Teks -- Ecclesiastes 12:1-14 (NET)

Fear God Now Because Old Age and Death Come Quickly

12:1 So remember your Creator in the days of your youth– before the difficult days come, and the years draw near when you will say, “I have no pleasure in them”; 12:2 before the sun and the light of the moon and the stars grow dark, and the clouds disappear after the rain; 12:3 when those who keep watch over the house begin to tremble, and the virile men begin to stoop over, and the grinders begin to cease because they grow few, and those who look through the windows grow dim, 12:4 and the doors along the street are shut; when the sound of the grinding mill grows low, and one is awakened by the sound of a bird, and all their songs grow faint, 12:5 and they are afraid of heights and the dangers in the street; the almond blossoms grow white, and the grasshopper drags itself along, and the caper berry shrivels up– because man goes to his eternal home, and the mourners go about in the streets– 12:6 before the silver cord is removed, or the golden bowl is broken, or the pitcher is shattered at the well, or the water wheel is broken at the cistern– 12:7 and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the life’s breath returns to God who gave it.

Concluding Refrain: Qoheleth Restates His Thesis

12:8 “Absolutely futile!” laments the Teacher, “All of these things are futile!”

Concluding Epilogue: Qoheleth’s Advice is Wise

12:9 Not only was the Teacher wise, but he also taught knowledge to the people; he carefully evaluated and arranged many proverbs. 12:10 The Teacher sought to find delightful words, and to write accurately truthful sayings. 12:11 The words of the sages are like prods, and the collected sayings are like firmly fixed nails; they are given by one shepherd.

Concluding Exhortation: Fear God and Obey His Commands!

12:12 Be warned, my son, of anything in addition to them. There is no end to the making of many books, and much study is exhausting to the body. 12:13 Having heard everything, I have reached this conclusion: Fear God and keep his commandments, because this is the whole duty of man. 12:14 For God will evaluate every deed, including every secret thing, whether good or evil.

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per frasa)

Wesley: Ecc 12:1 - Now

For now thou art most able to do it; and it will be most acceptable to God, and most comfortable to thyself, as the best evidence of thy sincerity, and the best provision for old age and death.

Wesley: Ecc 12:1 - Evil days

The time of old age, which is evil; burdensome in itself, and far more grievous when it is loaded with the sad remembrance of youthful follies, and with the dreadful prospect of approaching death and judgment.

Wesley: Ecc 12:1 - No pleasure

My life Is now bitter and burdensome to me: which is frequently the condition of old age.

Wesley: Ecc 12:2 - Which

Heb. While the sun, and the light, and the moon, &c. That clause, and the light, seems to be added to signify that he speaks of the darkening of the sun, and moon, and stars; not in themselves, but only in respect of that light which they afford to men. And therefore the same clause which is expressed after the sun, is to be understood after the moon and stars. And those expressions may be understood of the outward parts of the body, and especially of the face, the beauty of the countenance, the pleasant complexion of the cheeks, the liveliness of the eyes, which are compared to the sun, and moon, and stars, and which are obscured in old age, as the Chaldee paraphrast understands it. Or of external things, of the change of their joy, which they had in their youth, into sorrow, and manifold calamities, which are usually the companions of old age. This interpretation agrees both with the foregoing verse, in which he describes the miseries of old age, and with the following clause, which is added to explain those otherwise ambiguous expressions; and with the scripture use of this phrase; for a state of comfort and happiness is often described by the light of the sun, and a state of trouble is set forth, by the darkening of the light of the sun.

Wesley: Ecc 12:2 - Nor the clouds

This phrase denotes a perpetual succession of rain, and clouds bringing rain, and then rain and clouds again. Whereby he expresses either the rheums or destructions which incessantly flow in old men; or the continual vicissitude of infirmities, diseases, and griefs; one deep calling upon another.

Wesley: Ecc 12:3 - The house

Of the body: whose keepers are the hands and arms, which are man's best instruments to defend his body; and which in a special manner are subject to his trembling.

Wesley: Ecc 12:3 - The strong men

The thighs and legs, in which the main strength of the body consists.

Wesley: Ecc 12:3 - Grinders

The teeth, those especially which are commonly so called, because they grind the meat.

Wesley: Ecc 12:3 - Cease

To perform their office.

Wesley: Ecc 12:3 - And those, &c.

The eyes.

Wesley: Ecc 12:3 - By windows he understands either the eye

lids, which like windows, are either opened or shut: or, those humours and coats of the eyes, which are the chief instruments by which we see.

Wesley: Ecc 12:4 - In

Or, towards the streets: which lead into the streets. This may be understood either of the outward senses, which, as doors, let in outward objects to the soul: or rather the mouth, the two lips, here expressed by a word of the dual number, which like a door, open or shut the way that leads into the streets or common passages of the body; which also are principal instruments both of speaking and eating. And these are said to be shut, not absolutely, but comparatively, because men in old age grow dull and listless, having little appetite to eat, and are very frequently indisposed for discourse.

Wesley: Ecc 12:4 - When the sound

When the teeth are loose and few, whereby both his speech is low, and the noise which he makes in eating is but small.

Wesley: Ecc 12:4 - Shall rise

From his bed, being weary with lying, and unable to get sleep.

Wesley: Ecc 12:4 - The bird

As soon as the birds begin to chirp, which is early in the morning, whereas young men, can lie and sleep long.

Wesley: Ecc 12:4 - The daughters

All those senses which are employed in music.

Wesley: Ecc 12:4 - Brought low

Shall be cast down from their former excellency, and become incapable either of making musick, or of delighting in it.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - Afraid

The passion of fear is observed to be most incident to old men.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - High

When they walk abroad they dread to go up high or steep places.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - Fears

Lest as they are walking, they should stumble, or fall.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - The almond

tree - Their heads shall be as full of grey hairs, as the almond - tree is of white flowers.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - The grasshopper

They cannot endure the least burden, being indeed a burden to themselves.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - Desire

Of meats, and drinks, and music, and other delights, which are vehemently desired by men in their youth.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - Goeth

is travelling towards it, and every day nearer to it.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - Long home

From this place of his pilgrimage into the grave, from whence he must never return into this world, and into the state of the future life, which is unchangeable and everlasting.

Wesley: Ecc 12:5 - Mourners

Accompany the corpse thro' the streets to the grave.

Wesley: Ecc 12:6 - The silver cord

By the silver cord he seems to understand the marrow of the back - bone, which comes from the brain, and goes down to the lowest end of it. And this is aptly compared to a cord, both for its figure, which is long and round, and for its use, which is to draw and move the parts of the body; and to silver, both for its excellency and colour, which is white and bright, in a dead, much more in a living body. This may properly be said to be loosed, or dissolved, because it is relaxed, or otherwise disabled for its proper service. And answerably hereto by the golden bowl we may understand, the membranes of the brain, and especially that inmost membrane which insinuates itself into all the parts of it, following it in its various windings, keeping each parcel of it in its proper place, and dividing one from another, to prevent disorder. This is not unfitly called a bowl, because It is round, and contains in it all the substance of the brain; and a golden bowl, partly for its great preciousness, partly for its ductility, being drawn out into a great thinness or fineness; and partly for its colour, which is some - what yellow, and comes nearer to that of gold than any other part of the body does. And this, upon the approach of death, is commonly shrivelled up, and many times broken. and as these clauses concern the brain, and the animal powers, so the two following respect the spring of the vital powers, and of the blood, the great instrument thereof is the heart. And so Solomon here describes the chief organs appointed for the production, distribution, and circulation of the blood. For tho' the circulation of the blood has been hid for many generations, yet it was well known to Solomon. According to this notion, the fountain is the right ventricle of the heart, which is now acknowledged to be the spring of life; and the pitcher is the veins which convey the blood from it to other parts, and especially that arterious vein by which it is transmitted to the lungs, and thence to the left ventricle, where it is better elaborated, and then thrust out into the great artery, called the Aorta, and by its branches dispersed into all the parts of the body. And the cistern is the left ventricle of the heart, and the wheel seems to be the great artery, which is fitly so called, because it is the great instrument of this circulation. The pitcher may be said to be broken at the fountain, when the veins do not return the blood to the heart, but suffer it to stand still and cool, whence comes that coldness of the outward parts, which is a near fore - runner of death. And the wheel may be said to be broken at the cistern, when the great arteries do not perform their office of conveying the blood into the left ventricle of the heart, and of thrusting it out thence into the lesser arteries, whence comes that ceasing of the pulse, which is a certain sign of approaching death.

Wesley: Ecc 12:8 - Vanity

This sentence, wherewith he began this book, he here repeats in the end of it, as that which he had proved in all the foregoing discourse, and that which naturally followed from both the branches of the assertion laid down, Ecc 12:7.

Wesley: Ecc 12:9 - Taught

As God gave him this wisdom, that he might be a teacher of others. So he used it to that end.

Wesley: Ecc 12:9 - Gave heed

He did not utter whatever came into his mind, but seriously pondered both his matter and words.

Wesley: Ecc 12:10 - Acceptable

Such as would comfort and profit the readers.

Wesley: Ecc 12:11 - Nails

Piercing into men's dull minds, which make powerful and abiding impressions in them.

Wesley: Ecc 12:11 - Masters

By the teachers of God's church, appointed of God for that work.

Wesley: Ecc 12:11 - Shepherd

From Christ, the great Shepherd of the church in all ages.

Wesley: Ecc 12:12 - By these

By these wise men, and their writings.

Wesley: Ecc 12:13 - The conclusion

The sum of all that hath been said or written by wise men.

Wesley: Ecc 12:13 - Fear God

Which is put here, for all the inward worship of God, reverence, and love, and trust, and a devotedness of heart to serve and please him.

Wesley: Ecc 12:13 - The whole

It is his whole work and business, his whole perfection and happiness; it is the sum of what he need either know, or do, or enjoy.

