Edited sentence: (A full literal translation is included in their one-volume Shir HaShirim, and in the footnotes of their Tanach.)  In the ArtScroll Stone Chumash, a truncated passage from Rashi's Introduction to the Song of Songs is quoted to support the notion that the translation follows Rashi's commentary.As such, the literal content of "Shir Hashirim" - including the erotic elements - are entirely replaced with "symbolic" content.As with the previously published books, we began with a new, free-flowing translation of the text - not always literal, but faithful to Rabbinic interpretation.Designed to be as readable as possible, the translation removed many of the "surface difficulties" dealt with by the Midrash, Rashi and Ibn Ezra, by incorporating their interpretations into the translation.However, Rashi's Introduction is not quoted in full.However, this method is the opposite of what most translators consider translation.In the introduction to Koheles: Ecclesiastes (ArtScroll Tanach Series), Rabbi Meir Zlotowitz writes:.In the portion of his Introduction not cited by ArtScroll, Rashi actually argues for a two-tiered approach to interpreting the Song of Songs, which first addresses the literal meaning of the words and verses.In their siddurim (daily prayer books), machzorim (holiday prayer books), and in the ArtScroll Stone edition of the Chumash (Pentateuch), Shir HaShirim (the Song of Songs or Song of Solomon, a poem describing the intimate relationship of a man and a woman) is translated following the allegorical portion of Rashi's commentary.Rather, the introductions to their Tanach commentaries state the medieval rabbinic commentators or midrash compilations that the editors favor, and write an English language text in accord with these interpretations, thus "removing surface difficulties".Their Tanach commentaries make no attempt to directly translate the text of the Tanach.This line of books has come under criticism from some scholars (both Orthodox and non-Orthodox) on a number of points: