Ecclesiastes

Douglas Sean O’Donnell

• Publisher: P Publishing
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781629950211
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Commentary

Practical, biblical, redemptive-historical, expositional help with the unusual book of Ecclesiastes. O'Donnell shows that grateful obedience, steady contentment, and surprising joy are God's gifts to those trusting in him.

1

THE END OF ECCLESIASTES: AN INTRODUCTION

Ecclesiastes 1:1–2

The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity. (Eccl. 1:1–2)

How do we read the book of Ecclesiastes?

The first day of my Introduction to Philosophy class at Wheaton College, my professor, Dr. Mark Talbot, nonchalantly declared, “None of you know how to read.” The students, all of whom had scored well on exams in order to get into that college, had various expressions—from “how arrogant” to “I’m dropping this class”—written across their unimpressed faces. Yet most of us, by the end of the term, after we had read all the words, sentences, and paragraphs from classic books such as Plato’s Republic, Hume’s An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, and Augustine’s Confessions, confessed our inability to really read.

Ecclesiastes is a tough read.¹ You know it’s a tough read when books that are supposed to help you read it (commentaries) contain sentences such as: “This book is one of the more difficult books in all of Scripture, one which no one has ever completely mastered,”² and “Two thousand years of interpretation . . . have utterly failed to solve the enigma,”³ and (my favorite) “Ecclesiastes is a lot like an octopus: just when you think you have all the tentacles under control—that is, you have understood the book—there is one waving about in the air!”⁴ And so while I could start this commentary on Ecclesiastes by saying something bold such as “None of you knows how to read it,” instead I will start more modestly. I will safely assume that we all need some help, and thus begin at the beginning of wisdom: in awe of God and in need of his divine assistance.

As I have asked for God’s wisdom and with a prayerful and long-suffering attitude studied the book, and as I now seek to guide you in our understanding and application of it, I believe the best way to read Ecclesiastes is as (1) God’s wisdom literature (2) with a unified message (3) that makes better sense in light of the crucified, risen, and returning Christ.

GOD’S WISDOM LITERATURE

First, we must read Ecclesiastes as God’s wisdom literature. Note that the first word in that short summary is God’s. As Christians, we come to this book as believers who are convinced that Ecclesiastes, as peculiar and puzzling as it is at times, is rightly part of the canon of Scripture because it has been uniquely inspired by God.⁵ While it shares similarities with other wisdom literature of the world, including Jewish writings (e.g., Sirach and Wisdom of Solomon), it is unique among the wisdom books of the world in that it has Yahweh’s breath in and upon and around it. And because of this, it is living and active and can cut us to the core of who we are.

Second, it is wisdom literature. This is its genre. It is not an epistle (like Galatians), a lawbook (like Leviticus), or an apocalyptic revelation (like Revelation). And as a book of wisdom, it shares characteristics found in Proverbs, Job, and the Song of Songs. There is a plethora of poetry. There are piles of parallelisms (synonymous, antithetic, synthetic, and inverted), as well as many metaphors, similes, hyperboles, alliterations, assonances, and other wonderful wordplays. There might even be onomatopoeia. There are proverbs. There are short narratives with pointed, parable-like endings. There are practical admonitions. There are rhythmic-quality refrains. There are rhetorical questions. There are shared key terms, such as wisdom, folly, and my son. There are shared concepts, such as the fear of God. And as is true of much other biblical wisdom literature, it was written by or about or by and about Solomon, the Old Testament’s ultimate wisdom sage (1 Kings 4:29–34).⁶

In the Christian canon, the order of the wisdom books is Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs. Proverbs begins: “The proverbs of Solomon, son of David, king of Israel” (Prov. 1:1). Ecclesiastes is introduced with: “The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem” (Eccl. 1:1) = Solomon? The Song starts out: “The Song of Songs, which is Solomon’s” (Song 1:1). Regarding Ecclesiastes, because Solomon wrote wisdom literature and was literally a “son of David” as well as a “king in Jerusalem” (Eccl. 1:1; see also 1:12), commentators before the nineteenth century thought Solomon was the author. Yet for various reasons (many legitimate ones),⁷ most scholars today shy away from Solomonic authorship.⁸ They claim that Ecclesiastes might have been written about Solomon (a fictional autobiography)⁹ or in the tradition of Solomon, but probably not by Solomon.