Wesley: Ecc 12:14 - For

All men must give an account to God of all their works, and this alone will enable them to do that with joy.

Wesley: Ecc 12:14 - Every secret

Not only outward and visible actions, but even inward and secret thoughts.

JFB: Ecc 12:1

(Ecc 12:1-14)

As Ecc 11:9-10 showed what youths are to shun, so this verse shows what they are to follow.

JFB: Ecc 12:1 - Creator

"Remember" that thou art not thine own, but God's property; for He has created thee (Psa 100:3). Therefore serve Him with thy "all" (Mar 12:30), and with thy best days, not with the dregs of them (Pro 8:17; Pro 22:6; Jer 3:4; Lam 3:27). The Hebrew is "Creators," plural, implying the plurality of persons, as in Gen 1:26; so Hebrew, "Makers" (Isa 54:5).

JFB: Ecc 12:1 - while . . . not

That is, before that (Pro 8:26) the evil days come; namely, calamity and old age, when one can no longer serve God, as in youth (Ecc 11:2, Ecc 11:8).

JFB: Ecc 12:1 - no pleasure

Of a sensual kind (2Sa 19:35; Psa 90:10). Pleasure in God continues to the godly old (Isa 46:4).

JFB: Ecc 12:2

Illustrating "the evil days" (Jer 13:16). "Light," "sun," &c., express prosperity; "darkness," pain and calamity (Isa 13:10; Isa 30:26).

JFB: Ecc 12:2 - clouds . . . after . . . rain

After rain sunshine (comfort) might be looked for, but only a brief glimpse of it is given, and the gloomy clouds (pains) return.

JFB: Ecc 12:3 - keepers of the house

Namely, the hands and arms which protected the body, as guards do a palace (Gen 49:24; Job 4:19; 2Co 5:1), are now palsied.

JFB: Ecc 12:3 - strong men . . . bow

(Jdg 16:25, Jdg 16:30). Like supporting pillars, the feet and knees (Son 5:15); the strongest members (Psa 147:10).

JFB: Ecc 12:3 - grinders

The molar teeth.

JFB: Ecc 12:3 - cease

Are idle.

JFB: Ecc 12:3 - those that look out of the windows

The eyes; the powers of vision, looking out from beneath the eyelids, which open and shut like the casement of a window.

JFB: Ecc 12:4 - doors

The lips, which are closely shut together as doors, by old men in eating, for, if they did not do so, the food would drop out (Job 41:14; Psa 141:3; Mic 7:5).

JFB: Ecc 12:4 - in the streets

That is, toward the street, "the outer doors" [MAURER and WEISS].

JFB: Ecc 12:4 - sound of . . . grinding

The teeth being almost gone, and the lips "shut" in eating, the sound of mastication is scarcely heard.

JFB: Ecc 12:4 - the bird

The cock. In the East all mostly rise with the dawn. But the old are glad to rise from their sleepless couch, or painful slumbers still earlier, namely, when the cock crows, before dawn (Job 7:4) [HOLDEN]. The least noise awakens them [WEISS].

JFB: Ecc 12:4 - daughters of music

The organs that produce and that enjoy music; the voice and ear.

JFB: Ecc 12:5 - that which is high

The old are afraid of ascending a hill.

JFB: Ecc 12:5 - fears . . . in the way

Even on the level highway they are full of fears of falling, &c.

JFB: Ecc 12:5 - almond . . . flourish

In the East the hair is mostly dark. The white head of the old among the dark-haired is like an almond tree, with its white blossoms, among the dark trees around [HOLDEN]. The almond tree flowers on a leafless stock in winter (answering to old age, in which all the powers are dormant), while the other trees are flowerless. GESENIUS takes the Hebrew for flourishes from a different root, casts off; when the old man loses his gray hairs, as the almond tree casts its white flowers.

JFB: Ecc 12:5 - grasshoppers

The dry, shrivelled, old man, his backbone sticking out, his knees projecting forwards, his arms backwards, his head down, and the apophyses enlarged, is like that insect. Hence arose the fable, that Tithonus in very old age was changed into a grasshopper [PARKHURST]. "The locust raises itself to fly"; the old man about to leave the body is like a locust when it is assuming its winged form, and is about to fly [MAURER].

JFB: Ecc 12:5 - a burden

Namely, to himself.

JFB: Ecc 12:5 - desire shall fail

Satisfaction shall be abolished. For "desire," Vulgate has "the caper tree," provocative of lust; not so well.

JFB: Ecc 12:5 - long home

(Job 16:22; Job 17:13).

JFB: Ecc 12:5 - mourners

(Jer 9:17-20), hired for the occasion (Mat 9:23).

JFB: Ecc 12:6

A double image to represent death, as in Ecc 12:1-5, old age: (1) A lamp of frail material, but gilded over, often in the East hung from roofs by a cord of silk and silver interwoven; as the lamp is dashed down and broken, when the cord breaks, so man at death; the golden bowl of the lamp answers to the skull, which, from the vital preciousness of its contents, may be called "golden"; "the silver cord" is the spinal marrow, which is white and precious as silver, and is attached to the brain. (2) A fountain, from which water is drawn by a pitcher let down by a rope wound round a wheel; as, when the pitcher and wheel are broken, water can no more be drawn, so life ceases when the vital energies are gone. The "fountain" may mean the right ventricle of the heart; the "cistern," the left; the pitcher, the veins; the wheel, the aorta, or great artery [SMITH]. The circulation of the blood, whether known or not to Solomon, seems to be implied in the language put by the Holy Ghost into his mouth. This gloomy picture of old age applies to those who have not "remembered their Creator in youth." They have none of the consolations of God, which they might have obtained in youth; it is now too late to seek them. A good old age is a blessing to the godly (Gen 15:15; Job 5:26; Pro 16:31; Pro 20:29).

JFB: Ecc 12:7 - dust

The dust-formed body.

JFB: Ecc 12:7 - spirit

Surviving the body; implying its immortality (Ecc 3:11).

JFB: Ecc 12:8-12

A summary of the first part.

JFB: Ecc 12:8-12 - Vanity, &c.

Resumption of the sentiment with which the book began (Ecc 1:2; 1Jo 2:17).

JFB: Ecc 12:9 - gave good heed

Literally, "he weighed." The "teaching the people" seems to have been oral; the "proverbs," in writing. There must then have been auditories assembled to hear the inspired wisdom of the Preacher. See the explanation of Koheleth in the Introduction, and chapter 1 (1Ki 4:34).

JFB: Ecc 12:9 - that which is written, &c.

Rather, (he sought) "to write down uprightly (or, 'aright') words of truth" [HOLDEN and WEISS]. "Acceptable" means an agreeable style; "uprightly . . . truth," correct sentiment.

JFB: Ecc 12:11 - goads

Piercing deeply into the mind (Act 2:37; Act 9:5; Heb 4:12); evidently inspired words, as the end of the verse proves.

JFB: Ecc 12:11 - fastened

Rather, on account of the Hebrew genders, (The words) "are fastened (in the memory) like nails" [HOLDEN].

JFB: Ecc 12:11 - masters of assemblies

Rather, "the masters of collections (that is, collectors of inspired sayings, Pro 25:1), are given ('have published them as proceeding' [HOLDEN]) from one Shepherd," namely, the Spirit of Jesus Christ [WEISS], (Eze 37:24). However, the mention of "goads" favors the English Version, "masters of assemblies," namely, under-shepherds, inspired by the Chief Shepherd (1Pe 5:2-4). SCHMIDT translates, "The masters of assemblies are fastened (made sure) as nails," so Isa 22:23.

JFB: Ecc 12:12

(See on Ecc 1:18).

JFB: Ecc 12:12 - many books

Of mere human composition, opposed to "by these"; these inspired writings are the only sure source of "admonition."

JFB: Ecc 12:12 - (over much) study

In mere human books, wearies the body, without solidly profiting the soul.

JFB: Ecc 12:13

The grand inference of the whole book.

JFB: Ecc 12:13 - Fear God

The antidote to following creature idols, and "vanities," whether self-righteousness (Ecc 7:16, Ecc 7:18), or wicked oppression and other evils (Ecc 8:12-13), or mad mirth (Ecc 2:2; Ecc 7:2-5), or self-mortifying avarice (Ecc 8:13, Ecc 8:17), or youth spent without God (Ecc 11:9; Ecc 12:1).

JFB: Ecc 12:13 - this is the whole duty of man

Literally, "this is the whole man," the full ideal of man, as originally contemplated, realized wholly by Jesus Christ alone; and, through Him, by saints now in part, hereafter perfectly (1Jo 3:22-24; Rev 22:14).

JFB: Ecc 12:14 - For God shall bring every work into judgment

The future judgment is the test of what is "vanity," what solid, as regards the chief good, the grand subject of the book.

