ECCLESIASTES (ĭ klē’ zĭ ăs’tēz) Gr. Ekklēsiastēs, Heb. Qōheleth, prob. meaning The Assembly-speaker, i.e. The Preacher.)
Outline
I. Etymology and genre
The term Qoheleth is derived from the root qāhāl, “assembly, congregation”; hence the fem. abstract noun may have meant “the office or function of speaker in the assembly.” This book belongs to the general class of Wisdom Literature, or Ḥokhmah, but to the special genre of the philsophical discourse—of which there are no other extant examples in ancient near Eastern lit. It purports to have been composed by “the son of David, king in Jerusalem” (Eccl 1:1), i.e. by Solomon. Since it consists of a review of his lifelong search for truly valid goals in human existence, it was doubtless a product of his old age, c. 940 b.c.
II. Authorship and time of composition
The Solomonic authorship of this book is regarded by most modern authorities as purely fictional, composed by some unknown later author upon the basis of the experiences and insights of the historic Solomon. On the basis of supposed allusions to the misfortunes of the Israelite nation down through the Babylonian Exile, as well as on allegedly late characteristics of language, Qoheleth has been assigned a 5th cent. date by such conservative authors as Hengstenberg, Delitzsch, Leupold and E. J. Young, and 3rd cent. or later by liberal scholars. These allegations of spuriousness (or fictional character) are not justified by the objective evidence. More recent discussions of the language of Ecclesiastes (like that of J. Muilenberg in BASOR 135, p. 135) admits that “Linguistically the book is unique. There is no question that its language has many striking peculiarities.” In other words, it differs from all other books of the OT of whatever age; it equally differs from all known intertestamental Heb. works, such as Ecclesiasticus (which, however, has been greatly influenced by it) and the Qumran sectarian lit. No significant resemblances can be made out with the extant pre-Christian Heb. lit. of any period, either in respect to vocabulary, grammar or style. It is quite as dissimilar to 5th-cent. productions, such as, Zechariah, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther and Malachi as to any of the pre-exilic period. This poses an insuperable difficulty to those who, like Delitzsch and Young, date Qoheleth (Qoh.) around 430, or to Beecher (in ISBE) who puts it at 400 b.c. The earliest MS fragments come from Qumran Cave 4 and date from the 2nd cent. b.c., and so there is no possibility of dating it after the sectarian period (to whose writings it is altogether dissimilar).
A. Linguistic affinities with Phoenician. The true explanation for the peculiar language and style of Ecclesiastes is to be found in its genre. As in ancient Gr. lit. the dialect or style in which each genre (such as the epic, the elegiac, the love poem, etc.) was first brought to classic perfection became a binding convention upon all who would in later ages compose in that genre, so also in ancient Sem. and Egyp. circles a peculiar style became conventional for each genre. It so happens that there are no other surviving examples of the genre to which Qoheleth belongs (the philosophical disquisition), and there is no literary parallel with which to compare it. There is, however, a noteworthy affinity for early Canaanite and Phoenician characteristics which makes it likely that Solomon, if he was the true author, wrote in a genre which had been cultivated in Phoenicia or in Canaanite areas of Pal. itself.
The evidence for this has been gathered in a very able article by M. J. Dahood, “Canaanite-Phoenician Influence in Qoheleth” (Biblica 33, 1952), in which he draws upon the linguistic data of the 14th cent. Ugaritic tablets, the Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum, and Lidzbarski’s Phoenician and Punic inscrs. in Ephemeris. He comes to the conclusion (op. cit. p. 32) that “The Book of Ecclesiastes was originally composed by an author who wrote in Hebrew but who employed Phoenician orthography, and whose composition shows heavy Canaanite-Phoenician influence.” He marshals his proofs under the following categories: (1) Phoen. orthography, (2) Phoen. inflections, pronouns and particles, (3) Phoen. syntax, and (4) Phoen. lexical borrowings or analogies.
1. Orthography. Under Phoen. spelling he lists many instances of variants as between the MT of the OT and the ancient VSS in Gr., Aram., Syr. and Lat.—variants which are most easily accounted for by an original text in which no vowel letters were written (final vowel letters were introduced into Heb. spelling at least by late 8th cent., judging by the Siloam Inscr.). Thus it was possible to supply differing final vowels affecting the number and gender of verbs (such as na’’seh “was made,” in the MT of Ecclesiastes 1:13, but na’asū “were made” in some of the VSS; or again, hāyâ is the MT reading in 1:16—“it came into being”—but hāyû, “they came into being” according to the VSS. These variants indicate that the original author spelled the first word n-’s, and the second word h-y—which remained the normal Phoen. spelling until 3rd cent. b.c. or later. Or again, 3:16 reads haṩṩedeq “the righteousness” in MT, but haṩṩaddīq “the righteous man” in the VSS.
