Following the Subject
Song of Songs 1:11
During the little “idle time” before this verse, I decided to add one more perspective as I walk through the Song of Songs:
“Let’s follow the movement of the subject.”
Who is speaking?
Who is being spoken to?
Is it singular or plural?And where does the subject change?
Now, verse 11.
“We will make for you ornaments of gold,studded with silver.”
Let’s look at the Hebrew.
תּוֹרֵי זָהָב נַעֲשֶׂה־לָּךְעִם נְקֻדּוֹת הַכָּסֶף
（torei zahav naʿaseh-lakh
ʿim nequddot hakkasef）
The word that catches my eye first is:
נַעֲשֶׂה
naʿaseh Its root is:עשה
asah“to do / to make”
It is Qal imperfect, first person plural.
In other words,
“We will make.”
Ah.
We.
The subject has become plural.
In verse 9, we had:
דִּמִּיתִיךְ
dimmîtîkh
“I compared you…”
The subject was first person singular.
In verse 10, the gaze moved closer to “you”—
your cheeks,your neck.
And now, verse 11:
נַעֲשֶׂה־לָּךְ
“We will make for you.”
From “I”
to “we.”
The subject moved.
So, who are these “we”?
……I don’t know yet.
Or rather, whatנַעֲשֶׂה tells us is simply this:
“we.”
In Hebrew verbs, distinctions of gender appear in certain second- and third-person forms.
But the first person does not distinguish between masculine and feminine.
So from
נַעֲשֶׂה
alone, we cannot tell whether these are men, women, or a group containing both.
But immediately after it comes:
לָּךְ
lakh
“for you”
This “you” is feminine singular.
So, from the text itself, this is what we can see in verse 11:
we → for you (feminine singular) → will make
That much.
……As soon as I began following the subject, I started to see both what the text tells me and what it does not tell me.
And then—
נַעֲשֶׂה
naʿaseh
That sound.
I’ve heard it somewhere before.
Genesis 1:26.
וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים נַעֲשֶׂה אָדָם
vayyomer ʾelohim naʿaseh ʾadam
There it is again.
נַעֲשֶׂה
naʿaseh
The same root, עשה。
The same Qal imperfect.
The same first person plural.
In Genesis:
“Let us make…”
In the Song of Songs:
“We will make…”
Of course, this alone does not mean that Song of Songs 1:11 is pointing to Genesis 1:26.
For now, all I can confirm is this:
The same נַעֲשֶׂה is here too.
That’s all.
But while observing Genesis 3 and paying attention to the movement of the subject,
I opened Song of Songs 1:11 and found—
naʿaseh.
What an interesting place to stumble upon.
Now, let’s look back at verse 10 once more.
Verse 10 has:
בַּתֹּרִים
battorim
“with ornaments”
And verse 11 has:
תּוֹרֵי זָהָב
torei zahav
“ornaments of gold”
The “ornaments” of verse 10 continue into verse 11.
The words are connected.
But—
the subject moved.
From the “I” of verse 9
to the “we” of verse 11.
Who are they?
I still don’t know.
So, for now, I won’t give them name tags.
What I do know is this:
“We will make for you.”
The subject moved.
I’ll keep following this movement of the subject all the way through chapter 8.
Today, I’ll put a little pencil circle around:
נַעֲשֶׂה
“We will make.” ⭕
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