Your lips are like a scarlet ribbon; your mouth is lovely. Your temples behind your veil are like the halves of a pomegranate. – Song of Songs 4:3

Today’s Scripture Reading (October 24, 2019): Song of Songs 4

Marilyn Monroe once commented that “All little girls should be told they are pretty, even if they aren't.” While I understand what the actress was trying to argue, I might adjust her words a little bit. I think that “every little girl should be told that she is a princess, even if she isn’t of royal blood.” My problem with Monroe’s comment is that I have never met a little girl that was not pretty. And I have never met a little boy who was not handsome. Oh, there are some unfortunate pictures of little kids that cast the child in an unflattering light, but they are just pictures. Once you get to spend some time with any child, you will know that they are all beautiful in their own way.

The other problem with our concept of beauty or “prettiness” is that it is so changeable. What society seems to consider to be beautiful in the culture in which I live, I have to admit that I don’t really understand. To me, what we find to be attractive seems to be so artificial and not all that healthy. Something inside of me seems to argue that when we have to plump here and thin there, then we are destroying the natural beauty that is hidden inside each of us, and part of what made us beautiful as children. And we have all seen the pictures of plastic surgery that has gone horribly wrong. But it wasn’t that long ago that a plump woman was considered eminently beautiful, and not the rail-thin models that we see today. Any picture of Bathsheba, Solomon’s lovely mother, painted more than a hundred years ago, is likely to portray a plump woman who might not be considered beautiful in our culture.

And for all of those women who have had collagen pumped into their lips to fatten them and enhance their beauty, during Solomon’s time, the reverse was true. He describes his bride as having lips that were like “scarlet ribbons.” Her lips were thin and delicate, and a deep color of red, and this was considered to be part of her beauty. And so Solomon praises this delicate feature of his bride, relishing her beauty in a way that a contemporary audience would likely miss.

Of course, tomorrow, what we consider to be beautiful is likely to change once again.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Song of Songs 5