Clarke: Ecc 12:1 - Remember thy Creator

Remember thy Creator - בוראיך Boreeycha , thy Creators. The word is most certainly in the plural number in all our common Hebrew Bibles; but it is in the singular number, בוראך Borecha , in one hundred and seventy-six of Dr. Kennicott’ s MSS., and ninety-six of De Rossi’ s; in many ancient editions; and in all the ancient versions. There is no dependence on the plural form in most of the modern editions; though there are some editions of great worth which exhibit the word in this form, and among them the Complutensian, Antwerp, Paris, and London polyglots

The evidence, therefore, that this text is supposed to give to the doctrine of the ever blessed Trinity, is but precarious, and on it little stress can be laid; and no man who loves truth would wish to support it by dubious witnesses. Injudicious men, by laying stress on texts dubious in themselves, and which may be interpreted a different way, greatly injure the true faith. Though such in their hearts may be friends to the orthodox faith, they are in fact its worst friends, and their assistance is such as helps their adversaries

But what does the text say? It addresses the youth of both sexes throughout the creation; and says in effect: -

I.    You are not your own, you have no right to yourselves. God made you; he is your Creator: he made you that you might be happy; but you can be happy only in him. And as he created you, so he preserves you; he feeds, clothes, upholds you. He has made you capable of knowing, loving, and serving him in this world, and of enjoying him in his own glory for ever. And when you had undone yourselves by sin, he sent his Son to redeem you by his blood; and he sends his Spirit to enlighten, convince, and draw you away from childishness, from vain and trifling, as well as from sinful, pursuits

II.    Remember him; consider that he is your Creator, your loving and affectionate Father. In youth memory is strong and tenacious; but, through the perversion of the heart by sin, young people can remember any thing better than God. If you get a kindness from a friend, you can remember that, and feel gratitude for it; and the person is therefore endeared to you. Have any ever given you such benefits as your Creator? Your body and soul came from him; he gave you your eyes, ears, tongue, hands, feet, etc. What blessings are these! how excellent! how useful! how necessary and will you forget Him

III.    Remember him in thy Youth, in order that you may have a long and blessed life, that you may be saved from the corruption and misery into which young people in general run; and the evils they entail upon themselves by giving way to the sinful propensities of their own hearts. As in youth all the powers are more active and vigorous, so they are capable of superior enjoyments. Faith, hope, and love, will be in their best tenor, their greatest vigor, and in their least encumbered state. And it will be easier for you to believe, hope, pray, love, obey, and bear your cross, than it can be in old age and decrepitude

IV.    Remember him Now, in this part of your youth - you have no certainty of life; now is yours, to-morrow may not be. You are young; but you may never be old. Now he waits to be gracious; tomorrow may be too late. God now calls; his Spirit now strives; his ministers now exhort. You have now health; sin has not now so much dominion over you as it will have, increasing by every future moment, if you do not give up your hearts to your Maker

V.    There is another consideration which should weigh with you: should you live to old age. it is a very disadvantageous time to begin to serve the Lord in. Infirmities press down both body and mind, and the oppressed nature has enough to do to bear its own infirmities; and as there is little time, so there is generally less inclination, to call upon the Lord. Evil habits are strengthened by long continuance; and every desire and appetite in the soul is a strong hold for Satan. There is little time for repentance, little for faith, none for obedience. The evil days are come, and the years in which you will feelingly be obliged to say, Alas! "we have no pleasure in them;"and, what is worse, the heart is hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

Clarke: Ecc 12:2 - While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened

While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened - i.e., in the Spring, prime, and prosperity of life

Clarke: Ecc 12:2 - Nor the clouds return

Nor the clouds return - The infirmities of old age of which Winter is a proper emblem, as spring is of youth, in the former clause of this verse.

Clarke: Ecc 12:3 - In the day when the keepers of the house

In the day when the keepers of the house - The Body of man is here compared to a House: - mark the metaphors and their propriety

1. The keepers shall tremble - the hands become paralytic, as is constantly the case, less or more, in old age

2. The strong men shall bow - The legs become feeble, and unable to support the weight of the body

3. The grinders cease because they are few - The teeth decayed and mostly lost; the few that remain being incapable of properly masticating hard substances or animal food. And so they cease; for soft or pulpy substances, which are requisite then, require little or no mastication; and these aliments become their ordinary food

4. Those that look out of the windows - The optic nerves, which receive impressions, through the medium of the different humours of the eye, from surrounding objects - they are darkened; the humours becoming thick, flat, and turbid, they are no longer capable of transmitting those images in that clear, distinct manner, as formerly. There may be an allusion here to the pupil of the eye. Look into it, and you will see your own image in extreme minature looking out upon you; and hence it has its name pupillus, a little child, from pupus, a baby, a doll; because the image in the eye resembles such. The optic nerve being seated at the bottom of the eye, has the images of surrounding objects painted upon it; it looks out through the different humors. The different membranes and humours which compose the eye, and serve for vision, are, the tunica conjunctiva, the tunica sclerotica, the cornea, the iris, the pupil, the choroides, and the retina. The iris is perforated to admit the rays of light, and is called the pupil; the retina is a diffusion of the optic nerve in the bottom of the eye, on which the images are painted or impressed that give us the sensation we term sight or vision. All these membranes, humours, and nerves, are more or less impaired, thickened, or rendered opaque, by old age, expressed by the metaphor, "Those that look out of the windows are darkened."

Clarke: Ecc 12:4 - And the doors shall be shut in the streets

And the doors shall be shut in the streets -

5. The doors - the lips, which are the doors by which the mouth is closed

6. Be shut in the streets - The cavities of the cheeks and jaws, through which the food may be said to travel before it is fitted by mastication or chewing to go down the aesophagus into the stomach. The doors or lips are shut to hinder the food in chewing from dropping out; as the teeth, which prevented that before, are now lost

7. The sound of the grinding is low - Little noise is now made in eating, because the teeth are either lost, or become so infirm as not to nsuffer their being pressed close together; and the mouth being kept shut to hinder the food from dropping out, the sound in eating is scarcely heard. The teeth are divided into three kinds: -

1.    The dentes incisores , or cutting teeth, in the front of the jaw

2.    The dentes canini , or dog teeth, those in the sides of the jaws, for gnawing, or tearing and separating hard or tough substances. And

3.    Dentes molares , or grinding teeth, the posterior or double teeth, in both jaws, generally termed the grinders; because their office is to grind down the substances that have been cut by the fore teeth, separated into their parts or fibres by the dog teeth, and thus prepare it for digestion in the stomach

8. He shall rise up at the voice of the bird - His sleep is not sound as it used to be; he slumbers rather than sleeps; and the crowing of the cock awakes him. And so much difficulty does he find to respire while in bed, that he is glad of the dawn to rise up and get some relief. The chirping ot the sparrow is sufficient to awake him

9. All the daughters of music shall be brought low - The Voice, that wonderful instrument, almost endless in the strength and variety of its tones, becomes feeble and squeaking, and merriment and pleasure are no more. The tones emitted are all of the querulous or mournful kind.

Clarke: Ecc 12:5 - When they shall be afraid of that which is high

When they shall be afraid of that which is high -

10. Being so feeble, they are afraid to trust themselves to ascend steps, stairs, etc., without help. And when they look upwards, their heads turn giddy, and they are ready to fall

11. Fears shall be in the way - They dare not walk out, lest they should meet some danger, which they have not strength to repel, nor agility to escape. A second childishness has taken place - apprehensions, fears, terrors, and weakness

12. The almond tree shall flourish - ינאץ yenaets , not flourish, but fall off. The hair begins to change, first gray, then white; it having no longer that supply of nutritive juices which it once had, this animal vegetable withers and falls off. The almond tree, having white flowers, is a fit emblem of a hoary head; or as Hasselquist says, who observed the tree in full flower in Judea, "like an old man with his white locks.

13. The grasshopper shall be a burden - Even such an inconsiderable thing as a locust, or a very small insect, shall be deemed burdensome, their strength is so exceedingly diminished. In cases of the gout, especially in old men, the shadow of a person passing by puts them to acute pain! How much less can they bear the smallest pressure! But probably the words refer to the man himself, who, bent at the loins, and his arms hanging down, exhibits some caricature of the animal in question. The poor grasshopper has become a burden to himself. Another interpretation has been given of the grasshopper; but I pass it by as impertinent and contemptible; such commentators appear as if they wished to render the text ridiculous

14. Desire shall fail - Both relish and appetite for food, even the most delicate, that to which they were formerly so much attached, now fails. The teeth are no longer able to masticate the food, or have all dropped out; the stomach no longer able to digest any thing; and, as the body is no longer capable of receiving nourishment, appetite and relish necessarily fail

15. Because man goeth to his long home - אל בית עולמו el beith olamo , "to the house of his age;"the place destined to receive him, when the whole race or course of life shall be finished; for עולם olam takes in the whole course or duration of a thing; if applied to a dispensation, such as the Law, it takes in its whole duration; to the life of man, it takes in the whole life; to time, it includes its whole compass; to eternity, it expresses its infinite duration. So old age terminates the olam, the complete duration of human life; and when life is no longer desired, and nutrition ceases, the olam of man is terminated. My old MS. Bible translates it, The hous of his everlastingness

16. He is just departing into the invisible world; and this is known by the mourners going abount the streets, the long hollow groans and throat rattlings which proceed from him; the sure prognostications of the extreme debility and speedy cessation of those essential animal functions next mentioned.

