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INTRODUCTION If we look at the world without God, it appears what it is-a magnificent, graduated combination of diverse classes of beings, connected causes and effects, well-calculated means and ends. But thus contemplated, the world as a whole remains a mystery. If, with the atheist, we lay aside the idea of God, then, notwithstanding the law of causation, which is grounded in our mental nature, we abandon the question of the origin of the world. If, with the pantheist, we transfer the idea of God to the world itself, then the effect is made to be as one with the cause-not, however, without the conception of God, which is inalienable in man, reacting against it; for one cannot but distinguish between substance and its phenomena. The mysteries of the world which meet man as a moral being remain, under this view of the world, altogether without solution. For the moral order of the world presupposes an absolutely good Being, from whom it has proceeded, and who sustains it; it demands a Lawgiver and a Judge. Apart from the reference to this Being, the distinction between good and evil loses its depth and sharpness. Either there is no God, or all that is and happens is a moment in the being and life of God Himself, who is identical with the world: thus must the world-destructive power of sin remain unrecognised. The opinion as to the state of the world will, from a pantheistic point of view, rise to optimism; just as, on the other hand, from an atheistic point of view, it will sink to pessimism. The commanding power of goodness even the atheist may recognise by virtue of the inner law peculiar to man as a moral being, but the divine consecration is wanting to this goodness; and if human life is a journey from nothing to nothing, then this will be the best of all goodness: that man set himself free from the evil reality, and put his confidence in nothing. "Him who views the world," says Buddhism, "as a water-bubble, a phantom, the king of death does not terrify. What pleasure, what joy is in this world? Behold the changing form-it is undone by old age; the diseased body-it dissolves and corrupts! 'I have sons and treasures; here will I dwell in the season of the cold, and there in the time of the heat:' thus thinks the fool; and cares not for, and sees not, the hindrances thereto. Him who is concerned about sons and treasures-the man who has his heart so entangled-death tears away, as the torrent from the forest sweeps away the slumbering village." The view taken of the world, and the judgment formed regarding it, in the Book of Ecclesiastes, are wholly different. While in the Book of Esther faith in God remains so much in the background that there is nowhere in it express mention made of God, the name of God occurs in Ecclesiastes no fewer than thirty-seven times, (Note: haa'elohiym These primary principles, to which the book again and again returns, are of special importance for a correct estimate of it.
Of like decisive importance for the right estimate of the theistic, and at the same time also the pessimistic, view of the world presented by Koheleth is this, that he knows of no future life compensating for the troubles of the present life, and resolving its mystery. It is true that he says, Eccl 12:7, that the life-spirit of the man who dies returns to God who gave it, as the body returns to the dust of which it is formed; but the question asked in 3:21 shows that this preferring of the life-spirit of man to that of a beast was not, in his regard, raised above all doubt. And what does this return to God mean? By no means such a return unto God as amounts to the annihilation of the separate existence of the spirit of man; for, in the first place, there is the supposition of this separate existence running through the Bible; in the second place, ntnh Man exists also beyond the grave, but without the light and the force of thought and activity characterizing his present life, Eccl 9:5,10. The future life is not better, but is worse than the present, a dense darkness enduring "for ever," 9:6; 11:8; 12:5b. It is true, indeed, that from the justice of God, and the experiences of the present life as standing in contradiction thereto, 8:14, the conclusion is drawn, 12:14; 11:9, that there is a last decisive judgment, bringing all to light; but this great thought, in which the interest of the book in the progress of religious knowledge comes to a climax, is as yet only an abstract postulate of faith, and not powerful enough to brighten the future; and therefore, also, not powerful enough to lift us above the miseries of the present.
That the author gives utterance to such thoughts of the future as Eccl 12:7 and 11:9; 12:14-to which Wisd. 3:1 ("The souls of the righteous are in God' hand, and no trouble moves them") and Dan 12:2 ("Many that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt") are related, as being their expansionwarrants the supposition that he disputes as little as Job does in ch. 14 the reality of a better future; but only that the knowledge of such a future was not yet given to him. In general, for the first time in the N.T. era, the hope of a better future becomes a common portion of the church's creed, resting on the basis of faith in the history of redemption warranting it; and is advanced beyond the isolated prophetic gleams of light, the mere postulates of faith that were ventured upon, and the unconfirmed opinions, of the times preceding Christ. The N.T. Scripture shows how altogether different this world of sin and of change appears to be since a world of recompense and of glory has been revealed as its background; since the Lord has pronounced as blessed those who weep, and not those who laugh; and since, with the apostle (Rom 8:18), we may be convinced that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed to us.
The goal of human life, with its labour and its sufferings, is now carried beyond the grave. That which is done under the sun appears only as a segment of the universal and everlasting operation, governed by the wisdom of God, the separate portions of which can only be understood in their connection with the whole. The estimate taken of this present world, apart from its connection with the future, must be one-sided. There are two worlds: the future is the solution of the mystery of the present.
A N.T. believer would not be able to write such a book as that of Job, or even as that of Ecclesiastes, without sinning against revealed truth; without renouncing the better knowledge meanwhile made possible; without falling back to an O.T. standpoint. The author of the Book of Ecclesiastes is related to revealed religion in its O.T. manifestation-he is a believer before the coming of Christ; but not such an one as all, or as most were, but of peculiar character and position. There are some natures that have a tendency to joyfulness, and others to sadness. The author of this book does not belong to the latter class; for if he did, the call to rejoice, Eccl 11:9,8;15, etc., would not as it does pervade his book, as the chai'rete Neither does he belong to those superficial natures which see almost everything in a rosy light, which quickly and easily divest themselves of their own and of others' sorrows, and on which the stern earnestness of life can make no deep and lasting impressions.
Nor is he a man of feeling, whom his own weakness makes a prophet of evil; not a predominatingly passive man, who, before he could fully know the world, withdrew from it, and now criticises it from his own retired corner in a careless, inattentive mood; but a man of action, with a penetrating understanding and a faculty of keen observation; a man of the world, who, from his own experience, knows the world on all its sides; a restless spirit, who has consumed himself in striving after that which truly satisfies. That this man, who was forced to confess that all science and art, all that table dainties, and the love of women, and riches, and honour yielded him, was at last but vanity and vexation of spirit, and who gained so deep an insight into the transitoriness and vanity of all earthly things, into the sorrows of this world of sin and death, and their perplexing mysteries, does not yet conclude by resigning himself to atheism, putting "Nothing" (Nirvâna), or blind Fate, in the place of God, but firmly holds that the fear of God is the highest duty and the condition of all true prosperity, as it is the highest truth and the surest knowledge-that such is the case with him may well excite our astonishment; as well as this also, that he penetrates the known illusory character of earthly things in no overstrained manner, despising the world in itself, and also the gifts of God in it, but that he places his ultimatum as to the pure enjoyment of life within the limits of the fear of God, and extends it as widely as God permits.
One might therefore call the Book of Koheleth, "The Song of the Fear of God," rather than, as H. Heine does, "The Song of Scepticism;" for however great the sorrow of the world which is therein expressed, the religious conviction of the author remains in undiminished strength; and in the midst of all the disappointments in the present world, his faith in God, and in the rectitude of God, and in the victory of the good, stands firm as a rock, against which all the waves dash themselves into foam. "This book," says another recent author, (Note: Hartmann's Das Lied vom Ewigen, St. Galle 1859, p. 12.) "which contains almost as many contradictions as verses, may be regarded as the Breviary of the most modern materialism, and of extreme licentiousness." He who can thus speak has not read the book with intelligence. The appearance of materialism arises from this, that the author sees in the death of man an end similar to that of beasts; and that is certainly so far true, but it is not the whole truth. In the knowledge of the reverse side of the matter he does not come beyond the threshold, because His hand was not yet there-viz. the hand of the Arisen One-which could help him over it. And as for the supposed licentiousness, Eccl 9:7-9 shows, by way of example, how greatly the fear of God had guarded him from concluding his search into all earthly things with the disgust of a worn-out libertine.
But there are certainly self-contradictions in the Book of Ecclesiastes.
They have a twofold ground. They are, on the one hand, the reflection of the self-contradicting facts which the author affirms. Thus, e.g., Eccl 3:11, he says that God has set eternity in the heart of man, but that man cannot find out from the beginning to the end the work which God maketh; 3:12- 13, that the best thing in this world is for a man to enjoy life; but to be able to do this, is a gift of God; 8;12, 14, that it goes well with them that fear God, but ill with the godless. But there is also the contrary-which is just the ground-tone of the book, that everything has its But; only the fear of God, after all that appertains to the world is found to be as vanitas vanitatum, remains as the kernel without the shell, but the commandment of the fear of God as a categorical imperative, the knowledge that the fear of God is in itself the highest happiness, and fellowship with God the highest good, remain unexpressed; the fear of God is not combined with the love of God, as e.g., in Ps 73 it serves only for warning and not for comfort.
On the other hand, the book also contains contradictions, which consists in contrasts which the author is not in a condition to explain and adjust.
Thus, e.g., the question whether the spirit of a dying man, in contrast to that of a beast, takes its way upwards, Eccl 3:21, is proposed as one capable of a double answer; but 12:7 answers it directly in the affirmative; the author has good grounds for the affirmative, but yet no absolute proofs. And while he denies the light of consciousness and the energy of activity to those who have gone down to Hades, 9:10, he maintains that there is a final decisive judgment of a holy and righteous God of all human conduct, 11:9; 12:14, which, since there is frequently not a righteous requital given on earth, 8:14, and since generally the issue here does not bring to light, 9:2, the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, will take place in eternity; but it is difficult to comprehend how he has reconciled the possibility of such a final judgment with the shadowy nature of existence after death.
