Another thing about the death of Levan. Solomon said (Song of Songs 8:4): "I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, that you not stir up or awaken love until it pleases." I am sick with love, a love that is not of the bowels or of the head. From what do I suffer?
"For I am love-sick" (Hosea 2:7). And not just love, but also death, as it says (Song of Songs 8:6), "For love is strong as death." As it says (Song of Songs 1:3), "Your oils have a pleasing fragrance, your name is like purified oil; therefore the maidens love you." What nation in the world did God tell to "descend to the sea"?
Only the Jews, as David said (Psalms 27:10), "When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up." Similarly, Nebuchadnezzar said (Daniel 3:15), "And who is the god that will deliver you out of my hands?" And it is written (Daniel 3:16), "We will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up." But to deny God, Nebuchadnezzar and the dog are the same.
They even have the same fate as the frogs, as it says (Exodus 8:3), "And the river shall swarm with frogs, and they shall go up and come into your house and into your bedchamber and onto your bed and into the houses of your servants and your people, and into your ovens and into your kneading bowls." And even if God does not save us, we will not abandon Him. What did Nebuchadnezzar say when they came out of the furnace?
"Nebuchadnezzar answered and said, 'Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent His angel and delivered His servants who trusted in Him and set aside the king's command and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any god except their own God'" (Daniel 3:28). They did not give themselves up in order to be saved, but in order to be burned. Why "For love is strong as death" (Song of Songs 8:6)? A song to be sung over the death of Levan.