CHAP. ΠῚ. 13, 14. 263 here, as at ver. 11, wholly passes over into the individualizing
But this enjoyment of life also, Koheleth continues, this advisedly the best portion in the limited and restrained condition of man, is placed beyond his control:— Ver. 13. “ But also that he should eat and drink, and see good in all his labour, is for every man a gift of God.” The inverted and yet anacoluthistic formation of the sentence is quite like that at v. 18. ‘enmdp signifies, properly, the totality of men=all men, eg. Ps. exvi. 11; but here and at v. 18, xii. 13, the author uses the two words so that the determ. second member of the st. constr. does not determine the first (which elsewhere sometimes occurs, as d¢thulath Israel, a virgin of Israel, Deut. xxii. 19): every one of men (ef. πᾶς τις βροτῶν). The subst. clause col-haadam is subject: every one of men, in this that he eats.... is dependent on God. Instead of ‘9 the word NAD (abbrev. from 27D) is here used, as at v.18. The connection by v‘gam is related to the preceding adversat.: and (= but) also (= notwithstanding that), as at vi. 7, Neh. v. 8, cf. Jer. iii. 10, where gam is strengthened by D‘col-zoth. As for the rest, it follows from ver. 13, in connection with ii. 24-26, that for Koheleth εὐποία and εὐθυμία reciprocally condition each other, without, however, a conclusion following therefrom justifying the translation “to do good,” 12). Men’s being conditioned in the enjoyment of life, and, generally, their being conditioned by God the Absolute, has certainly an ethical end in view, as is expressed in the conclusion which Koheleth now reaches:—
Ver. 14. “Thus I discerned it then, that all that God will do exists for ever; nothing is to be added to it, and nothing taken from it: God has thus directed it, that men should fear before Him.” This is a conclusion derived from the facts of experience, a truth that is valid for the present and for the time to come. We may with equal correctness render by quidquid facit and quidquid faceet. But the pred. shows that the fut. expression is also thought of as fut.; for ‘y> ‘nN’ ὙΠ does not mean: that is for ever (Hitz.), which would be expressed by the subst. clause phys san; but: that shall be for ever (Zick.), 1.6. will always assert its validity. That which is affirmed here is true of God’s directing and guiding events in the natural world, as well as of the announcements of His will and His controlling and directing providence in the history of human affairs. All this is removed beyond the power of the creature to alter it. The meaning is not that one ought not to add to or to take from it (Deut. xiii. 1; Prov. xxx. 6), but that such a thing cannot be done
(vid. Sir. xviii. 5). And this unchangeableness characterizing the arrangements of God has this as its aim, that men should fear Him who is the All-conditioning and is Himself unconditioned: He has done it that they (men) should fear before Him, 8 ney, fecit ut; ef. Ezek. xxxvi. 27. ποιεῖν ἵνα, Rev. xiii. 15; and “ fear before Him,” as at viii. 12 f.; ef. 1 Chron. xvi. 30 with Ps. xevi. 9. The unchangeableness of God's action shows itself in this, that in the course of history similar phenomena repeat themselves; for the fundamental principles, the causal connections, the norms of God's government, remain always the same.
Ver. 15. “That which is now hath been long ago; and that which will be hath already been: God seeketh after that which was crowded out.” The words: “ hath been long ago” (#7 732), are used of that which the present represents as something that hath been, as the fruit of a development; the words: “hath already been” (ΠῚ 133), are used of the future (Ὁ WR, τὸ μέλλον, vid. Gesen. § 132. 1), as denying to it the right of being regarded as something new. The government of God is not to be changed, and does not change; His creative as well as His moral ordering of the world produces with the same laws the same phenomena (the Ὁ corresponds to this line of thought here, as at 142)—God seeks ὙΤῊΝ (cf. vii. 7; Ewald, § 277d). Hengstenberg renders: God seeks the persecuted (LXX. Symm. Targ. Syr.), i« visits them with consolation and comfort Nirdaph here denotes that which is followed, hunted, pressed, by which we may think of that which is already driven into the past; that God seeks, seeks it purposely, and brings it back again into the present; for His government remains always, and brings thus always up again that which hath been. Thus Jerome: Deus instaurat quod abiit; the Venet.: ὁ θεὸς ζητήσει τὸ ἀπεληλαμένον; and thus Geier, among the post-Reform. interpreters: praestat ut quae propulsa sunt ac practerierunt iterum innoventur ac redeant; and this is now the prevailing exposition, after Knobel, Ewald, and Hitzig. The thought is the same as if we were to translate: God seeks after the analogue. In the Arab., one word in relation to another is called murad¢f, if it is cogn. to it; and muéaradifat is the technical expression for asynonym. In Heb. the expression used is ΒΤ Moy, they who are followed the one by another,—one of which, as it w treads on the heels of another. But this designation is mediated through the Arab. In evidence of the contrary, ancient examples are wanting.
The godless Vonduct of Men left to themselves, and their End lite that of the Beasts, iii. 16-22,
Ver. 16. “ And, moreover, I saw under the sun the place of judgment, that wickedness was there; and the place of righteousness, that wickedness was there.” The structure of the verse is palindromic, like i. 6, ii. 10, iv. 1. We might also render Dip as the so-called casus absol., so that ‘OY... 'ῬΌ is an emphatic DIpD2 (Hitz.), and the construction like Jer. xlvi. 5; but the accentuation does not require this (cf. Gen. i. 1); and why should it not be at once the object to ‘nw, which in any case it virtually is? These two words penn any might be attribut. clauses: where wickedness (prevails), for the old scheme of the attributive clause (the sifat) is not foreign to the style of this book (vid. i. 13, nathan =n‘thano; and v. 12, raithi=rithiha); but why not rather virtual pred. accus.: vidi locum juris (quod) ἰδὲ impietas? Cf. Neh. xiii. 23 with Ps, xxxvil. 25. The place of “judgment” is the place where justice should be ascertained and executed; and the place of “ righteousness,’ that where righteousness should ascertain and administer justice; for mishpat is the rule (of right), and the objective matter of fact; tsedek, a subjective property and manner of acting. yv is in both cases the same: wickedness (see under Ps. i. 1), which bends justice, and is the contrary of ¢tsedek, ἡ.6. upright and moral sternness. yer elsewhere, like melvk, tsedek, preserves im p. its e, but here it takes rank along with 307, which in like manner fluctuates (cf. Ps. exxx. 7 with Prov. xxi. 21). 78 is here = OY, as at Ps. cxxii. 5, etc.; the locative ah suits the question Where? as well as in the question Whither /—He now expresses how, in such a state of things, he arrived at satisfaction of mind.
Ver. 17. “I said in mine heart: God shall judge the righteous as well as the wicked: for there is there a time for every purpose and for every work.” Since “ the righteous” stands first, the word bbe has here the double sense of judging [richtens = setting upright] = acting uprightly, justly by one, as in the shofteni of Ps. vii. 9, xxvi.1, etc., and of judging = inflicting punishment. To the righteous, as well as to the wicked,! God will administer that which of right belongs to them. But this does not immediately happen, and has to be waited for a long time, for there is a definite time for every undertaking
(iii. 1), and for (>, in the more modern form of the language, interchanges promiscue with 58 and 9, eg. Jer. xix. 15; Ezek. xxii. 3; Ewald, ὃ 217%) every work there is a “time.” This OY, defended by all the old interpreters, cannot have a temporal sense: tunc = in die judicii (Jerome, Targ.), cf. Ps. xiv. δ, xxxvi. 13, for “a time of judgment there is for all one day” is not intended, since certainly the ov (day of judgment) is this time itself, and not the time of this time. Ewald renders ov as pointing to the past, for he thus construes; the righteous and the unrighteous God will judge (for there is a time for everything), and judge (σαν thus explicat., “ and that too,” “and indeed”) every act there, ἐξ everything done before. But this ov is not only heavy, but also ambiguous and purposeless; and besides, by this parenthesizing of the words ὋΝ Mp ‘2 [for thére is a time for everything], the principal thought, that with God everything, even His act of judgment, has its time, is robbed of its independence and of the place in the principal clause appropriate to it. But if ov is understood adverbially, it certainly has a local meaning connected with it: there, viz. with God, apud Dewm; true, for this use of the word Gen. xlix. 24 affords the only example, and it stands there in the midst of a very solemn and earnest address. Therefore it lies near to read, with Houbig, Déderl, Palm., and Hitz., Ot, “a definite time... has He (God) ordained;” Dw (Ὁ) is the usual word for the ordinances of God in the natural world and in human history (Prov. viii. 29; Ex. xxi. 13; Num. xxiv. 23; Hab. i. 12, etc.), and, as in the Assyr. simfur,so the Heb. πον (NOW), 2 Sam. xiii. 32, signifies lot or fate, decree. With this reading, Elster takes exception to the position of the words; but at Judg. vi. 19 also the object goes before o&, and “unto every purpose and for every work ” is certainly the complement of the object-conception, so that the position of the words is in reality no other than at x. 20a; Dan. ii, 17. Quite untenable is Herzfeld’s supposition (Fiirst, Vaih.), that δ’ has here the Talm. signification: asstimat, taxat, for (1) this cw = Arab. sham, has not Sy, but the accus. after it; (2) the thought referring to the time on which ver. 18 rests is thereby interrupted. Whether we read ov, or take OY in the sense of iy (Job xxv. 2, xxiii. 14, ete.), the thought is the same, and equally congruous: God will judge the innocent and the guilty; it shall be done some time, although not so soon as one might wish it, and think necessary, for God has for every undertaking and for every work its fixed time, also its judicial decision (vid. at Ps. lxxv. 3); He permits wickedness, lets it develope itself, waits long before He interposes (vid. under Isa. xviii. 4 f.).
Reflecting on God’s delay to a time hidden from men, and known only to Himself, Koheleth explains the matter to himself in the following verse —
Ver. 18. “Thus I said then in mine heart - (it happeneth) for the sake of the children of men that God might sift them, and that they might see that they are like the cattle, they in themselves,” Regarding ‘arty [for the sake of = on account of] as at viii. 2, vid. under Ps. cx. 4, where it signifies after (κατά) the state of the matter, and above at p.195. The infin. ‘2? is not derived from “3, —?, ix. 1, is only the metaplastic form of 72> or 425—pbut only from 73, whose infin. may take the form 13, after the form ΤΊ, to tread down, Isa. xlv. 1, 3%, to bow, Jer. vy. 26; but nowhere else is this infin. form found connected with a suff.; ONP, Hos. xi. 3, would be in some measure to be compared, if it could be supposed that this = BANP3, swmendo eos. The root 12 proceeds, from the primary idea of cutting, on the one side to the idea of separating, winnowing, choosing out; and, on the other, to that of smoothing, polishing, purifying (vid. under Isa. xlix, 2). Here, by the connection, the meaning of winnowing, ic. of separating the good from the bad, is intended, with which, however, as in 1729, Dan. xi. 35, the meaning of making clear, making light, bringing forward into the light, easily connects itself (cf. Shabbath 1380, 74a), of which the meaning to winnow (οἵ, 7279, Jer. iv. 11) is only a particular form;? ef. Sanhedrin 74: “when a matter is clear, 173, to thee (free from ambiguity) as the morning, speak it out; and if not,do not speak it.” In the expression Nn 3», the word "ΝΠ is, without doubt, the subject, according to Gesen. ὃ 133. 2. 3; Hitz. regards ‘bxn as genit., which, judged according to the Arab., is correct; it is true that for li-imtihanthim allahi (with genit. of the subj.), also allahu (with nominat. of the subj.) may be used; but the former expression is the more regular and more common (vid. Ewald’s Gramm. Arab. § 649), but not always equally decisive with reference to the Heb. usus log. That God delays His righteous interference till the time appointed beforehand, is for the sake of the children of men, with the intention, viz., that God may sift them, 1.6. that, without breaking in upon the free development of their characters before the time, He may permit the distinction between the good and the bad to become manifest. Men, who are the obj. to 25, are the subject to Mish to be supplied: εἰ ut videant; it is unnecessary, with the LXX., Syr, and Jerome, to read Mint (=‘I0): ut ostenderet. It is a question whether mo is the expression of the copula: sunt (sint), or whether hémmah lahém is a closer definition, co-ordinate with sh‘hem Whémah. The remark of Hitzig, that ἰαλὸπι throws back the action on the subject, is not clear. Does he suppose that lahem belongs to liroth? That is here impossible. If we look away from /ahem, lessly circumstantial expression ‘on... ‘ny can still understood: Aemmah takes up, as an echo, δ'λεπιαλ, and the comparison (compare the battology in Hos. xiii. 2).