The Book of Koheleth is, on the one side, a proof of the power of revealed religion which has grounded faith in God, the One God, the All-wise Creator and Governor of the world, so deeply and firmly in the religious consciousness, that even the most dissonant and confused impressions of the present world are unable to shake it; and, on the other side, it is a proof of the inadequacy of revealed religion in its O.T. form, since the discontent and the grief which the monotony, the confusion, and the misery of this earth occasion, remain thus long without a counterbalance, till the facts of the history of redemption shall have disclosed and unveiled the heavens above the earth. In none of the O.T. books does the Old Covenant appear as it does in the Book of Koheleth, as "that which decayeth and waxeth old, and is ready to vanish away" (Heb 8:13). If the darkness of earth must be enlightened, then a New Covenant must be established; for heavenly love, which is at the same time heavenly wisdom, enters into human nature and overcomes sin, death, and Hades, and removes the turning-point of the existence of man from this to the future life. The finger of prophecy points to this new era. And Koheleth, from amid his heaps of ruins, shows how necessary it is that the heavens should now soon open above the earth.
It is a view of the world, dark, and only broken by scattered gleams of light, not disowning its sullenness even where it recommends the happy enjoyment of life, which runs through the book in a long series of dissonances, and gives to it a peculiar character. It is thus intentionally a homogeneous whole; but is it also divided into separate parts according to a plan? That we may be able to answer this question, we subject the contents of the book to a searching analysis, step by step, yet steadily keeping the whole in view. This will at the same time also serve as a preparation for the exposition of the book.
Here below, all things under the sun are vanity. The labour of man effects nothing that is enduring, and all that is done is only a beginning and a vanishing away again, repeating itself in a never-ending circle: these are the thoughts of the book which stand as its motto, Eccl 1:2-11.
Koheleth-Solomon, who had been king, then begins to set forth the vanity of all earthly things from his own experience. The striving after secular knowledge, Eccl 1:12ff., has proved to him unsatisfactory, as has also the striving after happiness in pleasure and in procuring the means of all imaginable gratifications, 2:1-11; wisdom is vanity, for the wise man falls under the stroke of death as well as the fool, and is forgotten, 2:12-17; the riches are vanity, for they become the inheritance, one knows not whether or a worthy or of an unworthy heir, 2:18-21; and, besides, pure enjoyment, like wisdom and knowledge, depends not merely on the will of man, but both are the gift of God, 2:22ff. Everything has its time appointed by God, but man is unable to survey either backwards or forwards the work of God, which fills eternity, notwithstanding the impulse to search into it which is implanted within him; his dependence in all things, even in pure enjoyment, must become to him a school in which to learn the fear of God, who maintains all things unchangeably, for forms the course of that which is done, 3:1-15. If he sees injustice prevailing in the place of justice, God's time for righteous interference has not yet come, 3:16-17. If God wishes to try men, they shall see that they are dependent like the beasts, and liable to death without any certain distinction from the beasts-there is nothing better than that this fleeting life should be enjoyed as well as may be, 3:18ff.
Koheleth now further records the evils that are under the sun: oppression, in view of which death is better than life, and not to have been at all is better than both, Eccl 4:1-3; envy, 4:4; the restlessness of labour, from which only the fool sets himself free, 4:5-6; the aimless trouble and parsimony of him who stands alone, 4:7-12; the disappointment of the hopes placed on an upstart who has reached the throne, 4:13-16.
Up to this point there is connection. There now follow rules, externally unconnected, for the relation of man to Him who is the Disposer of all things; regarding his frequenting the house of God, 4:17 5:1; prayer, 5:2; and praise, 5:3-6.
Then a catalogue of vanities is set forth: the insatiable covetous plundering of the lowly by those who are above them in despotic states, whereat the author praises, Eccl 5:7-8, the patriarchal state based on agriculture; and the nothingness and uncertainty of riches, which do not make the rich happier than the labourer, 5:9-11; which sometimes are lost without any to inherit them, 5:12-14; and which their possessor, at all events, must leave behind him when he dies, 5:15-16. Riches have only a value when by means of them a purer enjoyment is realized as the gift of God, 5:17ff. For it happens that God gives to a man riches, but to a stranger the enjoyment thereof, 6:1-2. An untimely birth is better than a man who has an hundred children, a long life, and yet who has no enjoyment of life even to his death, 6:3-6. desire stretching on into the future is torment; only so much as a man truly enjoys has he of all his labour, 6:7-9; what man shall be is predestinated, all contendings against it are useless: the knowledge of that which is good for him, and of the future, is in the power of no man, 6:10ff.
There now follow, without a premeditated plan, rules for the practical conduct of life, loosely connecting themselves with the "what is good," Eccl 6:12, by the catchword "good:" first six (probably originally seven) proverbs of two things each, whereof the one is better than the other, 7:1- 9; then three with the same catch-word, but without comparison, 7:10-14.
This series of proverbs is connected as a whole, for their ultimatum is a counsel to joy regulated by the fear of God within the narrow limits of this life, constituted by God of good and bad days, and terminating in the darkness of death. But this joy is also itself limited, for the deep seriousness of the memento mori is mingled with it, and sorrow is declared to be morally better than laughter.
With Eccl 7:15, the I, speaking from personal experience, again comes into the foreground; but counsels and observations also here follow each other aphoristically, without any close connection with each other. Koheleth warns against an extreme tendency to the side of good as well as to that of evil: he who fears God knows how to avoid extremes, 7:15-18. Nothing affords a stronger protection than wisdom, for (?) with all his righteousness a man makes false steps, 7:19-20. Thou shalt not always listen, lest thou hear something about thyself-also thou thyself hast often spoken harshly regarding others, 7:21-22. He has tried everything, but in his strivings after wisdom, and in his observation of the distinction between wisdom and folly, he has found nothing more dangerous than the snares of women; among a thousand men he found one man; but one woman such as she ought to be, he found not; he found in general that God made men upright, but that they have devised many kinds of by-ways, 7:23ff.
As the wise man considers women and men in general, wisdom teaches him obedience to the king to whom he has sworn fealty, and, under despotic oppression, patient waiting for the time of God's righteous interference, Eccl 8:1-9. In the time of despotic domination, it occurs that the godless are buried with honour, while the righteous are driven away and forgotten, 8:10. God's sentence is to be waited for, the more deliberately men give themselves to evil; God is just, but, in contradiction to His justice, it is with the righteous as with the wicked, and with the wicked as with the righteous, here on earth, 8:11-14. In view of these vanities, then, it is the most desirable thing for a man to eat and drink, and enjoy himself, for that abides with him of his labour during the day of his life God has given him, 8:15. Restless labour here leads to nothing; all the efforts of man to comprehend the government of God are in vain, 8:16ff. For on closer consideration, it appears that the righteous also, with all their actions, are ruled by God, and generally that in nothing, not even in his affections, is man his own master; and, which is the worst thing of all, because it impels men to a wicked, mad abuse of life, to the righteous and the unrighteous, death at last comes alike; it is also the will of God towards man that he should spend this transient life in cheerful enjoyment and in vigorous activity before it sinks down into the night of Hades, 9:1-10. The fruits of one's labour are not to be gained by force, even the best ability warrants it not, an incomprehensible fate finally frustrates all, 9:11-12.
There now follows, but in loose connection as to thought with the preceding, a section relating to wisdom and folly, and the discordances as to the estimate of both here below, along with diverse kinds of experiences and proverbs, Eccl 9:13-10:15. Only one proverb is out of harmony with the general theme, viz., 10:4, which commends resignation under the abullition of the wrath of the ruler. The following proverb, 10:5-6, returns to the theme, but connecting itself with the preceding; the relation of rulers and the ruled to each other is kept principally in view by Koheleth.
With a proverb relating to kings and princes, good and bad, a new departure is made. Riotous living leads to slothfulness; and in contrast to this (but not without the intervention of a warning not to curse the king) follow exhortations to provident, and, at the same time, bold, and allattempting activity; for the future is God's, and not to be reckoned on, Eccl 10:16-11:6. The light is sweet; and life, however long it may last, in view of the uncertain dark future, is worthy of being enjoyed, 11:7-8. Thus Koheleth, at the end of this last series of proverbs, has again reached his Ceterum censeo; he formulates it, in an exhortation to a young man to enjoy his life-but without forgetting God, to whom he owes it, and to whom he has to render an account-before grey-haired old age and death overtake him, into a full-toned finale, 11:9-12:7. The last word of the book, 12:8, is parallel with the first (1:1): "O! vanity of vanities; All is vain!"
An epilogue, from the same hand as the book seals its truth: it is written as from the very soul of Solomon; it issues from the same fountain of wisdom. The reader must not lose himself in reading many books, for the sum of all knowledge that is of value to man is comprehended in one sentence: "Fear God, for He shall bring every work into judgment," Eccl 12:9ff.
If we look back on this compendious reproduction of the contents and of the course of thought of the book, there appears everywhere the same view of the world, along with the same ultimatum; and as a pictorial overture opens the book, a pictorial finale closes it. But a gradual development, a progressive demonstration, is wanting, and so far the grouping together of the parts is not fully carried out; the connection of the thoughts if more frequently determined by that which is external and accidental, and not unfrequently an incongruous element is introduced into the connected course of kindred matters. The Solomonic stamp impressed on ch. 1 and 2 begins afterwards to be effaced. The connection of the confessions that are made becomes aphoristic in ch. 3; and the proverbs that are introduced do not appropriately fall into their place. The grounds, occasions, and views which determine the author to place confessions and moral proverbs in such an order after one another, for the most part withdraw themselves from observation. All attempts to show, in the whole, not only oneness of spirit, but also a genetic progress, an allembracing plan, and an organic connection, have hitherto failed, and must fail. (Note: "Ajunt Hebraei, quum inter cetera scripta Salomonis, quae antiquata sunt nec in memoria duraverunt, et hic liber obliterandus videretur, et quod vanas assereret Dei creaturas et totum putaret esse pro nihilo, et potum et cibum et delicias transeuntes praeferret omnibus, ex hoc uno capitulo (Eccl 12:13) meruisse auctoritatem, ut in divinorum voluminum numero poneretur."-Jerome.)
