Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Welcome to the weekly deep dive podcast on the add-on education network. This is a bonus episode. Yeah,
Speaker 1 00:00:07 Baby.
Speaker 0 00:00:07 I am your host, Jason Lloyd here in the studio with my friend. And this show is producer Nate Piper.
Speaker 1 00:00:13 I mean, I'm not playing any music or anything. We don't gotta do this whole thing. Let's just tell him what it's about today. <laugh>
Speaker 0 00:00:18 Fair point fair point.
Speaker 1 00:00:20 Do you just wanna mention real quick there? Um, there will be, you know, some mature talk in this, um, mostly just about, um, you know, symbolisms, uh, intimacy, various, uh, ways that those are kind of connected to covenants, covenant, making the temple process. Um, it is definitely a little bit more of a mature discussion than any of our other podcasts and things like that. So just be aware of that in case, um, you know, you're in an environment you don't really wanna be listening to this or with young people that, you know, might not be ready to have this discussion. So please just keep that in mind and then, uh, let's get into it. We're
Speaker 0 00:01:00 Diving into the book of song of Solomon first, the Janus parallel. And then we're gonna talk a little bit about the nature of the book, the relationship between God and his bride, Israel, and then the relationship between man and his wife. So let's start with our Janus parallel. This is song of Solomon chapter two, verse 12, the flowers appear on the earth. The time of the singing of birds is come and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land. And you look at that and you're like, that doesn't sound super impressive. Well, it doesn't, but wait,
Speaker 1 00:01:36 There's more,
Speaker 0 00:01:37 There's more I've I hopefully have taught you guys that anytime you see italicized words, you should look at it and realize that italicized words don't exist in the original text. They're added by the translators to try to add context and understanding to the verse. Now what you don't see in this is that the Hebrew word for singing,
Speaker 0 00:02:02 If it's vowed slightly different is the same Hebrew word as blooming. Okay. And, and where that becomes cool is in the original Hebrew Bible, there were no vows. So when you come across this word, if you're reading it and you're just seeing it on the page, it is the same word for blooming as it is the same word for singing, and you have to choose, am I gonna translate it one way or the other? And by the translators picking singing, they've, they've ruined this verse. So I want you to look at that singing and realize that it's blooming and singing. And if you wanna even put a note, circle that word and put blooming slash singing, this is why the first line, the flowers appear on the earth. The time of the blooming is come see that fits flowers appear because it's the time of blooming.
Speaker 0 00:02:56 Now take that second line, the time of the blooming and change it back to singing. The time of the singing has come. And the voice of the turtle turtles don't sing. This is a turtle dove. The voice of the turtle dove is heard in the land. Ah, see, now it fits singing. The turtle doves are chirping. So that's what a Janus parallel. Janice is the Roman God. And it's the Roman God that kind of stood in the gate and he has two faces. One that faces forward and one that faces backward. So this word is a Janus word in the sense that it faces backwards to the line that came before it and faces forward to the line. That's going to follow it where I think the Janus parallel is so cool is the idea of God being a Janus in and of himself. If you go into the Burlar great price and you look at FOME number two, and we're looking at figure one and figure two and figure one and figure two there's there's this weird.
Speaker 0 00:04:01 It almost looks like a beetles shaped person that this head looks got like antenna coming out in either direction, but, but put your finger over and block like half the face off. Then you'll notice that it's one face facing towards the right and another face facing towards the left. It's actually two different faces melted into one person. And this is very much like Janus and, and that Janus becomes an image of God. The reason why it's cool is because God sits in the Meridian of time. One face looking back one face, looking forward, but he's also looking half of him being deity God, from who we came from, this, this line of God's and then also this other mortal and, and being able to stand in that gate and bridge both worlds and bring them together. Then this idea that he is the one that can affect the atonement and that can you reunify God's with men.
Speaker 0 00:04:54 So it's kind of a cool little verse, kind of a cool image talking about, uh, God and, and his role. So I, I like it when I come across these Janus parallels to me, they're kind of simple, but powerful and very, okay. Now the rabbis thought song of Solomon, at least when they disagreed on all sorts of things, they could agree on the fact that this book was the, the, the most important book of all other books. And I, and I think we would tend to disagree with that in, in our time in our culture, we look at it and say, this is, this just seems like smut. It doesn't seem like it's, it, it it's an erotic poetry. Why is this so important? The reason why it's so important, I think is, is actually at least twofold, maybe more than twofold, but one, because you're taking time to describe this, this intimate relationship between a man and his wife is being used to describe the relationship between Jehovah and Israel and that he loves his bride so much.
Speaker 0 00:06:03 And the love between God and his people is personified here in this book. That's, that's one reason why they would give it a lot of importance, a lot of do, because it helped them to see that the Lord really did love and cherish and treasure them. And also help you understand the relationship. I guess, if we're going twofold, one is the relationship between God and his people. Two is the relationship that a husband and a wife should, should have between them and the idea that there is nothing wrong or dirty about intimacy and sex. It's extremely appropriate when done, right? And it's in, in the Christian world, it's been attached to original sin. It's gotten a negative connotation, an idea of Adam parting of the fruit as this symbol of, of man can't control his desires and this isn't abomination. And now because of that, everyone's born in sin and really it's best if you don't do it.