mah along with lahem, and the former ‘as well as these two words is then better understood. The > i that of the pure dat. (Aben Ezra: They (are like beasts) to selves, ic. in their own estimation), but that of reference, Gen. xvii. 20, “ as for Ishmael;" οἵ, Ps. iii. 3; 2 Kings v. 7; 1 Sam. i. 27, ete. Men shall see that they are cattle (beasts), in reference to themselves, i. either they in reference to themselves mutually (Luther: among themselves), or: they in reference to themselves. To interpret the reference as that of mutual relation, would, in looking back to ver. 16, commend itself, for the condemnation and oppression of the innocent under the appearance of justice is an act of human brutishness. _ But the reason assigned in ver. 19 does not accord with this reciprocal rendering of lahem. Thus lahem will be meant reflexively, but it is not on that account pleonastic (Knobel), nor does it ironically form a climax: tpsissimi = héchstsclbst (Ewald, ὃ 315a); but “they in reference to themselves” is = they in and of themselves, i. viewed as men (viewed naturally). If one disregards the idea of God's interfering at a future time with the discordant human history, and, in general, if one loses sight of God, the distinction between the life of man and of beast disappears.
Ver. 19. “ For the children of men are a chance, and the beast a chance, and they both have once chance: as the death of the one, so the death of the other, and they have all one breath; and there is no advantage to a man over a beast, for all is vain.” If in both instances the word is pointed προ (LXX.), the three-membered sentence would then have the form of an emblematical proverb (as eg. Prov. xxv. 25): “ For as the chance of men, 80 (vav of comparison) the chance of the beast: they have both one chance.” mapa with segol cannot possibly be the connecting form (Luzz.), for in cases such as © WD, Isa. iii, 24, the relation of the words is appositional, not genitival. This form ΡΟ, thus found three times, is vindicated by the Targ. (also the Venet.) and by Mss.; Joseph Kimchi remarks that “ all three have segol, and are thus forms of the absolutus.” The author means that men, like beasts, are in their existence and in their death influenced accidentally, 1.6. not of necessity, and are wholly conditioned, not by their own individual energy, but by a power from without—are dependent beings, as Solon (Herod. i. 32) says to Croesus: “Man is altogether συμφορή, ie. the sport of accident. The first two sentences mean exclusively neither that men (apart from God) are, like beasts, the birth of a blind accident (Hitz.), nor that they are placed under the same law of transitoriness (Elst.); but of men, in the totality of their being, and doing, and suffering, it is first said that they are accidental beings; then, that which separates them from this, that they all, men like beasts, are finally exposed to one, ic. to the same fate. As is the death of the one, so is the death of the other; and they all have one breath, ic. men and beasts alike die, for this breath of life (ὉΠ ™, which constitutes a beast—as well as a man a 7M YB) departs from the body (Ps. civ. 29). In mM... MM (as at vi. 5, Ex. xiv. 20, and frequently), pnp (mas. as genus potius) is separately referred to men and beasts. With the Mishnic nind = bibl. 152 (cf. Maaser Sheni, v. 2), the ΓΞ here used has manifestly nothing todo. The noun id, which in the Book of Proverbs (xiv. 23, xxi. 5, not elsewhere) occurs in the sense of profit, gain, is here in the Book of Koheleth found as a synon. of {i7M, “ preference,” advantage which is exclusively peculiar to it. From this, that men and beasts fall under the same law of death, the author concludes that there is no preference of a man toa beast; he doubtless means that in respect of the end man has no superiority; but he expresses himself thus generally because, as the matter presented itself to him, all-absorbing death annulled every distinction. He looks only to the present time, without encumbering himself with the historical account of the matter found in the beginning of the 7éra; and he adheres to the external phenomenon, without thinking, with the Psalmist in Ps. xlix., that although death is common to man with the beast, yet all men do not therefore die as the beast dies. That the beast dies because it must, but that in the midst of this necessity of nature man can maintain his freedom, is for him out of view.
Ver. 20. “ All goes hence to one place; all has sprung the dust, and all returns to the dust again." The “one place” (as at vi. 6) the earth, the great graveyard which finally receives the living when dead. The art. of the first ΡΠ is that denoting species; the art. of the second is retrospective: to the dust whence he sprang (cf. Ps. civ. 29, exlvi. 4); otherwise, Gen. iii, 19 (ef. Job xxxiv. 15), “to dust shalt thou return,” shalt become dust again. From dust to dust (Sir. xl 11, xli. 10) is true of every living corporeal thing. It is true there exists the possibility that with the spirit of the dying man it may be different from what it is with the spirit of the dying beast, but yet that is open to question.
Ver. 21. “Who knoweth with regard to the spirit of the children of men, whether it mounteth upward; and with regard to the spirit of a beast, whether it goeth downward to the earth?” The interro- lators: LXX., Targ., Syr, Jerome, Venet., Lather. Among the moderns, Heyder (wid. Psychol. p. 410), Hengst, Hahn, Dale, and Bullock take the 7 in both cases as the article: “Who knoweth the spirit of the children of men, that which goeth upward...?” But (1) thus rendered the question does not accord with the connection, which requires a sceptical question; (2) following “ who knoweth,” after ii. 19, vi. 12, ef. Josh. ii. 14, an interrogative continuance of the sentence was to be expected; and (3) in both cases *'7 stands as designation of the subject only for the purpose of marking the interrogative clause (cf. Jer. ii. 14), and of making it observable that ha'olah and hayorédéth are not appos. belonging as objects to rm and nm. It is questionable, indeed, whether the punctuation of these words, 79$7 and M™0, as they lie before us, proceeds from an interrogative rendering. Saadia in Emunoth c. vi.,and Juda Halevi in the Kuzri ii. 80, deny this; and so also do Aben Ezra and Kimchi. And they may be right. For instead of "97, the pointing ought to have been "7 (cf. "yn, Job xiii 25) when used as interrog. an ascendens; even before ἐξ the compens. lengthening of the interrog. ha is nowhere certainly found’ instead of the virtual reduplication; and thus also the parallel ὙΠ is not to be judged after "7, Lev.
x. 19, "9, Ezek. xviii. 29,—we must allow that the punctation seeks, by the removal of the two interrog. 9 (n), to place that which is here said in accord with xii. 7. But there is no need for this. For yw does not quite fall in with that which Lucretius says (Zid. 1):
** Jgnoratur enim quae sit natura animai, Nata sit an contra nascentibus insinuetur? An simul intereat nobiscum morte diremta?”
It may certainly be said of mi yode'a, as of ignoratur, that it does not exclude every kind of knowledge, but only a sure and certain knowledge resting on suflicient grounds; interire and ὯΝ Ὑ are also scarcely different, for neither of the two necessarily signifies annihilation, but both the discontinuance of independent individual existence. But the putting of the question by Koheleth is different, for it discloses more definitely than this by Lucretius, the possibility of a different end for the spirit of a man from that which awaits the spirit of a beast, and thus of a specific distinction between these two principles of life. In the formation even of the dilemma: Whether upwards or downwards, there lies an inquiring knowledge; and it cannot surprise us if Koheleth finally decides that the way of the spirit of a man is upwards, although it is not said that he rested this on the ground of demonstrative certainty. It 1s enough that, with the moral necessity of a final judgment beyond the sphere of this present life, at the same time also the continued existence of the spirit of man presented itself to him as a postulate of faith. One may conclude from the desidervwm acternitatis (111. 11) implanted in man by the Creator, that, like the instincts implanted in the beasts, it will be calculated not for deception, but for satisfaction; and from the ndyn?, Prov. xv. 24,—~<e. the striving of ἃ wise man rising above earthly, temporary, common things,—that death will not put an end to this striving, but will help it to reach its goal. But this is an indirect proof, which, however, is always inferior to the direct in force of argument. He presupposes that the Omnipotence and Wisdom which formed the world is also at the same time Love. Thus, though at last, it is faith which solves the dilemma, and we see from xii. 7 that this faith held sway over Koheleth. In the Book of Sirach, also, the old conception of Hades shows itself as yet dominant; but after the οὐκ ἀθάνατος υἱὸς ἀνθρώπου, xvii. 25, we read towards the end, where he speaks of Elias: καὶ yap ἡμεῖς ζωῇ ξησόμεθα, xiviii. 11. In the passage before us, Koheleth remains in doubt, without getting over it by the hand of faith. In a certain reference the question he here proposes 1s to the present day unanswered; for the soul, or, more correctly, according to the biblical mode of conception, the spirit from which the soul-life of all corporeal beings proceeds, is a monas, and as such is indestructible. Do the future of the beast’s soul and of man’s soul not then stand in a solidaric mutual relation to each other? In fact, the future life presents to us mysteries the solution of which is beyond the power of human thought, and we need not wonder that Koheleth, this sober-minded, intelligent man, who was inaccessible to fantastic self-deception, arrives, by the line of thought commenced at ver. 16, also again at the ultimatum.
Ver. 22. “Thus I then saw that there is nothing better than that aman should rejoice in his works, for that is his portion; for who can bring him to this, that he gains an insight into that which shall be after him?” Hengstenberg, who has decided against the interrog. signification of the twice-repeated 7 in ver. 21, now also explains wn... 72, not: What shall become of him after it (his death)? but: What further shall be done after the state in which he now finds himself’ Zockler, although rightly understanding both 7 as well as nx (after him = when he will be separated, or separates from this life, vii. 14, ix. 3; cf. Gen. xxiv. 67), yet proceeds on that explanation of Hengstenberg’s, and gives it the rendering: how things shall be on the earth after his departure. But (1) for this thought, as vi. 12 shows, the author had a more suitable form of expression; (2) this thought, after the author has, ver. 21, explained it as uncertain whether the spirit of a man in the act of death takes a different path from that of a beast, is altogether aside from the subject, and it is only an apologetic tendency not yet fully vanquished which here constrains him. The chain of thought is however this: How it will be with the spirit of a man when he dies, who knows? What will be after death is thus withdrawn from human knowledge. Thus it is best to enjoy the present, since we connect together (ii. 24) labour and enjoyment mediated thereby. This joy of a man in his work—ze. as v. 18: which flows from his work as a fountain, and accompanies him in it (viii. 15)—is his portion, ἐς. the best which he has of life in this world. Instead of 8 7D3, the punctuation is 753, because yonx amy is a kindred idea; vid. regarding ™ under ii. 22. And 3 mw) is used, because it is not so much to be said of the living, that he cannot foresee how it shall be with him when he dies, as that he can gain no glimpse into that world because it is an object that has for him no fixity.
The Wrongs suffered by Man from Man embittering the Life of the Observer, iv. 1-3.
