The explanation of Philippson would have been the most plausible, if Rashbam and the anonymous MS. had not shown that ‏עָטַה‎ itself means to roam, to wander, by referring to Isa. xxii. 17, where, according to its parallel, ‏טוּל‎, to cast down, it must signify to roll about. This meaning bests suits the context here, and is confirmed by Symach., Vulg., Syriac, Chald. 8. If thou knowest not. The court ladies, hearing the rustic girl say that she wished to be with her shepherd, tell her ironically to go, and be employed in the low and toilsome occupation of a shepherdess, rather than enjoy the exalted and easy life of a royal favourite. Some have put this answer into the mouth of the beloved; but it is evident from v. 9, and vi. 1, the only two places where the appellation “fairest of women” occurs, that it is the reply of the court ladies, which even Döpke, Good and Noyes, the defenders of the fragmentary theory, admit. Nothing can be more plain and incontrovertible than the statement in this verse, that the damsel is a shepherdess, and the beloved a shepherd, whom, she is told, she would find among his fellow-shepherds. It is for those who maintain the theory that this Song celebrates the marriage of Solomon with the daughter of Pharaoh, or some other prince’s daughter, to get over this fact. ‏לֹא יָדָע‎ is unnecessarily and incorrectly rendered by Ewald, Meier, Hitzig, &c., unwise. The Sept., which is followed by Luther, mistaking the usage of ‏לָדְ‎, translates this clause ἐὰν μὴ γνῷν σεαυτήν, as if the original were ‏אִם לֹא תֵדְעִי אֶת נִפְשֶׁךָ‎. The prepo. ‏בּ‎ in ‏בַּנָּשִׁים‎ gives to ‏הַיָּפָה‎ the force of the superlative. Besides the several modes of expressing the superlative adduced by Gesenius, § 119, 2, this degree is sometimes also expressed by the positive and the prepo. ‏ב‎ prefixed to the noun designating the class to which the person or thing compared belongs: thus ‏אַלְפִי הַדַּל בִּמְנַשֶׁה‎, my family is the weakest in Manasseh, Judg. xvi. 5; Prov. xxx. 30, comp. also εὐλογημένη συ ἐν γυναιξίν, thou art the most blessed of women, Luke i. 28, Ewald, § 313 c.