PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
Expositor's Bible: The Book of Ecclesiastes
Cox, Samuel · 82,291 words · 109 reading sections
Preface.
Produced by Marcia Brooks, Colin Bell, Julia Neufeld and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) Transcriber's note: Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). Small capital …
668 wordsSECTION 2Preface.
Another and much more important result of these subsequent studies has been that I can now speak with a more assured confidence of the theme of this Scripture, and of its handling by the Author. None of the scholars who have recently commented on the Book doubt that it _is_ the quest of the chief good which it sets for…
431 wordsSECTION 3Application 165-186
§ 1. _On the Authorship, Form, Design, and Contents of the Book_ 3-32 § 2. _On the History of the Captivity_ 32-66 (1) The Babylonian Period 38-43 (2) The Persian Period 43-66 § 1. _The Prologue_ 69-70 § 2. _The First Section_: or, The Quest of the Chief Good in Wisdom and in Pleasure 71-76 § 3. _The Second Se…
527 wordsSECTION 4§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
(A) _The Quest in Wealth_ 212-218 (_a_) The Man who makes Riches his Chief Good is haunted by Fears and Perplexities 213, 214 (_b_) Much that he gains only feeds Vanity 214, 215 (_c_) He cannot tell what it will be Good for him to have; 215 (_d_) Nor foresee what will become of his Gains: 215, 216 (_e_) And be…
783 wordsSECTION 5§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
When scholars and "philosophers" have fallen into a mistake so radical and profound, it is not surprising that the unlettered should have followed their leaders into the ditch, and taken this Scripture to be the most melancholy in the Sacred Canon, instead of one of the most consolatory and inspiriting, for want of app…
755 wordsSECTION 6§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
To scholars versed in the niceties of the Oriental languages, the most convincing proof of the comparatively modern date and authorship of the Book is to be found in its words, and idioms, and style. The base forms of Hebrew and the large intermixture of foreign terms, phrases, and turns of speech which characterize it…
940 wordsSECTION 7§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
Nothing would be more difficult than to accept this as a picture of the social and political features of the Hebrew commonwealth during the reign of Solomon, or even during those later years of his reign in which his rule grew hard and despotic. Nothing can well be more incredible than that this should be intended as a…
1,091 wordsSECTION 8§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
[4] Plumptre writes the word Koheleth, and Perowne Quoheleth. Which of the three initial letters should be used is of little consequence, and hence I retain the form in most common use. _Ecclesiastes_ is simply its Greek equivalent. In the Epilogue (xii. 9-12) the Author of the Book lifts the dramatic mask from his…
746 wordsSECTION 9§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
[6] Solomon could not have been more than sixty years of age when he died, yet it was not till he was "_old_" that his wives "turned away his heart from the Lord his God" (1 Kings xi. 4). On the whole, then, we conclude that in this Book Solomon is taken as the Hebrew type of wisdom, the wisdom which is based on lar…
920 wordsSECTION 10§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
[8] The nearest analogy in English literature to this triumphant use of the proverb of which I can think is Pope's use of the couplet--in every way a much lesser feat, however; while its burlesque or caricature may be found in Tupper's _Proverbial Philosophy_. [9] In the Book of Proverbs, for instance, he would fin…
821 wordsSECTION 11§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
In all this I have said nothing, it is true, of that "inspiration of the Almighty" which alone gives man understanding of spiritual things. But why should not "He who worketh all," and has deigned to use every form of literary art by which men teach their fellows, move and inspire a lover of wisdom to collect and arran…
666 wordsSECTION 12§ 1. _On The Authorship, Form, Design, And Contents Of The Book._
* * * * * It was very natural that the Problem here discussed should fill a large space in Hebrew thought and literature; that it should be the theme of many of the Psalms and of many of the prophetic "burdens", as well as of the Books Ecclesiastes and Job. For the Mosaic revelation did teach that virtue and vice woul…
721 wordsSECTION 13§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
