The Pulpit Commentary — Ecclesiastes — Section 89

I. THE PllOFOUND PRODLEM, The moral disorder of the universe. "I saw under the sun in the place of judgment t?at wickedness was there, and in the place of righteousness that wickedness was there ' (ver. 16). 1. The strange spectacle. What fascinated the Preacher's gaze and perplexed the Preacher's heart was not so much the existence as the triumph of sin-the fact that sin existed where and as it did. Had he always beheld sin in its naked deformity, essential loathsomeness, and abject baseness, receivincr the due reward of its misdeeds, trembling as a culprit before the bar of providentiJ judgment, and suffering the punishment its criminality merited, the mystery and perplexity would most likely have been reduced by half. What, however, be did witness was iniquity, not trembling but triumphing, not sorrowing but sin"in", not suffering the due recompense of her own evil deeds but snatching off the rew~rd; and prizes that belonged to virtue. In short, what he perceived was the complete moral disorder of the world-as it were society turned topsy-turvy; the wicked up and the righteous down; bad men exalted and good men despised; vice arrayed in silks and bedizened with jewels, and virtue only half covered with tattered rags. 2. Two par- ticular sights. (1) Iniquity usurping the place of judgment; thrusting itself into the very council-cham hers where right and justice should prevail; now as a judge who deliberately holds the scales uneven because the one litigant is rich and the other poor, anon as an advocate who employs all bis ingenuity to defend a prisoner whom he knows to be guilty, and again as a witness who hos accepted a bribe and calmly swears to a lie. (2) Iniquity preoccupying the place of righteousness; i.e. the tribunal, whether secular or ecclesiastical, whose efforts should be all directed to finding out and maintain- ing the cause of righteousness. II. '£HE PERPLEXING MYSTERY. "I said in mine heart" (ver. 17). The Preacher was troubled about it, as David (Pa. xxxvii. 1, 7), Job (xxi. 7), .Asaph (Ps. lxxiii. 3), and Jeremiah (xii. 1) had been. To him, as to them, it was an enigma. But why should it have been? 1. On one hypothesis it is no enigma. On the supposition that God, duty, and immortality are non-existent, it is not a mystery at all that vice should prevail and virtue have a poor time of it so long as it remains above ground, for (on the hypothesis) fleeing to a better country beyond the skies is out of the ques- tion. '£he mystery would be that it were otherwise. 2. On another hypothesis it is an enigma. What creates the mystery is that these things occur while God is, duty presses, and immortality awaits. Since God is, why does he suffer these things to happen? Why does he not interpose to put matters right? If right and wrong are not empty phrases, how comes it that moral distinctions are so constantly submerged? With "eternity in their hearts," how is it to be explained that men are so regardless ol the future? III. THE PROPOSED SOLUTION, This lay in three things. 1. The certainty of a future ;'udgment. "I sl\id in mine heart, God shall judge the righteous and the wicked; for there is a time for every purpose and for every work" (ver. 17). Con- vinced that God, duty, and immortality were no fictions but solemn realities, the Preacher saw that these implied the certainty of a judgment in the future world when nil the entanglements of this world would be s,)rted out, ils inequalities evened, aud its wrongs righted; and seeing this, he discernell iu it a sufficient re,1son why God should not be in a hurry to cast down vice from its undeserved eminence and exalt virtuo to its rightful renown. 2. The discrimination of human character, The Preacher saw that God allowed wickeilness to triumph and righteousness to suffer, in order that he might thereby " provo them," i.e. sift and distinguish them from one another by the free development of their characters. Were Gou by external restraints to place a check on the ungodly or by outward helps to recompense the pious, it might come to be doubtrul who were the sinful and who the virtuous; but granting free scopo to both, each manifests its hidden character by its actions, according to the principle, "Every tree is known by its fruits" (Matt. vii.16-20). 3. The revelation of human depravity. Because a future judgment awaits, it is necessary that tbe wickedness of the wicked should be revealed. Hence God 11bstains from interfering prematurely with tho world's disorder that men may see to what thorough inherent depravity they have really come; that, oppressing and destroying one another, they are little batter than brute beasts who, without consideration or remorse, prey on each other. LEssoNs, 1. Patience. 2. Confidence. 3. Hopefulness, 'i2 ECCLESIASTES; OR, THE PREACHER. [en. 111. 1-2:2. - - -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Vers. 19-22.