Whoever discerns accurately and searches all the way to the highest peak will be said to crush everything and reduce to dust the doctrines of good fragrance, like some perfume with which the bride is now said to be fragrant. Perhaps also the one who does not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit, whose heart has not been hardened, generating and preserving various sweet smells, renders a good odor from all the herbs which are now called perfumes.
Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on the Song of Songs
Smell may be one of our most overlooked senses. Often we are unaware of it until we are struck by a particularly enjoyable fragrance or offensive odor. And yet this easily forgotten faculty is also one of the strongest senses when it comes to memory. There are certain smells that remind me of people and places, many of whom are now long gone. I will forever associate the smell of honeysuckle with my childhood home, just as the smell of lavender will forever remind me of my wedding day. The smell of salt air takes me back to the many childhood vacations my family took to the beach, and the smell of cut grass reminds me of my father, who to this day loves few things more than taking care of his yard.
The prevalence of scents evoking memories was no less a reality for the Biblical authors. When Jacob seeks to deceive his blind father Isaac, he uses the scent of his brother Esau as part of his deception. In this way Jacob uses Isaac’s intimate familiarity with his eldest son against him. In the Song of Songs, the lover fondly dotes over the scent of the beloved, and frequently cites fragrant smells throughout the wedding song. We also see scents evoking memories of God’s judgement and with folly.
“Dead flies make a perfumer’s oil ferment and stink; so a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor.”
Ecclesiastes 10:1
In this passage we see how a little folly can ruin a lifetime of wisdom and honor, just as something as small as a dead fly can cause the fragrant perfumer’s oil to turn rancid.
“I caused the stench of your camp
Amos 4:10b
to fill your nostrils,
yet you did not return to me.”
Here we see that God’s judgement against the people was such that the smell of decay filled the camp, and yet not even this constant reminder of God’s displeasure caused the people to repent.
This connection between scent and memory is not limited to the human creation, but also to our Creator. While it might seem strange to modern readers, the Bible includes many passages in which God is seen as smelling the pleasing odor of a burnt offering. As Herman Bavinck noted in The Origin, Essence, and Purpose of Man, “Scripture could not speak in this human way about God if in all his abilities and activities, man were not created in the image of God.”
Then Noah built an altar to the LORD. He took some of every kind of clean animal and every kind of clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. When the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma, he said to himself, “I will never again curse the ground because of human beings, even though the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth onward. And I will never again strike down every living thing as I have done.
Genesis 8:20-21
Then burn the whole ram on the altar; it is a burnt offering to the LORD. It is a pleasing aroma, a food offering to the LORD.
Exodus 29:18
The idea was not so much that the scent of the animal sacrifice was a pleasing aroma in and of itself, but rather that act of the the sacrifice itself was pleasing and acceptable to the Lord. The smoke of the atoning sacrifice was as pleasing to the Lord as a fragrant perfume might be to His people.
In the New Testament, we see that Christ himself is our a “fragrant offering” to God. Christ is our once and for all atoning sacrifice.
Walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
Ephesians 5:2
This takes on even more meaning when we see that the “aroma of Christ” now is the mark of Christians in the nostrils of God.
We are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing,
2 Corinthians 2:15
Paul borrows this imagery in his letter to the Philippian church, comparing the gifts given to him in support of his missionary endeavors as a fragrant offering to God.
I have received full payment, and more. I am well supplied, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent, a fragrant offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God.
Philippians 4:18
In this way the biblical authors drew a connection between sacrifices and offerings made unto the Lord and pleasant aromas evoking the Godhead to remember his covenant love. This divine love was truly made manifested in the ultimate sacrificial act of atoning love in the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.
And while scent was used as a metaphor for God’s remembering of his covenant love, we also see examples in which scent was literally evoked to remind the people of God of His saving love for them. Old Testament worship, for example, presents us with a special incense which was to be used only in worship.
“You shall make an altar on which to burn incense; you shall make it of acacia wood… And Aaron shall burn fragrant incense on it. Every morning when he dresses the lamps he shall burn it, and when Aaron sets up the lamps at twilight, he shall burn it, a regular incense offering before the LORD throughout your generations.”
Exodus 30:1, 7-8
This altar of incense was located within the tabernacle itself. Priests would burn fragrant incense on the altar to symbolize the prayers of God’s people rising up to heaven. The pleasing aroma of the incense was a daily reminder of God’s pleasure upon hearing His people reaching out to Him in prayer.
Let my prayer be counted as incense before you,
Psalm 141:2
and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice!
In this way scent memory reminded the people of God, not just of the atonement, but also of the abiding pleasure of God upon His children. As a loving father delights in His children, so too does the Lord delight in us when we come to Him in prayer and adoration.
We see this theme continue into the New Testament in the adoration of Christ by Mary and in the symbolism of fragrant prayer offerings in the Revelation.
Mary therefore took a pound of expensive ointment made from pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (he who was about to betray him), said, “Why was this ointment not sold for three hundred denarii and given to the poor?” He said this, not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief, and having charge of the moneybag he used to help himself to what was put into it. Jesus said, “Leave her alone, so that she may keep it for the day of my burial. For the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me.”
John 12:3-5
And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints… And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.
Revelation 5:8, 8:3-4
In both cases we see the use of sweet fragrance linked to prayer and adoration. Our prayers are never a burden to the Lord, and instead are as pleasing as a sweet perfume or a fresh bouquet of roses.
Recently my wife and I took a short weekend getaway trip to Memphis Tennessee, and one of our stops was the Memphis Botanical Garden. It was a wonderful experience for they eyes as well as the nose. Spending several hours in awe of the botanical wonders of creation awakened in me a sense of awe and reverence for both God and gardener alike. God had done the wonderful task of creation, and man had contributed to this beauty through the hard labor of cultivation. And yet neither served any true utilitarian purpose. God created, not because there was anything lacking on His part, but out of pure delight. Likewise many gardens, including my own, are full of beautiful plants which contribute nothing to the gardener beyond their aesthetic beauty and fragrant aromas. Why then do we plant flowers? We plant flowers because the pleasing aroma and beauty is enough. We plant flowers because we delight in flowers.
So perhaps the next time we stumble upon an unpleasing or offensive odor, we should take a moment to consider the stench of our sin and folly while delighting in the knowledge that the fragrant aroma of Christ’s righteousness is abundantly enough to make us acceptable to God. And perhaps the next time we come across a particularly fragrant or appealing aroma, we can delight in knowledge that God likewise delights in our prayers. May we always seek to present our lives, our prayers, our worship, and our gifts and an acceptable sacrifice and a pleasing aroma to the one who lovingly blessed us abundantly more than we could ever deserve.
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