Shabbos Chol Hamoed Pesach

As is the custom of Ashkenazi Synagogues we read Song of Songs. This book presents difficulties to the sincere reader looking for meaning. The sensual nature of the text seems out of charachter with what we normally find in synagogue. If we understand it as an allegory what is it really trying to tell us? In an attempt to deal with these questions i drew upon the comments of Rabbi Mordechai Gifter zt"l whose introduction to Song of Songs appears in Hebrew in the beginning of the Song of Songs by Mesorah Artscroll. What appears below is my free flowing translation of the parts of the introduction that I drew upon for my drasha.

All the songs are holy but the Song of Songs is Holy of Holies

1. The purpose of creation is in the creator doing good to others. he bestows upon His creatures a goodness that is found nowhere else but in Him. The only way to achieve this goodness is to cling to Him.
2. Love is defines by the clinging of the lover to the beloved not for any personal gain but purely because of love. For this reason are we instructed to serve G-d not to receive reward but simply because we love him.
3. In Parshas Mishpatim it says that at the giving of the Torah the children of Israel looked at G-d and they ate and they drank. The gemara in Tractate Brachos 17a says 'in the next world there is no eating or drinking ...just basking in the glow of G-d as it says "they looked at G-d and they ate and they drank". Rashi explains that they were satiated by the glow of G-d as thought they had eaten and drunk. Onklos comments that from here we see that enjoying G-d is charactarised by the terminology of eating and drinking. The spiritual experience of the next world is parrallled by the phisycal experience in this world. ed.
4. Total love of G-d means negating ones existance to G-ds oneness. in order to acheive this one must experience love with the senses. The story of creation concludes with the words "therefore will a man leave his mother and father and cling to his wife and they shall be as one flesh. That is the clinging of the lover to the beloved. When a man clings to his wife they experience becoming one with another and then they can experience becoming one with G-d. This is why G-d created woman and why he said it is not good for man to be alone. Rabbi Yitzchak of Acco commented that any man who has not experienced the love of a woman is as far from experiencing the divine as is a donkey.
5. This would explain why Yaacov recited Shema upon his reuniting with Joseph.
6. Now we understand that the woman who has lost her lover is bereft of her purpose in life and her longing to regain him is great. This longing is one and the same as the longing of Israel for G-d.
7. The shining of G-ds light upon those who cling to Him is called Holyness. Song of Songs which is devoted entirely to the yearing of the lover to experience the shine of the beloved is called Holy of Holies.
8. To us from our limited perspective the words of Song of Songs appear to be an analogy. Were we to achieve a higher level of understand we would see how they accurately the words describe the relationship.
9. Since Song of Songs describes the ultimate relationship included in it are all of the major themes of Jewsih philosophy/ theology. Exile, redemption, reward , punishment, revelation and hiddenness.
10. All of the above may be viewed as a short explanation of the words of Maimonedes in the Laws of Repentence chapter 10 law 3 "What is love of the divine? it is a very great and powerful love to the point that ones soul is bound up with G-d to the point that one can think of nothing else. When eating or drinking sitting or standing one is consumed by thoughts of G-d exactly as one is lovesick for their beloved. This is what King Solomon meant when he said 'for I am lovesick'. The Song of Songs describes this relationship"