In presenting this view of the spirit and plan of the Book of Koheleth, we have proceeded on the supposition that it is a post-exilian book, that it is one of the most recent of the books of the O.T. It is true, indeed, that tradition regards it as Solomonic. According to Bathra 15a, the Hezekiah- Collegium vid., Del. on Proverbs, p. 5] must have "written"-that is, collected into a written form-the Book of Isaiah, as also the Proverbs, the Song, and Koheleth. The Midrash regards it as Solomon's, and as written in the evening of his days; while the Song was written in his youth, and the Proverbs when he was in middle age (Jalkut, under Prov 1:1). If in Rosch haschana 21b it is said that Koheleth sought to be a second Moses, and to open the one of the fifty gates of knowledge which was unopened by Moses, but that this was denied to him, it is thereby assumed that he was the incomparable king, as Moses was the incomparable prophet.
And Bloch, in his work on the origin and era of the Book of Koheleth (1872), is right in saying that all objections against the canonicity of the book leave the Solomonic authorship untouched. In the first Christian century, the Book of Koheleth was an antilegomenon. In the Introduction to the Song (p. 505) we have traced to their sources the two collections of legal authorities according to which the question of the canonicity of the Book of Koheleth is decided. The Synod of Jabne (Jamnia), about 90, decided the canonicity of the book against the school of Shammai. The reasons advanced by the latter against the canonicity are seen from Shabbath 30b, and Megilla 7a. From the former we learn that they regarded the words of the book, particularly Eccl 2:2 (where they must have read m|huwlaal According to the Midrash Koheleth, under Eccl 11:9, they were stumbled also by the call to the enjoyment of pleasure, and to walk in the way of the desire of the heart, which appeared to stand in contradiction to the Tôra (cf. 11:9 with Num 15:39), and to savour of heresy. But belief in the Solomonic authorship remained, notwithstanding, uninjured; and the admonitions to the fear of God, with reference to the future judgment, carried them over the tendency of these observations. Already, at the time of Herod the Great (Bathra 4a), and afterwards, in the time of R. Gamaliel (Shabbath 30b), the book was cited as Holy Scripture; and when, instead of the book, the author was named, the formula of citation mentioned the name of Solomon; or the book was treated as equally Solomonic with Proverbs and the Song (Erubin 21b).
Even the doubtfulness of its contents could give rise to no manner of doubt as to the author. Down till the new era beginning with Christianity, and, in the main, even till the Reformation-century, no attention was paid to the inner and historico-literary marks which determine the time of the origin of a book. The Reformation first called into existence, along with the criticism of dogmatic traditions, at the same time also biblical criticism, which it raised to the place of an essential part of the science of Scripture. Luther, in his Tischreden (Table-Talk), is the first who explained the Preacher as one of the most recent books of the O.T.: he supposed that the book had not reached us in its completed form; that it was written by Sirach rather than by Solomon; and that it might be, "as a Talmud, collected from many books, perhaps from the library of King Ptolemy Euergetes, in Egypt." (Note: Tischreden, ed. Förstemann-Bindseil, p. 400f. The expression here almost appears as if Luther had confounded Ecclesiastes (Koheleth) with Ecclesiasticus (Sirach). At a later period he maintained that the book contained a collection of Solomonic sayings, not executed, however, by Solomon himself.)
These are only passing utterances, which have no scientific value; among his contemporaries, and till the middle of the century following, they found no acceptance. Hugo Grotius (1644) is the first who, like Luther, rejects its Solomonic authorship, erroneously supposing, with him, that it is a collection of diverse sayings of the wise, peri' tee's eudaimoni'as; but on one point he excellently hits the nail on the head: Argumentum ejus rei habeo multa vocabula, quae non alibi quam in Daniele, Esdra et Chaldaeis interpretibus reperias. This observation is warranted. If the Book of Koheleth were of old Solomonic origin, then there is no history of the Hebrew language. But Bernstein (Quaestiones nonnullae Kohelethanae, 1854) is right in saying that the history of the Hebrew language and literature is certainly divided into two epochs by the Babylonish exile, and that the Book of Koheleth bears the stamp of the post-exilian form of the language. (Here see "Words in Koheleth (Ecclesiastes)" in the Keil & Delitzsch Supplement under 'General Books'.)
This survey of the forms peculiar to the Book of Koheleth, and only found in the most recent books of the O.T., partly only in the Chaldee portions of these, and in general use in the Aramaic, places it beyond all doubt that in this book we have a product of the post-exilian period, and, at the earliest, of the time of Ezra-Nehemiah. All that Wagenmann (Comm. 1856), von Essen (Der Predeger Salomo's, 1856), Böhl (De Aramaismis libri Coheleth, 1860), Hahn (Comm. 1860), Reusch (Tübinger Quartalschr. 1860), Warminski (Verfasser u. Abfassungszeit des B. Koheleth, 1867), Prof. Taylor Lewis (in the American ed. of Lange's Bibelwerk, 1869), Schäfer (Neue Untersuchungen ü d. B. Koheleth, 1870), Vegni (L'Ecclesiaste secondo il testo Ebraico, Florenz 1871) have advanced to the contrary, rests on grounds that are altogether untenable. If we possessed the original work of Sirach, we should then see more distinctly than from fragments (Note: Vid., the collection of the Heb. fragments of the Book of Ben- Sira in my Gesch. der jüd. Poesie, p. 204f.) that the form of the language found in Koheleth, although older, is yet one that does not lie much further back; it is connected, yet loosely, with the old language, but at the same time it is in full accord with that new Heb. which we meet with in the Mishna and the Barajtha-Literature, which groups itself around it. To the modern aspects of the Heb. language the following forms belong:- 1. Verbs Lamed-Aleph, which from the first interchange their forms with those of verbs Lamed-He, are regularly treated in certain forms of inflexion in the Mishna as verbs Lamed-He; e.g., yaats|'aah This interchange of forms found in the later language reveals itself here in yotsaa' The optative of the first person (the cohortative) is only represented by 'ech|k|maah, Eccl 7:23. the form of the subjunctive (jussive) is found in the prohibitive clauses, such as 7:16-18; 10:4; but elsewhere the only certain examples found are sheyoleek| The enumeration of linguistic peculiarities betokening a late origin is not yet exhausted; we shall meet with many such in the course of the Exposition. Not only the language, however, but also the style and the artistic form of the book, show that it is the most recent product of the Bibl. Chokma literature, and belongs to a degenerated period of art. From the fact that the so-called metrical accent system of the three books- Psalms, Job, and Proverbs-is not used in Ecclesiastes, it does not follow that it is not a poetical book in the fullest sense of the word; for the Song and Lamentations, these masterpieces of the shyr and qynh, the Minnesong and the Elegy, are also excluded from that more elevated, more richly expressive, and more melodious form of discourse, perhaps to preserve the spiritual character of the one, and not to weaken the elegiac character of the other, to which a certain melancholy monotone andante is suitable.
So also, to apply that system of accentuation to the Book of Koheleth was not at all possible, for the symmetrical stichs to which it is appropriate is for the most part wanting in Koheleth, which is almost wholly written in eloquent prose: unfolding its instruction in the form of sentences without symmetrical stichs.-It is, so to speak, a philosophical treatise in which "I saw," and the like, as the expression of the result of experience; "I said," as the expression of reflection on what was observed; "I perceived," as the expression of knowledge obtained as a conclusion from a process of reasoning; and "this also," as the expression of the result-repeat themselves nearly terminologically. The reasoning tone prevails, and where the writer passes into gnomic poetry he enters into it suddenly, e.g., Eccl 5:9b, or holds himself ready to leave it quickly again, e.g., 5:12; 7:13f.
Always, indeed, where the Mashal note is struck, the discourse begins to form itself into members arranged in order; and then the author sometimes rises in language, and in the order of his words, into the true classic form of the proverb set forth in parallel members, e.g., Eccl 7:7,9; 9:8. The symmetry of the members is faultless, 5:5; 8:8; 9:11; but in other places, as 5:1; 7:26; 11:9, it fails, and in the long run the book, altogether peculiar in its stylistic and artistic character, cannot conceal its late origin: in the elevated classical style there quickly again intermingles that which is peculiar to the author, as representing the age in which he lived, e.g., 7:19; 10:2f., 6, 8-10, 16f., 11:3,6. That in the age of the Mishna they knew how to imitate classic masterpieces, is seen from the beautiful enigma, in the form of a heptastich, by Bar-Kappara, jer. Moëd katan iii. 1, and the elegy, in the form of a hexastich on the death of R. Abina, by Kar-Kippuk, b.
Moëd katan 25b. (Note: Given and translated in Wissenschaft, Kunst, Judenthum (1838), p. 231f.)
One would thus be in error if he regarded such occasional classical pieces in the Book of Koheleth as borrowed. The book, however fragmentary it may seem to be on a superficial examination, is yet the product of one author. (Note: Renan, in his Histoire des Langues Semitiques, supposes that a work of so bold a scepticism as Ecclesiastes could not have originated in the post-exilian period of the severely legal rabbinical Judaism; it may be an old Solomonic work, but as it now lies before us, revised by a more recent hand-an untenable expedient for establishing an arbitrary supposition.)
In its oratorical ground-form, and in the proverbs introduced into it, it is a side-piece to Prov 1-9. We have shown, in the introduction to the Book of Proverbs, that in these proverbial discourses which form the introduction to the older Solomonic Book of Proverbs, which was probably published in the time of Jehoshaphat, the Mashal appears already rhetorically decomposed. This decomposition is much further advanced in the Book of Ecclesiastes. To it is applicable in a higher degree what is there (Proverbs, p. 10f.) said of Prov 1-9. The distich is represented in the integral, Eccl 7:13, synonymous, 11:4, and synthetic, 7:1, and also, though rarely, in the antithetic form, 7:4; but of the emblematic form there is only one example, 10:1. The author never attempted the beautiful numerical and priamel forms; the proverbial form also, beyond the limits of the distich, loses the firmness of its outline.
