This commentary has no title-page, which renders it impossible to ascertain the name of its author or its exact age. From the French expressions, however, occurring in it, and from its style and appearance, it is evident that this commentary was written by a French Jew in at least the twelfth or thirteenth century. The handwriting is peculiarly bad, and very much effaced; but the valuable remarks it contains, both on the verbal difficulties and poetical figures of this book, would amply repay any Hebrew scholar for publishing it, and would be a boon to Biblical and Hebrew literature. 1350. So numerous and diverse were the interpretations of this Song in the middle of the fourteenth century, that R. Isaac Sehula, having been solicited by his friends to comment upon it, consulted the existing expositions, but finding himself so confused by their conflicting theories, as some explained it literally, others referred it to the union of the body with the soul, others again expounded it according to the Medrash, and others again affirmed, that it represents the union of the active with the passive intellect, he felt it necessary to reject them all, and advanced a new theory, viz., that this book represents the love of the people of Israel to their God. [61] 1360–1730. For a space of about four hundred years, the battle-field was simultaneously occupied by all the parties who strenuously defended those different views. Thus, the commentary Shear Jashub, which was printed together with that of Saadias and Caspe, and Meier Arma, who was born in Saragossa about the year 1475, and whose commentary is published in the Amsterdam Rabbinical Bible, 1724, maintain the philosophical interpretation of this Song. Whilst Isaac Arma, the father of Meier Arma, Obadiah Sforno, a physician, divine, and commentator, who died in 1550, [62] and whose commentary is published in the Amsterdam Rabb. Bible, Moses Cordovero, born in 1522, and died 1570, [63] whose commentary has not been published, Abraham Levi, whose commentary has been printed, together with that of Ibn Shoeb, Sabionnetta in Italy, 558, [64] Elisha Galicho, who flourished in the second half of the sixteenth century, [65] and whose commentary was published 1587, Venice, and his contemporary, Moses Alshech, [66] whose commentary was published in 1591, Venice, are the combatants for the other views. While this severe struggle was carried on between the conflicting parties for the maintenance of their respective views, another champion entered the battle-field, occupying and defending another position. It was no less a personage than the celebrated Don Isaac Abravanel, who affirmed that the Bride of the Song represents Wisdom, with whom Solomon converses. [67] His son, Leon Hebræus, defended the same view. [68]