Whatever the truth (who can know for certain and who doesn’t eventually get a headache arguing about authorship?), I will call “the Preacher” (as the ESV translates the Hebrew word Qoheleth) Solomon. I will call him Solomon because I’m not completely convinced by the consensus of modern scholarship,¹⁰ and also because I’m sentimental when it comes to the opinions of the ancient church. Plus, Solomon is simpler to say than Qoheleth.

In fact, simple, down-to-earth preacher that I am, I will call him not only Solomon but also Pastor Solomon. I add the title Pastor because of the book’s pastoral tone, motive, and message and also because the word Qoheleth is the Qal feminine singular participle of the verb qāhal, which means “to assemble.” This verb was used of Solomon when he assembled God’s people together for the temple consecration ceremony in 1 Kings 8:1 (cf. 2 Chron. 5:2). The implied setting for Solomon’s speech here—the body of the book of Ecclesiastes itself—is that of an assembly or a church (ekklesia is the New Testament word for church).¹¹ This is why Phil Ryken writes that Qoheleth or the Assembler is “not so much a teacher in a classroom but more like a pastor in a church. He is preaching wisdom to a gathering of the people of God.”¹² Precisely. So Pastor Solomon it is. But whoever the original author was (Pastor Solomon, King Qoheleth, Simon the Sage, Ephraim the Editor, or whatever we want to call him)—and whenever he wrote it (tenth century or third century B.C.)—his timeless message is what matters most. We turn to that message next.

A UNIFIED MESSAGE

The book of Ecclesiastes can be, and too often has been, read as a noninspired, postexilic Jewish wisdom book that is as unorthodox as it is disjointed. I hold that Ecclesiastes should not be read that way. I find it unlikely, as some estimate, that an editor got hold of the raw material of what we now call Ecclesiastes and tried to clean up the contradictions and clear up the confusions by adding a corrective verse here and there as well as tacking on an appropriate theological addendum at the end, and still in the end botched the whole project (i.e., that the canonical book remains slightly unorthodox and disjointed). Rather, the best way to read Ecclesiastes is as God’s wisdom literature with a unified message.¹³ For as we will see in our study of the whole book, there is persistent literary intention and a consistent theological argument to Ecclesiastes.

With that claim and clarification made, it is nevertheless true that if you look at all the separate parts of Ecclesiastes, the book is an enigma. It is confusing. What is meant by saying “the race is not to the swift” (Eccl. 9:11) or by the image “the grinders cease because they are few” (12:3)? Ecclesiastes is also filled with seeming contradictions. How does the maxim “For who knows what is good for man while he lives the few days of his vain life, which he passes like a shadow?” (6:12) fit with the refrainlike call to eat, drink, and find satisfaction in our work? And how does the observation “He who loves money will not be satisfied with money” (5:10) blend with the claim that “money answers everything” (10:19)? Ecclesiastes is like a thousand- piece puzzle taken from the box, thrown on the floor, and kicked around by the kids. But if you discipline the children (sit them in time-out or lock them in some “box of shame,” to quote from the marvelous movie Despicable Me), quiet the house and your heart, start to lift the scattered pieces from the ground, lay...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Series Introduction
• Preface
• 1. The End of Ecclesiastes: An Introduction (Ecclesiastes 1:1–2)
• 2. Why I Wake Early (Ecclesiastes 1:3–11)
• 3. A Crack in the Window of Wisdom (Ecclesiastes 1:12–18)
• 4. The Hollow House of Hedonism (Ecclesiastes 2:1–11)
• 5. Enjoyment East of Eden (Ecclesiastes 2:12–26)
• 6. The Terrific Truth about Time (Ecclesiastes 3:1–15)
• 7. Sights under the Sun (Ecclesiastes 3:16–22)
• 8. It Is Not Good for the Children of Man to Be Alone (Ecclesiastes 4:1–16)
• 9. Sandals Off, Mouth Shut (Ecclesiastes 5:1–7)
• 10. Grievous Evils, Great Joys (Ecclesiastes 5:8–6:9)
• 11. Instructions from the Grave (Ecclesiastes 6:10–7:14)
• 12. Finding the Fear of God in a Crooked World (Ecclesiastes 7:15–29)
• 13. Living within the Limits to the Limit (Ecclesiastes 8:1–15)
• 14. What to Know about Knowing Nothing (Ecclesiastes 8:16–9:12)
• 15. Dead Flies, a Serpent’s Bite, and Twitter (Ecclesiastes 9:13–10:20)
• 16. Before the Evil Days Come (Ecclesiastes 11:1–12:8)
• 17. Repining Restlessness (Ecclesiastes 12:9–14)
• Select Bibliography
• Index of Scripture
• Index of Subjects and Names