From unjust decisions a transition is now made to the subject of the haughty, unmerciful cruelty of the wide-extended oppressions inflicted by men.
iv. 1. “And again I saw all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold there the tears of the oppressed, and they have no comforter; and from the hand of their oppressors goeth forth violence; and they have no comforter,” Incorrectly Hahn: And anew I saw,—the observation is different from that of iii 16, though cognate. Thus: And again I saw,—the expression follows the syntactic scheme of Gen. xxvi. 18; regarding the fut. consec. brought into view here and at ver. 7, vid. above, p. 197, 2. The second ‘WYN is part. pass.; the first, as at Job xxxv. 9, and also at Amos lii. 9, is abstract (é.e. bringing the many separate instances under one general idea) plwraletantum (cf. "378, redemti, Isa. xxxv. 10; and redemtio, pretium redemtionis, Num. iii. 46); the plur. 'y) qwix need not appear strange, since even 05°F is connected with the plur. of the pred., eg. Ps. xxxi. 11, Ixxxviii. 4. nyo7 has, as at Isa. xxv. 8 (cf. Rey. xxiv. 4, πᾶν δάκρυον), a collective sense. The expression nd... is singular. According to the most natural impression, it seems to signify: “and from the hand of their oppressors no power of deliverance” (carrying forward }'x); but the parallelism of the palindromically constructed verse (as at i. 6, ii. 10, iii. 16) excludes this meaning. Thus 5 is here once—nowhere else—used, like the Greek βία, in the sense of violence; Luzzatto prefers the reading 33, by which the expression would be in conformity with the linguistic usage; but also Ἴ is explained: the force which they have in their hands is, in going forth from their hands, thought of as abused, and, as taking the form of δ᾽ or ΠΡΙΠ. In view of this sorrow which men bring upon their fellow-men, life for Koheleth lost all its worth and attraction.
Vers. 2, 3. “And I praised the dead who were long ago dead, more than the living who are yet in life; and as happier than both, him who has not yet come into existence, who hath not seen the evil work which is done under the sun.” 3% is hardly thought of as part., like Dvipy = Dvp"D, ix. 12; the » of the part. Pih. is not usually thrown away, only 19, Zeph. i. 14, is perhaps = 128, but for the same reason as Sem, 2 Kings ii. 3, is= ONNY33, Thus 73, like jin», viii. 9, is inf. absol., which is used to continue, in an adverbially subord. manner, the preceding finite with the same sub-
Ex. viii. 11: “Pharaoh saw... and hardened (123%) his heart;” just in the same manner as [3% here connects itself with ‘2x ‘ch ‘. Only the annexed designation of the subject is peculiar; the syntactic possibility of this connection is established by Num. xix. 35, Ps. xv. δ, Job xl 2, and, in the second rank, by Gen. xvii. 10, Ezek. v. 14. Yet % might well enough have been omitted had "Δ ‘38 ‘th not stood too remote. Regarding ΠΣῚΡ Ἶ and MP, adhue, vid. p. 194. The circumstantial form of the expression: prac vivis qui vivi sunt adhue, is intentional: they who are as yet living must be witnesses of the manifold and comfortless human miseries.
It is a question whether ver. 3 begins a new clause (LXX., Syr., and Venet.) or not. That ΠΝ like the Arab. αἶψα, sometimes serves to give prominence to the subject, cannot be denied (eid. Bottcher, § 516, and Miuhlau’s remarks thereto). The Mishnic ex- ions OWT inix, that day, M7 AMix, that land, and the like (Geiger, § 14. 2), presuppose a certain preparation in the older language; and we might, with Weiss (Stud. weber d. Spr. der Mishna, p. 112), interpret 78% NX in the sense of yen mx, is qui. But the accus. rendering is more natural. Certainly the expression 310 May, “to praise,” “to pronounce happy,” is not used; but to 3.0 it is natural to suppose ‘WO added. Jerome accordingly translates: εἰ feiciorem utroque judicavi qui necdum natus est. YY) has the double Kametz, as is generally the case, except at Ps. liv. 7 and Mic. vii. 3.’ Better than he who is born is the unborn, who does not become conscious of the wicked actions that are done under the sun. A similar thought, with many variations in its expression, is found in Greek writers; see regarding these shrill discordances, which run through all the joy of the beauty and splendour of Hellenic life, my Apologetik, p. 116. Buddhism accordingly gives to nirvdna the place of the highest good. That we find Koheleth on the same path (cf. vi. 3, vii. 1), has its reason in this, that so long as the central point of man’s existence lies in the present life, and this is not viewed as the fore-court of eternity, there is no enduring consolation to lift us above the miseries of this present world.
Miserable Rivalry and Restless Pursuit, iv. 4-6.
There follow two other observations, mutually related and issuing in “ windy effort:”"—
Ver. 4. “ And I saw all the labour and all the skill of business, that it is an envious surpassing of the one by the other: also this is vain and windy effort.” The & 9 refers to this exertion of vigorous effort and skill. The Graec. Venet., by rendering here and at ii, 24 ΠΣ by καθαρότης, betrays himself as a Jew. With ‘D, quod, that which forms the pred. follows the object. The min in mere’ehu is as in amatz min, Ps. xviii. 18, and the like—the same as the compar.: aemulatio qua unus prae altero eminere studet. All this expenditure of strength and art has covetousness and envy, with which one seeks to surpass another, as its poisoned sting.
Ver. 5. There ought certainly to be activity according to our calling; indolence is self-destruction: “The fool foldeth his hands, and eateth his own flesh.” He layeth his hands together (Prov. vi. 10 =xxiv. 33),—placeth them in his bosom, instead of using them in working,—and thereby he eateth himself up, i. bringeth ruin upon himself (Ps. xxvii. 2; Mic. iii, 3; Isa. xlix. 26); for instead of nourishing himself by the labour of his hands, he feeds on his own flesh, and thus wasteth away. The emphasis does not lie on the subject (the fool, and only the fool), but on the pred.
Ver. 6. The fifth verse stands in a relation of contrast to this which follows: “Better is one hand full of quietness, than both fists full of labour and windy effort.” Mendelssohn and others interpret ver. 5 as the objection of the industrious, and ver. 6 as the reply of the slothful. Zoéckler agrees with Hitz., and lapses into the hypothesis of a dialogue otherwise rejected by him (vid. above, p. 217). As everywhere, so also here it preserves the unity of the combination of thoughts. ΤΠ) signifies here, as little as it does anywhere else, the rest of sloth; but rest, in contrast to such activity in labour as robs a man of himself, to the hunting after gain and honour which never has enough, to the rivalry which places its goal always higher and higher, and seeks to be before others—it is rest connected with well-being (vi. 5), gentle quietness (ix. 17), resting from selfactivity (Isa. xxx. 15); cf. the post-bibl. 1 nN), satisfaction, contentment, comfort. In a word, nahath has not here the sense of being idle or lazy. The sequence of the thoughts is this: The fool in idleness consumes his own life-strength; but, on the other hand, a little of true rest is better than the labour of windy effort, urged on by rivalry yielding no rest. 3 is the open hollow hand, and j5n
(Assyr. hupunnu) the hand closed like a ball, the fist. “Rest” and “labour and windy effort” are the accusatives of that to which the designation of measure refers (Gesen. § 118. 3); the accus. connection lay here so much the nearer, as ¥9D is connected with the accus. of that with which anything is full. In “and windy effort” lies the reason for the judgment pronounced. The striving of a man who laboriously seeks only himself and loses himself in restlessness, is truly a striving which has wind for its object, and has the property of wind.
The Aimless Labour and Penuriousness of him who stands alone, iv. 7-12.
Another sorrowful spectacle is the endless labour and the insatiable covetousness of the isolated man, which does good neither to himself nor to any other:
Vers. 7, 8. “There is one without a second, also son and brother he has not; and there is no end of his labour; his eyes nevertheless are not satisfied with riches: For whom do I labour, then, and deny all good to my soul? Also this is vain, and it is a sore trouble.” That P*), as in Ps. civ. 25, ον. 34, has the meaning of ΓΈ, absgue, Nolde has already observed in his Partik..Concordanz: a solitarius, without one standing by his side, a second standing near him, i2. without wife and without friend; also, as the words following show, without son and brother. Regarding "%), for which, with the connect. accus., ΠΕΡῚ might be expected (cf. also ii. 7, MX} with Mahpach; and, on the other hand, ii. 23, 093) with Pashia), vid. under Ps. lv. 10. Gam may be interpreted in the sense of “also” as well as of “nevertheless” (Ewald, 354a); the latter is to be preferred, since the endless labour includes in itself a restless striving after an increase of possession. The Kerf, in an awkward way, changes yxy into ΣΦ; the taking together the two eyes as one would here be unnatural, since the avaricious man devours gold, silver, and precious things really with both his eyes, and yet, however great be his wealth, still more does he wish to see in his possession; the sing. of the pred. is as at 1 Sam. iv. 15; Mic. iv. 11. With wmi ani, Koheleth puts himself in the place of such a friendless, childless man; yet this change of the description into a self-confession may be occasioned by this, that the author in his old age was really thus isolated, and stood alone. Regarding %©9 with the accus. of the person, to whom, and min of the matter, in respect of which there is want, vid. under Ps. viii. 6. That the author stands in sympathy with the sorrowful condition here exposed, may also be remarked from the fact that he now proceeds to show the value of companionship and the miseries of isolation:
Ver. 9. “ Better are two together than one, seeing they have a good reward in their labour.” By hashsh‘ndim, the author refers to such a pair; Adehhad is one such as is just described. The good reward consists in this, that each one of the two has the pleasant consciousness of doing good to the other by his labour, and especially of being helpful to him. In this latter general sense is grounded the idea of the reward of faithful fellowship:
Ver. 10. “ For if they fall, the one can raise up his fellow: but woe to the one who falleth, and there is not a second there to lift him up.” Only the Targ., which Griitz follows, confounds i} with DN (vid. above, pp. 191 and 192); it is equivalent to 5 ‘ix, Isa. iii. 9, or % ‘in, Ezek. xiii. 18. Hiiehhad is appos. connecting itself to the pronominal suff., as, ¢g., in a far more inappropriate manner, Ps. Ixxxvi. 2; the prep. is not in appos. usually repeated, Gen. ii. 19, ix. 4 (exceptions: Ps. xviii. 51, lxxiv. 14). Whether we translate
BY by qui ceciderit (xi. 3), or by quum ceciderit (Jerome), is all one. O'P is potential: it is possible and probable that it will be done, provided he is a 318 37, ie. a true friend (Pirke aboth, ii. 13).
Ver. 11. “ Moreover, if two lie together, then there is heat to them: but how can it be warm with one who is alone?” The marriage relation is not excluded, but it remains in the background; the author has two friends in his eye, who, lying in a cold night under one covering (Ex. xxii. 26; Isa. xxviii. 20), cherish one another, and impart mutual warmth. Also in Aboth de-Rabbi Nathan, c. 8, the sleeping of two together is spoken of as an evidence of friendship. The vav in v*hham is that of the consequent; it is wanting, 10a, according to rule, in hdehhad, because it commonly comes into use with the verb, seldom (e.g. Gen. xxil. 1) with the preceding subj.