"It is all one--therefore will I say it, The guilty and the guiltless He treateth alike; The deceiver and the deceived both are his;" or we say with the Preacher,-- "This is the greatest evil of all that is done under the sun That there is one fate for all; The same fate befalleth to the righteous and to the wick…
722 wordsSECTION 14§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
Happily, a brief sketch of it, such as is well within any man's reach, will suffice to show how, from their contact with the Babylonian and Persian races, the Jews received literary and religious impulses which go far to account for the marvellous changes which swept over them, and enable us to read the Preacher intell…
674 wordsSECTION 15§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
But who were the people, and what were the social and political conditions of the people, among whom the Hebrew captives lived? The two leading races with whom they were brought in contact were the Babylonians--an offshoot from the ancient Chaldean stock--and the Persians. The history of the Captivity divides itself in…
815 wordsSECTION 16§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
[12] There is a curious allusion to these enamelled bricks, and the admiration the Jews conceived for them, in Ezekiel xxiii. 14-16. But a larger, and probably the largest, class of the people must have busied themselves with the toils of agriculture; the broad Chaldean plain being famous, from the time of the Patria…
829 wordsSECTION 17§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
Cyrus was sixty years of age when he took Babylon (B.C. 539), and died ten years after his conquest. He was succeeded by men utterly unlike himself, so unlike that the Persian nobles revolted from them, and placed Darius Hystaspes, the heir of an ancient dynasty, on the throne. As Cyrus was the soldier of the Persians,…
839 wordsSECTION 18§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
[14] _Herodotus_, ix. 62. [15] Æschyl., _Pers._, 94. Despising trade and commerce as menial and degrading, the ruling caste of a vast empire, with a monopoly of office and boundless means of wealth at their command, accustomed to lord it over subject races, of a high spirit and a faith comparatively pure, their very …
895 wordsSECTION 19§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
The Book is full of allusions to the Persian luxury, to the Persian forms of administration, above all, to the corruptions of the later years of the Persian empire, and the miseries they bred. Coheleth's elaborate description (ii. 4-8) of the infinite variety of means by which he sought to allure his heart unto mirth--…
668 wordsSECTION 20§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
"I am bowed down and brought very low; I go mourning all the day long: Truly I am nigh unto falling, And my heaviness is ever before me" (xxxviii.). "My days consume away like smoke, And my bones are burned up like as a firebrand; My heart is smitten down and withered like grass, So that I forget to eat my bread…
651 wordsSECTION 21§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
To win the favour of the God of heaven it was requisite to cultivate the virtues of purity, truthfulness, industry, and a pious sense of the Divine presence; and these virtues must spring from the heart, and cover thought as well as word and deed. His worship consisted in the frequent offering of prayer, praise, and th…
668 wordsSECTION 22§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
To which, as choral responses, might be added, "Let him depart to those for whom flow the rivers of nectar. Let him depart to those who through meditation have obtained the victory, who by fixing their thoughts on the unseen have gone to heaven.... Let him depart to the mighty in battle, to the heroes who have laid…
671 wordsSECTION 23§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
Nevertheless, we must remember that, even at their worst, the Persians preserved the sacred records of their earlier faith, and that their best men steadily refused to accept the base additions to it which the Magians proposed. Corrupt as in many respects many of them became, the conquest of Babylon was the death-blow …
667 wordsSECTION 24§ 2. _On The History Of The Captivity._
Now this, as we shall see, is the very moral of the Book Ecclesiastes, the triumphant climax to which it mounts. The endeavour of Coheleth is to show how evil and good were blended in the human lot, evil so largely preponderating in the lot of many of the good as to make life a curse unless it were sustained by hope; t…
383 wordsSECTION 25_In Which The Problem Of The Book Is Indirectly Stated._