Clarke: Ecc 12:6 - Or ever the silver cord be loosed

Or ever the silver cord be loosed - We have already had all the external evidences of old age, with all its attendant infirmities; next follow what takes place in the body, in order to produce what is called death, or the separation of body and soul

1. The silver cord - The medulla oblongata or spinal marrow, from which all the nerves proceed, as itself does from the brain. This is termed a cord, from its exact similitude to one; and a silver cord, from its color, as it strikingly exhibits the silver gray; and from its preciousness. This is said to be loosed; as the nervous system became a little before, and at the article of death, wholly debilitated. The last loosing being the fall of the under jaw, the invariable and never-failing evidence of immediate death; a few struggles more, and the soul is dismissed from its clay tenement

2. The golden bowl be broken - The brain contained in the cranium, or skull, and enveloped with the membranes called the dura and pia mater; here called a bowl, from its resemblance to such a vessel, the container being put for the contained; and golden because of its color, and because of its exceeding preciousness as has been noticed in the former case. Broken - be rendered unfit to perform its functions, neither supplying nor distributing any nervous energy

3. Or the pitcher be broken at the fountain - The vena cava , which brings back the blood to the right ventricle of the heart, here called the fountain, המבוע hammabbua , the spring whence the water gushes up; properly applied here to the heart, which by its systole and diastole (contraction and expansion) sends out, and afterwards receives back, the blood; for all the blood flows from, and returns back to, the heart

4. The wheel broken at the cistern - The great aorta, which receives the blood from the cistern, the left ventricle of the heart, and distributes it to the different parts of the system. These may be said, as in the case of the brain above, to bo broken, i.e., rendered useless; when, through the loosening of the silver cord, the total relaxation of the nervous system, the heart becomes incapable of dilatation and contraction, so that the blood, on its return to the right ventricle of the heart, is not recessed, nor that already contained in the ventricles propelled into the great aorta. The wheel is used in allusion to the Asiatic wheels, by which they raise water from their wells and tanks, and deep cisterns, for domestic purposes, or to irrigate the grounds. Thus, then, the blood becomes stagnate; the lungs cease to respire; the blood is no longer oxidized, all motion, voluntary and involuntary, ceases; the body, the house of the immortal spirit, is no longer tenantable, and the soul takes its flight into the eternal world. The man D-I-E-S! This is expressed in the following verse: -

Clarke: Ecc 12:7 - Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God

Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God -

5. Putrefaction and solution take place; the whole mass becomes decomposed, and in process of time is reduced to dust, from which it was originally made; while the spirit, הרוח haruach , that spirit, which God at first breathed into the nostrils of man, when he in consequence became a Living Soul, an intelligent, rational, discoursing animal, returns to God who gave it. Here the wise man makes a most evident distinction between the body and the soul: they are not the same; they are not both matter. The body, which is matter, returns to dust, its original; but the spirit, which is immaterial, returns to God. It is impossible that two natures can be more distinct, or more emphatically distinguished. The author of this book was not a materialist

Thus ends this affecting, yet elegant and finished, picture of Old Age and Death. See a description of old age similar, but much inferior, to this, in the Agamemnon of Aeschylus, 5:76-82

It has been often remarked that the circulation of the blood, which has been deemed a modern discovery by our countryman Dr. Harvey, in 1616, was known to Solomon, or whoever was the author of this book: the fountains, cisterns, pitcher, and wheel, giving sufficient countenance to the conclusion.

Clarke: Ecc 12:8

This affecting and minute description of old age and death is concluded by the author with the same exclamation by which he began this book: O vanity of vanities, saith Koheleth, all is vanity. Now that man, the masterpiece of God’ s creation, the delegated sovereign of this lower world, is turned to dust, what is there stable or worthy of contemplation besides? All - All is Vanity!

Clarke: Ecc 12:9 - Because the Preacher was wise, he still taught the people knowledge

Because the Preacher was wise, he still taught the people knowledge - And in order to do this he took good heed - considered what would be most useful. He set in order - collected and arranged, many parables, probably alluding to the book over which we have already passed.

Clarke: Ecc 12:10 - He sought to find out acceptable words

He sought to find out acceptable words - דברי חפץ dibrey chephets , words of desire, words of will; the best, the most suitable words; those which the people could best understand. But these words were not such as might merely please the people; they were words of truth; such as came from God, and might lead them to him.

Clarke: Ecc 12:11 - The words of the wise

The words of the wise - Doctrines of faith, illustrated by suitable language, are as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies, בעלי אספות baaley asuphoth , the masters of collections, those who had made the best collections of this kind, the matter of which was of the most excellent nature; every saying sinking as deeply into the mind, by the force of the truth contained in it, as a nail well pointed does into a board, when impelled by the hammer’ s force. These masters of collections have been supposed to be public persons appointed by the prince himself, the sole shepherd, to see that nothing was put into the people’ s hands but what would be profitable for them to read; and that, when any wise man gave public instructions, a good scribe sat by to take down the words; and then the master examined what he had written, to see that it was upright, and that the words were doctrines of truth. These were something like our licensers of the press; but the existence of such is little more than conjecture

After all, masters of assemblies may mean public teachers; that which was written, the oracles of God, out of which they instructed the people; the one Shepherd, God Almighty, from whom they received their authority and unction to preach the truth; and by the energy of whose Spirit the heavenly teaching was fastened in their hearts, as a well-driven nail in a sound piece of wood.

Clarke: Ecc 12:12 - And farther, by these, my son, be admonished

And farther, by these, my son, be admonished - Hear such teachers, and receive their admonitions; and do not receive the grace of God in vain

Clarke: Ecc 12:12 - Of making many books there is no end

Of making many books there is no end - Two thousand years have elapsed since this was written; and since that time some millions of treatises have been added, on all kinds of subjects, to those which have gone before. The press is still groaning under and teeming with books, books innumerable; and no one subject is yet exhausted, notwithstanding all that has been written on it. And we who live in these latter times are no nearer an end, in the investigation of Nature and its properties; of God, his attributes, his providence, his justice, and his mercy; of Man, his animal life, his mode of nutrition and existence, and his soul and its powers; of Jesus, and the redemption by him; of Eternity, and what it implies as exhibiting to us the pains of the cursed, and the glories of the blessed. Of several of these we know no more than they who have lived five thousand years before us; nor do we know any thing certainly by the endless books that have been published, except what bears the seal of the God of heaven, as published in that word which was declared by his Spirit

Clarke: Ecc 12:12 - And much study is a weariness of the flesh

And much study is a weariness of the flesh - O how true is this! Let the trembling knees, the palsied hands, the darkened eyes, the aching heart, and the puzzled mind of every real student declare! And should none more worthy of the name of student be within reach to consult, the writer of this work is a proof in point.

Clarke: Ecc 12:13 - Keep his commandments

Keep his commandments - They are contained in two words

1.    "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart;

2.    "And thy neighbor as thyself.

Blessed be God, much reading and much study are not necessary to accomplish this, which is called כל האדם col haadam , the whole of Adam; the whole that God required of the first man and of all his posterity. But the gospel of Jesus Christ must be understood to comprehend the full force of this short saying

The word duty, added here by our translators, spoils, if not Perverts, the sense

The whole passage is rendered with great simplicity by Coverdale: -

"The same preacher was not wyse alone: but taught the people knowledge also. He gave good hede, sought out the grounde, and set forth many parables. His diligence was to fynde out acceptable wordes, right scripture, and the wordes of trueth. For the wordes of the wyse are like prickes and nales that go thorow, wherewith men are kepte together: for they are geven of one Shepherd onely. Therefore be warre (my sonne) that above these thou make thee not many and innumerable bookes, nor take dyverse doctrynes in hande, to weery thy body withall

"Let us heare the conclusion of all thinges; Feare God, and kepe his comaundementes, for that toucheth all men; for God shall judge all workes and secrete thinges, whether they be good or evell.

I shall give the same from my old MS. Bible: -

And wan Ecclesiastes was most wiis he taght the peple, and told out what he had don, and enserchinge maade many parablis. He soght profitable wordis, and wrote most right sermons, and ful of trewth, The wordis of wismen as prickis and as nailis into herte pigt: that bi the counseyle of maisteris ben geven of oon scheperd. More thann thes sone myn, ne seche thou; of making many bokes is noon eend, and oft bethinking is tormenting of the flesche. Eend of spekinge alle togydir heere mee. Drede God, and his hestis kepe; that is eche man. Alle thingis that ben maad schal bringen into dome, for eche erid thinge, whithir good or evyl it be.

||&&$

Clarke: Ecc 12:14 - For God shall bring every work into judgment

For God shall bring every work into judgment - This is the reason why we should "fear God and keep his commandments.

1.    Because there will be a day of judgment

2.    Every soul of man shall stand at that bar

3.    God, the infinitely wise, the heart-searching God, will be judge

4.    He will bring to light every secret thing - all that has been done since the creation, by all men; whether forgotten or registered; whether done in secret or in public

5.    All the works of the godly, as well as all the works of the wicked, shall be judged in that day; the good which the godly strove to conceal, as well as the evil which the wicked endeavored to hide

This, then, will be the conclusion of the whole mortal story. And although in this world all is vanity; yet there, "vanities will be vain no more."Every thing whether good or evil, will have its own proper stable, eternal result. O God! prepare the reader to give up his accounts with joy in that day! Amen

Masoretic Note

Number of verses, 222

Middle verse, Ecc 6:10

Sections, 4

The Arabic subjoins this colophon: - "Praise be to God for ever and ever!

"By the assistance of the Most High God this book of Ecclesiastes, which is vanity of vanities, written by Solomon the son of David who reigned over the children of Israel, is completed.

The Syriac has, "The end of the book of Koheleth.

There are others, but they are of no importance.

Defender: Ecc 12:1 - Remember now thy Creator

The climactic and concluding counsel of Solomon, the man of great wisdom, is for young men to remember their Creator rather than seeking wealth or pleasure or fame. He himself had forgotten His Creator much too long. When a young person fully realizes that he has been created for a divine purpose, and that his Creator has also become his Savior, it will change his life forever."

Defender: Ecc 12:3 - keepers of the house

Ecc 12:3-6 constitutes a picturesque description of old age. The "house" is the aging body, the "keepers of the house" are the hands and arms, the "strong men" are the legs, the "grinders" are the teeth, and the "windows" are the eyes."

Defender: Ecc 12:4 - doors shall be shut

The closed "doors" represent the difficulty of speaking, the "low" sound speaks of the difficulty of hearing, and the "daughters of music," the deterioration of the vocal chords; there is also the difficulty of sleeping."

Defender: Ecc 12:5 - which is high

The fear of heights suggests the danger of falling; fear of being "in the way" implies inability to protect oneself.

Defender: Ecc 12:5 - almond tree

The "almond tree" represents the white hair of age; the aged one is easily irritated, even by the chirping of a grasshopper, and sexual desire fails.

Defender: Ecc 12:5 - long home

Finally death comes, and the life, like the light in a "golden bowl" hanging by a "silver cord," goes out."

Defender: Ecc 12:7 - dust return to the earth

In accord with the primeval curse, the body returns to the dust from which it was formed (Gen 3:17-19).

