Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries

Eric S. Christianson

• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9780470674918, 9780631225294
• eBook ISBN: 9781118234976
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries

"A rich tour down many significant streams of Western interpretation of this fascinating biblical book… Heartily recommended, without reservation."
Bible and Critical Theory

"A fundamental resource on biblical interpretation, especially in the modern world, this book is a winner."
International Review of Biblical Studies

"The introduction and commentary proper cover many topics, from patristic and rabbinic exegesis through to modern science-fiction, with numerous stops on the way… Very well written and accessible…an excellent book."
Society for Old Testament Study Book List

Over the centuries, Ecclesiastes has influenced numerous aspects of life and thought. Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries assesses the diverse effects of the book on culture in religion, art, and social contexts.

Ecclesiastes shaped the life of European abbeys of the middle ages. For Renaissance thinkers, it provided a sceptical line of inquiry weighted with the disquieting authority of Scripture. It has inspired the imaginations of artists, musicians, and poets from the Renaissance to the present day. The influence of Ecclesiastes on literature has engaged authors as diverse as Bacon, Donne, Eliot, Hardy, Melville, and numerous Elizabethan poets. This commentary traces these influences as well as the fascinating range of Jewish and Christian readings. The result is an informative and broad-ranging approach to the impact of this book through the centuries that will engage all those studying the Bible.

For further information about the Blackwell Bible Commentaries please visit www.bbibcomm.net.

Ecclesiastes 1

In this tightly organized opening our protagonist is introduced by the frame narrator (who appears again in 7:27 and 12:8–14) ‘Qoheleth, son of David’ (1:1). As he is to many simultaneously joyful and miserable, so he is both Solomon and not Solomon, and the playful ascription has cast a peculiar shadow over legion readings. Here also begins his momentous theme of hebel (1:2 et passim), a word variously translated (e.g. ‘vanity’, ‘futility’, ‘absurdity’), which if nothing else signifies a gaping negation. In the experiences Qoheleth will go on to relate, hebel comes to represent the defiance of all reasonable expectation about the world. This is the ‘raw material’ for the most voluminous theme in Ecclesiastes’ reception history, the refutation and contempt of the vanity of the world. My discussion of these two tremendously important topoi of reading is undertaken in the first two sections that follow.

The remaining portion of the first chapter (which will be taken up in a third, distinct section) begins with a programmatic, rhetorical question about the profit of human endeavour (1:3). This is followed by a brief poem on the circuitous behaviour of the sun, wind and sea (the earth is the only thing that stands still here – v. 4; cf. 3:11), with reflections that seem to beg comparison to human experience (4, 8–11). Qoheleth then undertakes his quest proper to examine what God has done, and indirectly how that activity impacts humanity (12–18). The theme of hebel courses all through this passage, even when the word does not appear. It is also here coupled with the ‘pursuit of wind’ (14), and in the pages that remain nothing now seems certain except instability and uncertainty itself. It is full of the frustratingly unchangeable – what has been, what will be – the irredeemably crooked and the forever forgotten (8–11, 15). And here the Preacher’s infeasible credentials are placed on show – a man who is full-to-bursting with life experience and has become more wise than all the sages who preceded him (12, 16). This is neatly coupled to Qoheleth’s persuasive and biblically unique epistemological style: ‘And so I found . . .’ (14 et passim) – a style that indelibly stamps the whole book.

This brief and memorable overture expresses futility, sorrow and vexation, but it is also undergirded by the diamond-hard intransigence of Qoheleth’s desire to understand, to apply his mind to know, even if that knowledge is folly itself, even if in the end it will only bring misery. Already the reader is witness to Qoheleth’s peculiar wizardry, his compelling ability to bring into habitation what should not dwell together (wisdom and sorrow), making them disappear and reappear without apology or condition.

