Fathers

Song of Solomon 4

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Behold, you are beautiful, my love. Behold, you are beautiful. Your eyes are like doves behind your veil. Your hair is as a flock of goats, that descend from Mount Gilead. Your teeth are like a newly shorn flock, which have come up from the washing, where every one of them has twins. None is bereaved among them. Your lips are like scarlet thread. Your mouth is lovely. Your temples are like a piece of a pomegranate behind your veil. Your neck is like David’s tower built for an armory, on which a thousand shields hang, all the shields of the mighty men. Your two breasts are like two fawns that are twins of a roe, which feed among the lilies. Until the day is cool, and the shadows flee away, I will go to the mountain of myrrh, to the hill of frankincense. You are all beautiful, my love. There is no spot in you. Come with me from Lebanon, my bride, with me from Lebanon. Look from the top of Amana, from the top of Senir and Hermon, from the lions’ dens, from the mountains of the leopards. You have ravished my heart, my sister, my bride. You have ravished my heart with one of your eyes, with one chain of your neck. How beautiful is your love, my sister, my bride! How much better is your love than wine, the fragrance of your perfumes than all kinds of spices! Your lips, my bride, drip like the honeycomb. Honey and milk are under your tongue. The smell of your garments is like the smell of Lebanon. My sister, my bride, is a locked up garden; a locked up spring, a sealed fountain. Your shoots are an orchard of pomegranates, with precious fruits, henna with spikenard plants, spikenard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon, with every kind of incense tree; myrrh and aloes, with all the best spices, a fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, flowing streams from Lebanon. Awake, north wind, and come, you south! Blow on my garden, that its spices may flow out. Let my beloved come into his garden, and taste his precious fruits.

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What the Fathers say

Song of Solomon 4:16

Western Saints

Ambrose of Milan

For this reason, too, the church, guarding the depth of the heavenly mysteries, repels the furious storms of wind, and calls to it the sweetness of the grace of spring, and knowing that its garden cannot displease Christ, invites the bridegroom, saying, "Arise, O north wind, and come, you south; blow upon my garden, and let my ointments flow down. …

On the Mysteries 9:56 ↗

Bede

"Arise, O north wind, and come, O south wind," etc. For in the north or south, He signifies the tempests of frequent temptations with which the Church was to be buffeted, so that it might become known how much spiritual grace and internal strength it possessed. …

Commentary on the Song of Songs ↗

Robert of Tombelaine

For what is designated by the North wind, which constricts with cold and makes things numb, if not the unclean spirit, who, while he possesses all the reprobate, makes them numb to good work? By the South wind, truly, that is, the warm wind, the Holy Spirit is figured: who, when He touches the minds of the elect, releases them from all numbness and makes them fervent, so that they eagerly perform all good things. For hence it is said: "Turn again, O Lord, our captivity, as a torrent in the South" (Psalm 125:4). …

Commentary on the Song of Songs, Chapter 4 ↗