2. Inflections and particles. As for inflections, Phoen. uses the -t ending even for fem. nouns in the absolute state; so there are nouns like mattat in 3:13 and 5:18 meaning “gift”—as in a 7th cent. Phoen. inscr. from Ur (op. cit. p. 46). Even more distinctive are prepositions ending in “t,” like ’al dibrat (“on account of”) in 3:18 and ’ummat (“corresponding to”) in 5:14. So Phoen. uses ’-l-t as well as ’-l for “upon,” and p-n-t as well as l-p-n for “in front of.” As for the relative pronoun shĕ, which occurs sixty-seven times in Ecclesiastes alongside ’asher (which is used eighty-nine times), it is very close to the Phoen. ’-š (“who, what”). It occurs elsewhere in the OT largely in writings containing N Israelite elements. Closely related is mah-še “whatever” in 1:9; 3:15, etc.—which appears as m-'-š in the 9th cent. Phoen. Kilamuwa Inscription. The same inscr. also uses the interrogative “who?” (m or m-y) five times in the sense of “whoever”; compare this with the four occurrences in Ecclesiastes (1:9; 3:15; 5:9; 9:4) where the same indefinite interrogative appears—a far higher ratio than in any other OT book. As for the definite article ha, “the,” its sporadic and irregular use conforms perfectly with Phoen. usage, where ’-y-t the sign of the accusative, often precedes a noun lacking ha- (contrary to the rule in Heb. grammar), just as Qoheleth often uses ’ēt before an anarthrous noun. Or, he leaves out the article before an adjective modifying a definite noun—which is also good Phoen. usage. (This cannot be explained as a tr. from a late A ram. original which no longer used the emphatic state [-ā] for definite nouns only; it is now known from the 1st cent. Genesis Apocryphon that even by that period the emphatic was still restricted to definite nouns.) As for particles, the conditional ’illū (“if”), used in Ecclesiastes 6:6, is found in the 11th cent. Ahiram Inscription spelled as ’-l; hence it is not to be regarded as derived from Aram. ’illā, as some have argued. One other particle is vowelpointed as lāmmâ “why?” in the MT (5:5 and 7:7); but in view of the Phoen. l-m meaning “lest,” it should prob. be so construed in those two passages, where “lest” makes far better sense.
3. Syntax. As for syntax, the peculiar combination of infinitive absolute plus the independent pronoun (e.g. 4:2 reads weəabbēa, ’anī for “And I praised”) occurs four or five times in Qoh., and only once elsewhere in the OT. Cf. the combination q-t-l ’-n-k in the Karatepe Phoen. inscrs., and EA 113:40-42 in the Tell-Amarna correspondence, back in the 14th cent. Even the use of the independent personal pronoun as a copular verb, which occurs quite often in Ecclesiastes (e.g. 3:13 mattat ’elōhīm hî', “it is a gift of God”) is shown to be a Phoen. usage, as well as Aram. and Mishnaic Heb. For example, the 5th cent. Yehawmilk Inscription states that “He was a righteous king” (k-m-l-k ş-d-q h-'). (Cf. also CIS 93:1-2; Lidzbarski 36:4; and Nora Inscr. 2f.)
4. Lexical affinities. As for lexical affinities, note that Ecclesiastes uses ’ādām for “man” in the non-generic sense (contrary to normal Heb. practice); cf. the Azitawadd 9th cent. inscr., which uses ’-d-m five times and ’-š (Heb. ’îš) only once. The characteristic phrase “under the sun” (tahat haššemeš) occurs in no other ancient NW Sem. language except Phoen. (cf. the inscrs. of Tabnit and Eshmunazar at Sidon). Even the term re'ût (“a striving, a desire”), which occurs seven times in Qoh. and is usually explained as a borrowing from Aram., occurs in Punic inscrs.: once meaning “decree, decision,” once meaning “pleasure, good will.” An unusual pair of verbs occurs in 10:18: “By slothfulness the roof sinks in (yimmak), and through idleness of hands the house leaks (yiḏlōp).” It is most significant that these two verbs, mākak and dālap, occur nowhere else in combination except Ugaritic Text 68:17. The distinctive climax series “seven...eight” occurring in 11:2 (nowhere else in OT except Mic 5:5) appears at least six times in Ugaritic lit. (BASOR 76 [1939], 5-11). The distinctive phrase šemen rōqēaḥ occurs nowhere else besides Ecclesiastes 10:1 (“perfumer’s oil”) and in Ugaritic Text 120:5. But the noun r-q-ḥ “perfumer” occurs at least five times in Phoenician and Punic inscrs. It is unknown in Aram., although ruqqû appears in Akkad. as “compound ointment.”