Defender: Ecc 12:7 - spirit shall return unto God

The spirit of the one who dies, however, does not die. The molecules of the body disintegrate back to their basic elements, but the spirit lives on. The spirit was sent from God into the body in the first place, and thus is still under His control when the body dies."

Defender: Ecc 12:12 - making many books

It is surprising to learn that there was a plethora of books being written even three thousand years ago."

Defender: Ecc 12:13 - keep his commandments

The problem is that no one can keep all God's commandments (Ecc 7:20; Jam 2:10). The solution is in Christ, who said: "This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent" (Joh 6:29)."

Defender: Ecc 12:14 - every word into judgment

Judgment is sure, even of our words in the coming "day of Judgment" (Mat 12:36)."

TSK: Ecc 12:1 - Remember // while // when

Remember : Ecc 11:10; Gen 39:2, Gen 39:8, Gen 39:9, Gen 39:23; 1Sa 1:28, 1Sa 2:18, 1Sa 2:26, 1Sa 3:19-21, 1Sa 16:7, 1Sa 16:12, 1Sa 16:13, 1Sa 17:36, 1Sa 17:37; 1Ki 3:6-12, 1Ki 14:13, 1Ki 18:12; 2Ch 34:2, 2Ch 34:3; Psa 22:9, Psa 22:10; Psa 34:11, Psa 71:17, Psa 71:18; Pro 8:17, Pro 22:6; Isa 26:8; Lam 3:27; Dan 1:8, Dan 1:9, Dan 1:17; Luk 1:15, Luk 2:40-52, Luk 18:16; Eph 6:4; 2Ti 3:15

while : Ecc 11:8; Job 30:2; Psa 90:10; Hos 7:9

when : 2Sa 19:35

TSK: Ecc 12:2 - the sun // nor

the sun : Ecc 11:7, Ecc 11:8; Gen 27:1, Gen 48:10; 1Sa 3:2, 1Sa 4:15, 1Sa 4:18

nor : Psa 42:7, Psa 71:20, Psa 77:16

TSK: Ecc 12:3 - strong // and those

strong : 2Sa 21:15-17; Psa 90:9, Psa 90:10, Psa 102:23; Zec 8:4

and those : Ecc 12:2

TSK: Ecc 12:4 - all

all : 2Sa 19:35

TSK: Ecc 12:5 - the almond // because // the mourners

the almond : Gen 42:38, Gen 44:29, Gen 44:31; Lev 19:32; Job 15:10; Psa 71:18; Pro 16:31, Pro 20:29; Isa 46:4; Jer 1:11

because : Ecc 9:10; Job 17:13, Job 30:23; Psa 49:10-14; Heb 9:27

the mourners : Gen 50:3-10; Jer 9:17-20; Mar 5:38, Mar 5:39

TSK: Ecc 12:7 - dust // the spirit // God

dust : Ecc 3:20; Gen 3:19, Gen 18:27; Job 4:19, Job 4:20, Job 7:21, Job 20:11, Job 34:14, Job 34:15; Psa 90:3; Psa 146:4; Dan 12:2

the spirit : Ecc 3:21

God : Gen 2:7; Num 16:22, Num 27:16; Isa 57:16; Jer 38:16; Zec 12:1; Heb 12:9, Heb 12:23

TSK: Ecc 12:8

Ecc 1:2, Ecc 1:14, Ecc 2:17, Ecc 4:4, Ecc 6:12, Ecc 8:8; Psa 62:9

TSK: Ecc 12:9 - moreover, because the Preacher was wise // he still // he gave

moreover, because the Preacher was wise : or, the more wise the Preacher was, etc

he still : 1Ki 8:12-21, 1Ki 10:8

he gave : 1Ki 4:32; Pro 1:1, Pro 10:1, Pro 25:1

TSK: Ecc 12:10 - Preacher // acceptable words // written

Preacher : Ecc 1:1, Ecc 1:12

acceptable words : Heb. words of delight, Pro 15:23, Pro 15:26, Pro 16:21-24, Pro 25:11, Pro 25:12; 1Ti 1:15

written : Pro 1:1-6, Pro 8:6-10, Pro 22:17-21; Luk 1:1-4; Joh 3:11; Col 1:5

TSK: Ecc 12:11 - as goads // masters // given

as goads : Jer 23:29; Mat 3:7; Act 2:37; 2Co 10:4; Heb 4:12

masters : Joh 3:10

given : Gen 49:24; Psa 23:1, Psa 80:1; Isa 40:11; Eze 34:23; Joh 10:14; Heb 13:20; 1Pe 5:4

TSK: Ecc 12:12 - by these // study // weariness

by these : Luk 16:29-31; Joh 5:39, Joh 20:31, Joh 21:25; 2Pe 1:19-21

study : or, reading

weariness : Ecc 1:18

TSK: Ecc 12:13 - Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter // Fear // for

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter : or, The end of the matter, even all that hath been heard is

Fear : Ecc 5:7, Ecc 8:12; Gen 22:12; Deu 6:2, Deu 10:12; Psa 111:10, Psa 112:1, Psa 145:19, Psa 147:11; Pro 1:7, Pro 23:17; 1Pe 2:17; Rev 19:5

for : Ecc 2:3, Ecc 6:12; Job 28:28; Psa 115:13-15; Pro 19:23; Luk 1:50

TSK: Ecc 12:14

Ecc 11:9; Psa 96:13; Mat 12:36, 25:31-46; Luk 12:1, Luk 12:2; Joh 5:29; Act 17:30, Act 17:31; Rom 2:16, Rom 14:10-12; 1Co 4:5; 2Co 5:10; Rev 20:11-15

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per Ayat)

Poole: Ecc 12:1 - Remember // Thy Creator // In the days of thy youth // The evil days // I have no pleasure in them

Remember to wit, practically, or so as to fear, and love, and faithfully serve and worship him, which when men do not they are said to forget God, Psa 9:17 106:21 , and in many other places.

Thy Creator the first author and continual preserver of thy life and being, and of all the perfections and enjoyments which accompany it, to whom thou hast the highest and strongest obligations to do so, and upon whom thou hast a constant and necessary dependence, and therefore to forget him is most unnatural, and inhuman, and disingenuous.

In the days of thy youth for then thou art most able to do it, and thou owest the best of thy time and strength to God; then thou hast opportunity to do it, and thou mayst not live to old age; then it will be most acceptable to God, and most comfortable to thyself, as the best evidence of thy sincerity, and the best provision for old age and death; and then it is most necessary for the conquering those impetuous lusts and passions which drown so many thousands of young men in perdition, both in this life and in that to come.

The evil days the time of old age, which is evil, i.e. burdensome and calamitous in itself, and far more grievous and terrible when it is loaded with the sad remembrance of a man’ s youthful follies and lusts, and with the dreadful prospect of approaching death and judgment, which makes him see that he cannot live, and yet dare not die, and with the consideration and experience of the hardness of his heart, which in that age is rarely brought to true repentance, and so generally expires either in vain presumption, or in hellish desperation.

I have no pleasure in them my life is now bitter and burdensome to me, and worse than death; which is frequently the condition of old age.

Poole: Ecc 12:2 - While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars be not darkened // Nor the clouds return after the rain

While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars be not darkened Heb. While the sun, and the light, and the moon , &c. That clause, and the light , seems to be added to signify that he speaks of the darkening of the sun, and moon, and stars, not in themselves, or in their own bodies, but only in respect of that light which they afford to men. And therefore the same clause which is expressed after the sun, is to be understood after the moon and stars, as is very usual in Scripture in like cases. And those expressions are to be understood either,

1. Literally, of the dim-sightedness of old men, by reason whereof the light of the sun, &c. seems dark to them; which seems not to agree with the context, partly because the dimness of their sight is expressed in the next verse, and partly because both his and the following verses are wholly allegorical. Or rather,

2. Figuratively, and that either,

1. Of the outward parts of the body, and especially of the face, the beauty of the countenance, the lightsome and pleasant complexion of the cheeks, the liveliness of the eyes, which are compared to the sun, and moon, and stars, and which are obscured in old age, as the Chaldee paraphrast understands it. Or,

2. Of the inward parts of the mind, the understanding, fancy, memory, which may not unfitly be resembled to the sun, and moon, end stars, and all which are sensibly decayed in most old men. For it may seem improbable that Solomon in his description of the infirmities of old age should omit the decays of the most noble part of man, which are commonly incident to old age. And yet, with submission to those worthy persons who think otherwise, it seems not necessary that he should here speak of those inward decays, partly, because they are not so general in old men as the decays of the body are; partly, because he here directeth his speech to sensual men, who are more affected with corporal than with intellectual maladies; and partly, because both the foregoing and following passages concern the state of men’ s bodies, and their outward condition. Or rather,

3. Of external things, and of the great change of their joy and prosperity, which they had in their youthful time, into sorrow and manifold calamities, which are usually the companions of old age; for this interpretation seems best to agree both with the foregoing verse, in which he describes the miseries of old age, and with the following clause, which is added to explain and determine those otherwise ambiguous expressions; and with the Scripture use of this phrase, which is the best key for the understanding of Scripture; for a state of comfort and happiness is oft described by the light of the sun, &c., as Jud 5:31 2Sa 23:4 Isa 30:26 60:20 , and a time and state of great trouble is set forth by the darkening of the light of the sun, &c., as Isa 13:9 , &c.; Isa 24:23 Joe 2:10 3:15 Mat 24:29 , and oft elsewhere.

Nor the clouds return after the rain: this phrase notes a perpetual succession and reciprocation of rain, and clouds bringing rain, and then rain and clouds again, and so without end; whereby he expresseth either,

1. The rheums or deflutions which do abundantly and incessantly flow in and from old men, for want of natural heat and strength to prevent or remove them. Or rather,

2. The continual vicissitude of infirmities, diseases, and griefs in old men, one deep calling upon another, and one affliction beginning at the end of another; whereas in young men after rain the clouds are dispersed, and fair weather succeeds.

