In his Old Testament Christology, written in
the early 19th century (and translated into English in 1854), E.W.
Hengstenberg (1802-1869) wrote the following about the Song of Solomon Why the following
should be of interest to Latter-day Saints is that the author clearly struggles
to make sense of the Song of Solomon and its contents and it being viewed as
inspired scripture:
The Song of Solomon does not, strictly speaking,
possess a prophetical character. It does not communicate any new revelations;
like the Psalms, it only represents, in a poetical form, things already known.
It sufficiently appears . . . The Song of Solomon then, is no apocalypsis—no revelation of mysteries
till then unknown. There is in it no such disclosure as is e.g. 2 Sam. vii. on the descent of the Messiah from David, or as is
that in Mic. v. 1 (2) on His being born at Bethlehem, or even as it that in Is.
liii. on His office as a High priest, and His vicarious satisfaction. (Ernst
Wilhelm Hengstenberg, Old Testament
Christology [trans. R. Keith; 2 vols.; 1854; repr., Mac Dill, Fla.: MacDonald Publishing
Company, 1971], 1:113)