CHAP. I., vv. 1-11. 1 The words of the Preacher, son of David, king in Jerusalem. 2 Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher; Vanity of vanities, all is vanity, 3 Since man hath no profit from all his labour Which he laboureth under the sun![23] [23] Just as we speak of this "sublunary world," so "under the sun" is…
258 wordsSECTION 26_The Quest Of The Chief Good In Wisdom And In Pleasure._
CHAP. I., v. 12, to CHAP. II., v. 26. [Sidenote: _The Quest in Wisdom._ Ch. i., vv. 12-18.] 12 I, the Preacher, was King over Israel, in Jerusalem: 13 And I applied my heart to survey and search by wisdom Into all that is done under heaven: This sore task hath God given to the children of men, To exercise themsel…
686 wordsSECTION 27_The Quest Of The Chief Good In Wisdom And In Pleasure._
* * * * * [Sidenote: _Wisdom and Pleasure compared._ Ch. ii., vv. 12-23.] 12 Then I turned to compare wisdom with madness and folly-- And what can he do that cometh after the king Whom they made king long ago?-- 13 And I saw that wisdom excelleth folly As far as light excelleth darkness: 14 The wise man's eyes a…
450 wordsSECTION 28_The Quest Of The Chief Good In Devotion To The Affairs Of Business._
CHAP. III., v. 1, to CHAP. V., v. 20. [Sidenote: _The Quest obstructed by Divine Ordinances_; Ch. iii., vv. 1-15.] 1 There is a time for all things, And a season for every undertaking under heaven: 2 A time to be born, and a time to die; A time to plant, and a time to pluck up plants; 3 A time to kill, and a time…
662 wordsSECTION 29_The Quest Of The Chief Good In Devotion To The Affairs Of Business._
2 And I accounted the dead who died long ago Happier than the living who are still alive; 3 While happier than either is he who hath not been born, Who hath not seen the evil which is done under the sun. [Sidenote: _It is rendered hopeless by the base Origin of Human Industries._ Ch. iv., vv. 4-8.] 4 Then too I sa…
677 wordsSECTION 30_The Quest Of The Chief Good In Devotion To The Affairs Of Business._
9 And the advantage for the people is, that it extendeth to all, For even the king is servant to the field. VER. 9. Some commentators prefer another possible reading of this difficult verse: _But the profit of a land is every way a king devoted to the field, i.e._ a lover and promoter of good husbandry. This readi…
398 wordsSECTION 31Chaps. Vi., Ver. 1, To Viii., Ver. 15.
[Sidenote: _The Quest in Wealth. He who makes Riches his Chief Good is haunted by Fears and Perplexities_: Ch. vi., vv. 1-6.] 1 There is another evil which I have seen under the sun, And it weigheth heavily upon men: 2 Here is a man to whom God hath given riches and wealth and abundance, So that his soul lacketh no…
656 wordsSECTION 32Chaps. Vi., Ver. 1, To Viii., Ver. 15.
7 Wrong-doing maketh the wise man mad, As a bribe corrupteth the heart. 8 The end of a reproof is better than its beginning, And patience is better than pride; 9 Therefore hurry not on thy spirit to be angry: For anger is nursed in the bosom of fools. 10 Say not, "How is it that former days were better than these…
653 wordsSECTION 33Chaps. Vi., Ver. 1, To Viii., Ver. 15.
26 And I found woman more bitter than death; She is a net; Her heart is a snare, and her hands are chains: Whoso is good before God shall escape her, But the sinner shall be taken by her. 27 Behold, what I have found, saith the Preacher-- Taking things one by one to reach the result-- 28 I have found one man amo…
651 wordsSECTION 34Chap. Viii., Ver. 16, To Chap. Xii., Ver. 7.
13 And it shall not be well with the wicked, But, like a shadow, he shall not prolong his days, Because he doth not fear before God. [Sidenote: _Therefore the Preacher condemns this View of Human Life._] 14 Nevertheless, this vanity doth happen on the earth, That there are righteous men who have a wage like that o…
654 wordsSECTION 35Chap. Viii., Ver. 16, To Chap. Xii., Ver. 7.
4 For who is exempted? To all the living there is hope, For a living dog is better than a dead lion; 5 For the living know that they shall die, But the dead know not anything; And there is no more any compensation to them, For the very memory of them is gone: 6 Their love, too, no less than their hatred and riva…
666 wordsSECTION 36Chap. Viii., Ver. 16, To Chap. Xii., Ver. 7.
5 There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, An outrage which only a ruler can commit: 6 A great fool is lifted to high place, While the noble sit degraded: 7 I have seen servants upon horses, And masters walking like servants on the ground. VER. 7.: To ride upon a horse is still a mark of distinction in …
663 wordsSECTION 37Chap. Viii., Ver. 16, To Chap. Xii., Ver. 7.