Ver. 12. “ And if one shall violently assail him who is alone, two shall withstand him; and (finally) a threefold cord is not quickly broken asunder.” The form yithg’pho for yithg‘phehu, Job xv. 24, is like yird‘pho, Hos. viii. 3 = yird‘phehu, Judg. ix. 40. 1} we take pn in the sense of to overpower, then the meaning is: If one can overpower him who is alone, then, on the contrary, two can maintain their ground against him (Herzf.); but the two O8, vers. 10, 11, which are equivalent to ἐάν, exclude such a pure logical et. And why should spn, if it can mean overpowering, not also
1 With Munach and Rebia in one word, which, according to the Masora, occurs in only four other places. Vid. Mas. magna under this passage, and Mishpete hateamin 26a.
mean doing violence to by means of a sudden attack? In the Mishnic and Arab. it signifies to seize, to lay hold of; in the Aram. ἜΡΓ = PINT, and also at Job xiv. 20, xv. 24 (vid. Comm), it may be understood of a violent assault, as well as of a completed subjugation; as xt means to lift up and carry; oy, to tread and to stand. But whether it be understood inchoat, or not, in any case wan is not the assailant, who is much rather the unnamed subj. in ‘opr, but the one (the solifarius) who, if he is alone, must succumb; the construction of yithg’pho Aachhad follows the scheme of Ex. ii. 6, “she saw it, the child” To the assault expressed by 4pn, there stands opposed the expression 3) top, which means to withstand any one with success; as ‘5 tmp, 2 Kings x. 4, Pa cxlvii. 17, Dan. viii. 7, means to maintain one’s ground. Of three who hold together, 12a says nothing; the advance from two to three is thus made in the manner of a numerical proverb (vid. Proverbs, vol. I. p. 13). If two hold together, that is seen to be good; but if there be three, this threefold bond is likened to a cord formed of three threads, which cannot easily be broken. Instead of the definite specific art. ὍΣ ‘A, we make use of the indefinite. Puniculus triplex dificile rumpitur is one of the winged expressions used by Koheleth.
The People's Enthusiasm for the new King, and ils Extinction, iv. 13-16. A political observation follows in an aphoristic manner the obser- and passes even into its opposite. The author, who here plainly quotes from actual events, begins with a general statement:
Ver. 13. “ Better is a youth poor and wise, than a king old and foolish, who no longer understands how to be warned,"—ic. who increases his folly by this, that he is “ wise in his own eyes,” Prov. xxvi. 12; earlier, as tiy denotes, he was, in some measure, accessible to the instruction of others in respect of what was wanting to him; but now in his advanced age he is hardened in his folly, bids defiance to all warning counsel, and undermines his throne. The connection of the verb yr with 5 and the inf. (for which elsewhere only the inf. is used) is a favourite form with the author; it means to know anything well, v. 1, vi 8, x. 15; here is meant an understanding resting on the knowledge of oneself and on the knowledge of men. ὙΠ is here and at xii 12, Ps. xix. 12,8 Niph. toleratiowm, such as the synon. ἼΘΙ), Pa ii 10: to let oneself be cleared up, made wiser, enlightened, warned. After this contrast, the idea connected with o5n also defines itself. A young man (1%, as at Dan. i 4, but also Gen. iv. 23) is meant who (vid, above, p. 193, under misken) yet excels the old imbecile and childish
Ver. 14. “ For out of the prison-house he goeth forth to reign as king, although he was born as a poor man in his kingdom.” With ‘> the properties of poverty and wisdom attributed to the young man are verified,—wisdom in this, that he knew how to find the way from a prison to a throne. As harammim, 2 Chron. xxii, 5 =haarammimn, 2 Kings viii. 28, so hasurim = haasurim (cf. masoreth = maasoreth, Ezek. xx. 37); beth haasirim (Keri: haasurim), Judg. xvi. 21, 25, and beth haesur, Jer. xxxvii 15, designate the prison; cf. Mosd katan, iii. 1. The modern form of the language prefers this elision of the &, eg. DN = iN AN, ρὸν = ἼΠΝ ΟΝ, "2 post = N82 contra, ete. The perf. X¥ is also thought of as such; for the comparison, ver. 13, would have no meaning if the poor and wise youth were not thought of as having reached the throne, and having pre-eminence assigned to him as such. He has come forth from the prison to become king, *)...°>. Zickler translates: “ Whereas also he that
was born in his kingdom was poor,” and adds the vemark: “ p) 55, after the ‘> of the preceding clause, does not so much introduce a verification of it, as much rather an intensification; by which is expressed, that the prisoner has not merely transitorily fallen into such misery, but that he was born in poor and lowly circumstances, and that in his own kingdom ‘D3, ic, in the same land which he
should afterwards rule as king.” But δ) 5 is nowhere used by Koheleth in the sense of “ja auch ” (= whereas also); and also where it is thus to be translated, as at Jer. xiv. 18, xxiii. 11, it is used in the sense of “ denn auch” (= for also), assigning proof. The fact is, that this group of particles, according as ‘> is thought of as demonst. or relat., means either “denn auch,” iv. 16, vii. 22, viii. 16, or “wenn auch” = ἐὰν καί, as here and at viii. 12. In the latter case, it is related to “3 D3 (sometimes also merely 53, Ps, χουν. 9 5 Mal. iii. 15), as ἐὰν (εἰ) καί, although, notwithstanding, is to καὶ ἐάν (et), even although.’ Thus 142, connecting itself with PEP, 18 to be translated: “although he was born (7213, not 791) in his kingdom as ἃ poor man.”* We cannot also concur with Zéckler in the view
* That the accentuation separates the two words -ὩΣ "2 is to be judged from this, that it almost everywhere prefers “ON ‘5 (vid. under Comm. to Ps. i. 2). wy th cannot mean “to become poor.” Gratz appeals to the Mishnic that the suff. of ‘p3 refers to the young upstart: in the kingdom which should afterwards become his; for this reason, that the suff. of ‘nn, ver. 166, refers to the old king, and thus also that this designation may be mediated, 2 must refer to him. mao signifies kingdom, reign, realm; here, the realm, as at Neh. ix. 35, Dan. v. 11, vi. 29. Gritz thinks vers. 13-16 ought to drive expositors to despair. But hitherto we have found no room for despair in obtaining ἃ meaning from them. What follows also does not perplex us. The author describes how all the world hails the entrance of the new youthful king on his government, and gathers together under his
Vers. 15, 16a. “ I saw all the living which walk under the sun on the side of the youth, the second who shall enter upon the place of the former: no end of all the people, all those at whose head he stands.” The author, by the expression “I saw,” places himself back in the time of the change of government. If we suppose that he represents this to himself in a lively manner, then the words are to be translated: of the second who shall be his successor; but if we suppose that he seeks to express from the standpoint of the past that which, lying farther back in the past, was now for the first time future, then the future represents the time to come in the past, as at 2 Kings iii. 27; Ps. lxxviii. 6; Job xv. 28 (Hitz.): of the second who should enter on his place (ΟΡ, to step to, to step forth, of the new king, Dan. viii. 23, xi. 2 f.; ef mp, 1 Kings viii. 20). The designation of the crowd which, as the pregnant OY expresses, gathered by the side of the young successor to the old king, by “all the living, those walking under the sun (7, perhaps intentionally the pathetic word for 5°25, Isa. xlii. 5),” would remain a hyperbole, even although the throne of the Asiatic world-ruler had been intended; still the expression, so absolute in its universality, would in that case be more natural (vid. the conjectural reference to Cyrus and Astyages, above, at p. 215). ‘07, Ewald refers to the successor to the king, the second after the king, and translates: “to the second man who should reign in his stead;” but the second man in this sense has certainly never been the child of fortune; one must then think of Joseph, who, however, remains the second man. Hitzig rightly: “ The youth is the second "Στ᾿, not 7%, in contrast to the king, who, as his predecessor, is the first.” “ Yet,” he continues, “4m should be the appos. and yin the principal word,” ic. instead of: with the second youth, was to be expected: with the second, the youth. It language; but no intelligent linguist will use g> 73 of a man in any other sense than that he is originally poor.
is true, we may either translate: with the second youth, or: with the second, the youth—the form of expression has in it something incorrect, for it has the appearance as if it treated of two youths, But similar are the expressions, Matt. viii, 21, ἕτερος w.T.X., “ another, and that, too, one of His disciples;” and Luke xxiii. 32, ἤγοντο κιτιλ. All the world ranks itself by the side (thus we may also express it) of the second youthful king, so that he comes to stand at the head of an endless multitude. The LXX., Jerome, and the Venet. render incorrectly the all (the multitude) as the subject of the relative clause, which Luther, after the Syr., corrects by reading ypS for onyn: of the people that went for him there was no end. Rightly the Targ.: at whose head (= ΠΡ 3) he had the direction, "DBD, as with 2) xy’, 1 Sam. xviii. 16; 2 Chron. ji. 10; Ps. lxviii. 8, ete. All the world congregates about him, follows his leadership; but his history thus splendidly begun, viewed backwards, is a history of hopes falsified.
Ver. 160. “ And yet they who come after do not rejoice in him: for that also is vain, and a grasping after the wind.” For all that, and in spite of that (yam has here this meaning, as at vi. 7; Jer. vi. 15; Ps. exxix. 2; Ewald, ὃ 9546), posterity (ΝΠ, as at 1, 11: ef. Isa.-xli. 4) has no joy in this king,—the hopes which his contemporaries placed in the young king, who had seized the throne and conquered their hearts, afterwards proved to be delusions; and also this history, at first so beautiful, and afterwards so hateful, contributed finally to the confirmation of the truth, that all under the sun is vain. As to the historical reminiscence from the time of the Ptolemies, in conformity with which Hitzig (in his Comm.) thinks this figure is constructed, vid. above, p. 213; Gritz here, as always, rocks himself in Herodian dreams, In his Comm., Hitz. guesses first of Jeroboam, along with Rehoboam the Ὁ) 70%, who rebelled against King Solomon, who in his old age had become foolish. In an essay, “ Zur Exeg. u. Kritik des B. Koheleth,” in Hilgenfeld’s Zeitschr. XIV. 566 ff., Saul, on the contrary, appears to him to be the old and foolish king, and David the poor wise youth who rose to the throne, and took possession of the whole kingdom, but in his latter days experienced desertion and adversities; for those who came after (the younger men) had no delight in him, but rebelled against him. But in relation to Saul, who came from the plough to be king, David, who was called from being a shepherd, is not vw 1%); and to Jewish history this Saul, whose nobler self is darkened by melancholy, but again brightens forth, and who to his death maintained the dignity of a king of Israel, never at any time appears as S:p>)... $m. Moreover, by both combinations of that which is related with the Ὁ ΟΣ m3
It is true that ‘wo, as the so-called particip. perfecti, may mean “ gone aside (to a distance),” Isa. xlix. 21, Jer. xvii. 13; and we may, at any rate, by ΡΟ, think on that poor rabble which at first gathered around David, 1 Sam. xxii. 2, regarded as outcasts from honourable society. But m3 will not accord therewith. That David came forth from the house (home) of the estranged or separated, is and remains historically an awkward expression, linguistically obscure, and not in accordance with the style of Koheleth. In order to avoid this incongruity, Bottcher regards Antiochus the Great as the original of the. He was the second son of his father, who died 225. When a hopeful youth of fifteen years of age, he was recalled to the throne from a voluntary banishment into Farther Asia, very soon gained against his old cousin and rival Achaeus, who was supported by Egypt, a large party, and remained for several years esteemed as a prince and captain; he disappointed, however, at a later time, the confidence which was reposed in him. But granting that the voluntary exile of Antiochus might be designated as ‘oun ns, he was yet not a poor man, born poor, but was the son of King Seleacus Callinicus; and his older relative and rival Achaeus wished indeed to become king, but never attained unto it. Hence yen is not the youth as second son of his father, but as second on the throne, in relation to the dethroned combination of Bottcher's also stands on a feeble foundation, and falls in ruins when assailed.
The section i. 12-iv. 16, to which we have prefixed the superscription, “ Koheleth’s Experiences and their Results,” has now series of proverbs which here follows is the briefest, most complete in internal connection.
