Some thoughts on Ecclesiastes

Major conclusion: everything is hebel

The major conclusion of the whole book is that everything is hebel ('vanity'/'vapour'/'meaningless') and a chasing after the wind.

To understand this conclusion it is helpful to keep in mind that:

1. When Paul says in Romans 8:20 that "creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it", the word for 'futility' is the same as the word used by the Septuagint to translate hebel.
2. Most interpreters find Genesis 1-3 to be the most significant biblical background to the book.
3. THEREFORE remember that hebel is not inherent to life, but a result of God's curse on the old creation.
4. THEREFORE hebel is overcome through Christ in new creation.

Qualification to the major conclusion: there is joy despite the hebel

Contrasting the negative major conclusion, is the qualification that often follows the statement that all is hebel, namely that it is "good and fitting to eat and drink and find enjoyment in all the toil". Some interpreters find this positive conclusion to be the major conclusion of the book, but this seems unlikely given the tone of the book as a whole and the reminders throughout that this joy is limited (simply to finding enjoyment in toil) and temporary (5:18).

Central theme: toil

The driving force behind the whole book is the question of 1:3, repeated several times later, "What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?" As Webb points out, the word 'toil' and its cognates appears 24 times in the book. From Genesis we could answer this question without Ecclesiastes as follows:

1. Toil is good because it was part of the good creation
2. God curses toil and makes it hard and fruitless

As we have seen, this positive and negative teaching on work is echoed in Qoheleth's discoveries. What Qoheleth adds to Genesis is what it feels like to live in this reality.

Sub-themes: death and time

Qoheleth doesn't simply jump to Genesis and the curse to answer his central question. Instead he focuses on two things which make toil hebel, namely death and time. These themes appear throughout the book and serve as destroyers of all meaning and hope of lasting joy.

Christ in Ecclesiastes

Qoheleth is not a atheist, but if he is a believer in Christ he keeps it well hidden. He relies on experience and reason alone to reach his conclusions, and never draws upon scripture. He constantly refers to God, and clearly sees God as being sovereign over hebel. Much like Romans 1, we see the limits of natural theology in giving us a true, but partial understanding of God.

His limited knowledge of God offers him some kind of hope, but it is an extremely uncertain hope because he doesn't know the character of the God who has the power to save him from hebel. Just because God is able to reverse the hebel, will he? He reminds us to fear God, but never because that gives any assurance of something better.

I think Ecclesiastes can be read as a Wisdom literature version of Genesis 1-3, without the protoevangelium. Which I think poses a difficult question for Bible readers. We always read Biblical books in the context of the whole Bible, but can we accept an interpretation of a book Ecclesiastes, which reads it entirely as what Glen Scrivener describes as a photo-negative of the Gospel?

Under the sun

Qoheleth could have used the phrase "under the heavens" to describe life on earth full of breath/vanity. I think he used the phrase he did because:

1. The word "under" has connotations of rule in the OT, and perhaps even harsh rule (cf. Paul's use of "under the law")
2. For Israelites the "sun" was not the happy smiley face in the skies that English people think of. The favourite weather forecast for Israelites was rain because sun meant baking heat. It was "oppressive" weather when the sun ruled the skies.

Too much of a good thing?

It is often commented that we live in an information rich age. In 2005 206,000 new titles were published in the UK (can you believe that! that is more than any other country, even the US!), and we have easier access to those that are out of print than we did in the past. In addition we have countless other sources of information.

It is not a new problem though. Over 2000 years ago before there were too many books and the Teacher complained that 'Of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh' (Ecclesiastes 12:12)... I wonder if he saw the irony as he added to the pile.

Luther saw the problem he created by writing so much (the English translation of some of his works numbers 55 volumes) when he wrote in his Preface to the Wittenberg Edition of his German writings that:

I shudder to think of the example I am giving, for I am well aware how little the church has been profited since they have begun to collect many books and large libraries, in addition to and besides the Holy Scriptures, and especially since they have stored up, without discrimination, all sorts of writings by the church fathers, the councils, and teachers. Through this practice not only is precious time lost, which could be used for studying the Scriptures, but in the end the pure knowledge of the divine Word is also lost, so that the Bible lies forgotten.

Philip Melanchthon was a true disciple when he also constantly apologised for writing so much. In his 1521 Loci he ends his very restrained work by recognising that it is good to write on good things, but that it can have bad results:

I think I have done well to discuss such important topics more briefly than I should have done, lest with misplaced diligence I call someone away from the Scripture to my disputations.

The problem is not always that we spend our time doing bad things instead of good, but that we spend time on good things and displace the best. I was reminded this when I observed on Sunday that my church was about to embark on some new thing. Our pastor rightly explained how this thing was good and Biblical, but then inferred that it therefore should be done (not seeing that A needn't imply B). This week I've realised that what is true of my church is true of me too. For example, I have got an unusually long list of good 'must read' books on my shelf at the moment but they do crowd out other things, including reading the Scriptures.

At the heart of this problem of not prioritising, or ordering our loves (?!), is that we don't want to accept that we are finite. We want to do a million things well. We just can't. We have to accept that we are not God. We cannot sustain the whole world by our action, comprehend all knowledge, or enjoy all good things we have been given.

I need to learn this, and our churches need to learn it as well.