19 They turn bread, and wine, which cheereth life, into revelry; And money has to pay for all. 20 Nevertheless revile not the king even in thy thoughts, Nor a prince even in thy bed-chamber, Lest the bird of the air carry the report, And the winged tribes tell the story. * * * * * [Sidenote: _But in a wise Use a…
705 wordsSECTION 38Chap. Xii., Vv. 8-14.
6 Before the silver cord snappeth asunder, And the golden bowl escapeth; Before the pitcher be shattered at the fountain, And the wheel is broken at the well; 7 And the body is cast into the earth from which it came, And the spirit returneth to God who gave it. 8 Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, All is va…
297 wordsSECTION 39Chap. I., Vv. 1-11.
The search for the _summum bonum_, the quest of the Chief Good, is the theme of the Book Ecclesiastes. Naturally we look to find this theme, problem, this "riddle of the painful earth," distinctly stated in the opening verses of the Book. It is stated, but not distinctly. For the Book is an autobiographical poem, the j…
813 wordsSECTION 40Chap. I., Vv. 1-11.
This painful contrast between the ordered stability of nature and the changeful and profitless disorder of human life is emphasized by a detailed reference to the large natural forces which rule the world, and which abide unchanged, although to us they seem the very types of change. The figure of ver. 5 is, of course, …
714 wordsSECTION 41Chap. I., Vv. 1-11.
[26] So Marcus Aurelius (_Meditt._, xi. 1): "They that come after us will see nothing new; and they who went before saw nothing more than we have seen." Yet this is not the only, not the inevitable, mood of the mind as it ponders that great contrast. _We_ have learned to look upon it with other, perhaps with wider, …
762 wordsSECTION 42Chap. I., Vv. 1-11.
Solomon, moreover,--and Solomon in his premature old age, sated and weary, is the mask under which the Preacher conceals his natural face,--had had a large experience of life, had tried its ambitions, its lusts, its pursuits and pleasures; he had tested every promise of good which it held forth, and found them all illu…
708 wordsSECTION 43Chap. I., Vv. 1-11.
Again I say all depends on the heart we turn to nature. It was because his heart was heavy with the memory of many sins and many failures, because too the lofty Christian hopes were beyond his reach, that this "son of David" grew mournful and bitter in her presence. This, then, is the mood in which the Preacher commen…
281 wordsSECTION 44Chap. I., Ver. 12, To Chap. Ii., Ver. 26.
Oppressed by his profound sense of the vanity of the life which man lives amid the play of permanent natural forces, Coheleth sets out on the search for that true and supreme Good which it will be well for the sons of men to pursue through their brief day; the good which will sustain them under all their toils, and be …
747 wordsSECTION 45Chap. I., Ver. 12, To Chap. Ii., Ver. 26.
And, apart from the special wrongs and oppressions of the time, it is inevitable that the thoughtful student of men and manners should become a sadder as he becomes a wiser man. To multiply knowledge, at least of this kind, _is_ to multiply sorrow. We need not be cynics and leave our tub only to reflect on the dishones…
676 wordsSECTION 46Chap. I., Ver. 12, To Chap. Ii., Ver. 26.
Alas, if we think to find the true Good in a wide and varied knowledge of the conditions of men, their hopes and fears, their struggles and successes, their loves and hates, their rights and wrongs, their pleasures and their pains, we shall but share the defeat of the Preacher, and repeat his bitter cry, "Vanity of van…
734 wordsSECTION 47Chap. I., Ver. 12, To Chap. Ii., Ver. 26.
[29] "One such pleasaunce as this there was at Etam, Solomon's Belvedere, as Josephus informs us (_Antiq._, VIII. 7, 3). Thither it was the custom of the king, he says, to resort when he made his morning excursions from the city, clad in a white garment, and driving his chariot, surrounded by his body-guard of youn…
890 wordsSECTION 48Chap. I., Ver. 12, To Chap. Ii., Ver. 26.
