Rabbi Eliezer offers a breathtaking interpretation of (Song of Songs 2:14), reading each phrase as a reference to the events at the Red Sea. The verse reads: "Show me your face, let me hear your voice, for your voice is sweet and your face is fair." Rabbi Eliezer maps every clause onto a specific moment in the Exodus narrative.
"Show me your face" — this corresponds to (Exodus 14:13), where Moses tells the people, "Stand and see the salvation of the Lord." God was asking Israel to witness His power with their own eyes, to look upon His deeds and see His "face" — not literally, but through the visible evidence of divine intervention at the sea.
"Let me hear your voice" — this corresponds to (Exodus 14:10), where the Israelites, terrified by the approaching Egyptian army, "cried out to the Lord." God wanted to hear their voices raised in prayer. Their terror drove them to call upon Him, and that cry was precious to God.
"For your voice is sweet" — this corresponds to (Exodus 2:23), much earlier in the narrative: "and their outcry ascended to God." The sweetness of Israel's voice was not in its melody but in its sincerity. When the enslaved people groaned under their burdens and their cry rose to heaven, God heard it as something beautiful — the authentic sound of a people turning to their Creator in desperation.
"And your face is fair" — this corresponds to (Exodus 4:30-31), where Aaron performed signs before the people "and the people believed." Israel's "fairness" was their faith. When they saw the signs and chose to believe, their faces became beautiful in God's eyes. Rabbi Eliezer transforms the Song of Songs from a love poem into a chronicle of the Exodus, revealing that every tender word between lover and beloved was really about God and Israel at the sea.