5:1. Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat the fruit of his apple trees. I am come into my garden, O my sister, my spouse, I have gathered my myrrh, with my aromatical spices: I have eaten the honeycomb with my honey, I have drunk my wine with my milk: eat, O friends, and drink, and be inebriated, my dearly beloved.
Let my beloved come into his garden, etc.... Garden, mystically the church of Christ, abounding with fruit, that is, the good works of the elect.
5:2. I sleep, and my heart watcheth: the voice of my beloved knocking: Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is full of dew, and my locks of the drops of the nights.
5:3. I have put off my garment, how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet, how shall I defile them?
5:4. My beloved put his hand through the key hole, and my bowels were moved at his touch.
My beloved put his hand through the key hole, etc.... The spouse of Christ, his church, at times as it were penned up by its persecutors, and in fears, expecting the divine assistance, here signified by his hand: and ver. 6, but he had turned aside and was gone, that is, Christ permitting a further trial of suffering: and again, ver. 7, the keepers, etc., signifying the violent and cruel persecutors of the church taking her veil, despoiling the church of its places of worship and ornaments for the divine service.
5:5. I arose up to open to my beloved: my hands dropped with myrrh, and my fingers were full of the choicest myrrh.
5:6. I opened the bolt of my door to my beloved: but he had turned aside, and was gone. My soul melted when he spoke: I sought him, and found him not: I called, and he did not answer me.
5:7. The keepers that go about the city found me: they struck me: and wounded me: the keepers of the walls took away my veil from me.
5:8. I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved, that you tell him that I languish with love.