Dahood’s article closes with an impressive assortment of mercantile terms most appropriate to a commercial culture such as characterized the Phoen. people. Thus: (a) ’āmāl “gain, earning” (twelve times); (b) yitrôn “gain, advantage” (eighteen times); (c) ’inyān “occupation, business” (six times); (d) ḥesrôn “lack, deficit” (six times); (e) ḥēleq “share, portion” (seven times); (f) kišrôn “success, advantage” (five times); (g) ’ōšer “riches” (twelve times); (h) hešbôn “computation, reckoning” (five times); and (i) ṩākār “wages” (two times). These and many other terms which he lists confirm still further the theory that the genre to which Qoh. belongs was borrowed from a Phoen. prototype. Nor should it be forgotten (although Dahood does not discuss this) that Israel in the age of Solomon was more deeply involved in international trade than at any other time in its history, before or since (1 Kings 9:26-28; 10:28, 29). (Dahood attempts to retain an early postexilic date on the basis of a theory that a substantial colony of Jews took refuge in Phoenicia after the fall of Jerusalem in 587 b.c., and that the unknown author composed Ecclesiastes there; but there is not a shred of historical evidence for any such colony, and it seems unlikely that a Phoenician subject to Nebuchadnezzar’s authority—apart from a revolt by Tyre resulting in the complete destruction of its mainland city—would have dared to harbor refugees from the wrath of the Chaldeans subsequent to the assassination of Gedaliah. All the refugees of whom there is any recorded knowledge fled southward to Egypt.)
In view of the prominence of the Red Sea port of Elath during Solomon’s reign, there is every reason to believe that he had extensive contacts with India from whence he might have borrowed such terms as pardēs “park” (Sanskrit: paridhis) and pitgām “official decision” (Sanskrit: pratigāma), rather than from Pers. (a language rather closely related to the Sanskrit classical language of India). As for allegedly postexilic terms like šhālaṭ (“have dominion, authority”), the Hyksos invaders of Egypt called their ruler by the title Salitis back in the 18th cent. b.c., long before the time of Moses. It is beyond question that Salitis is derived from the root šālaṭ. As for zemān “appointed time,” while it is true that it appears outside of Ecclesiastes in the Heb. Scriptures, only in Esther and Nehemiah, it is also true that it was used in Akkad. as simānu “fixed date,” and also in Arab. as zamanun, and in Ethiopic as zaman. It was a Pan-Semitic word, therefore, and no evidence for a post-Solomonic date, esp. since “a proper time,” “fixed time,” is elsewhere in Ecclesiastes always expressed by the classical Heb. ’ēt (cf. 3:1-8).
III. Other internal evidences as to authorship
Apart from linguistic factors there are other internal evidences used by opponents of Solomonic authorship to indicate a later date of composition. Thus there are said to be such obvious anachronisms as to alert any Heb. reader to the fictional character of this work. The Preacher declared that he had attained more wisdom than “all they that have been before me in Jerusalem” (1:16). Since the only Heb. king before Solomon in Jerusalem was his father David, the “all that were before me” must point to a long succession of Jewish kings before Ecclesiastes was actually written. But this argument overlooks the fact that the author is not referring to kings who preceded him in Jerusalem, but rather to “wise men” or sages who were practitioners of the various genres of ḥokhmah lit. (cf. 1 Kings 4:31, which states that Solomon excelled even Heman, Chalcol and Darda, who were doubtless outstanding scholars who flourished in pre-Israelite Jerusalem, a city of notable influence and prestige from the days of Melchi-zedek and Adoni-zedek centuries before). A second anachronism is alleged in 1:12: “I...was (hāyîtî) king...in Jerusalem,” which is thought to imply that Solomon was no longer king (and therefore dead) at the time this book was written. It should be pointed out, however, that hāyîtî can also mean, “I became king over Israel”—a perfectly natural explanation for an elderly king to give when recollecting the commencement of his reign.
Solomonic authorship is supposedly excluded by the non-royal viewpoint of the author. Instead of speaking of himself as the ruler of the land he occasionally expressed sentiments implying disapproval of, or even hostility toward, the king. See, for example, 10:17: “Happy are you, O land, when your king is the son of free men, and your princes feast at the proper time, for strength, and not for drunkenness.” Or again, “Do not curse the king, not even in your bedchamber” (10:20), or 4:13: “Better is a poor and wise youth than an old and foolish king, who will no longer take advice.”