As an appendix and interlude, these proverbs directly follow the personal section preceding. The first rule here laid down refers to the going to the house of God.
iv. 17 [v. 1]. “Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and to go to hear is better than that fools give a sacrifice; for the want of knowledge leads them to do evil.” The “house of God” is like the “house of Jahve,” 2 Sam. xii 20, Isa. xxxvii. 1, the temple; ®, altogether like 5x-'0->x, Ps. Ixxiii. 17. The Chethib
231 is admissible, for elsewhere also this plur. (“thy feet”) occurs in a moral connection and with a spiritual reference, e.g. Ps. cxix. 59; but more frequently, however, the comprehensive sing. occurs, Ps. exix. 105, Prov. i. 15, iv. 26 ἢ, and the Xeré thus follows the right note. The correct understanding of what follows depends on 5... 73. Interpreters have here adopted all manner of impossible views. Hitzig’s translation: “for they know not how to be sorrowful,” has even found in Stuart at least one imitator; but yn my would, as the contrast of ‘asoth tov, iii. 12, mean nothing else than, “to do that which is unpleasant, disagreeable, bad,” like ’asah ra’ah, 2 Sam. xii, 18. Gesen., Ewald (ὃ 3360), Elster, Heiligst., Burger, Zockl,, Dale, and Bullock translate: “they know not that they do evil;” but for such a rendering the words ought to have been 37 Onivy (cf. Jer. xv. 15); the only example for the translation of mivyd after the manner of the ace. 6. inf. = se facere malum—viz. at 1 Kings xix. 4— is incongruous, for md does not here mean se mori, but ut moreretur. Yet more incorrect is the translation of Jerome, which is followed by Luther: nesciunt quid faciant mali. It lies near, as at 11. 24 so also here, to suppose an injury done to the text. Aben Ezra introduced > before ‘wy, but Koheleth never uses this limiting particle; we would have to write myb-ox "3, after iii, 12, viii. 15. Anything thus attained, however, is not worth the violent means thus used; for the ratifying clause is not ratifying, and also in itself, affirmed of the pSo>, who, however, are not the same as the e’shaim and the hattdim, is inappropriate. Rather it might be said: they know not to do good (thus the Syr.); or: they know not whether it be good or bad to do, i.e. they have no moral feeling, and act not from moral motives (so the Targ.). Not less violent than this remodelling of the text is the expedient of Herzberg, Philippson, and Ginsburg, who from yee derive the subject - conception of the obedient (c'yoen): “ For those understand not at all to do evil;” the subj. ought to have been expressed if it must be something different from the immediately preceding oo. We may thus render cnam yodim, after Ps. lxxxii. δ, Isa. vi. 10, as complete in itself: they (the fools) are devoid of knowledge to do evil = so that they do evil; ic, want of knowledge brings them to this, that they do evil. Similarly also Knobel: they concern themselves not,—are unconcerned (viz about the right mode of worshipping God),—so that they do evil, with the correct remark that the consequence of their perverse conduct is here represented as their intention. But yr 1), absol., does not mean to be unconcerned (wanton), but to be without knowledge. Rashbam, in substance correctly: they are predisposed by their ignorance to do evil; and thus also Hahn; Mendelssohn translates directly: “they sin because they are ignorant” If this interpretation is correct, then for 70° it follows that it does not mean “to obey” (thus ἐφ. Zockler), which in general it never means without some words being added to it (cf. on the contrary, 1 Sam. xv. 22), bat “to hear,”"—viz. the word of God, which is to be heard in the house of God,—whereby, it is true, a hearing is meant which leads to obedience. In the word nitvin, priests are not perhaps thought of, although the comparison of ver. 5 (Oo) with Mal. ii. 7 makes it certainly natural; priestly instruction limited itself to information regarding the performance of the law already given in Scripture, Lev. x. 11, Deut. xxxiii. 9 f, and to deciding on questions arising in the region of legal praxis, Deut. xxiv. 8; Hag ii 11. The priesthood did not belong to the teaching class in the sense of preaching. Preaching was never a part of the temple cultus, but, for the first time, after the exile became a part of the synagogue worship. The preachers under the O. T. were the prophets,—preachers by a supernatural divine call, and by the immediate impulse of the Spirit; we know from the Book of Jeremiah that they sometimes went into the temple, or there caused their books of prophecy to be read; yet the author, by the word ΣΌΣ of the foregoing proverb, scarcely thinks of them. But apart from the teaching of the priests, which referred to the realization of the letter of the law, and the teaching of the prophets to the realization of the spirit of the law, the word formed an essential part of the sacred worship of the temple: the 7¢filla, the Beracha, the singing of psalms, and certainly, at the time of Koheleth, the reading of certain sections of the Bible. When thou goest to the house of God, says Koheleth, take heed to thy step, well reflecting whither thou goest and how thou hast there to appear; and (with this } he connects with this first nota bene a second) drawing near to hear exceeds the sacrifice-offering of fools, for they are ignorant Gust because they hear not), which leads to this result, that they do evil. 1, prac, expresses also, without an adj,, precedence in number, Isa. x. 10, or activity, ix. 17, or worth, Ezek. xv. 2, 4p is inf. absol. Bottcher seeks to subordinate it as such to bv; take heed to thy foot... and to the coming near to hear more than to. δε But these obj. to 6 would be incongruous, and "ὩΣ pnp clumsy and even distorted in expression; it ought rather to be ΠῚ oD23 AND, As the inf. absol. can take the place of the obj., Isa. vii. 15, xlii. 24, Lam. iii. 45, so also the place of the subj. (Ewald, § 240a), although Prov. xxv. 27 is a doubtful example of this. That the use of the inf. absol. has a wide application with the author of this book, we have already seen under iv. 2. Regarding the sequence of ideas in M2}... AAD (first the subj., then the obj.), vid. Gesen. § 133. 3, and ef. above at iii, 18. M3? (0°31), along with its general signification comprehending all animal sacrifices, according to which the altar bears the name ΠΙΒΗΣ, early acquired also a more special signification: it denotes, in contradistinction to my, such sacrifices as are only partly laid on the altar, and for the most part are devoted to a sacrificial festival, Ex. xviii. 12 (cf. Ex. xii. 27), the so-called sh‘lamim, or also zivhhe sh‘lamim, Prov. vii. 14. The expression jn) mat makes it probable that here, particularly, is intended the festival (1 Kings i. 41) connected with this kind of sacrifice, and easily degenerating to worldly merriment (vid. under Prov. vii. 14); for the more common word for MA would have been 3 ὉΠ or biNY; in NA it seems to be indicated that it means not only to present something to God, but also to give at the same time something to man. The most recent canonical Chokma-book agrees with Prov. xxi. 3 in this depreciation of sacrifice. But the Chokma does not in this stand alone. The great word of Samuel, 1 Sam. xv. 22 f., that selfdenying obedience to God is better than all sacrifices, echoes through the whole of the Psalms. And the prophets go to the utmost in depreciating the sacrificial cultus.
v. 1, 2 [2, 3]. “Be not hasty with thy mouth, and let not thy heart hasten to speak a word before God: for God is in heaven, and thou art upon earth; therefore let thy words be few. For by much business cometh dreaming, and by much talk the noise of fools. As we say in German: auf Fligeln fliegen [to flee on wings], std Einem Auge nicht sehen [not to see with one eye], auf der Flote blasen [to blow on the flute], so in Heb. we say that one slandereth with (auf) his tongue (Ps. xv. 3), or, as here, that he hasteth with his mouth, i+. is forward with his mouth, inasmuch as the word goes before the thought. It is the same usage as when the post-bibl. Heb., in contradistinction to 29320 7M, the law given in the Scripture, calls the oral law Πρ ΣΕ ‘nA, ic the law mediated ney, oraliter = oralis traditio (Shabbath 31a; cf. Gittin 60d). The in- above, p. 191; once it occurs quite like our “ sich becilen” [to hasten], with reflex. accus. suff, 2 Chron. xxxv. 21. Man, when he prays, should not give the reins to his tongue, and multiply words as one begins and repeats over a form which he has learnt, knowing certainly that it is God of whom and to whom he speaks, but without being conscious that God is an infinitely exalted Being, to whom one may not carelessly approach without collecting his thoughts, and irreverently, without lifting up soul. the heavens, God's throne, are exalted above the earth, the dwelling-place
ὉΡῸ (fewness) used as δὴ adv.; but the more recent treats it as an adj., and forms from it the plur. O°®¥ (here and in Ps. cix. 8, which bears the superscription /e-david, but has the marks of Jeremiah’s style); the post-bibl places in the room of the apparent adj. the particip. adj. OF with the plur. Ooyio (ΓΌΡΊΟ), eg. Berachoth 61a: “always let the words of a man before the Holy One (blessed be His name!) be few” (no). Few ought the words to be; for where they are many, it is not without folly. Thisis what is to be understood, ver. 2, by the comparison; the two parts of the verse stand here in closer mutual relation than vii. 1,—the proverb is not merely synthetical, but, like Job v. 7, parabolical The 3 is both times that of the cause. The dream happens, or, as we say, dreams happen ὯΨ 353; not: by much labour; for labour in itself, as the expenditure of strength making one weary, has as its consequence, v. 11, Sweet sleep undisturbed by dreams; but: by much self-vexation in a man’s striving after high and remote ends beyond what is possible (Targ., in manifold project-making); the care of such a man transplants itself from the waking to the sleeping life, if it does not wholly deprive him of sleep, v. 110, viii. 16,—all kinds of images of the labours of the day, and fleeting phantoms and terrifying pictures hover before his mind. And as dreams of such a nature appear when a man wearies himself inwardly as well as outwardly by the labours of the day, so, with the same inward necessity, where many words are spoken folly makes its appearance. Hitzig renders Spo, in the connection ‘2 iP, as adj.; but, like ON (which forms an adj. gout), Sos is always a subst., or, more correctly, it is a name occurring always only of a living being, never of a thing. There is sound without any solid content, mere blustering bawling without sense and intelligence. The talking of a fool is in itself of this kind (x. 14); but if one who is not just a fool falls into much talk, it is scarcely possible but that in this flow of words empty bombast should appear.
Another rule regarding the worship of God refers to vowing.
Vers. 3-ὸ. “ When thou hast made a vow to God, delay not to fulfil it; for there is no pleasure in fools: that which thou hast vowed fulfil Better that thou vowest not, than that thou vowes'; and fulfillest not. Let not thy mouth bring thy body into punishment; and say not before the messenger of God that it was precipitation: why shall God be angry at thy talk, and destroy the work of thy hands? For in many dreams and words there are also many vanities: much rather fear God!” If they abstained, after Shabbath 300, from treating the Book of Koheleth as apocryphal, because it begins with Amn 35 (cf. at 1, 3) and closes in the same way, and hence warrants the conclusion that that which lies between will also be mn “234, this is in a special manner true of the passage before us regarding the vow which, in thought and expression, is the echo of Deut. xxiii. 22-24. Instead of kaasher tiddor, we find there the words ki tiddor; instead of lelohim (= leélohim, always only of the one true God), there we have lahovah elohécha; and instead of al-t°ahher, there lo t‘ahher. There the reason is: “for the Lord thy God will surely require it of thee; and it would be sin in thee;” here: for there is no pleasure in fools, ze. it is not possible that any one, not to speak of God, could have a particular inclination toward fools, who speak in vain, and make promises in which their heart is not, and which they do not keep. Whatever thou vowest, continues Koheleth, fulfil it; it is better (Ewald, § 356a) that thou vowest not, than to vow and not to pay; for which the 7éra says: “If thou shalt forbear to vow, it shall be no sin in thee” (Deut. xxiii. 22). 173, which, according to the stem-word, denotes first the vow of consecration or setting apart (cogn. Arab. nadar, to separate, 71, whence ™2), the so-called "δὲ [vid. Num. xxx. 3], is here a vow in its widest sense; the author, however, may have had, as there, the law (cf. ver. 24), especially shalme nédér, in view, ic. such as the law does not enjoin, but which the offerer promises (cogn. with the shalme n‘davah, ic. such as rest on free-will, but not on any obligation arising from a previous promise) from his own inclination, for the event that God may do this or that for him. The verb 0d” is not, however, related to this name for sacrifices, as KOM is to Neen, but denotes the fulfilling or discharge as a performance fully accordant
Lamed and the inf signifies to allow, to permit, Gen. xx. 6; Judg. i. 34; Job xxxi 30. MPO a ος translated: not to bring into punishment; for syncop.