The tetrastich, Eccl 10:20, is, however, a beautiful exception to this. But splendour of form would not be appropriate to such a sombre work as this is. Its external form is truly in keeping with its spirit. In the checkered and yet uniform manner of the book is reflected the image of the author, who tried everything and yet was satisfied with nothing; who hastened from one thing to another because nothing was able to captivate him. His style is like the view he takes of the world, which in its course turned to him only its dark side. He holds fast to the fear of God, and hopes in a final judgment; but his sceptical world-sorrow remains unmitigated, and his forced eudaemonism remains without the right consecration: these two stars do not turn the night into day; the significance of the book, with reference to the history of redemption, consists in the actual proof that humanity, in order to its being set free from its unhappiness, needs to be illuminated by the sun of a new revelation.
But although the manner of the author's representation is the reflection of his own inner relation to the things represented, yet here and there he makes his representation, not without consciousness and art, the picture of his own manner of thought. Thus, e.g., the drawling tautologies in Eccl 8:14; 9:9, certainly do not escape from him against his will. And as was rightly remarked under Gen 2:1-3, that the discourse there is extended, and forms itself into a picture of rest after the work of the creation, so Koheleth, in 1:4-11 and 12:2-7, shows himself a master of eloquence; for in the former passage he imitates in his style the everlasting unity of the course of the world, and in the latter he paints the exhausted and finally shattered life of man.
Not only, however, by the character of its thought and language and manner of representation, but also by other characteristic features, the book openly acknowledges that it was not written by Solomon himself, but by a Jewish thinker of a much later age, who sought to conceive of himself as in Solomon's position, and clothed his own life-experiences in the confessions of Solomon. The very title of the book does not leave us in doubt as to this. It is in these words: The words of Koheleth, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. The apposition, "king in Jerusalem," appertains, like e.g., 2 Chron 35:3, to the name of the speaker who is introduced; for nothing is here said as to the place in life held by David, but to that held by him who is thus figuratively named. The indeterminate "king" of itself would be untenable, as at Prov 31:1.
As there the words "king of Massa" are to be taken together, so here "king" is determined by "in Jerusalem" added to it, so far that it is said what kind of king Koheleth was. That by this name Solomon is meant, follows, apart from Eccl 1:12ff., from this, that David had only one son who was king, viz., Solomon. The opinion of Krochmal, that a later David, perhaps a governor of Jerusalem during the Persian domination, is meant, (Note: Vid., Kerem chemed v. 89, and his More necobhe ha-seman (Director errnatium nostrae aetatis), edited by Zunz, 1851, 4.) is one of the many superfluities of this learned author. Koheleth is Solomon, but he who calls him "king in Jerusalem" is not Solomon himself.
Solomon is called "king of Israel," e.g., 2 Kings 23:13; and as in 1:12 he names himself "king over Israel," so, Neh 13:26, he is called "king of Israel," and along with this designation, "king over all Israel;" but the title, "king in Jerusalem," nowhere else occurs.
We read that Solomon "reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel," 1 Kings 11:42, cf. 14:21; the title, "king in Jerusalem," is quite peculiar to the title of the book before us. Eichhorn supposes that it corresponds to the time subsequent to the division of the kingdom, when there were two different royal residences; but against this view Bloch rightly remarks, that the contrasted "in Samaria" occurs only very rarely (as 2 Kings 14:23). We think that in this expression, "king in Jerusalem," there is revealed a time in which Israel had ceased to be an independent kingdom, in which Jerusalem was no more a royal city.
That the book was not composed immediately by Solomon, is indicated by the circumstance that he is not called Solomon, nor Jedidiah (2 Sam 12:25), but is designated by a hitherto unheard of name, which, by its form, shows that it belongs, at earliest, to the Ezra-Nehemiah age, in which it was coined. We consider the name, first, without taking into account its feminine termination. In the Arab., kahal (cogn. kahal) signifies to be dry, hard, from the dryness and leather-like toughness of the skin of an old man; and, accordingly, Dindorf (Quomodo nomen Coheleth Salomoni tribuatur, (1791) and others understand Koheleth of an old man whose life is worn out; Coccejus and Schultens, with those of their school, understand it of the penitent who is dead to the world. But both views are opposed by this, that the form qaaheel (qeeheel, cf. keehel) would be more appropriate; but above all by this, that qhl, in this meaning aridum, marcidum esse, is a verbal stem altogether foreign to the northern Semitic.
The verb qhl signifies, in the Heb., Aram., and Assyr., to call (cf. the Syr. kahlonitho, a quarrelsome woman), and particularly to call together; whence qaahaal This derivation of the name Koheleth shows that it cannot mean sunathroistee's (Grotius, not Aquila), in the sense of collector sententiarum; the Arab. translation alajam'at (also van Dyk) is faultless, because jam' can signify, to collect men as well as things together; but qhl is not used in that sense of in unum redigere. In close correspondence with the Heb. word, the LXX translates, ho ekkleesiastee's; and the Graec.
Venet., hee ekkleesia'stria (Eccl 12:9: hee ekkleesia'zousa). But in the nearest signification, "the collector," this would not be a significant name for the king represented as speaking in this book. In Solomon's reign there occurred an epoch-making assembly in Jerusalem, 1 Kings 8:1; 2 Chron 5:2-viz for the purpose of consecrating the temple. The O.T. does not afford any other historical reference for the name; for although, in Prov 5:14; 26:26, b|qaahaal signifies coram populo, publice, yet it does not occur directly of the public appearance of Wisdom; the expressions for this are different, 1:20f., Eccl 8:1-4; 9:3, though cognate.
But on that great day of the consecration of the temple, Solomon not only called the people together, but he also preached to them-he preached indirectly, for he consecrated the temple by prayer; and directly, for he blessed the people, and exhorted them to faithfulness, 1 Kings 8:55-61.
Thus Solomon appears not only as the assembler, but also as the preacher to those who were assembled; and in this sense of a teacher of the people (cf. Eccl 12:9), Koheleth is an appropriate name of the king who was famed for his wisdom and for his cultivation of the popular Mashal. It is known that in proper names the Kal is frequently used in the sense of the Hiph. thus Koheleth is not immediately what it may be etymologically = qoree' Knobel in his Comm. (1836) has spoken excellently regarding the feminine form of the name; but when, at the close, he says: "Thus Koheleth properly signifies preaching, the office and business of the public speaker, but is then = qoheel, maq|hiyl, public speaker before an assembly," he also, in an arbitrary manner, interchanges the n. agentis with the n. actionis. His remark, that "the rule that concreta, if they have a fem. termination, become abstraccta, must also hold for participia," is a statement that cannot be confirmed. As chotemet Also Arab names of men with fem. forms are concreta. To the participial form Koheleth correspond, for the most part, such names as (Arab.) rawiyaton, narrator of tradition (fem. of rawyn); but essentially cogn. also are such words as 'allamat, greatly learned man; also khalyfaton, which is by no means an inf. noun, like the Heb. chaliypaah, but is the fem. of the verbal adj. khalyf, successor, representative. The Arabic grammarians say that the fem. termination gives to the idea, if possible, a collective signification, e.g., jarrar, the puller, i.e., the drawer of a ship (Helciarius), and jarrarat, the multitude drawing, the company (taife) drawing the boat up the stream; or it also serves "as an exhaustive designation of the properties of the genus;" so that, e.g., 'allamat means one who unites in himself that which is peculiar to the very learned, and represents in his own person a plurality of very learned men. They also say that the fem. termination serves in such cases to strengthen the idea. But how can this strengthening result from a change in the gender? Without doubt the fem. in such cases discharges the function of a neut.; and since doctissimus is heightened to doctissimum, it is thereby implied that such an one is a pattern of a learned man-the reality of the idea, or the realized ideal of such an one.
From these Arab. analogues respecting the import of the name Koheleth, it follows that the fem. is not to be referred to Chokma in such a way as that Solomon might be thereby designated as the representative, and, as it were, the incarnation of wisdom (Ewald, Hitzig, etc.)-an idea which the book by no means supports; for it the author had designed, in conformity with that signification of the name, to let Wisdom herself speak through Solomon's mouth, he would have let him speak as the author of Prov 1-9 speaks when he addresses the reader by the title, "my son," he would not have put expressions in his mouth such as 1:16-18; 7:23f. One should not appeal to Eccl 7:27; for there, where the subject is the dangers of the love of women, Koheleth, in the sense of Wisdom preaching, is as little appropriate as elsewhere; just here as the masculine gender of the speaker to be accented, and Amrah Koheleth is thus an incorrect reading for Amar Hakkoheleth (Eccl 12:8). The name Koheleth, without Chokma being supplied, is a man's name, of such recent formation as Sophereth, Neh 7:5, for which Ezra 2:55, Hassophereth; cf. also Ezra 2:57, hats|' poke'. The Mishna goes yet further in the coining of such names for men generis fem.
As it generally prefers to use the part. passivi in an active sense, e.g., caabuwr, thinking; raakuwb, riding; shaatuwy, having drunk; so also it forms fem. plurals with a masculine signification-as Hadruchoth, presstreaders, Terumoth iii. 4; Hammeshuhhoth, surveyors, Erubin iv. 11; Halleuzoth, speakers in a foreign tongue, Megilla ii. 1-and construes these with mas. predicates. (Note: Vid., Geiger, Lehrbuch, xvi. 6, and cf. Weiss' Studien, p. 90, who arbitrarily explains away this linguistic usage. Duke, in his Sprache der Mishna, p. 75, avoids the difficulty by the supposition of inadmissible ellipses.)
