Song of Solomon 7:2 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

An heap of wheat— It was usual with the Jews, when their wheat had been threshed out and fanned, to lay it in heaps, Ruth 3:7. Haggai 2:16 and as their threshing-floors were in the open air, they stuck them round with thorns in order to keep off the cattle, Hosea 2:5-6. These, as a mark of respect to the spouse, are here converted into a fence of lilies; or, we may suppose with Lamy, that Solomon here alludes to a custom which, according to him, they had in Palestine, of throwing flowers round the heaps of corn after it was winnowed. Wheat and barley were, among the ancient Hebrews, emblems of fertility; and it was usual for the standers-by to scatter these grains upon the new-married couple, accompanying it with a wish that they might increase and multiply. The passage in the text is therefore a prediction of the glorious fertility of the church of Christ. The next verse should be rendered as in ch. Song of Solomon 4:5. See the New Translation, and Selden, Uxor. Heb. lib. ii. ver. 15.