; xon—the Hiph. of which, according to an old, and, in the Pentateuch, favourite form, is W'ON?—signifies to sin, and also (eg. Gen. xxxix. 9; ef. the play on the word, Hos. viii. 11) to expiate sin; sin-burdened and guiliy, or liable to punishment, mean the same thing. Incorrectly, Gin: burg, Zock., and others: “ Do not suffer thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin;” for (1) the formula: “the flesh sins,” is not in TT det eee ee uses the expression σὰρξ dyaprias, Rom. viii. 3, but ἁμαρτά- vouga, that which sins is not the flesh, but the will determined PTA REN TU ον hath spoken. Geniestnntyideoetidsdaaenatiaaaea xxiv. 4, for the meaning peceati rewm facere; Isa. xxix. 21 is similar.
The further warning refers to the lessening of the sin of a rash vow unfulfilled as an unintentional, easily expiable offence: “ and say not before the messenger of God that it was a ποῦ, a sin of weakness.” Without doubt hammalach is an official byname of a priest (wid. above, p. 193), and that such as was in common use at the make the matter of the warning clear. That it is not easy, may be concluded from this, that with Jewish interpreters it lies remote to think of a priest in the word hammalach. By this word the Targ. understands the angel to whom the execution of the sentence of punishment shall be committed on the day of judgment; Aben Ezra: the angel who writes down all the words of a man; similarly Jerome, after his Jewish teacher. Under this passage Ginsburg has an entire excursus regarding the angels. The LXX. and Syr. translate “before God,” as if the words of the text were ‘5x 1, Ps, exxxviii. 1, or as if hammalach could of itself mean God, as presenting Himself in history. Supposing that hammalach is the official name of a man, and that of a priest, we appear to be under the necessity of imagining that he who is charged with the obligation of a vow turns to the priest with the desire that he would release him from it, and thus dissolve (bibl. Y2", Mishnic YA) the vow. But there is no evidence that the priests had the power of releasing from vows. Individual cases in which a husband can dissolve the vow of his wife, and a father the vow of his daughter, are enumerated in Num. xxx.; besides, in the traditional law, we find the sentence: “ A vow, which one who makes it repents of, can be dissolved by a learned man (05m), or, where none is present, by three laymen,” Bechoroth 36b; the matter cannot be settled by any middle person (mv), but he who has taken the vow (717) must appear personally, Jore deah c. 228, § 16. Of the priest as such nothing is said here. Therefore the passage cannot at all be traditionally understood of an official dissolution of an oath. Where the Talm. applies it juristically, Shabbath 32, etc., Rashi explains hammalach by gizbar shél-haqdesh, te. treasurer of the revenues of the sanctuary; and in the Comm. to Koheleth he supposes that some one has publicly resolved on an act of charity (npty), ic. has determined it with himself, and that now the representative of the congregation (mv) comes to demand it. But that is altogether fanciful. If we proceed on the idea that liphne hammalach is of the same meaning as liphne hakkohen, Lev. xxvii. 8, 11, Num. ix. 6, xxvii. 2, etc., we have then to derive the figure from such passages relating to the law of sacrifice as Num. xv. 22-26, from which the words ki sh‘gagah hi (Num. xv. 250) originate. We have to suppose that he who has made a vow, and has not kept it, comes to terms with God with an easier and less costly offering, since in the confession (7!) which he makes before the priest he explains that the vow was a sh‘gagah, a declaration that inconsiderately escaped him. The author, in giving it to be understood that under these circumstances the offering of the sacrifice is just the direct contrary of ἃ good work, calls to the conscience of the inconsiderate 1: why should God be angry on account of thy voice with which thou dost excuse thy sins of omission, and destroy (vid. regarding 53" under Isa. x. 27) the work of thy hands (eid. under Ps. xc. 17), for He destroys what thou hast done, and causes to fail what thou purposest? The question with /ammah resembles those in Ezra iv. 22, vil. 23, and is of the same kind as at vii. 16 £.; it leads us to consider what a mad self-destruction that would be (Jer. xliv. 7, cf. under Isa. i. 5).
The reason [for the foregoing admonition] now following places the inconsiderate vow under the general rubric of inconsiderate words. We cannot succeed in interpreting ver. 6 (in so far as we do not supply, after the LXX. and Syr. with the Targ.: ne credas; or better, with Ginsburg, ΚΠ & it is) without taking one of the vars in the sense of “also.” That the Heb. cae, like the Greek καί, the Lat. εἰ, may have this comparative or intensifying sense rising above that which is purely copulative, is seen from «g. Num. ix. 14, ef. also Josh. xiv. 11. In many cases, it is true, we are not under the necessity of translating rae by “also;” but since the “ and” here does not merely externally connect, but expresses correlation of things an“ also” ora similar particle involuntarily substitutes itself for the “ and,” ἐν. Gen. xvii. 20 (Jerome): super Ismad quoque; Ex. xxix. 8: filios quoqgue; Deut. i 32: εἰ nec sic quidem eredidistis; ix. 8: πᾶνε εἰ ἐπ Hore; of. Josh. xv. 19; 1 Sam. xxv. 43; 2 Sam. xix. 25; 1 Kings ii 22, xi 26; Isa xlix. 6, “I have also given to thee.” But there are also passages in which it cannot be otherwise translated than by “also.” We do not reckon among these Ps. xxxi. 12, where we do not translate “ also my neighbours,” and Amos iv. 10, where the words are to be translated, “and that in your nostrils.” On the contrary, Isa. xxxii. 7 is scarcely otherwise to be translated than “also when the poor maketh good his right,” like 2 Sam. i 23, “ also in their death they are not divided” In 2 Chron. xxvii. δ, in like manner, the two vars are scarcely correlative, but we have, with Keil, to translate, “also in the second and third year.” And in Hos. viii. 6, κυ at least according to the punctuation, signifies “also it,” as Jerome translates: ex Jsracle et tpse est. According to the interpunction of the passage before us, “ Ἢ is the pred., and thus, with the Venet., is to be translated: “ For in many dreams and vanities there are also many words.” We could at all events render the var, as also at x. 11, Ex. xvi. 6, as ταῦ apod.; but ὋΝ 318 has not the character of a virtual antecedent,—the meaning of the expression remains as for the rest the same; but Hitzig’s objection is of force against it (as also against Ewald’s disposition of the words, like that of Symmachus, Jerome, for he explains: “for in many dreams are also vanities, 1.6. things from which nothing comes, and (the like) in many words.” But not only is this assumed carrying forward of the 3 doubtful, but the principal thing would be made a secondary matter, and would drag heavily. The relation in ver, 2 is different where vav is that of comparison, and that which is compared follows the comparison. Apparently the text (although the LXX. had it before them, as it is before us) has undergone dislocation, and is thus to be arranged: pam Ama Asn modn 373 δ: for in many dreams and many words there are also vanities, ic. illusions by which one deceives himself and others. Thus also Bullock renders, but without assigning a reason for it. That dreams are named first, arises from a reference back to ver. 2, according to which they are the images of what a man is externally and mentally busied and engaged with. But the principal stress lies on AIA OADN, to which also the too rash, inconsiderate vows belong. The pred. obam, however, connects itself with «“ vanity of vanities,” which is Koheleth’s final judgment regarding all that is earthly. The "5 following connects itself with the thought lying in 6a, that much talk, like being much given to dreams, ought to be avoided: it ought not to be; much rather (imo, Symm. ἀλλά) fear God, Him before whom one should say nothing, but that which contains in it the whole heart.
CONTINUATION OF THE CATALOGUE OF VANITIES. THE GRADATIONS OF OPPRESSION IN DESPOTIC STATES.—YV. 7, 8 [8, 9].
“Fear God,” says the proverb (Prov. xxiv. 21), “and the king.” The whole Book of Koheleth shows how full its author is of this fundamental thought. Thus the transition to the theme now following was at least inwardly mediated. The state-government, however, although one should be subject to it for conscience’ sake, corresponds very little to his idea: the ascending scale of the powers is an ascending scale of violence and oppression.
robbery of right and of justice in the state, marvel not at the matter: for one higher watches over him who is high; and others are high above both.” Like rash, mishpat vatsedeq are also the gen. of the obj.; “robbery of the right and of justice” is an expression not found elsewhere, but not on that account, as Gritz supposes, impossible: mishpat is right, rectitude, and conformity to law; and tsédéq, judicial administration, or also social deportment to these norms; 2, a wicked, shameless depriving of a just claim, and withholding of the showing. of right which is due: It one gets a sight of such things as these in a m‘dinah, ic. in a territorial district under a common government, he ought not to wonder at the matter. 759 means to be startled, astonished, and, in the sense of “to wonder,” is the word commonly used in modern Heb. But 7° has here the colourless general signification of res, according to which the Syr. translates it (wid. under iii. 1); every attempt in passages such as this to retain the unweakened primary meaning of the word runs out into groundless and fruitless subtlety. Cf. Berachoth δα, 'n> yon... ΟὟ, “a man who buys a thing from another.” On the other hand, there is doubt about the meaning of the clause assigning the reason. It seems to be intended, that over him who is high, who oppresses those under him, there stands one who is higher, who in turn oppresses him, and thereby becomes the executor of punishment upon him; and that these, the high and the higher, have over them a Most High, viz. God, who will bring them to an account (Knobel, Ew., Elst., Vaih., Hengst., Zéckl.). None of the old translators and expositors rises, it is true, to the knowledge that D123 may be pl. majestatis,' but the first 323 the Targ. renders by Wax by, This was natural to the Jewish usus /og., for ΤΩΣ in the post-bibl. Heb. is a favourite name for God, eg. Beza 20}, Jebamoth 87a, Kamma 13a: “from the table of God” (mas jnden), ie, the altar (cf. Heb. xiii, 10; 1 Cor. x. 21).2 The interpretation of ‘33, however, as the p/. majest., has in the Book of Koheleth itself 8 support in P32, xii. 1; and the thought in which 74 climactically terminates accords essentially with iii. 17. This explanation, however, of 76 does not stand the test. - For if an unrighteous
‘ That is surprising, since the Talm. interpretation, Menachoth 110a, even brings it about that ‘35, v. 10, is to be understood of God.
