My beloved [is] white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand.
Ver. 10. My beloved is white and ruddy, &c.] Love lacks no rhetoric to lay forth the thing beloved in liveliest colours. "White and ruddy!" What can be more laudable and lovely? What can come nearer to a perfect symmetry, to a sound and sure constitution and complexion? Sure it is that these two, being comelily mixed, do make the most beautiful or orient look or colour; see the prophet's description of the Nazarites, Lamentations 4:7. And note, saith an expositor, that the Holy Ghost joineth both these together - the whiteness making the ruddiness more fresh and fair, and the ruddiness discerning the whiteness from paleness of face, or phlegmatic complexion. Sed sunt in his mysteria investiganda, saith another, itaque candor refert divinam Christi naturam, rubor humanam. White and red may signify Christ's Godhead and manhood. God is called the "Ancient of days"; Dan 7:9 his "head and his hairs are white like wool, as white as snow." Rev 1:14 Man had his name Adam of the red earth, out of which he was taken. Gen 2:7 Christ also, the second Adam, became red with his own blood, whereby he "purchased the Church" Act 20:28 - a bloody spouse she was unto him - and paved for her "a new and lively way into the most holy place"; Heb 10:20 upon the battlements whereof he hangs out still (as once that warlike Scythian did) a white flag of grace and mercy to penitent persons, that humble themselves at his feet for favour; but a red flag of justice and severity to those his enemies that will not have him to rule over them - in token whereof his raiment is said to be red, Isa 63:1-3 his vesture dipped in blood. Rev 19:13
The chiefest among ten thousand.] Heb., Vexillatus prae decem millibus; that is, famous and conspicuous among and above many, as "Saul was higher than the people by the head and shoulders," as the Hachmonite was the chief of David's mighties; 1Ch 11:11 or, "the standardbearer of ten thousand." Now the goodliest, and with it the ablest, men used to carry the banner or standard. Christ standeth "for an ensign of the people," Isa 11:10 and hath ten thousand times ten thousand standing before him, following him wheresoever he goeth, Revelation 7:9 ; Rev 7:14 and singing, "We will rejoice in thy salvation, and in the name of our God (vexillabimus) we will set up our banner." Psa 20:6 The Church's design here is to hold out Christ as altogether matchless and incomparable, that there is none like him in the earth, as God said of Job; Son 1:8 to teach us to esteem him, as the people did David, more worth than ten thousand others; 2Sa 18:3 to set him upon the chief chariot, and to give him the sole command of all, as Pharaoh dealt by Joseph. And as the sun, moon, and eleven stars in Joseph's vision did obeisance to him, so let our souls, bodies, all our temporal, natural, moral, and spiritual abilities, be subject and serviceable to Christ, who, if he be the chiefest of ten thousand, ought to have as much love as ten thousand hearts put into one could hold.