Speaker 0 00:07:10 And the only reason to do it is, is procreate. This is I, I I'd like to take a look at this book and view this as a counter argument to that. An argument that love is divine, and we share in godliness with intimacy. And there's some powerful connections here with that. When you look at I'm trying to figure out how, how much I want to go into this, Nate, how deep I wanna roll on this roll dog. <laugh> when you look at the temple and what you find in the holy of holy is the presence of God. But in order to get there, you have to go into the temple. You have to penetrate through the curtains, into the presence of God and in the presence of God, in the holy of Holies, there was a rock and the rock was supposed to signify the first rock that rose or rose out of the waters in creation from which God stood and organized and created the rest of the earth from which he created.
Speaker 0 00:08:29 Man. Now look at this relationship between a husband and wife and the wife as a very sacred temple. Think again about Abraham and his wife PSIA when God and the messengers came and she stayed within the tent and, and didn't come out and she prepared the mill from in there. And Abraham has to go into her. And this idea that as a man goes into the temple and in a sense that going in a relationship with his wife, this intimacy coming into her is akin to going into the garden of Eden, going into paradise. And the reward, the results from going into paradise is the power of creation. The ability to create the ability to be like God, in ancient temples, you could see that they were so close, but they got this wrong. And you would look at these temples and, and they would create altars that that would signify the, the Fallas, and then they would pour oil on it.
Speaker 0 00:09:36 And, and this idea that this was the womb of creation, and, and through here, God is able to create the world and, and they would depict their temples in terms of sexuality and intimacy between a husband and wife. And you look at the way they describe earth is that the earth was a female. And that God, the sky God was male. And that the sky God, by raining on the earth is his way of fertilizing the earth to be able to create the crops, to be able to bring fertility to the earth and that the sky is impregnating the earth so that life can spring forth. And you have all of these different fertility cults that celebrate intimacy between God and the earth. And, and that's how we are born. And this idea that heaven, the, the, the, the best of everything being able to go into the presence of God is also found in a relationship with a spouse.
Speaker 0 00:10:40 Then a husband and a wife being drawn together is discovering God. And it's an act just as sacred as going to a temple, just as sacred as anything else. And the reason why I want to go down, this is as tricky, as hard, as difficult as it is for me to try to discuss this with you. It's still worth it. Going down. This path for me is because I feel like the world has been damaged that Satan and trying to undermine God's plan, undermine what God is teaching is taking what he has provided and cheapening it. You look at the contrast between wisdom and foolishness, and it's the same thing. They're both females, they're both desirable. They're both offering what you think is the same thing, but one is made to an image of dirty, of, of wrong of something that shouldn't be talked about.
Speaker 0 00:11:42 Something that shouldn't be discussed that happens to it has to happen in the nighttime, in the darkness when no one's looking when no one's there. And, and it's degrading the other image of wisdom, which is an, an image of beauty, uh, an image that should be celebrated that should be talked about that is appropriate. And that is an invitation to all people everywhere to participate in and to become like God, to enjoy that blessing. Then that blessing is stripped from so many people because of the negative connotation that's associated with it. And it's be, it's, it's been ruined, it's been destroyed. So I, I love song of Solomons. And I look at it as an opportunity to try to reestablish the beauty. That is a relationship with God. And I don't think it's a coincidence that when we get sealed to a spouse in the temple, we're not just sealed to our spouse. We're sealed to God. Then that relationship with God is aching very much so to a relationship with a spouse.
Speaker 1 00:12:47 Fantastic. A lot of important symbolism in there.
Speaker 0 00:12:52 Yeah. And maybe one last note, while we're finishing up song of Solomon, knowing we're not going back to this, I would like to highlight how in, in this book, you see how much the, the man is enjoying his bride and her body in, in, in a sense that it's bringing him a lot of pleasure and it's giving her a lot of pleasure and, and she's enjoying it and he's enjoying it in a sense, the intimacy is not just for the creating of kids, not just for the power of creation, but also a divine gift for the enjoyment of each other. And this idea that this relationship should be providing a lot of pleasure, a lot of enjoyment, a lot of happiness, a lot of satisfaction, and that there should be joy in the journey. There, there should be a lot of happiness derived from this, not just for, for having kids purposes and maybe a key point to this to really drive home is the idea that both partners are experiencing pleasure, uh, in the moment that one partner is taking advantage of the other and, and doing so for their own satisfaction at the displeasure discomfort of another, that that's a relationship and discord, that's not unity.
Speaker 0 00:14:10 That's not how it's supposed to go. And, and, and we're not here to define every relationship and what you can and what you can't. And I, I believe the church has handled that very beautifully in how they've described this relationship, that, that really, this is two partners coming together and finding out what works for them, but realize that no partner should be making another one feel uncomfortable or making somebody feel not right. And, and that this should be something that's very pleasurable, very beautiful and very divine.
Speaker 1 00:14:40 Awesome. Um, we appreciate you listening to the bonus episode. Um, hopefully you got some, you know, good insight and information out of that, and, uh, we will actually see you. Yeah. Next week when we are back into Isaiah.