+ mc pin i deo a tommoa Habla nana for Ge th tithes and offerings (cf. ¢.g. Nachmani under Gen. xiv. 20). Along with msn pn, the sacrifices are also called (in Hurwitz’ work on the Heb. rites, known by the abbreviated title nb’) mass oon; vid. 85) of the ed. 1764, and 23d of the Amsterdam ed. 1707 of the abridgment.
administration of justice, if violence is in vogue instead of right, that is an actual proof that over him who is high no human higher one watches who may put a check upon him, and to whom he feels that he is responsible. And that above them both one who is Most High stands, who will punish injustice and avenge it, is ἃ consolatory argument against vexation, but is no explanatory reason of the phenomenon, such as we expect after the noli mirari ἡ for Apnn-5y does not signify “be not offended ” (John xvi. 1), or, “think it not strange” (1 Pet. iv. 12), which would be otherwise expressed (cf. under Ps. xxxvii. 1), but μὴ θαυμάσῃς (LXX.). Also the contrast, ver. 8, warrants the conclusion that in ver. 7 the author seeks to explain the want of legal order from the constitution of a despotic state as distinguished from patriarchal government. For this reason ew will not be meant of over-watching, which has its aim in the execution of legal justice and official duty, but of egoistic watching,—not, however, as Hitzig understands it: “ they mutually protect each other’s advantage; one crow does not peck out the eyes of another,’—but, on the contrary, in the sense of hostile watching, as at 1 Sam. xix. 11, 2 Sam. xi. 16, as B. Bardach understands it: “he watches for the time when he may gain the advantage over him who is high, who is yet lower than himself, and may strengthen and enrich himself with his flesh or his goods.” Over the one who is high, who oppresses the poor and is a robber in respect of right and justice, there stands a higher, who on his part watches how he can plunder him to his own aggrandisement; and over both there are again other high ones, who in their own interest oppress these, as these do such as are under them. This was the state of matters in the Persian Empire in the time of the author. The satrap stood at the head of state officers. In many cases he fleeced the province to fatten himself. But over the satrap stood inspectors, who often enough built up their own fortunes by fatal denunciations; and over all stood the king, or rather the court, with its rivalry of intrigues among courtiers and royal women. The cruel death-punishments to which disagreeable officials were subjected were fearful. There was a gradation of bad government and arbitrary domination from high to low and from low to high, and no word is more fitting for this state of things in Persia than ον; for watching, artfully lurking as spies for an opportunity to accomplish the downfall of each other, was prevalent in the Persian Empire, especially when falling into decay. Ver. 8. The author, on the other hand, now praises the patriarchal form of government based on agriculture, whose king takes pride, not in bloody conquests and tyrannical caprice, but in the peaceful promotion of the welfare of his people: “ But the advantage of a country consists always in a king given to the arable land.” What impossibilities have been found here, even by the most recent expositors! Ewald, Heiligst., Elster, Zockl. translate: rex agro factus = terrae pracfectus; but, in the language of this book, not ay but ἦρθ nivy is the expression used for “to make a king.” Gesen., Win., de Wette, Knobel, Vaih. translate: rex qui colitur a terra (civibus). But could a country, in the sense of its population in subjection to the king, be more inappropriately designated than by 71”? Besides, 12) certainly gains the meaning of colere where God is the object; but with s human ruler as the object it means sewvire and nothing more, and 733" can mean nothing else than “dienstbar gemacht” [made subject to], not “honoured.” Along with this signification, related denom. to 739, ἼΩ;), referred from its primary signification to 1, the open fields (from 77%, to go out in length and breadth), may also, after the phrase mown ty, signify cultivated, wrought, tilled; and while the phrase “ made subject to” must be certainly held as possible (Rashi, Aben Ezra, and others assume it without hesitation), but is without example, the NipA. occurs, ¢g. at Ezek. xxxvi. 9, in the latter signification, of the mountains of Israel: “ ye shall be tilled.” Under 8a, Hitzig, and with him Stuart and Zéckler, makes the misleading remark that the Chetht is *7523, and that it is = M33, according to which the explanation is then given: the protection and security which an earthly ruler secures is, notwithstanding this, not to be disparaged. But xn is Chethth, for which the Kert substitutes wn; 522 is Chethth without Kert; and that 532 is thus a modification of the text, and that, too, an objectionable one, since μετ πῶ, in the sense of “in all this,” is unheard of. The Xert seeks, without any necessity, to make the pred. and subj. like one another in gender; without necessity, for 87 may also be neut.: the advantage of a land is this, viz. what follows. And how 533 is to be understood is seen from Ezra x. 17, where it is to be explained: And they prepared? the sum of the men, ie. the list of the men, of such as had married strange wives; cf. 1 Chron. vii. 5. Accordingly 523 here means, as the author generally uses 937 mostly in the impersonal sense of omnia: in omnibus, in all things = by all means; or: in wniversum,
1 Thus pointed rightly in J., with Sheva quiese. and Dagesh in Beth; vid. Kimchi in Michlol 63a, and under ΣΡ
"προ no. may meen “to ba pubdyeiih engthing,” Keil erroneously points to Gen. xliv. 12; and Philippi, St. Const. p. 49, thinks that rdkol dndshim can be taken together in the sense of ναξοὶ Aaanashia.
in general. Were the words accentuated Tay m5 Sp, the adject. connection of Ὁ) 'w would thereby be shown; according to which the LXX. and Theod. translate τοῦ ἀγροῦ εἰργασμένου: Symm., with the Syr., τῇ χώρᾳ εἰργασμένῃ: “a king for the cultivated land,” 7.2, one who regards this as a chief object. Luzz. thus indeed accentuates; but the best established accentuation is 139) ΠῚ 150, This séparation of 12y from ‘wv can only be intended to denote that say) is to be referred not to it, but to 1>n, according to which the Tare. paraphrases. The meaning remains the same: a king subject (who has become a servus) to the cultivated land, rex agro addictus, as Dathe, Rosenm., and others translate, is a still more distinct expression of that which “a king for the well-cultivated field” would denote; an agriculture-king,—one who is addicted, not to wars, lawsuits, and sovereign stubbornness in his opinions, but who delights in the peaceful advancement of the prosperity of his country, and especially takes a lively interest in husbandry and the cultivation of the land. The order of the words in 8d is like that at ix. 2 séfiga: vili. 22, xxii. 2. The author thus praises, in contrast to a despotic state, a patriarchal kingdom based on agriculture.
THE UNCERTAINTY OF RICHES, AND THE CHEERFUL ENJOYMENT OF LIFE WHICH ALONE IS PRAISEWORTHY.—V. 9—VI. 6.
If we fix our attention on the word man, Ia, which properly denotes that which comes into the barn from without (eg. Prov. xiv. 4), ver. 9 seems to continue the praise of husbandry, as Rashi, Aben Ezra, Luzzatto, Bardach, and others have already concluded. But the thought that one cannot eat money is certainly not that which is intended in 9a; and in 90 the thought would be awkwardly and insufficiently expressed, that it is vain to love riches, and not, on the contrary, the fruit of agriculture. Therefore we are decidedly of opinion that here (cf. above, p. 182), with ver. 9, the foregoing series of proverbs does not come to a close, but makes a new departure.
Ver. 9. “He who loveth silver is not satisfied with silver; and he whose love cleaveth to abundance, hath nothing of it: also this is vain.” The transition in this series of proverbs is not unmediated; for the injustice which, according to ver. 7, prevails in the state as it now is becomes subservient to covetousness, in the very nature of which there lies insatiableness: semper avarus eget, hune nulla pecunia replet. That the author speaks of the “ sacra, fames argenti” (not aurt) arises from this, that not ant, but 43, is the specific word for coin.’ Mendelssohn-Friedliinder also explains: “He who loveth silver is not satisfied with silver,” ie. it does not make him full; that might perhaps be linguistically possible (cf. eg. Prov. xii. 11), although the author would in that case probably have written the words 0377}, after vi. 3; but “to be not full of money” is, after i. 8, and especially iv. 8, Hab. ii. 5, ef. Prov. xxvii. 20 = never to have enough of money, but always to desire more.
That which follows, 9a, is, according to Hitz.,a question: And who hath joy in abundance, which bringeth nothing in? But such questions, with the answer to be supplied, are not in Koheleth’s style; and what would then be understood by capital without interest? Others, as Zéckler, supply Y3%": and he that loveth abundance of possessions (is) not (full) of income; but that which is gained by these hard ellipses is only a tautology. With right, the Targ., Syr., Jerome, the Venet., and Luther take lo ¢vuah as the answer or conclusion: and who clings to abundance of possessions with his love?—he has no fruit thereof; or, with a weakening of the interrog. pronoun into the relative (as at i. 9; cf. under Ps, xxxiv. 13): he who... clings has nothing of it. Hamon signifies a tumult, a noisy multitude, particularly of earthly goods, as at Ps, xxxvil. 16; 1 Chron. xxix. 16; Isa. lx. 5. The connection of 378 with 3, occurring only here, follows the analogy of 3 72" and the like. The conclusion is synon. with U‘vilti ho'il; eg. Isa. xliv. 10; Jer. vii. 8. All the Codd, read x5; %$ in this sense would be meaningless.* The designation of advantage by t’vuah may be occasioned by the foregoing agricultural proverb. In the ¢‘vuah, the farmer enjoys the fruit of his labour; but he who hangs his heart on the continual tumult, noise, pomp of more numerous and greater possessions if possible, to him all real profit——ze. all pleasant, peaceful enjoyment—is lost. With the increase of the possessions there is an increase also of unrest, and the possessor has in reality nothing but the sight of them.
Ver. 10. “ When property and goods increase, they become many who consume them; and what advantage hath the owner thereof but the sight of [them with] his eyes?” The verb "J signifies to increase, and 33), to be many; but also (which Béttch. denies) inchoa-
1 A Jewish fancy supposes that D> is chosen because it consists of letters rising in value (20, 60, 80); while, on the contrary, 377 consists of letters decreasing in value (7, 5, 2).
3. In Maccoth 10a, \ is read three times in succession; the Midrash Wajikra, c. 22, reads x5, and thus it is always found without Keri and without variation.
θησαν. The author has not a miser in view, who shuts up his money in chests, and only feeds himself in looking at it with closed doors; but a covetous man, of the sort spoken of in Ps, xlix. 12, Isa. v. 8. If the hattovah, the possession of such an one, increases, in like manner the number of people whom he must maintain increases also, and thus the number of those who eat of it along with him, and at the same time also his disquiet and care, increase; and what advantage, what useful result (vid. regarding Kishron, above, p.193, and under ii. 21) has the owner of these good things from them but the beholding of them (r%th; Kert, s*uth; cf. the reverse case, Ps, cxxvi. 4)?—the possession does not in itself bring happiness, for it is never great enough to satisfy him, but is yet great enough to fill him with great care as to whether he may be able to support the demands of so great a household: the fortune which it brings to him eonsists finally only in this, that he can look on all he has accumulated with proud self-complacency.
Ver. 11. He can also eat that which is good, and can eat much; but he does not on that account sleep more quietly than the labourer who lives from hand to mouth: “Sweet is the sleep of the labourer, whether he eats little or much; but, on the contrary, the abundance of the rich does not permit him to sleep.’ The LXX., instead of “labourer,’ uses the word “slave” (δούλου), as if the original were 727. But, as a rule, sound sleep is the reward of earnest labour; and since there are idle servants as well as active masters, there is no privilege to servants. The Venet. renders rightly by “of the husbandman” (ἐργάτου), the 72787 72y; the “ labourer ἢ in general is called DY, iv. 8 and Judg. v. 26, post-bibl. °vB. The labourer enjoys sweet, 1.6. refreshing, sound sleep, whether his fare be abundant or scanty—the labour rewards him by sweet sleep, notwithstanding his poverty; while, on the contrary, the sleep of the rich is hindered and disturbed by his abundance, not: by his satiety, viz. repletion, as Jerome remarks: zncocto cibo in stomachi angustiis aestuante; for the labourer also, if he eats much, eats his fill; and why should sufficiency have a different result in the one from what it has in the other? As Ya’ means satiety, not over-satiety; so, on the other hand, it means, objectively, sufficient and plentifully existing fulness to meet the wants of man, Prov. ii. 10, and the word is meant thus objectively here: the fulness of possession which the rich has at his disposal does not permit him to sleep, for all kinds of projects, cares, anxieties regarding it rise within him, which follow him into the night, and do not suffer his mind to be at rest, which is a condition of sleep. The expression ΨῸ ‘7 is the circwm- locutio of the genit. relation, like ‘2d... "on, Ruth ii. 3; ‘po... ὋΝ (LXX. ᾿Αμνὼν τῆς ᾿Αχινόαμ), 2 Sam. iii, 2. Heiligstedt remarks that it stands for ὙΠ y2’; but the nouns ΝΣ, 4, yIY form no const., for which reason the circwmloc. was necessary; ¥I¥ is the constr. of Y3¥. Falsely, Ginsburg: “ aber der Ueberfluss den Reichen —er lisst ihn nicht schlafen” [but superabundance the rich—it doth not suffer him to sleep]; but this construction is neither in accordance with the genius of the German nor of the Heb. language. Only the subject is resumed in ΣῈ (as in i. 7); the construction of minis as at 1 Chron. xvi. 21; ef. Ps. cv. 14. Of the two Hiphil forms, the properly Heb. 29 and the Aramaizing 3), the latter is used in the weakened meaning of ἐᾶν, sinere.