Before addressing the two ‘momentous themes’ of vanitas and Solomon, John Trapp, ‘M.A. Pastour of Weston upon Avon in Glocester shire’, in his A Commentary or Exposition upon Ecclesiastes, or The Preacher (1650) offers a suitable note of fanfare to introduce ‘The words of Qoheleth’:

The words. Golden words, waighty and worthy of all acceptation, grave and gracious Apophthegmes, or rather Oracles, meet to be well remembered: Solomon’s Sapientall Sermon of the Soveraigne good, and how to attain to it; Solomon’s Soliloquie, so some style it; others, his Sacred Retractions; others, his Ethicks, or Tractate de Summo Bono [marg. reads ‘[John] Serranus’], of the chiefest good, compiled and composed with such a picked frame of words, with such pithy strength of sentences, with such a thick series of demonstrative arguments, that the sharp wit of all the Philosophers compared with this Divine discourse, seems to be utterly cold, and of small account; their elaborate Treatises of Happinesse to be learned dotages, and laborious losse of time. (1650:1–2; in fact, most of the second half of this sentence is derived from the Preface to Serranus 1587)

The Life and Death of Solomon the Author: 1:1 et passim

A. ALIVE AND WELL IN PRE-MODERNITY (–1500)

Of course, the first verse of chapter 1 provides the ‘raw materials’ for the premise of Solomonic authorship. It is notable, however, that even Qoheleth’s first interpreters, the Septuagint translators, who had opportunity to mask the authorial ambiguity to a non-Hebrew-reading public, resisted a clear ascription to Solomon by rendering the first verse as ‘The words of Ecclesiastes’ (‘rēmata ’Ekklēsiastou) and not ‘of Solomon’ (on the tenor and style of the Septuagint’s rendering of Ecclesiastes, see Fox 1999: 349). This may be understood in part by an early strand of rabbinic tradition reluctant to acknowledge the inspiration of Solomon in the composition of Ecclesiastes (and, at the time, the Song of Songs; Halperin 1982: 277).

It is widely held that Ecclesiastes was received into the Jewish canon due mainly to its association with Solomon (e.g. Holm-Nielsen 1976: 55; Salters 1974–5: 340–2; Whybray 1989: 3). ¹ Debate about the book in general was abundant, with Ecclesiastes and Esther most frequently coming under the erratic microscope of the rabbis. The real issues of those discussions are, however, not always easy to determine (see Christianson 1998a: 148–9). Rather obliquely, discussions gave great weight to a book’s ability to ‘defile the hands’ (see Leiman 1976: 104–20), or to its inspirational status in general (e.g. b. Yadayim 2:14; see below). Take, for example, the following (b. Yadayim 3:5): ‘All the holy writings defile the hands. The Song of Songs defiles the hands, but there is a dispute about Ecclesiastes. R. Jose says: Ecclesiastes does not defile the hands, but there is a dispute about the Song of Songs’ (also see b. Yadayim 2:14; b. ‘Eduyyoth 5:3; b. Megillah 7a; Midrash Leviticus 28.1). B. Megillah 7a is similar: as learned ‘Rabbi Shimon ben Mennasiah states: Ecclesiastes does not defile the hands since it is the wisdom of Solomon.’ Ultimately, defilement of the hands was probably about the degree of ritual effect a book could muster, and may even have been a roundabout measure to keep scrolls from being stored with sacred food, thus leading to mice and rats (see Broyde 1995: 66).

As Leiman suggests, discussions traditionally ascribed to the Council of Jamnia (c.100 CE) report that Ecclesiastes was in danger of being gnz (‘stored away’) since it fostered heretical ideas. But the reported debate probably served to confirm its canonical status early on, since only problematic canonical books were at risk of being ‘stored away’ (so Leiman 1976: 79–80, 86, 104–9). In this respect the Solomonic connection faded to the background. In none of the discussions at Jamnia was Solomonic authorship even mentioned, and in the end no books discussed at Jamnia were withdrawn from canonical use anyway (see Beckwith 1985: 276–7). Contrary to several studies, Ecclesiastes was spared gnz, but not because of any association with Solomon (see Christianson 1998a: 150 n. 75).

¹ Some of what follows on Solomonic authorship is adapted from Christianson 1998a: 148–54, 165–71.

In an infamous dispute about Ecclesiastes between the Shammaites and the school of Hillel, Solomonic authorship was not mentioned (see above; b. Yadayim 3:5; b. Eduyyoth 5:3). Indeed, reference to Solomon may not have been effectual anyway, as the early third-century ce tradition of R. Simeon ben Menasya suggests:

The Song of songs defiles the hands, because it was spoken through Divine inspiration; Ecclesiastes does not defile the hands, because it is [only] Solomon’s wisdom. They replied: Did he write this alone? Scripture says, ‘He spoke three thousand parables, and his songs were a thousand and five’ (1 Kgs 5:12), and ‘Do not add to [God’s] words, lest He rebuke you and you be found a liar’ (Prov. 30:6). (b. Yadayim 2:14, with variations; b. Megillah 7a; tr. by Halperin, 1982: 277)