In these there can be nowhere anything said of a heightening of the idea effected by the transition to fem. forms. But the persons acting, although they are men, are thought of as neut.; and they appear, separated from the determination of their gender, as the representatives of the activity spoken of. According to this, Koheleth is, without regard to the gender, a preaching person. The Book of Koheleth thus bears, in its second word, as on its very forehead, the stamp of the Ezra-Nehemiah era to which it belongs.
As the woman of Endor, when she raised Samuel out of Hades at the request of Saul, sees "gods ascending out of the earth" (1 Sam 28:13), so it is not the veritable Solomon who speaks in this book, but his spirit, for which this neut. name Koheleth is appropriate. When he says, Eccl 1:12, "I, Koheleth, have been king over Israel in Jerusalem," he recognises himself not as the reigning monarch, but as having been king. The Talmudic Aggada has joined to this hyyty Jellinek's Sammlung kleiner Midrashim 2. xxvi.)
In this fiction there is at least grammatical intelligence. For it is a vain delusion for one to persuade himself that Solomon in his advanced age could say, with reference to the period of his life as ruler, "I have been king," fui rex-he was certainly always so during the forty years of his reign, and on to the last moment of his life. Or can the words mlk Whether this word, in the former sense, corresponds to the Greek perfect, and in the latter to the Greek aorist, is determined only by the situation and connection. Thus in Ex 2:22 it signifies, "I have become a stranger" (ge'gona Accordingly, Solomon while still living would be able to say mlk This also does not harmonize with the more modern linguistic usage which is followed by Koheleth, e.g., Eccl 1:9, mh-sh', id quod fuit; 1:10, hyh The epilogue, Eccl 12:9ff., also furnishes an argument in favour of the late composition of this book, on the supposition that it is an appendix, not by another hand, but by the author himself. But that it is from the author's own hand, and does not, as Grätz supposes, belong to the period in which the school of Hillel had established the canonicity of the book, follows from this, that it is composed in a style of Hebrew approaching that used in the Mishna, yet of an earlier date than the Mishna; for in the Talmuds it is, clause by clause, a subject of uncertain interpretation-the language used is plainly, for the Talmudic authorities, one that is antiquated, the expressions of which, because not immediately and unambiguously clear, need, in order to their explanation, to be translated into the language then in use.
The author of the book makes it thus manifest that here in the epilogue, as in the book itself, Solomon is intentionally called Koheleth; and that the manner of expression, as well as of the formation of the sentences in this epilogue, can in all particulars be supported from the book itself. In "fear God," Eccl 12:13a, the saying in 5:6, which is similarly formed, is repeated; and "this is the whole of man," 12:13b, a thought written as it were more in cipher than in extenso, is in the same style as 6:10. The word ywtr ("moreover"), frequently used by the author and b`l But if this epilogue is the product of the author's own hand, then, in meaning and aim, it presents itself as its sequel. The author says that the Koheleth who appears in this book as "wise" is the same who composed the beautiful people's-book Mishle; that he sought out not only words of a pleasing form, but also all words of truth; that the words of the wise are like goads and nails which stand in collected rows and numbers-they are given from one Shepherd. The author of the book thereby denotes that the sentences therein collected, even though they are not wholly, as they lie before us, the words of Solomon, yet that, with the Proverbs of Solomon, and of the wise men generally, they go back to one giver and original author. The epilogue thus, by its historic reference to Solomon, recognises the fiction, and gives the reader to understand that the book loses nothing in its value from its not having been immediately composed by Solomon.
Of untruthfulness, of a so-called pia fraus, we cannot therefore speak.
From early times, within the sphere of the most ancient Israelitish authorship, it was regarded as a justifiable undertaking for an author to reproduce in a rhetorical or poetical form the thoughts and feelings of memorable personages on special occasions. The Psalter contains not a few psalms bearing the superscription le-David, which were composed not by David himself, but by unknown poets, placing themselves, as it were, in David's position, and representing him, such e.g., as 144, which in the LXX excellently bears the superscription pro's to'n Golia'd. The chronicler, when he seeks to give the reader an idea of the music at the festival of the consecration of the tabernacle and then of the completed temple, allows himself so great freedom, that he puts into the mouth of David the Beracha of the fourth book of the Psalms (Ps 106:48), along with the preceding verse of Ps 106 (1 Chron 16:35f.), and into Solomon's mouth verses of Ps 132 (2 Chron 6:41f.).
And the prophetical discourses communicated in the O.T. historical books are certainly partly of this sort, that they either may be regarded as original, as e.g., 1 Sam 2:27ff., or must be so regarded, as 2 Kings 18-20; but not merely where the utterances of the prophets are in general terms reproduced, as at Judg 6:8-10; 2 Kings 17:13; 21:10-15, but also elsewhere in most of the prophetic discourses which we read in the Books of Kings and Chronicles, the style of the historian makes itself perceptible.
Consequently (as also Caspari in his work on the Syro-Ephraimite War, 1849, finds) the discourses in the Chronicles, apart from those which are common to them, bear an altogether different homogeneous character from those of the Book of Kings. It is the same as with the speeches, for instance, which are recorded in Thucydides, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Livy, and other Greek and Roman historians.
Classen may be right in the opinion, that the speeches in Thucydides are not mere inventions, but that, nevertheless, as they lie before us, they are the work of the historian; even the letters that passed between Pausanias and Xerxes bear his stamp, although he composed them on the ground of the verbal reports of the Spartans. It is thus also in the speeches found in Tacitus. They are more Ciceronian than his own style is, and the discourses of Germans have less elaborated periods than those of the Romans; but so greatly was the writing of history by the ancients influenced by this custom of free reproduction, that even a speech of the Emperor Claudius, which is found engraven on brass, is given by Tacitus not in this its original, but in another and freer form, assimilated to his own manner of representation.
So also sacred history, which in this respect follows the general ancient custom, depends not on the identity of the words, but of the spirit: it does not feign what it represents the historical person as saying, it follows traditions; but yet it is the power of its own subjectivity which thus recalls the past in all that was essential to it in actual life. The aim is not artistically to represent the imitation which is made as if it were genuine.
The arts by which it is sought to impart to that which is introduced into a more recent period the appearance of genuineness, were unknown to antiquity. No pseudonymous work of antiquity shows any such imitation of an ancient style as, e.g., does Meinhold's Bernsteinhexe, or such a forgery as Wagenfeld's Sanchuniathon. The historians reproduce always in their own individual way, without impressing on the speeches of different persons any distinct individual character.
They abstain from every art aimed at the concealment of the actual facts of the case. It is thus also with the author of the Book of Koheleth. As the author of the "Wisdom of Solomon" openly gives himself out to be an Alexandrian, who makes Solomon his organ, so the author of the Book of Koheleth is so little concerned purposely to veil the fiction of the Solomon-discourse, in which he clothes his own peculiar life-experiences, that he rather in diverse ways discovers himself as one and the same person with the Salomo redivivus here presenting himself.
We do not reckon along with these such proverbs as have for their object the mutual relationship between the king and his subjects, Eccl 8:3-5; 10:4,16f., 20, cf. 5:8; these do not betray in the speaker one who is an observer of rulers and not a ruler himself; for the two collections of "Proverbs of Solomon" in the Book of Proverbs contain a multitude of proverbs of the king, Prov 16:10,12-15; 19:12; 20:2,8,26,28; 25:2-4f., 6f., which, although objectively speaking of the king, may quite well be looked on as old Solomonic-for is there not a whole princely literature regarding princely government, as e.g., Friedrich II's Anti-Machiavel? But in the complaints against unrighteous judgment, Eccl 3:16; 4:1; 5:7, one is to be seen who suffers under it, or who is compelled to witness it without the power to change it; they are not appropriate in the mouth of the ruler, who should prevent injustice.
It is the author himself who here puts his complaints into the mouth of Solomon; it is he who has to record life-experiences such as Eccl 10:5-7.
The time in which he lived was one of public misgovernment and of dynastic oppression, in contrast with which the past shone out in a light so much the rosier, 7:10, and it threw long dark shadows across his mind when he looked out into the world, and mediately also upon the confessions of his Koheleth. This Koheleth is not the historical Solomon, but an abstraction of the historical; he is not the theocratic king, but the king among the wise men; the actual Solomon could not speak, 2:18, of the heir to his throne as of "the man that shall be after him,"-and he who has led astray by his wives into idolatry, and thus became an apostate (1 Kings 11:4), must have sounded an altogether different note of penitential contrition from that which we read at 7:26-28.
This Solomon who tasted all, and in the midst of his enjoyment maintained the position of a wise man (Eccl 2:9), is described by the author of this book from history and from sayings, just as he needs him, so as to make him an organ of himself; and so little does he think of making the fiction an illusion difficult to be seen through, that he represents Koheleth, 1:16; 2:7,9, as speaking as if he had behind him a long line of kings over the whole of Israel and Judah, while yet not he, but the author of the book, who conceals himself behind Salomo redivivus, could look back on such a series of kings in Jerusalem.
When did this anonymous author, who speaks instead of his Solomon, live and write? Let us first of all see what conclusion may be gathered regarding the book from the literary references it contains. In its thoughts, and in the form of its thoughts, it is an extremely original work. It even borrows nothing from the Solomonic Book of Proverbs, which in itself contains so many repetitions; proverbs such as Prov 7:16-18 and Prov 3:7 are somewhat like, but only accidentally. On the contrary, between Eccl 5:14 and Job 1:21, as well as between 7:14 and Job 2:10, there undoubtedly exists some kind of connection; here there lie before us thoughts which the author of the Book of Koheleth may have read in the Book of Job, and have quoted them from thence-also the mention of an untimely birth, Eccl 6:3, cf. Job 3:16, and the expression "one among a thousand," 7:28, cf.