In dealing with passages such as these, however, it should be understood that the author is writing as a philosopher, not as the head of a government, or even as a propagandist in his own behalf. As a keen observer of world history, both past and current, it would be inconceivable that he was unaware of the existence of gluttonous, intemperate, stubborn or misguided kings in other countries, or of the unhappy consequences to their subjects under such a rule. Just as at a later age the Rom. emperor Marcus Aurelius composed his Meditations not as a piece of government propaganda but (esp. after the introductory Book I) as a Stoic philosopher, so also Solomon as a scholar of wide renown, wrote this remarkable treatise on the true values of life in order to persuade men to settle for nothing less than obedience to the revealed will of God. In order to illustrate his various points, he drew upon familiar experiences and vicissitudes common to the Near E in recent and contemporary history: the downfall of the rich and proud, the sudden elevation of the ignoble and lowly to positions of prominence and honor. It is quite pointless and futile to attempt to discover in these illustrations covert allusions to the national downfall of Judah in 587, the miseries of the Babylonian exile, or the penury that prevailed in the days of Ezra and Malachi. The author is dealing with the misfortunes and hardships that befall mankind generally as individuals rather than as nations. Sentiments such as, “Better than both is he who has not yet been, and has not seen the evil deeds that are done under the sun” (4:3) point to the injustice and calamity which all too often infects society and assaults its hapless victims at all periods in human history. Even though prosperity and peace prevailed during most of Solomon’s reign, his recollection of the harrowing experiences of his father during Absalom’s revolt, and his knowledge of the tides of invasion and bloodshed that had always characterized the history of the Near E, all served to give him a realistic understanding of the afflictions of mankind. Indeed it was these afflictions which posed the anguished questions of meaning and value without which the adventure of life made little sense. One concludes, then, that there is nothing in the sentiments expressed or the attitudes assumed in the text of Ecclesiastes to preclude Solomonic authorship. The so-called allusions to exilic and postexilic conditions are incapable of demonstration, nor are they at all inappropriate to a 10th cent. setting. Neither in this area nor in the linguistic phenomena of the book can a convincing case be made out for non-Solomonic authorship.
IV. The doctrinal message of Ecclesiastes
The basic theme of Qoheleth is the ultimate futility of a life based upon earthly ambitions and desires. Any world view which does not rise above the horizon of man himself is doomed to meaninglessness and frustration. To view personal happiness or enjoyment as life’s greatest good is sheer folly in view of the transcendent value of God Himself as over against His created universe. Happiness can never be achieved by pursuing after it, since such a pursuit involves the absurdity of self-deification. “...also, the hearts of men are full of evil, and madness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead” (9:3). The final judgment upon all self-seeking, autonomous human effort and pursuit after meaning and permanent achievement is: “Vanity of vanities” (i.e. complete futility), “This also is vanity.” Transient mortals must realize that they are mere creatures, and that they derive importance only from their relationship to the almighty Creator. “I know that whatever God does endures for ever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken away from it” (3:14). In other words Ecclesiastes is really intended to be a tract for the conversion of the self-sufficient intellectual; it compels him to discard his comfortable, self-flattering illusions and face honestly the instability of all those materialistic props on which he attempts to base his security. At the end of the road for the “hard-headed” materialist lies death and physical dissolution. Only as one finds a new meaning for life in surrendering to the sovereignty of God and faithful obedience to His will in moral conduct can one find a valid principle and goal for responsible human living. There may be many aspects of God’s will that man does not yet understand, nevertheless he must submit to it with unrebellious trust, and gratefully receive and enjoy the mercies of food and clo thing and material comforts as He may apportion them to us. “...also he has put eternity ('ôlām) into man’s mind, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. I know that there is nothing better for them than to be happy and enjoy themselves as long as they live; also that it is God’s gift to man that every one should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil” (3:11-13). It is from this perspective that the so-called “Epicurean” passages (like 2:24) are to be understood; they do not exalt mere hedonism to the status of absolute value (as some interpreters have imagined), but rather they exhort men to a wholehearted appreciation and enjoyment of God’s material bounties, even while they recognize them as possessing only temporal and conditional value.
