Week 26 Song of Solomon
There are different orders I can choose to read the OT. For instance:
Consecutive order (beginning-to-end – Genesis > Revelation)
Chronological order (oldest-to-most-recent – maybe Job > Nehemiah(?))
Longest to shortest (Jeremiah > Obadiah(?))
Most-Interesting to Least-Interesting? I’ve never actually seen this one recommended. If it was the 39 OT books could be arranged in a thousand variations since most-favorite to least-favorite would be different for everyone.
Personally I’m not sure where I’d start. Genesis Ruth Esther Daniel Jonah would all be right up there. But I wouldn’t think twice about the last book at the very bottom of the list. Song of Solomon. Hands-down.
The thing is…every other OT book gives a bible reader some kind of detectable tip-off about structure or mechanics or operations in the Total World. They all talk about some things that’re pretty evident to me and other things that aren’t. (What I do with the-things-that-aren’t is another question. I’m just saying there’re there).
Anyway my point is that Song of Solomon reads like a this-material-world-only story. There’s a guy. There’s a girl. He loves her. She loves him. He wants to marry her & have sexual intercourse with her and she wants to marry him & have sexual intercourse with him. A pretty normal love-story.
So… Q: what tip-offs do I get about the Total World in Song of Solomon?
A: none.
I’m not saying there aren’t any tip-offs. Just that they aren’t obvious to me.
Note: on second-thought Esther reads like a this-material-world-only story too.