Therefore wisdom is better than mirth. Nevertheless it is not best, nor can it remove the dejections of a thoughtful heart. Somewhere there is, there must be, that which is better still. For wisdom cannot explain to him why the same fate should befall both the sage and the fool (ver. 15), nor can it abate the anger tha…
749 wordsSECTION 49Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
I. If the true Good is not to be found in the School where Wisdom utters her voice, nor in the Garden in which Pleasure spreads her lures: may it not be found in the Market, in devotion to Business and Public Affairs? The Preacher will try this experiment also. He gives himself to study and consider it. But at the very…
867 wordsSECTION 50Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
* * * * * [Sidenote: _And by Human Injustice and Perversity._ Ch. iii., v. 16.-Ch. iv., v. 3.] But not only are our endeavours to find the "good" of our labours thwarted by the gracious, inflexible laws of the just God; they are often baffled by the injustice of ungracious men. In the days of Coheleth, Iniquity sat i…
713 wordsSECTION 51Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
Thus, after rising in the first fifteen verses of this Third Chapter, to an almost Christian height of patience, and resignation, and holy trust in the providence of God, Coheleth is smitten by the injustice and oppressions of man into the depths of a pessimistic materialism. * * * * * But now a new question arises. …
745 wordsSECTION 52Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
[34] So in Sophocles (_Oed. Col._, 1225) we read--I quote from Dean Plumptre's translation: "Never to be at all Excels all fame; Quickly, next best, to pass From whence we came." [Sidenote: _It is rendered hopeless by the base origin of Human Industries._ Ch. iv., vv. 4-8.] This stinging sense of the miserable e…
1,009 wordsSECTION 53Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
But in the fifth and most elaborate illustration (vv. 13, 14), we are once more carried back to the East. The slightest acquaintance with Oriental history will teach us how uncertain is the tenure of royal power; how often it has happened that a prisoner has been led from a dungeon to a throne, and a prince suddenly de…
724 wordsSECTION 54Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
* * * * * [Sidenote: _So also a happier and more effective Method of Worship is open to Men_; Ch. v., vv. 1-7.] The men of affairs are led from the vocations of the Market and the intrigues of the Divan into the House of God. Our first glance at the worshippers is not hopeful or inspiriting. For here are men who offe…
693 wordsSECTION 55Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
[Sidenote: _And a more helpful and consolatory Trust in the Divine Providence._ Ch. v., vv. 8-17.] Not content with this, however, the Preacher goes on to show how, when they returned from the House of God to the common round of life, and were once more exposed to its miseries and distractions, there were certain comf…
804 wordsSECTION 56Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
[35] Ginsburg quotes a capital illustration of this verse from the dialogue of Pheraulas and Sacian (Xenophon, _Cyrop._, viii. 3); "Do you think, Sacian, that I live with more pleasure the more I possess?... By having this abundance I gain merely this, that I have to guard more, to distribute to others, and have th…
898 wordsSECTION 57Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
Throughout this second section of the Book, his subject is excessive devotion to Business, and the correctives to it which his experience enables him to suggest. 1. His handling of the subject is very thorough and complete. Men of business might do worse than get the lessons he here teaches by heart. According to him,…
948 wordsSECTION 58Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
[Sidenote: _To produce a Materialistic Scepticism_; Ch. iii., vv. 18-21.] (_c_) The "speculation" in the eye of business men is not commonly of a philosophic cast, and therefore we do not look to find them _arguing_ themselves into the materialism which infected the Hebrew Preacher as he contemplated them and their bl…
806 wordsSECTION 59Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
What is it that makes their worship formal and insincere? It is the very cause which, as the Preacher tells us, produced the like evil effect upon the Jews. They come into the Temple with pre-occupied hearts. Their thoughts are distracted by the cares of life even as they bend in worship. And hence even the most sacred…
650 wordsSECTION 60Chap. Iii., Ver. 1, To Chap. V., Ver. 20.
And the other adds-- "My wind, cooling my broth, Would blow me to an ague, when I thought What harm a wind too great at sea might do. I should not see the sandy hour-glass run, But I should think of shallows and of flats, And see my wealthy Andrew, dock'd in sand, Vailing her high-top lower than her ribs To kis…
705 wordsSource & rights
Public domain in the USA; original historical text digitized by Project Gutenberg.
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Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.