Job 9:3; 33:23, may perhaps be reminiscences from the Book of Job occurring unconsciously to the author. This is not of any consequence as to the determination of the time of the composition of the Book of Koheleth, for the Book of Job is in any case much older. Dependence on the Book of Jeremiah would be of greater importance, but references such as Jer 7:2, cf. Jer 16:8; 9:11, cf. Jer 9:22, are doubtful, and guide to no definite conclusion. And who might venture, with Hitzig, to derive the golden lamp, Eccl 12:10, from the vision of Zech; 4:2, especially since the figure in the one place has an altogether different signification from what it has in the other? But we gain a more certain terminus a quo by comparing 5:5 with Mal 2:7. Malachi there designates the priests as messengers (delegated) of Jahve of hosts, along with which also there is the designation of the prophets as God's messengers, Eccl 3:1; Hag 1:13. With the author of the Book of Koheleth "the messenger" is already, without any name of God being added, a priestly title not to be misunderstood; ml'k This Book of Wisdom must stand in some kind of historical relation to the Book of Koheleth. The fact that both authors make King Solomon the organ of their own peculiar view of the world, shows a connection that is not accidental. Accident is altogether excluded by the circumstance that the Alexandrian author stands in the same relation to the Palestinian that James stands in to the Pauline letters. As James directs himself not so much against Paul as against a Paulinism misleading to fatal consequences, so that Book of Wisdom is certainly not directly a work in opposition to the Book of Koheleth, as is assumed by J. E. Ch. Schmidt (Salomo's Prediger, 1794), Kelle (Die salom. Schriften, 1815), and others; but, as Knobel and Grimm assert, against a one-sided extreme interpretation of views and principles as set forth by Koheleth, not without an acquaintance with this book.
The lovers of pleasure, who speak in Wisd. 2:1-9, could support that saying by expressions from the Book of Koheleth, and the concluding words there sound like an appropriation of the words of Koheleth Eccl 3:22; 5:17 (cf. LXX); it is true they break off the point of the Book of Koheleth, for the exhortation to the fear of God, the Judge of the world, is not echoed; but to break off this point did not lie remote, since the old Chokma watchword, "fear God," hovered over the contents of the book rather than penetrated them. It is as if the author of the Book of Wisdom, 1-5, wished to show to what danger of abuse in the sense of a pure materialistic eudaemonism the wisdom presented in the Book of Koheleth is exposed. But he also opposes the pessimistic thoughts of Koheleth in the decided assertions of the contrary: (1) Koheleth says: "There is one event to the righteous and to the wicked," Eccl 9:2; but he says: there is a difference between them wide as the heavens, Wisd. 3:2f., 4:7; 5:15f.; (2) Koheleth says: "He that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow," 1:18; but he says: wisdom bringeth not sorrow, but pure joy with it, Wisd. 8:16; (3) Koheleth says that wisdom bringeth neither respect nor favour, Eccl 9:11; but he says: it brings fame and honour, Wisd. 8:10; (4) Koheleth says: "There is no remembrance of the wise more than of the fool for ever," Eccl 2:16; but he says of wisdom in contrast to folly: "I shall obtain by it a deathless name, and shall leave to my descendants an everlasting remembrance," Wisd. 8:13.
The main distinction between the two books lies in this, that the comfortless view of Hades running through the Book of Koheleth is thoroughly surmounted by a wonderful rising above the O.T. standpoint by the author of the Book of Wisdom, and that hence there is in it an incomparably more satisfying Theodicee (cf. Wisd. 12:2-18 with Eccl 7:15; 8:14), and a more spiritual relation to this present time (cf. Wisd. 8:21; 9:17, with Eccl 2:24; 3:13, etc.). The "Wisdom of Solomon" has indeed the appearance of an anti-Ecclesiastes, a side-piece to the Book of Koheleth, which aims partly at confuting it, partly at going beyond it; for it represents, in opposition to Koheleth not rising above earthly enjoyment with the But of the fear of God, a more ideal, more spiritual Solomon. If Koheleth says that God "hath made everything beautiful in his time," 3:11, and hath made mad upright, 7:29; so, on the other hand, Solomon says that He hath made all things eis There are many such parallels, e.g., Eccl 5:9, cf. Koh. 8:13,5, cf. Koh. 7:12; 9:13-16, cf. Koh. 3:10f., but particularly Solomon's confession, 7:1-21, with that of Koheleth, 1:12-18. Here, wisdom appears as a human acquisition; there (which agrees with 1 Kings 3:11-13), as a gracious gift obtained in answer to prayer, which brings with it all that can make happy. If one keeps in his eye this mutual relation between the two books, there can be no doubt as to which is the older and which the younger. In the Book of Koheleth the Old Covenant digs for itself its own grave. It is also a "school-master to Christ," in so far as it awakens a longing after a better Covenant than the first. (Note: Vid., Oehler's Theol. des A.T., II, p. 324.)
But the Book of Wisdom is a precursor of this better covenant. The composition of the Book of Koheleth falls between the time of Malachi, who lived in the time of Nehemiah's second arrival at Jerusalem, probably under Darius Nothus (423-405 B.C.), and the Book of Wisdom, which at the earliest was written under Ptolemy Physkon (145-117), when the O.T. was already for the most part translated into the Greek language. (Note: Cf. 2:12a with Isa. 3:10, LXX, and 15:10a with Isa. 44:20, LXX.)
Hitzig does not venture to place the Book of Koheleth so far back into the period of the Ptolemies; he reaches with his chain of evidence only the year 204, that in which Ptolemy Epiphanes (204-181), gained, under the guardianship of the Romans, the throne of his father-he must be the minor whom the author has in his eye, Rom 10:16. But the first link of his chain of proof is a falsum. For it is not true that Ptolemy Lagus was the first ruler who exacted from the Jews the "oath of God," Eccl 8:2, i.e., the oath of fidelity; for Josephus (Antt. xii. 1. 1) says directly, that Ptolemy Lagus did this with reference to the fidelity with which the Jews had kept to Alexander the Macedonian the oath of allegiance they had sworn to Darius, which he particularly describes, Antt. xi. 8. 3; besides, the covenant, e.g., Sam 5:3, concluded in the presence of Jahve with their own native kings included in it the oath of allegiance, and the oath of vassalage which, e.g., Zedekiah swore to Nebuchadnezzar, 2 Chron 36:13, cf.
Ezek 17:13-19, had at the same time binding force on the citizens of the state that was in subjection. Also that "the oath of God" must mean the oath of allegiance sworn to a foreign ruler, and not that sworn to a native ruler, which would rather be called "the oath of Jahve," does not stand the test: the author of the Book of Koheleth drives the cosmopolitism of the Chokma so far, that he does not at all make use of the national name of God connected with the history of redemption, and Nehemiah also, Neh 13:25, uses an oath "of God" where one would have expected an oath "of Jahve." The first link of Hitzig's chain of proof, then, shows itself on all sides to be worthless. The author says, Eccl 8:2, substantially the same as Paul, Rom 13:5, that one ought to be subject to the king, not only from fear of punishment, but for conscience' sake.
Thus, then, Eccl 8:10 will also stand without reference to the carrying away of the Jews captive by Ptolemy Lagus, especially since the subject there is by no means that of a mass-deportation; and, besides, those who were carried into Egypt by Lagus were partly from the regions round about Jerusalem, and partly from the holy city itself (Joseph. Antt. 12. 1. 1). And the old better times, 7:10, were not those of the first three Ptolemies, especially since there are always men, and even in the best and most prosperous times, who praise the old times at the expense of the new. And also women who were a misfortune to their husbands or lovers there have always been, so that in 7:26 one does not need to think of that Agathoclea who ruled over Ptolemy Philopator, and even had in her hands the power of life and death.
Passages such as Eccl 7:10 and 7:26 afford no help in reference to the chronology. On the other hand, the author in 9:13-16 relates, to all appearance, what he himself experienced. But the little city is certainly not the fortified town of Dora, on the sea-coast to the west of Carmel, which was besieged by Antiochus the Great (Polybius, v. 66) in the year 218, as at a later period, in the year 138, it was by Antiochus VII, Sidetes (Joseph.
Bell. i. 2. 2); for this Dora was not then saved by a poor wise man within it-of whom Polybius knows nothing-but "by the strength of the place, and the help of those with Nicholaus." A definite historical event is also certainly found in 4:13-16. Hitzig sees in the old foolish king the spiritually contracted, but so much the more covetous, high priest Onias, under Ptolemy Euergetes; and in the poor but wise youth, Joseph (the son of Tobias), who robbed Onias of his place in the state, and raised himself to the office of general farmer of taxes.
But here nothing agrees but that Onias was old and foolish, and that Joseph was then a young wise man (Joseph. Antt. xii. 4. 2); of the poverty of the latter nothing is heard-he was the nephew of Onias. And besides, he did not come out of the house "of prisoners" (haacuwriym We have thus, in determining the time of the authorship of this book, to confine ourselves to the period subsequent to the Diadochs. It may be regarded as beyond a doubt that it was written under the Persian domination. Kleinert (Der Prediger Salomo, 1864) is in general right in saying that the political condition of the people which the book presupposes, is that in which they are placed under Satraps; the unrighteous judgment, Eccl 3:16; and the despotic oppression, 4:1; 8:9; 5:7; the riotous court-life, 10:16-19; the raising of mean men to the highest places of honour, 10:5-7; the inexorable severity of the law of war-service, 8:8; (Note: Vid., Herod. iv. 84, vii. 38f.) the prudence required by the organized system of espionage (Note: Vid., Duncker's Gesch. des Alterthums, Bd. 2 (1867), p. 894.) existing at such a time-all these things were characteristic of this period.
But if the Book of Koheleth is not at all older than Malachi, then it was written somewhere within the last century of the Persian kingdom, between Artaxerxes I, Longimanus (464-424), and Darius Codomannus (335-332): the better days for the Jewish people, of the Persian supremacy under the first five Achaemenides, were past (Eccl 7:10).