Compare Jerome, who in his commentary (388/9), steeped in rabbinic tradition, on 12:13–14 states that

The Hebrews say that although [Ecclesiastes] used to be among other writings of Solomon in the past, they have not persisted in memory; and this book seems as if it ought to have been omitted [oblitterandus], because it asserts that all God’s creations are vain and that he thinks everything is done for nothing, and he prefers food and drink and transient pleasures to all things; thus he takes his authority from this one title [Solomon?], so it is now included in the number of divine books, because he argues well and lists many things . . . and he said that his speeches are the easiest to hear, and to understand. (2000: ad loc.)

In other words, what really matters about this extraordinary little scroll is that, Solomon or no, it is ‘argued well’ and that the words bring pleasure to the ear. The significance of Solomon as author will grow almost grotesquely out of proportion before it returns to this meagre size again.

Often debates focused on some of the acknowledged contradictions of the book (even the ‘defiling of hands’ debate may have had this problem at its centre). Midrash Qoheleth 11.9 records what was perhaps the most serious of debates on Ecclesiastes:

The Sages sought to suppress the Book of Koheleth because they discovered therein words which tend toward heresy. They declared, ‘This is the wisdom of Solomon that he said, “Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth!” ’ (Eccl. 11:9). Now Moses said, that ye go not about after your own heart (Num. 15:39) . . . Is restraint to be abolished? Is there no judgement and no Judge? But since he continued, ‘But know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgement’, they exclaimed, ‘Well has Solomon spoken.’

The first tractate of the Mishnah states the case in general terms. R. Tanhum of Nave says, ‘O Solomon, where is your wisdom, where is your intelligence? Not only do your words contradict the words of your father, David, they even contradict themselves’ (in b. Shabbath 3). Many of the ancient readers are concerned with content and do not seem to be bothered with the much asked modern question, Why is Ecclesiastes in the canon? (See Christianson 1998a: 153–4 for an overview of some modern attempts to answer it.) And traditionally the question, Why Solomon?, has been answered with the question, Who else but Solomon could have spoken with such vehement denunciation on the vanity of riches, wealth and even human existence? As R. Eleazar is reputed to have so aptly noted, ‘but for Solomon . . . I might have said that this man who had never owned two farthings in his life makes light of the wealth of the world and declares, “Vanity of vanities” ’ (Midrash Qoheleth 3.11.1; cf. Midrash Deuteronomy 1.5). Such a view is articulated in the Christian tradition as well. For example, Bonaventure in the Introduction to his commentary (1253–7) notes that

a poor person with no possessions would not be believed about despising riches since that person has no experience and therefore knows nothing. So the author of this book had to be a person with experience of all these things, that is, a person who was powerful, rich, voluptuous, and curious or wise. We have not read or heard of anyone who so excelled in all these as Solomon. (2005: 76)

The most substantial biblical narrative about the eventual dispersal of Solomon’s kingdom (1 Kgs 11:9–40) is sparse, even ambiguous, and this particular ambiguity may have been the impetus for a number of legends about Solomon (Holm-Nielsen 1976: 71). In those books attributed to him (including Ecclesiastes) early Jewish tradition sometimes made attempts to understand the particular circumstances of Solomon’s writing. The most fascinating example is that of Solomon and the demon Asmodai. According to Ginzberg’s rendering of the legend, which is known among the talmudim and probably predates them (see Knobel 1991: 22–3), when Solomon gained too many wives for himself and desired too many horses and too much gold, the Book of Deuteronomy (i.e. the Law) stepped before the Lord and requested that Solomon be chastis...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Praise for Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries
• Series page
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Dedication page
• Series Editor’s Preface
• Preface
• Preface to the Paperback Edition
• Testimonia
• Introduction
• Ecclesiastes 1:
• Ecclesiastes 2:
• Ecclesiastes 3:1–8
• Ecclesiastes 3:9–6:12
• Ecclesiastes 7–8
• Ecclesiastes 9:1–12:
• Ecclesiastes 9:13–11:10
• Ecclesiastes 12:1–7
• Ecclesiastes 12:8–14
• A Hermeneutical Postscript
• Bibliography
• Appendix – The Quotable Qoheleth: Ecclesiastes in Popular Discourse
• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgements
• Name Index
• Subject Index