Poole: Ecc 12:3 - The keepers of the house // The strong men // The grinders // Cease // because they are few // Those that look out of the windows

The keepers of the house i.e. of the body, which is oft and fitly compared to a house, as Job 4:19 Psa 119:54 2Co 5:1 ; whose keepers here are either,

1. The ribs and bones into which they are fastened, which are the guardians of the inward and vital parts, which also are much weakened and shaken by old age. Or rather,

2. The hands and arms, which are man’ s best instruments to defend his body from the assaults of men or beasts, and which in a special manner are subject to this trembling, by paralytical or other like distempers, that are most incident to old men.

The strong men either the back, or the thighs and legs, in which the main strength of the body doth consist, which in old men are very feeble, and unable both for the support of the body and for motion.

The grinders the teeth, those especially which are commonly so called, because they grind the meat which we eat.

Cease to wit, to perform their office,

because they are few Heb. because they are diminished , either,

1. In strength. Or,

2. In number; being here one, and there another, and not united together, and one directly against another, and consequently unfit for their work.

Those that look out of the windows the eyes. By windows he understands either,

1. The holes in which the eyes are fixed, Zec 14:12 . Or,

2. The eye-lids, which, like windows, are either opened or shut. Or,

3. Those humours and coats of the eyes noted by anatomists, which are the chief instruments by which the eye sees.

Poole: Ecc 12:4 - The doors be shut in the streets // When the sound of the grinding is low // He shall rise up // at the voice of the bird // The daughters of music // Shall be brought low

The doors be shut in the streets or, towards the streets ; which lead into the streets. This is understood either,

1. Literally; because men, when they are very old, keep much at home, and have neither strength nor inclination to go abroad. Or rather,

2. Allegorically, as all the other clauses are understood. And so the doors are either,

1. The outward senses, which, as doors, let in outward objects to the soul. Or rather,

2. The mouth, or the two lips, here expressed by a word of the dual number, which are oft called a door , both in Scripture, as Psa 141:3 Mic 7:5 , and in other authors, which, like a door, open or shut the way which leads into the streets or common passages of the body, such as the gullet, and stomach, and all the bowels, as also the windpipe and lungs; which also are principal instruments both of speaking and eating. And these are said to be shut , not simply and absolutely, as if they did never eat, or drink, or speak; but comparatively, because men in extreme old age grow dull and listless, having little or no appetite to eat, and are very much indisposed for discourse, and speak but seldom.

When the sound of the grinding is low or, because the sound, &c. So this may be added, not as a new symptom of old age, but only as the reason of the foregoing symptom. The sense is, When or because the teeth, called the grinders, Ecc 12:3 , are loose and few, whereby both his speech is low, and the noise which he makes in eating is but small. And this is one great cause of his indisposedness both to eating and to speaking. Some understand this of concoction, which after a sort doth grind the meat in the stomach, and in the other parts appointed by God for that work. But that is transacted inwardly, and without all noise or sound.

He shall rise up to wit, from his bed, being weary with lying, and unable to get sleep,

at the voice of the bird either,

1. Upon the smallest noise; which doth not consist with that deafness incident to old men, and described in the next words. Or rather,

2. As soon as the birds begin to chirp, which is early in the morning, whereas children and young men can lie and sleep long in the morning.

The daughters of music all those senses or parts of the body which are employed in music and song, as well those which make it, as the parts of and within the mouth, as those which receive it, to wit, the ears.

Shall be brought low shall be cast down from their former excellency; they are become incapable either of making music, or of delighting in it.

Poole: Ecc 12:5 - They shall be afraid // Of that which is high // Also they shall be afraid and terrified // And fears shall be in the way // The almond tree shall flourish // The grasshopper shall be a burden // Man goeth // to his long home // The mourners

They shall be afraid the passion of fear is observed to be most incident to old men, of which divers reasons may be given.

Of that which is high either,

1. Of high things, lest they should fall upon them. Or rather,

2. Of high places, of going up hills or stairs, which is very irksome to them, because of their weakness, and weariness, ar, d giddiness, and danger, or dread of falling. And this clause, together with the next, may be rendered thus, and that agreeably to the Hebrew text,

Also they shall be afraid and terrified (two words expressing the same thing, which is very frequent in the Hebrew) of that which is high in the way . When they walk abroad, they will dread to go up any high or steep places.

And fears shall be in the way lest as they are walking, they should stumble, or fall, or be thrust down, or some infirmity or mischief should befall them.

The almond tree shall flourish their heads shall be as full of grey hairs as the almond tree is of white flowers. Such metaphors are not unusual in other authors. Hence Sophocles calls a grey or hoary head flowery , and again, covered with white flowers .

The grasshopper shall be a burden if it doth accidentally hop up and rest upon them. They cannot endure the least burden, being indeed a burden to themselves. But the words may be, and are by others, rendered, the locust (as the ancient interpreters and many others render it; or, as ours and some others, the grasshopper , which comes to the same thing; for these two sorts of insects are much of the same nature and shape) shall be a burden to itself . And by the locust or grasshopper may be understood, either,

1. The old man himself, who bears some resemblance to it; in shape, by reason of the bones sticking out; in the constitution of the body, which is dry and withering; and in the legs and arms, which are slender, the flesh being consumed. Or,

2. The back, which fitly follows after the head, upon which the almond tree flourished, in which the strength of the body lay, and which formerly was able to bear great burdens, but now, through its weakness and crookedness, is a burden too heavy for itself. And some of the Jewish and other interpreters understand this word, which others render locust or grasshopper , to be some part of the body, either the back-bone , or the head of the thigh bone , or the ankle-bone , any of which may well be said to be heavy or burdensome to itself, when it moves slowly and listlessly, and not without difficulty and trouble. Desire , to wit, of meats, and drinks, and music, and other carnal delights, which are vehemently desired by men in the heat of their youth, but are unsavoury to old men; of which see an instance 2Sa 19:35 . It is true, the former expressions are metaphorical, but the two next following are proper, and to be understood literally; and so may this clause also.

Man goeth is travelling towards it, and every day nearer to it than other,

to his long home from this place of his pilgrimage into the grave, from whence he must never return into this world, and into the state and place of the future life, which is unchangeable and everlasting.

The mourners either such as were hired to that end, of whom See Poole "Jer 9:17" ; See Poole "Mat 9:23" , See Poole "Mat 11:17" , or true mourners, near relations, and dear friends, accompany the dead corpse through the streets to the grave.

Poole: Ecc 12:6 - the silver cord // loosed // golden bowl // broken // the fountain // cistern // wheel // pitcher // broken at the fountain // broken at the cistern

This verse is to be understood either,

1. literally, of the ornaments of life, such as chains, and jewels, and vessels of gold and silver, and of the instruments by which the necessary provisions and supports of life are conveyed to us, such as fountains of water, and pitchers, &c.; which may be said to be loosed or broken, because they are neglected as useless things to the dead man. Or rather,

2. Allegorically, of those inward parts of man’ s body which are the chief instruments of life, or sense and motion, and of the vital or animal operations, whether such from which they first proceed, or in which they are first elaborated and contained, which may fitly be compared to a bowl , and fountain , or cistern ; or such by which they are derived or conveyed to the several parts of the body, which are very conveniently designed by the cord , and pitcher , and wheel ; all which are truly said to be loosed or broken , i.e. dissolved, or become useless and insufficient for the performance of their several functions. This in the general. But it seems most probable that Solomon, who was so profound a philosopher, and doubtless had an accurate knowledge of all the parts of man’ s body, and their several offices and operations, doth by these several expressions describe so many particular parts and offices. By

the silver cord it is generally and most probably conceived that he understands the pith or marrow of the back-bone, which comes from the brain, and thence goeth down to the very lowest end of the back-bone, together with the nerves and sinews, which, as anatomists observe, are nothing else but the production and continuation of the marrow. And this is most aptly compared to a cord , both for its figure, which is very long and round, and for its use, which is to draw and move the parts of the body; and to silver, both for its excellency and colour, which is white and bright, even in a dead, and much more in a living body. And this may properly be said to be

loosed or dissolved , or broken , or removed , as others render the word, the sense of all these translations being the same, because it is relaxed, or obstructed, or otherwise disenabled for its proper service. And answerably hereunto, by the

golden bowl he understands the membranes of the brain, and especially that innermost membrane which is called by anatomists the pious mother , because it doth with a motherly care defend the brain, and assist and govern its actions, which insinuates itself into all the parts of the brain, following it in its various windings and turnings, keeping each parcel of it in its proper place, and distinguishing and dividing one part from another, to prevent disorder and mischief. This is not unfitly called a bowl , partly because it is round, and partly because it receives and contains in it all the substance of the brain; and a golden bowl, partly, for its great preciousness and usefulness; partly, for its ductility, being drawn out into a great thinness or fineness, as gold is capable of being drawn forth into thinner plates than other metals can bear; and partly, for its colour, which is somewhat yellow, and comes nearer to that of gold than any other part of the body doth. And this is well said to be

broken as for the reason above noted, so because upon the approach of death it is commonly shrivelled up, and many times broken. And as these two former clauses concern the brain and the animal powers, so the two following clauses of this verse respect the spring and seat of the vital powers and operations, and of the blood, the great instrument thereof, which hath been commonly conceived, and consequently is here understood, to be the liver, but more truly and certainly is the heart, which is now known and confessed to be the source of the blood. And so Solomon here describes the chief organs or vessels appointed for the production, and distribution, and circulation of the blood in man’ s body. For although the doctrine of the circulation of the blood hath lain hid and unknown for very many generations together, and therefore the honour of the invention of it is justly ascribed to a famous physician of our country, yet it is not improbably supposed by some that it was well known to Solomon, although after his times it was lost, as doubtless many other things were, which he wrote concerning plants, and other things. According to this notion