Indeed, in 6:3 there appear to be reminiscences of Artaxerxes II, Mnemon (died about 360), who was 94 years old, and, according to Justin (x. 1), had 115 sons, and of Artaxerxes III, Ochus his successor, who was poisoned by the chief eunuch Bagoas, who, according to Aelian, Var. Hist. vi. 8, threw his (Ochus') body to the cats, and caused sword-handles to be made from his bones. The book altogether contains many examples to which concrete instances in the Persian history correspond, from which they might be abstracted, in which strict harmony on all sides with historical fact is not to be required, since it did not concern the author. The event recorded 4:13ff. refers to Cyrus rising to the supremacy of world-ruler (after dispossessing the old Median King Astyages), who left (Note: According to Nicolaus of Damascus (Müller's Fragm. hist.
Graec. III 398), Cyrus was the child of poor parents; by "prisonhouse" (Eccl 4:14), reference is made to his confinement in Persia, where access to him was prevented by guards (Herod. i. 123). Justin, i. 5: "A letter could not be openly brought to him, since the guards appointed by the king kept possession of all approaches to him.") nothing but misery to posterity. Such a rich man as is described in 6:2, who had to leave all his treasures to a stranger, was Croesus, to whom Solon, as 7:8a (cf. Herod. i. 32, 86), said that no one ought to be praised before his end. A case analogous at least to 9:14-16, was the deliverance of Athens by the counsel of Themistocles (Justin, ii. 12), who finally, driven from Athens, was compelled to seek the protection of the Persian king, and ended his life in despair. (Note: Vid., Spiegel's Erânische Alterthumskunde, II pp. 409, 413.
Bernstein suggests the deliverance of Potidea (Herod. viii. 128) or Tripolis (Diodor. xvi. 41); but neither of these cities owed its deliverance to the counsel of a wise man. Burger (Comm. in Ecclesiasten, 1864) thinks, with greater probability, of Themistocles, who was celebrated among the Persians (Thucyd. i. 138), which Ewald also finds most suitable, provided the author had a definite fact before his eye.)
If we were not confined, for the history of the Persian kingdom and its provinces, from Artaxerxes I to the appearance of Alexander of Macedon, to only a few and scanty sources of information (we know no Jewish events of this period, except the desecration of the temple by Bagoses, described by Josephus, Antt. xi. 7), we might probably be better able to understand many of the historical references of the Book of Koheleth. We should then be able to say to whom the author refers by the expression, "Woe to thy land when thy king is a child," Eccl 10:16; for Artaxerxes I, who, although only as yet a boy at the time of the murder of his father Xerxes (Justin, iii. 1), soon thereafter appeared manly enough, cannot be thought of. We should then, perhaps, be also in possession of the historical key to 8:10; for with the reference to the deportation of many thousands of Jewish prisoners (Josephus, c. Ap. i. 22)-which, according to Syncellus and Orosius, must have occurred under Artaxerxes III, Ochusthe interpretation of that passage does not accord. (Note: Vid., Bernstein's Quaestiones Kohelethanae, p. 66.)
We should then also, perhaps, know to what political arrangement the author points when he says, Eccl 7:19, that wisdom is a stronger protection to a city than "ten mighty men;" Grätz refers this to the decuriones of the Roman municipal cities and colonies; but probably it refers to the dynasties (Note: Vid., Duncker's Gesch. des Alterthums, II p. 910.) (cf. Assyr. salat, governor) placed by the Persian kings over the cities of conquered countries. And generally, the oppressed spirit pervading the book would be so much clearer if we knew more of the sacrifices which the Jewish people in the later time of the Persians had to make, than merely that the Phoenicians, at the same time with "The Syrians in Palestine," had to contribute (Herod. vii. 87) to Xerxes for his Grecian expedition three hundred triremes; and also that the people who "dwelt in the Solymean mountains" had to render him assistance in his expedition against Greece (Joseph. c. Ap. i. 22).
The author was without doubt a Palestinian. In 4:17 he speaks of himself as dwelling where the temple was, and also in the holy city, Eccl 8:10; he lived, if not actually in it, at least in its near neighbourhood, 10:15; although, as Kleinert remarks, he appears, 11:1, to make use of a similitude taken from the corn trade of a seaport town. From 4:8 the supposition is natural that he was alone in the land, without children or brothers or sisters; but from the contents and spirit of the whole book, it appears more certain that, like his Koheleth, he was advanced in years, and had behind him a long checkered life. The symptoms of approaching death presenting themselves in old age, which he describes to the young, 12:2ff., he probably borrowed from his own experience. The whole book bears the marks of age-a production of the Old Covenant which was stricken in age, and fading away.
The literature, down to 1860, of commentaries and monographs on the Book of Koheleth is very fully set forth in the English Commentary of Ginsburg, and from that time to 1867, in Zöckler's Commentary, which forms a part of Lange's Bibelwerk. Keil's Einleitung, 3rd ed. 1873, contains a supplement to these, among which, however, the Bonner Theolog.
Literaturblatt, 1874, Nr. 7, misses Pusey's and Reusch's (cf. the Tübingen Theol. Quartalschrift, 1860, pp. 430-469). It is not possible for any man to compass this literature. Aedner's Catalogue of the Hebrew books in the Library of the British Museum, 1867, contains a number of Jewish commentaries omitted by Ginsburg and Zöckler, but far from all. For example, the Commentary of Ahron B. Josef (for the first time printed at Eupatoria, 1834) now lies before me, with those of Moses Frankel (Dessau, 1809), and of Samuel David Luzzatto, in the journal, Ozar Nechmad 1864. Regarding the literature of English interpretation, see the American translation, by Tayler Lewis (1870), of Zöckler's Commentary.
The catalogue there also is incomplete, for in 1873 a Commentary by Thomas Pelham Dale appeared; and a Monograph on ch. 12, under the title of The Dirge of Coheleth, by the Orientalist C. Taylor, appeared in 1874.
The fourth volume of the Speaker's Commentary contains a Commentary on the Song by Kingsbury, and on Ecclesiastes by W. T. Bullock, who strenuously maintains its Solomonic authorship. The opinion that the book represents the conflict of two voices, the voice of true wisdom and that of pretended wisdom, has lately found advocates not only in a Hebrew Commentary by Ephraim Hirsch (Warsaw, 1871), but also in the article "Koheleth" by Schenkel in his Bibellexikon (vol. III, 1871). For the history and refutation of this attempt to represent the book in the form of a dialogue, we might refer to Zöckler's Introd. to his Commentary.
The old translations have been referred to at length by Ginsburg. Frederick Field, in his Hexapla (Poet. vol. 1867), has collected together the fragments of the Greek translations. Ge. Janichs, in his Animadversiones criticae (Breslau, 1871), has examined the Peshito of Koheleth and Ruth; vid., with reference thereto, Nöldeke's Anzeige in the Liter. Centralblatt 1871, Nr. 49, and cf. Middeldorpf's Symbolae exegetico-criticae ad librum Ecclesiastis, 1811. The text of the Graecus Venetus lies before us now in a more accurate form than that by Villoison (1784), in Gebhardt's careful edition of certain Venetian manuscripts (Leipzig, Brockhaus 1874), containing this translation of the O.T. books. "Ostendit omnia esse vanitati subjecta: in his quae propter homines facta sunt vanitas est mutabilitatis; in his quae ab hominibus facta sunt vanitas est curiositatis; in his quae in hominibus facta sunt vanitas mortalitatis." — Hugo of St. Victor (†1140).
ECCLESIASTES 1:1 The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.
Verse 1. The title, 1:1, The words of Koheleth, son of David, king in Jerusalem, has been already explained in the Introduction. The verse, which does not admit of being properly halved, is rightly divided by "son of David" by the accent Zakef; for the apposition, "king in Jerusalem," does not belong to "David," but to "Koheleth." In several similar cases, such as Ezek 1:3, the accentuation leaves the designation of the oppositional genitive undefined; in Gen 10:21b it proceeds on an erroneous supposition; it is rightly defined in Amos 1:1b, for example, as in the passage before us. That "king" is without the article, is explained from this, that it is determined by "in Jerusalem," as elsewhere by "of Israel" ("Judah"). The expression (cf. 2 Kings 14:23) is singular.
PROLOGUE: THE EVERLASTING SAMENESS 1:2-11 ECCLESIASTES 1:2 Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity.
The book begins artistically with an opening section of the nature of a preamble. The ground-tone of the whole book at once sounds in v. 2, which commences this section, "O vanity of vanities, saith Koheleth, O vanity of vanities! All is vain." As at Isa 40:1 (vid., l.c.) it is a question whether by "saith" is meant a future or a present utterance of God, so here and at Eccl 12:8 whether "saith" designates the expression of Koheleth as belonging to history or as presently given forth. The language admits both interpretations, as e.g., "saith," with God as the subject, 2 Sam 23:3, is meant historically, and in Isa 49:5 of the present time. We understand "saith" here, as e.g., Isa 36:4, "Thus saith...the king of Assyria," of something said now, not of something said previously, since it is those presently living to whom the Solomon redivivus, and through him the author of this book, preaches the vanity of all earthly things.
The old translators take "vanity of vanities" in the nominative, as if it were the predicate; but the repetition of the expression shows that it is an exclamation = O vanitatem vanitatum. The abbreviated connecting form of hebel Hevel primarily signifies a breath, and still bears this meaning in post-bibl.
Heb., e.g., Schabbath 119b: "The world exists merely for the sake of the breath of school-children" (who are the hope of the future). Breath, as the contrast of that which is firm and enduring, is the figure of that which has no support, no continuance. Regarding the superlative expression, "Vanity of vanities," vid., the Song 1:1. "Vanity of vanities" is the non plus ultra of vanity-vanity in the highest degree. The double exclamation is followed by a statement which shows it to be the result of experience. "All is vain"-the whole (of the things, namely, which present themselves to us here below for our consideration and use) is vanity.
