is progressing swiftly as the noble people’s chariots going forth.
“Return, return, O Shulammite; / Return, return, that we may gaze at you. / Why should you gaze at the Shulammite, / As upon the dance of two camps?” (v. 13). Those who are attracted by her ask her to come back that they may look at her as at two camps of an army celebrating their victory by dancing (cf. Gen. 32:2).
In Song of Songs 6:13 the lover’s name Shulammite, which is the feminine form of Solomon, is first used, indicating that at this point she has become Solomon’s duplication, counterpart, the same as Solomon in life, nature, and image, as Eve to Adam (Gen. 2:20-23), signifying that the lover of Christ becomes the same as Him in life, nature, and image to match Him (2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 8:29) for their marriage.