Song of Solomon 1:17

Render, The beams of our houses are cedars, and our rafters are cypresses. The meaning is not that their houses are built of cedar, but that the cedar trees and fir trees form the roof over their heads as they seek shelter under them. Perhaps the plural housesmay be significant. They have not one, but many palaces in the forest glades. The country maiden speaks as a country maiden whose couch was often in the green grass, and who had cedars and cypresses for walls and roof at her meetings with her lover.

our rafters Heb. râchîtçnu. This word is not found elsewhere, and its meaning can only be conjectured. The context suggests some portion of the woodwork of the roof, hence the -rafters" of the A.V. LXX, φατνώματα = laquearia, lacunaria, i.e. -panelled ceilings."

of fir are cypresses. The form of the Heb. word here is běrôthîm, which is supposed to be the North Palestinian pronunciation for the usual berôshîm. The Vulgate everywhere renders abies= pine, the LXX and Syriac give in many places -cypress." But the cedar and cypress were trees of Lebanon, and the most valued among them, and Solam, at the S.W. foot of Jebel-ed-Dahi (Oettli), was not very far from the forests of Lebanon. Probably therefore the cypress is meant.