As for the alleged pessimism of Qoheleth’s teaching, with its recurrent reminder of the inevitability and universality of death, these elements too must be interpreted in the light of the over-all purpose of the book, as defined above, and also in the light of the immediate context. Thus in the case of 4:2, “And I thought the dead who are already dead more fortunate than the living who are still alive,” this is no rejection of the worthwhileness of life as such. The preceding v. makes it clear that if a person’s life is to consist of nothing but oppression, calamity and sorrow, then it would have been better never to have been born at all. Or again, in 6:8 the query: “For what advantage has the wise man over the fool? And what does the poor man have who knows how to conduct himself before the living?” is to be put in focus with the main thrust of the book: apart from God and His holy will, the life of no man (whether educated or uneducated, rich or poor) has any ultimate meaning, but ends in futility. If a man’s relationship to the Lord is what it should be, then it will be well with him. “Though a sinner does evil a hundred times and prolongs his life, yet I know that it will be well with those who fear God” (8:12).
It should be added that the Preacher lays great stress upon the importance of this life as the only arena of opportunity and accomplishment for man before he steps off the stage into the eternity of the life beyond. From this standpoint it is true that “he who is joined with all the living has hope; for a living dog is better than a dead lion” (9:4). Also the following v. is no affirmation of soul-sleep (“the dead know not anything”) but rather a warning that the dead have no longer any expectation of a personal future with opportunities of choice for or against God, or between good and evil, such as they had prior to the grave. Nor do they have any knowledge of what goes on “under the sun,” i.e. upon earth, while they wait in Sheol for the day of judgment. (In Solomon’s time, of course, it was premature to reveal anything clear about the glories of heaven, since access to these glories for believers was largely delayed until the triumph of Christ’s resurrection.) All of these considerations then, are intended to point men away from the specious and pretended values of this life (personal enjoyment, happiness, success, or materialistic achievements) to the one true and abiding value, fellowship with God and living in obedience to His will. Plainly this is the conclusion to which the author wishes to drive his readers, for he ends with: “The conclusion, when all has been heard is: Fear God, and keep his commandments; for this is the whole duty of man” (12:13).
It is only by dint of deleting from the received text of Ecclesiastes the vv. which speak of obedience to God and trust in Him that rationalist critics are able to construe the book as a pessimistic manifesto of skepticism which somehow found its way into the OT canon despite its heresy. No plausible motivation can be made out for the reworking of an originally Bible-rejecting book in order to make it acceptable to the believing community through the insertion of occasional pious-sounding verses. Such a theory is totally without objective foundation, and a mere product of the inventive imagination of modern higher criticism.
V. Outline of the contents of the book
The book is composed of four main discourses and a conclusion.
Outline
VI. Final summation
Ecclesiastes presents itself as the matured and chastened wisdom of a king who has learned from experience the futility of living for any other purpose than the glory of God. He has come to realize what a poor bargain it is for a man to gain the whole world but to lose his own soul. He had been personally favored with unlimited wealth and power to test all that the world had to offer. He enjoyed the finest of education and an unrivaled reputation for wisdom (1:16). His riches were immeasurable (2:8); he was surrounded with hosts of servants (2:7); his opportunities for carnal pleasure knew no restriction (2:3); he could afford the most extensive building projects and look with pride on their accomplishment (2:4-6). Yet in the end these false avenues to life’s highest good led only to a vanished satisfaction and a sense of personal emptiness: all was “vanity,” futile meaninglessness. In the end this son of David was driven back to the lessons and insights of his early upbringing, and he had to recognize that only in God can a man find real significance and lasting satisfaction. It was therefore this legacy that Solomon wished to leave behind him for his willful, headstrong people, and also for all men of subsequent generations who earnestly search for life’s highest good. Paradoxically, it is not found in this life at all, but rather in God and the supernal realm of His perfect will.
Bibliography' The genuineness of Ecclesiastes as a work of Solomon is defended by W. T. Bullock in The Speaker’s Commentary, and by Dr. Charles Wordsworth (Archdeacon of Westminster), London (1868). So also the article by Gietmann in the Catholic Encyclopedia, V, 244-248. Taylor Lewis, the tr. of Zoeckler’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes in the Lange series, included his personal defense of Solomonic authorship and added comments of refutation in the commentary itself.
The following works, listed according to the order of their publication, hold to a postexilic date for Ecclesiastes:
O. Zoeckler, Commentary on Ecclesiastes in the Lange series, repr. (n.d.); A. L. Williams, Ecclesiastes (1922); Fr. Delitzsch, Commentary on Ecclesiastes, repr. (1950); H. L. Ginsberg, Studies in Koheleth (1950); R. Gordis, Koheleth: the Man and His World (1955); H. L. Ginsberg, “The Structure and Contents of the Book of Koheleth” (in Supplement to Vetus Testamentum, III [1955]), 138-149; O. S. Rankin and G. G. Atkins, “Ecclesiastes” in Interpreter’s Bible, V. (1956); E. W. Hengstenberg, Ecclesiastes, repr. (1960).