the fountain here is the right ventricle of the heart, which is now acknowledged to be the spring of life, and of the vital spirits, and the pitcher is the veins which convey the blood from it to other parts, and especially that arterious vein, as anatomists call it, by which it is transmitted to the lungs, and thence to the left ventricle of the heart, where it is better elaborated, and then by the pulse thrust out into the great artery, called arteria aorta , and by its branches dispersed into all the parts of the body, to give them life and vigour, which being done, the residue of the blood is carried back by the veins into the right ventricle of the heart, whence it is disposed, as hath been now mentioned, and so runs in a perpetual round, unless it be obstructed by some disorder in the body. And the

cistern is the left ventricle of the heart, and the

wheel seems to be the great artery which is joined to it, which is very fitly so called, because it is the first and great instrument of this rotation or circulation of the blood, which by its pulse is forcibly thrust out into all the parts of the body, whence by various windings and turnings it returns thither again, and so is sent again upon the same journey, which in like manner it performs again and again, as long as life and health continue; and when any of these parts are disenabled for the discharge of their offices, then are they fitly said to be broken. The

pitcher may be said to be

broken at the fountain when the veins do not return the blood to the heart, but suffer it to stand still and cool within them, whence comes that coldness of the outward parts, which is a near forerunner of death. And the wheel may be said to be

broken at the cistern when the great arteries do not perform their office of conveying the blood lute the left ventricle of the heart, and of thrusting it out thence into the lesser arteries, whence comes that ceasing of the pulse, which is a certain sign of approaching death.

Poole: Ecc 12:7 - The dust // Return to the earth as it was // Return unto God // Who gave it

The dust the body, called dust , both for its original, which was from the dust, and to signify its vile and corruptible nature, Job 4:19 30:19 Psa 103:14 .

Return to the earth as it was whence it was first taken. He alludes to that passage, Gen 3:19 . The spirit ; the soul of man, frequently so called, as Gen 2:7 Psa 31:5 , &c., because it is of a spiritual or immaterial nature.

Return unto God into his presence, and before his tribunal, that there it may be sentenced to its everlasting habitations, either to abide with God for ever, if it be approved by him, or otherwise to be eternally shut out from his presence and favour.

Who gave it to wit, in a peculiar manner, by his creating power: for in a general sense God giveth to every seed his own belly , 1Co 15:38 ; hence he is called the Father of spirits , Heb 12:9 .

Poole: Ecc 12:8

This sentence, wherewith he began this book, he here repeateth in the end of it partly as that which he had proved in all the foregoing discourse, and partly as that which naturally and necessarily followed from both the branches of the assertion now laid down, Ecc 12:7 .

Poole: Ecc 12:9 - The preacher was wise // Taught the people knowledge // He gave good heed // Sought out // Set in order // Many proverbs

The preacher was wise which he affirmeth not out of vain ostentation, but partly to procure the more credit and acceptance to his doctrine and, counsel here delivered; and partly to declare his repentance for his former follies, and God’ s great mercy in restoring his wisdom to him.

Taught the people knowledge as God gave him this wisdom, that he might be a teacher of others, so he used it to that end; therefore despise not his counsel.

He gave good heed he did not rashly and foolishly utter whatsoever came into his mind or mouth, but seriously pondered both his matter and words.

Sought out both by the exercise of his own mind, and by reading and learning from others.

Set in order or, directed or fitted . He selected such as were most useful.

Many proverbs excellent and wise sayings, which are oft called proverbs, as was noted before upon the Book of Proverbs.

Poole: Ecc 12:10 - Acceptable words // Written // Upright // Words of truth

Acceptable words Heb. desirable or delightful , worthy of all acceptation, such as would minister comfort and profit so the hearers or readers.

Written by the preacher in this and his other books.

Upright Heb. right or straight , agreeable to the mind or will of God, which is the rule of right, not crooked or perverse.

Words of truth not fables cunningly devised to deceive the simple, but true and certain doctrines, which commend themselves to men’ s own consciences or reasons; wholesome and edifying counsels.

Poole: Ecc 12:11 - The words of the wise // As goads, and as nails // Fastened // By the masters of assemblies // Which are given from one shepherd

The words of the wise not of secularly or politicly wise men, but of the spiritually wise and holy men of God; of which, and not of the former, this whole context treats.

As goads, and as nails piercing into men’ s dull minds and hard hearts, and quickening and provoking them to the practice of all their duties.

Fastened which do not only amuse and startle men for the present, as the wise and grave counsels of moral philosophers frequently do, but make powerful and abiding impressions in them; which is the peculiar effect of God’ s word.

By the masters of assemblies by the teachers of God’ s church and people, whether prophets or others, appointed by God for that work.

Which are given from one shepherd from God, or from Jesus Christ, the great Shepherd and Teacher of the church in all ages, by whose Spirit the ancient prophets, as well as other succeeding teachers, were inspired and taught, Jer 3:15 1Pe 1:11 2Pe 1:21 . And this clause seems to be added partly as the reason of that admirable harmony and agreement which is amongst all the men of God in all ages and places, because they are all taught by one Master, and guided by the same hand; and partly to oblige us to the greater attention and reverence to all their doctrines and counsels, which we are to receive as the word of God, and not of men only, as it is said, 1Th 2:13 .

Poole: Ecc 12:12 - By these // Be admonished // Of making many books there is no end // Much study // Is a weariness to the flesh

By these by these wise men, and their words or writings, of which he spoke in the foregoing verse.

Be admonished take your instructions from them, for their words are right and true, as he said, Ecc 12:10 , whereas the words of other men are false, or at best doubtful.

Of making many books there is no end I could easily write many books and large volumes upon these matters, but that were an endless and needless work, seeing things necessary to be known and done lie in a little compass, as he informs us in the next verse.

Much study the reading of many books written by learned philosophers about these things; which it is more than probable were then extant, though since lost, which also Solomon, being so curious and inquisitive a person, would in all likelihood procure anti peruse as far as he hail opportunity.

Is a weariness to the flesh it wasteth a man’ s strength and spirits, and yet (which is implied) doth not satisfy the mind, nor sufficiently recompense the trouble and inconvenience to which man is exposed by it.

Poole: Ecc 12:13 - The conclusion of the whole matter // Fear God // Keep his commandments // The whole duty

The conclusion of the whole matter the sum and substance of all that hath been said or written by wise men, so far as it is necessary for us to know.

Fear God which is synecdoically put here, as it is very frequently in Scripture, for all the inward worship of God, reverence, and love, and trust, and a devotedness of heart to serve and please God, and a loathness to offend him, and an aptness to tremble at his word and judgments.

Keep his commandments: this is fitly added as a necessary effect and certain evidence of the fear, of God. Make conscience of practising whatsoever God requires, how costly, or troublesome, or dangerous soever it be.

The whole duty in the Hebrew it is only, the whole ; it is his whole work and business, his whole perfection and happiness, it is the sum of what he need either know, or do, or enjoy.

Poole: Ecc 12:14 - For God shall bring every work into judgment // this is the whole of man // With every secret thing

For God shall bring every work into judgment: this is added either,

1. As a reason of what he last said,

this is the whole of man because all men must give an account to God of all their works, and this alone will enable them to do that with joy, and not with grief. Or,

2. As another argument to press the foregoing exhortation, Fear God, and keep his commandments, for you must be called to judgment about it, &c.

With every secret thing not only outward and visible actions, but even inward and secret thoughts.

PBC: Ecc 12:1

In the verses that follow the young man or woman is reminded of the frailties that await one in old-age. We should serve the Lord today, because we are not assured that we will live tomorrow; and if we do, we may not have the strength and health to do many things in His service that we are able to do today.

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Haydock: Ecc 12:1 - Profitable

Profitable. Hebrew, "pleasing." Utile dulci. (Haydock) ---

Perhaps he condemns his attempt to know all things, chap. i. 13. (Calmet)

Haydock: Ecc 12:1 - Not

Not. Prevent old age, to procure a stock of virtues. (Haydock) ---

Solomon refutes the former sentiments of the wicked, which he had perhaps once entertained. (Calmet)

Haydock: Ecc 12:2 - Before the sun // Rain

Before the sun, &c. That is, before old age: the effects of which upon all the senses and faculties are described in the following verses, under a variety of figures. (Challoner) ---

All are exhorted to live well, before death come to deprive them of their senses and all helps: and to continue in expectation of judgment, the signs of which are given, as [in] Matthew xxiv. (Worthington) (St. Jerome) ---

Rain. One misery succeeds another, the understanding is darkened, and the senses become dull. (Calmet) ---

The Jews explain ver. 2, 7., of the future distress of their nation under captivity. (St. Jerome) (Haydock)

Haydock: Ecc 12:3 - House // And the powers that are in heaven shall be moved // Men // Number // Holes

House. The sides, (St. Jerome) or rather the arms. (Calmet) ---

Some understand prelates, or angels. (Thaumat.) ---

And the powers that are in heaven shall be moved. (Mark xiii. 25.) (Haydock) ---

Men. The arms, (Chaldean) or thighs, (Smith) or those who were formerly the most robust. ---

Number. The rest have been lost, and what remain are of little service for chewing meat. (Calmet) ---

Holes. Spectacles, (Geier) as if they had been already in use. (Calmet) ---

Hebrew, "windows." (Haydock)

Haydock: Ecc 12:4 - Doors // Bird // Deaf

Doors. The lips, (Calmet) feet, (Chaldean) nostrils, (Vatable) or the trachea and pulmonary arteries. ---

Bird. The cock-crowing; or at the least sound their slumbers are broken. ---

Deaf. Hebrew, "be low." The ears cannot enjoy music, nor can the voice of the old people please, 2 Kings xix. 25.