After showing that riches bring to their possessor no real gain, but, instead of that, dispeace, care, and unrest, the author records as a great evil the loss, sometimes suddenly, of wealth carefully amassed.
Vers. 12,13 [13, 14]. “ There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun, riches kept by their possessor to his hurt: the same riches perish by an evil event; and he hath begotten a son, thus this one hath nothing in his hand.” There is a gradation of evils. Y)
relat. pron. (vid. under i. 13, iii. 16); the old language would use 7S), instead of ‘mn, with the reflex. pron. The great evil consists in this, that riches are not seldom kept by their owner to his own hurt. Certainly? ΘΕ’ can also mean that which is kept for another, 1 Sam. ix. 24; but how involved and constrained is Ginsburg’s explanation: “hoarded up (by the rich man) for their (future) owner,” viz. the heir to whom he intends to leave them! That S can be used with the passive as a designation of the subj., vd. Ewald, § 295c; certainly it corresponds as little as with the Greek ὑπό, but in Greek we say also πλοῦτος φυλαχθεὶς τῷ κεκ- τημένῳ, vid. Rost’'s Syntax, ὃ 112.4. The suff. of l‘ra atho refers to b°alav, the plur. form of which can so far remain out of view, that we even say adonim gosheh, Isa. xix. 4, ete. “To his hurt,” 2¢, at the last suddenly to lose that which has been carefully guarded. The narrative explanation of this, “ to his hurt,” begins with vav explic. Regarding "inyan ra’, vid. above, p. 194. It is a casus adversus that is meant, such a stroke upon stroke as destroyed Job's possessions. The perf. “ΠῚ supposes the case that the man thus suddenly made poor is the father of a son; the clause is logically related to that which follows as hypothet. antecedent, after the scheme, Gen. xxxill. 130. The loss of riches would of itself make one who is alone unhappy, for the misfortune to be poor is less than the misfortunes to be rich and then to become poor; but still more unfortunate is the father who thought that by well-guarded wealth he had secured the future of his son, and who now leaves him with an empty hand.
What now follows is true of this rich man, but is generalized into a reference to every rich man, and then is recorded as a second great evil. As a man comes naked into the world, so also he departs from it again without being able to take with him any of the earthly wealth he has acquired.
Ver. 14. “ As he came forth from his mother’s womb, naked shall he again depart as he came, and not the least will he carry away for his labour, which he could take with him in his hand.” In 13a the author has the case of Job in his mind; this verse before us is a reminiscence from Job i. 21, with the setting aside of the difficult word Πρ found there, which Sirach xl. 1 exhibits. With “naked” begins emphatically the main subject; NA¥2 = NI WN is the intensifying resumption of the comparison; the contrast of 29, going away, excedere vitd, is 82 of the entrance on life, coming into the world. 38 (according to the root meaning and use, corresponding to the French point, Olsh. § 205a) emphatically precedes the negation, as at Judg. xiv. 6 (cf. the emphasis reached in a different way, Ps. xlix. 18). sw) signifies here, as at ver. 18, Ps. xxiv. 5, to take hence, to take forth, to carry away. The 3 of Vis not partitive (Aben Ezra compares Lev. viii. 32), according to which Jerome and Luther translate de labore suo, but is the Beth preti, as eg.at 1 Kings xvi. 34, as the Chald. understands it; Nolde cites for this Beth pretii passages such as ii. 24, but incorrectly. Regarding the subjunctive Tw, quod. auferat, vid. above, No. 2, p. 197. We might also with the LXX. and Symm. punctuate ΠΡΟΣ which might accompany him in his hand, but which could by no means denote, as Hitzig thinks: (for his trouble), which goes through his hand. Such an expression is not used; and Hitzig’s supposition, that here the rich man who has lost his wealth is the subject, does not approve itself.
Ver. 15. A transition is now made to rich men as such, and the registering formula which should go before ver. 14 here follows: “ And this also is a sore evil: altogether exactly as he came, thus shall he depart: and what gain hath he that laboureth in the wind?”
Regarding nf, vid. above, No. 4, p. 198; and regarding τ᾽ ‘ya vid. p. 196. The writing of these first two as one word [vid. note below] accords with Ibn-Giat’s view, accidentally quoted by Kimchi, that the word is compounded of 3 of comparison, and the frequently occurring ney? always retaining its 5, and ought properly to be pointed ΠΩΣ (cf. 50,1 Kings vii. 20). "8 signifies combination, society, one thing along with or parallel to another; and thus npy? bears no 3, since it is itself a word of comparison, τ ΚΣ “altogether parallel,” « altogether the same.” The question: what kind of advantage (vid. i. 3) is to him (has he) of this that..., carries its answer in itself. Labouring for the wind or in the wind, his labour is (in) man rm, and thus fruitless. And, moreover, how miserable an existence is this life of labour leading to nothing!
Ver. 16. “ Also all his life long he eateth in darkness and grieveth himself much, and oh for his sorrow and hatred!” We might place ver. 16 under the regimen of the wv of ‘yw of ver. 15d; but the Heb. style prefers the self-dependent form of sentences to that which is governed. The expression 16a has something strange. This strangeness disappears if, with Ewald and Heiligst., after the LXX. and Jerome, for boi’ we read De): καὶ ἐν πένθει; Bottch. prefers >be}, “and in darkness.” Or also, if we read προ for bow; thus the Midrash here, and several codd. by Kennicott; but the Targ., Syr., and Masora read Ssw. Hitzig gets rid of that which is strange in this passage by taking γΌΣ 9 as accus. of the obj., not of the time: all his days, his whole life he consumes in darkness; but in Heb. as in Lat. we say: conswmere dies vitae, Job xxi. 13, xxxvi. 11, but not comedere; and why should the expression, “ to eat in darkness,” not be a figurative expression for a faithless, gloomy life, as elsewhere “ to sit in darkness” (Mic. vii. 8), and “ to walk in darkness”? It is meant that all his life long he ate DYN pnp, the bread of sorrow, or ὕπο ond, prison fare; he did not allow himself pleasant table comforts ina room comfortably or splendidly lighted, for it is unnecessary to understand 7M subjectively and figuratively (Hitz., Zock.).
In 160 the traditional punctuation is OY2.?_ The perf. ruled by the preceding fut. is syntactically correct, and the verb O¥3 is common with
1 In H. written as one word: noyde. Parchon (Lez. under ny) had this form before him. In his Lez. Kimchi bears evidence in fayour of the correct writing as two words.
the author, vii. 9. Hitzig regards the text as corrupt, and reads pona and DY2,and explains: and (he consumes or swallows) much grief in his, ete.; the phrase, “ to eat sorrow,” may be allowed (cf. Prov. xxvi. 6, cf. Job xv. 16); but Say, as the representative of two so bold and essentially different metaphors, would be in point of style in bad taste. If the text is corrupt, it may be more easily rectified by reading?)? ony N37 Dy: and grief in abundance, and sorrow has he, and wrath. We merely suggest this. Ewald, Burger, and Bottch. read only ΠῚ N37 Dy3; but 15 is not to be dispensed with, and can easily be reduced to a mere vav. Elster retains DY, and reads, like Hitzig, yona: he grieves himself much in his sorrow and wrath; but in that case the word \y¥p) was to be expected; also in this way the ideas do not psychologically accord with each other. However the text is taken, we must interpret Hyp) vdm as an exclamation, like ἘΠ, Isa. xxix. 16; ‘Dn, Jer. xlix. 16; Ewald, Ἕ 328a, as we have done above. That “ΠῚ of itself is a subst. clause =15 $m is untenable; the rendering of the noun as forming a clause, spoken of under ii. 21, is of a different character." He who by his labour and care aims at becoming rich, will not only lay upon himself unnecessary privations, but also have many sorrows; for many of his plans fail, and the greater success of others awakens his envy, and neither he himself nor others satisfy him; he is mcrbidly disposed, and as he is diseased in mind, so also in body, and his constantly increasing dissatisfaction becomes at last ἢνρ, he grumbles at himself, at God, and all the world. From observing such persons, Paul says of them (1 Tim. vi. 6f.): “They have pierced themselves through (transfoderunt) with many sorrows.”
In view of these great evils, with which the possession of riches also is connected: of their deceitful instability, and their merely belonging to this present life, Koheleth returns to his ceterwm censeo.
Ver. 17. “ Behold then what I have seen as good, what as beautiful (is this): that one eat and drink and see good in all his labour with which he wearieth himself, under the sun, throughout the number of the days of his life which God hath given him; for that is his portion.” Toward this seeing, 7.e. knowing from his own experience, his effort went forth, according to ii. 3; and what he here, vers. 17, 18, expresses as his resultat, he has already acknowledged at ii. 24 and iii. 12 £ With“ behold” he here returns to it; for he says, that from the observations just spoken of, as from others, no
1 Rashi regards 5m) as a form like inn. This o everywhere appears only in a gen. connection.
‘288... nam (with pausal dni with Rebta) constitutes the beginning of the verse, in the form, as it were, of a superscription; and then its second part, the main proposition, is divided by the disjunctives following each other: Zelisha Gedhola, Geresh, Legarmeh, Rebia, Tebir, Tifcha, Silluk (cf. Jer. viii. 1, where Pazer instead of Telisha Gedhola; but as for the rest, the sequence of the accents is the same). Among the moderns, Hengst. holds to the accents, for he translates in strict accordance therewith, as Tremellius does: “ Behold what I have seen: that it is fine and good (Trem. bonum pulchrum) to eat...” The asher in the phrase, tov asher-yapheh, then connects it together: good which is at the same time beautiful; Gritz sees here the Greek καλὸν κἀγαθόν. But the only passage to which, since Kimchi, reference is made for this use of asher, viz. Hos. xii. 8, does not prove it; for we are not, with Drusius, to translate there by: iniquitas quae sit peccatum, but by quae poenam mereat. The accentuation here is not correct. The second asher is without doubt the resumption of the first; and the translation—as already Dachselt in his Biblia Accentuata indicated: ecce itaque quod vidi bonum, quod pulchrum (hoc est ut quis edat)— presents the true relation of the component parts of the sentence. The suffix of ἸΡῸΡ refers to the general subj. contained in the inf.; cf. viii. 15. The period of time denoted by ἼΒΟΘ is as at ii. 3, vi 12. Also we read ὅπ... 7, iii. 22, in the same connection. Ver. 18. This verse, expressing the same, is constructed anakolouthistically, altogether like iii, 13: “Also for every man to whom God hath given riches and treasures, and hath given him power to eat thereof, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labour; just this is a gift of God” The anakolouthon can be rendered [into English] here as little as it can at ii. 13; for if we allow the phrase, “also every man,” the “also” remains fixed to the nearest conception, while in the Heb. it governs the whole long sentence, and, at the nearest, belongs to mf. Cheerful enjoyment is in this life that which is most advisable; but also it is not made possible in itself by the possession of earthly treasures,—it is yet a special