Turn away thine eyes from me, for they have overcome me: thy hair [is] as a flock of goats that appear from Gilead.
Ver. 5. Turn away thine eyes from me.] Or, Turn thine eyes right upon me; so Son 6:13 he calls, "Return, return, O Shulamite"; and then the sense is, Look up unto me by faith. "Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth." Isaiah 45:22 ; Isaiah 31:1 ; Isa 42:18 But to keep to our translation. Christ had before confessed himself ravished with one of her eyes; and here he saith the same in effect. Stupenda sane dignatio, a wonderful condescension. We use to say, Majesty and love cannot meet or cohabit: a because love is the abasing of the soul to all services. But it is otherwise in Christ: majesty and love, even unto ravishment, meet in his holy heart. If the Church be sick of love toward him, he would she should know that he is overcome with love towards her, and that there is no love lost between them.
Thy hair is as a flock of goats, &c.] Grazing upon, and gazing from Gilead - q.d., I like thee as well as ever I did, thy late relapse notwithstanding; for I find thee more humble, watchful, thankful for a Saviour, merciful to others, desirous of the state of perfection, &c. And as a limb once broke, and well set again, knits and grows stronger there than in any other place; so by thy late falling in some sort from me, I find thee more firmly fastened unto me. Thus God changeth, saith one, our griefly wounds into beauty spots, and maketh the horrible sting of Satan to be a pearl pin to pin upon us the long white robe of Christ, and to dress us with the garment of gladness. Son 4:1-6 And observe here an addition of some other parts described, and a more full description of some of the former: to show that his love was no whit diminished, but rather increased. Something it was surely that made Mr Foxe, the martyrologue say, that he got by his infirmities, and lost by his graces.
a Non bene conveniunt nec in una sede morantur, maiestas et amor.