-.Are men no better than beasts t I. Ilol'H ALIKE EMANATE FllOM '1'1-111 SOIL. "All are of the dust" (vcr. 20). This the first argument in support of tho monstrous proposition that man bath no pre-eminence above a beast. 1. T!.e measuro ({)f trnth it contains. In so far as it asserts that man, considered as to his material pnrt, possesses a common origin with the beasts that perish, that both were at first formed from the ground, and are so allied to the soil that, besides emerging from it, they are every day supported by it and will eventually return to it, being both resolved into indistinguishable dust, it accords exactly with the teaching of Scripture (Gen. i. 24; ii. 7), science, and experience. Compare the language of Arnobius, "Wherein do we differ from them? Our bones arc of the same materials; our oricrin is not more noble than theirs " (' Ad Gentes,' ii. 16). 2. The amount of error it ;'onceals. It overlooks the facts that, again according to Scripture (Gen. i. 27; ii. 7 ; ix. 6), man was created in the Divine image, which is never said of the lower creatures; was endowed with intelligence far surpassing that of the creatures (Job xxxii. 8); and so far from being placed on a leYel with the lower animals, was expressly constituted their lord (Gen. i. 28). Read in this connection Shakespeare's "What a piece of work is man!" etc. (' Hamlet,' act ii. sc. 2). Moreover, it ignores what is patent on every page of Scripture as well as testifieu by every chapter in human experience, viz. that God deals with man as he does not deal with the beasts, subjecting him as not them to ruoral discipline, and accepting of him what is never asked of them, the tribute of freely rendered service, inviting him as they are never invited to enter into conscious fellow- ship with himself, punishing him as never them for disobedience, and making of him an object of love and grace to the extent of devising and completing on his behalf a scheme of salvation, :is is never done or proposed to be done for them. Unless, there- fore, Scripture be set aside as worthless, it will be impossible to hold that in respect of origin and nature man bath no pre-eminence over the beasts. 11. BOTH ALIKE ARE THE SPORT OF 0HANCE. "That which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them;" or, "Chance are the sons of men, chance is the beast, and one chance is to them both" (ver. 19). 1. The asser- tion under limitations may be aiimitted as correct. Certainly no ground exists for the allegation that the course of providence, whether as it relates to man or as it bears upon the lower animals, is a chance, a peradventure, a haphazard. Yet events, which in the programme of the Supreme have their fixed places and appointed times, may seem to man to be fortuitous, as lying altogether beyond his calculation and not within his expectation; and what the present argument amounts to is that man is as helplcse before these events as the unthinking creatures of the field are-that they deal with him precisely as with the beasts, sweeping down upon him with resistless force, falling upon him at unexpected moments, and tossing him about with e.s much indifference e.s they do them. 2. The assertion, however, must be qualified. It follows not from the above concessions that man is as helpless before unforeseen occurrences as tho beasts are. Not only can he to some extent by foresight anticipate their coming, which the lower creatures cannot do, but, unlike them also, he can protect himself against them when they have come. To man belongs a power not (consciously at least) possessed by the animals, of not merely accommodating himself to circumstances-a. capability they to some extent share with him-but of rising above circumstances and compelling them to bend to him. If to this be added that if time and chance happen to man as to the beasts he knows it, which they do not, and can extract good frum it, which tLey cannot, it will once more appear that ground exists for disputing the degrading proposition that man hath no pre-eminence over the beasts. III. Bo'l'H ALIKE A.BE THE PREY OF DEATH. "As the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath" (ver. 19). 1. Seeming correspondences between the two ~n tlw matter of dyi119. (1) In both death means the extinction of physical life and the dissolution of the makrial frame. (~) In both the mode of dying is frequently the same. (3) The same grave receives both when the vital spark has departed. (4) The only difference between the two is that man commonly gets a coffin and a funeral, a mausoleum and a monument, whereas the beast gets none of these luxuries. 2. Obvious discrepancies between the two in respect of dying. (1) Man living knows that he must die (eh. ix. 5), which the beast does not. (2) Man has the choice and power, if he accepts the provisions of grace, of meeting death without a fear. (3) Even if he docs C'H, III. 1-22.] ECCLESIASTES; on, TTIE PREACHER.