ECCLESIASTES 1:3 What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?
With this verse commences the proof for this exclamation and statement: "What profit hath a man of all his labour which he laboureth in under the sun?!" An interrogative exclamation, which leads to the conclusion that never anything right, i.e., real, enduring, satisfying, comes of it. yit|rown ECCLESIASTES 1:4 One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever. "One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: and the earth remaineth for ever." The meaning is not that the earth remains standing, and thus (Hitz.) approaches no limit (for what limit for it could be had in view?); it is by this very immoveable condition that it fulfils, according to the ancient notion, its destiny, Ps 119:90. The author rather intends to say that in this sphere nothing remains permanent as the fixed point around which all circles; generations pass away, others appear, and the earth is only the firm territory, the standing scene, of this ceaseless change. In reality, both things may be said of the earth: that it stands for ever without losing its place in the universe, and that it does not stand for ever, for it will be changed and become something else. But the latter thought, which appertains to the history of redemption, Ps 102:26f., is remote from the Preacher; the stability of the earth appears to him only as the foil of the growth and decay everlastingly repeating themselves. Elster, in this fact, that the generations of men pass away, and that, on the contrary, the insensate earth under their feet remains, rightly sees something tragic, as Jerome had already done: Quid hac vanius vanitate, quam terram manere, quae hominum causa facta est, et hominem ipsum, terrae dominum, tam repente in pulverem dissolvi? The sun supplies the author with another figure. This, which he thinks of in contrast with the earth, is to him a second example of ceaseless change with perpetual sameness. As the generations of men come and go, so also does the sun.
ECCLESIASTES 1:5 The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose. "And the sun ariseth, the sun goeth down, and it hasteth (back) to its place, there to rise again." It rises and sets again, but its setting is not a coming to rest; for from its place of resting in the west it must rise again in the morning in the east, hastening to fulfil its course. Thus Hitzig rightly, for he takes "there to rise again" as a relative clause; the words may be thus translated, but strictly taken, both participles stand on the same level; show'eep But the shm And how unnatural to think of the rising sun, which gives the impression of renewed youth, as panting! No, the panting is said of the sun that has set, which, during the night, and thus without rest by day and night, must turn itself back again to the east (Ps 19:7), there anew to commence its daily course. Thus also Rashi, the LXX, Syr., Targ., Jerome, Venet., and Luther. Instead of show' ECCLESIASTES 1:6 The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits. "It goeth to the south, and turneth to the north; the wind goeth ever circling, and the wind returneth again on its circuits." Thus designedly the verse is long-drawn and monotonous. It gives the impression of weariness. shaab That the wind goes from the south (daarowm ECCLESIASTES 1:7 All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again. "All rivers run into the sea, and the sea becomes not full; to the place whence the rivers came, thither they always return again." Instead of nehhárim, nehhalim was preferred, because it is the more general name for flowing waters, brooks, and rivers; nachal If we include this internal ocean, then the rivers which lose themselves in hollows, deserts, or inland lakes, which have no visible outlet, form no exception. But the expression refers first of all to the visible sea-basins, which gain no apparent increase by these masses of water being emptied into them: "the sea, it becomes not full;" 'eeynenuw Generally the author does not mean to say that the rivers return to their sources, since the sea replenishes the fountains, but that where they once flow, they always for ever flow without changing their course, viz., into the all-devouring sea (Elst.); for the water rising out of the sea in vapour, and collecting itself in rain-clouds, fills the course anew, and the rivers flow on anew, for the old repeats itself in the same direction to the same end. m|qowm The author here purposely uses only participles, because although there is constant change, yet that which renews itself is ever the same. He now proceeds, after this brief but comprehensive induction of particulars, to that which is general.
ECCLESIASTES 1:8 All things are full of labour; man cannot utter it: the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. "All things are in activity; no man can utter it; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, and the ear is not full with hearing." All translators and interpreters who understand devarim here of words (LXX, Syr., and Targ.) go astray; for if the author meant to say that no words can describe this everlasting sameness with perpetual change, then he would have expressed himself otherwise than by "all words weary" (Ew., Elst., Hengst., and others); he ought at least to have said yg' laariyq But y|gee`iym Eccl 10:15; 12:12), working with a strain on one's strength, fatiguing oneself (cf. y|giya` This is just what these four examples are meant to show, viz., that a restless activity reaching no visible conclusion and end, always beginning again anew, pervades the whole world-all things, he says, summarizing, are in labour, i.e., are restless, hastening on, giving the impression of fatigue.
Thus also in strict sequence of thought that which follows: this unrest in the outer world reflects itself in man, when he contemplates that which is done around him; human language cannot exhaust this coming and going, this growth and decay in constant circle, and the quodlibet is so great, that the eye cannot be satisfied with seeing, nor the ear with hearing; to the unrest of things without corresponds the unrest of the mind, which through this course, in these ever repeated variations, always bringing back the old again to view, is kept in ceaseless activity. The object to dabbeer is the totality of things.
No words can comprehend this, no sensible perception exhaust it. That which is properly aimed at here is not the unsatisfiedness of the eyes (Prov 27:20), and generally of the mind, thus not the ever-new attractive power which appertains to the eye and the ear of him who observes, but the force with which the restless activity which surrounds us lays hold of and communicates itself to us, so that we also find no rest and contentment. With saaba` ECCLESIASTES 1:9 The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. "That which hath been is that which shall be, and that which is done is that which shall be done; and there is nothing new under the sun."-The older form of the language uses only 'shr ECCLESIASTES 1:10 Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us. "Is there anything whereof it may be said: See, this is new?-it was long ago through the ages (aeons) which have been before us." The Semit. substantive verb yeesh The singular haayaah ECCLESIASTES 1:11 There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after. "There is no remembrance of ancestors; and also of the later ones who shall come into existence, there will be no remembrance for them with those who shall come into existence after them." With zikaarown KOHELETH'S EXPERIENCES AND THEIR RESULTS 1:12-4:16 The Unsatisfactoriness of Striving After Wisdom, 1:12-18 After this prelude regarding the everlasting sameness of all that is done under the sun, Koheleth-Solomon unfolds the treasure of his lifeexperience as king.
ECCLESIASTES 1:12 I the Preacher was king over Israel in Jerusalem. "I, Koheleth, have been king over Israel in Jerusalem." That of the two possible interpretations of haayiytiy But in his search after worldly knowledge he found no satisfaction.
ECCLESIASTES 1:13 And I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven: this sore travail hath God given to the sons of man to be exercised therewith. "And I gave my heart to seek and to hold survey with wisdom over all that is done under the sun: a sore trouble it is which God has given to the children of men to be exercised therewith." The synonyms daarash It is the usual word for the exploring of a country, i.e., the acquiring personal knowledge of its as yet unknown condition; the passing over to an intellectual search is peculiar to the Book of Koheleth, as it has the phrase l| leeb Hitzig refers huw' ECCLESIASTES 1:14 I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit.
He adduces proof of the wearisomeness of this work of research: "I saw all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and striving after the wind." The point of the sentence lies in w|hineeh ECCLESIASTES 1:15 That which is crooked cannot be made straight: and that which is wanting cannot be numbered.
The judgment contained in the words, "vanity and a striving after the wind," is confirmed: "That which is crooked cannot become straight; and a deficit cannot be numerable," i.e., cannot be taken into account (thus Theod., after the Syro-Hex.), as if as much were present as is actually wanting; for, according to the proverb, "Where there is nothing, nothing further is to be counted." Hitzig thinks, by that which is crooked and wanting, according to Eccl 7:13, of the divine order of the world: that which is unjust in it, man cannot alter; its wants he cannot complete. But the preceding statement refers only to labour under the sun, and to philosophical research and observation directed thereto. This places before the eyes of the observer irregularities and wants, brings such irregularities and wants to his consciousness-which are certainly partly brought about and destined by God, but for the most part are due to the transgressions of man himself-and what avails the observer the discovery and investigation?- he has only lamentation over it, for with all his wisdom he can bring no help. Instead of lit|qon Having now gained such a result in his investigation and research by means of wisdom, he reaches the conclusion that wisdom itself is nothing.
ECCLESIASTES 1:16-18 I communed with mine own heart, saying, Lo, I am come to great estate, and have gotten more wisdom than all they that have been before me in Jerusalem: yea, my heart had great experience of wisdom and knowledge. "I have communed with mine own heart, saying: Lo, I have gained great and always greater wisdom above all who were before me over Jerusalem; and my heart hath seen wisdom and knowledge in fulness. And I gave my heart to know what was in wisdom and knowledge, madness and folly-I have perceived that this also is a grasping after the wind." The evidence in which he bears witness to himself that striving after wisdom and knowledge brings with it no true satisfaction, reaches down to the close of v. 17; yaada`|tiy The 'aniy It is a question whether `im-libiy, after the phrase ('eet Also lee'mor Regarding hyh Rightly the Venet.: hee Verse 17. By the consecutive modus waa'et|naah After the statement of the object laadaath, stands vedaath, briefly for wld`t. Ginsburg wishes to get rid of the words holeeloth vesikluth, or at least would read in their stead w|sik|luwt t|buwnyot (rendering them "intelligence and prudence"); Grätz, after the LXX parabola's kai' epistee'meen, reads wsklwt m|shaalowt. But the text can remain as it is: the object of Koheleth is, on the one hand, to become acquainted with wisdom and knowledge; and, on the other, with their contraries, and to hold these opposite to each other in their operations and consequences. The LXX, Targ., Venet., and Luther err when they render sikluth here by epistee'mee Verse 18. "For in much wisdom is much grief; and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow." The German proverb: "Much wisdom causeth headache," is compared, Eccl 12:12b, but not here, where ka`ac |