Haydock: Ecc 12:5 - Way // Flourish // Fat // Destroyed // Eternity // Street

Way. They shall walk bent down, and afraid of rough ground. ---

Flourish. Their head shall become white, like the almond-flower, Jeremias i. 11. ---

Fat. Septuagint, "heavy." ---

Destroyed. The hair shall fall off. (Calmet) ---

Concupiscence shall be extinct. (Vatable) (Tirinus) ---

Eternity. The body being consigned to the grave, and the soul to the region of spirits, to have no farther concern with the transactions of the world. (Haydock) (Job vii. 9.) ---

Street. This custom is often mentioned. (Herodotus ii. 85.) (Luke vii. 32.) ---

The women dance, having one (Calmet) or two old people disfigured in the midst of them, to recount the actions of the deceased. (Brun.)

Haydock: Ecc 12:6 - Cord // Fillet // Cistern

Cord. The nerves. ---

Fillet. Veins, or the spermatic vessels, (Calmet) and the soul. (St. Jerome) ---

Cistern. When the bladder, &c., become disordered, Numbers xxiv. 7. (Calmet)

Haydock: Ecc 12:7 - It

It. Man is composed of two distinct parts; the destination of which we ought never to forget. Thus the objection of infidels (chap. iii. 19.) is refuted. Plato and some of the ancients had the same idea of the soul's spiritual nature; though some took it to be an aerial body. (Calmet)

Haydock: Ecc 12:8 - Ecclesiastes

Ecclesiastes. "The preacher." (Worthington) ---

He returns to his first proposition, and having pushed the objection of free-thinkers as far as possible, shews us what we ought to believe and practise. He establishes the distinction of soul and body, the advantage of instruction, (ver. 11.) without meddling with things too high, (ver. 12.) the obligation of fearing God, (ver. 13.) and future retribution, ver. 14. This is the sum of all sound morality. (Calmet)

Haydock: Ecc 12:11 - In // Shepherd

In. The ground, (Haydock) to keep a tent in its proper place. He seemed before to have placed the wise on the same level with fools, chap. vi. 8, 11., and vii. 1. (Calmet) ---

Shepherd. God, or Solomon. The Jews explain it of Moses, and his successors, who taught the people.

Haydock: Ecc 12:12 - Not // End // -----Tenet insanabile multos // Scribendi cacoethes.---- // Flesh

Not. I have had experience of all. ---

End. They can teach nothing farther. (Calmet) ---

-----Tenet insanabile multos

Scribendi cacoethes.---- (Juvenal, Sat. vii.)

--- Impious productions abound, while those which promote piety are too scarce. When the same truths are enforced, as those which the Scriptures contain, we cannot be accused of writing many books. (Origen, Philoc. v.) (St. Jerome) ---

Flesh. It ruins the health.

Haydock: Ecc 12:13 - All man

All man. The whole business and duty of man. (Challoner) ---

This is the sum of all profitable doctrine. (Worthington) ---

He who does not fear God, deserves not the title of man. He is nothing but vanity. (Calmet)

Haydock: Ecc 12:14 - Error

Error. Or hidden and secret things. (Challoner) ---

Hebrew, "with every secret thing," (Protestants; Haydock) "every inadvertency." (Septuagint; Symmachus) (Calmet)

Gill: Ecc 12:1 - Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth // while the evil days come not // nor the years draw nigh, when thou shall say, I have no pleasure in them

Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth,.... Or "Creators" ^b; as "Makers", Job 35:10; for more than one were concerned, as in the creation of all things in general, so of man in particular, Gen 1:26; and these are neither more nor fewer than three; and are Father, Son, Spirit; the one God that has created men, Mal 2:10; the Father, who is the God of all flesh, and the Father of spirits; the former both of the bodies and souls of men, Jer 31:27; the Son, by whom all things are created; for he that is the Redeemer and husband of his church, which are characters and relations peculiar to the Son, is the Creator, Isa 43:1; and the Holy Spirit not only garnished the heavens, and moved upon the face of the waters, but is the Maker of men, and gives them life, Job 33:4. Now this God, Creator, should be "remembered" by young men; they should remember there is a God, which they are apt to be forgetful of; that this God is a God of great and glorious perfections, omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent, holy, just, and true; who judgeth in the earth, and will judge the world in righteousness, and them also; and that he is in Christ a God gracious, merciful, and pardoning iniquity, transgression, and sin: they should remember him under this character, as a "Creator", who has made them, and not they themselves; that they are made by him out of the dust of the earth, and must return to it; that he has brought them into being, and preserved them in it, and favoured them with the blessings of his providence, which are all from him that has made them: and they should remember the end for which they are made, to glorify him; and in what state man was originally made, upright, pure, and holy; but that he now is a fallen creature, and such are they, impure and unrighteous, impotent and weak, abominable in the sight of God, unworthy to live, and unfit to die; being transgressors of the laws of their Creator, which is deserving of death: they should remember what God their Creators, Father, Son, and Spirit, must have done or must do for them, if ever they are saved; the Father must have chosen them in Christ unto salvation; must have given his Son to redeem, and must send his Spirit into their hearts to create them anew; the Son must have been surety for them, assumed their nature, and died in their room and stead; and the Spirit must regenerate and make them new creatures, enlighten their minds, quicken their souls, and sanctify their hearts: they should remember the right their Creator has over them, the obligations they are under to him, and their duty to him; they should remember, with thankfulness, the favours they have received from him, and, with reverence and humility, the distance between him, as Creator, and them as creatures: they should remember to love him cordially and sincerely; to fear him with a godly fear; to worship him in a spiritual manner; to set him always before them, and never forget him. And all this they should do "in the days their youth"; which are their best and choicest day in which to serve him is most desirable by him, acceptable to him; who ordered the first of the ripe fruits and creatures of the first year to be offered to him: and then are men best able to serve him, when their bodies are healthful, strong, and vigorous; their senses quick, and the powers and faculties of their souls capable of being improved and enlarged: and to delay the service of him to old age, as it would be very ungrateful and exceeding improper, so no man can be sure of arriving to it; and if he should, yet what follows is enough to determine against such a delay;

while the evil days come not; meaning the days of old age; said to be evil, not with respect to the evil of fault or sin; so all days are evil, or sin is committed in every age, in infancy, in childhood, in youth, in manhood, as well as in old age: but with respect to the evil of affliction and trouble which attend it, as various diseases; yea, that itself is a disease, and an incurable one; much weakness of body, decay of intellects, and many other things, which render life very troublesome and uncomfortable ^c, as well as unfit for religious services;

nor the years draw nigh, when thou shall say, I have no pleasure in them; that is, corporeal pleasure; no sensual pleasure; sight, taste, and hearing, being lost, or in a great measure gone; which was Barzillai's case, at eighty years of age: though some ancient persons have their senses quick and vigorous, and scarce perceive any difference between youth and age; but such instances are not common: and there are also some things that ancient persons take pleasure in, as in fields and gardens, and the culture of them, as Cicero ^d observes; and particularly learned men take as much delight in their studies in old age as in youth, and in instructing others; and, as the same writer ^e says,

"what is more pleasant than to see an old man, attended and encircled with youth, at their studies under him?''

and especially a good man, in old age, has pleasure in reflecting on a life spent in the ways, work, and worship of God; and in having had, through the grace of God, his conversation in the world in simplicity and godly sincerity; as also in present communion with God, and in the hopes and views of the glories of another world: but if not religious persons, they are strangers to spiritual pleasure, which only is to be had in wisdom's ways; such can neither look back with pleasure on a life spent in sin; nor forward with pleasure, at death and eternity, and into another world; see 2Sa 19:35.

Gill: Ecc 12:2 - While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened // nor the clouds return after the rain

While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened,.... The wise man proceeds to describe the infirmities of old age, and the troubles that attend it; in order to engage young men to regard God and religion, before these come upon them, which greatly unfit for his service. This the Targum and Midrash, and, after them, Jarchi, interpret of the splendour of the countenance of man, of the light of his eyes, and the beauty of his cheeks, and other parts of his face; which decrease and go off at old age, and paleness and wrinkles succeed: and others of the adversities and calamities which attend persons at such years; which are sometimes in Scripture signified by the darkening of the sun, moon, and stars, Isa 13:10; but some choose to understand this, more literally, of the dimness of sight in old men; by whom the light of the sun, moon, and stars, is scarcely discerned: but as this infirmity is afterwards described, I rather think with others, that by the "sun", "light", and "moon", are meant the superior and inferior faculties of the soul, the understanding, mind, judgment, will, and affections; and, by the "stars", those bright notions and ideas raised in the fancy and imagination, and fixed in the memory; all which are greatly impaired or lost in old age: so Alshech interprets the sun and moon of the soul and spirit, and the stars of the senses; "light" is not in the Syriac version;

nor the clouds return after the rain; which some understand of catarrhs, defluxions, and rheums, flowing at the eyes, nose, and mouth, one after another, which frequently attend, and are very troublesome to persons in years; but may be more generally applied to the perpetual succession of evils, afflictions, and disorders, in old age; as soon as one is got over, another follows, billow after billow; or, like showers in April, as soon as one is gone, another comes. The Targum paraphrases it of the eyebrows distilling tears, like clouds after rain.

Gill: Ecc 12:3 - In the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble // and the strong men shall bow themselves // and the grinders cease because they are few // and those that look out of the windows be darkened

In the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble,.... By the "house" is meant the human body; which is a house of clay, the earthly house of our tabernacle, in which the soul dwells, Job 4:19, 2Co 5:1. The Targum interprets the keepers of the house, of the knees and the trembling of them; but the Midrash and Jarchi, much better, of the ribs; man being fenced with bones and sinews, as Job says, Job 10:11; though trembling cannot be well ascribed to them, they being so fixed to the backbone: rather therefore, as Aben Ezra, the hands and arms are meant; which work for the maintenance of the body, and feed it with food, got and prepared by them; and which protect and defend it from injuries; for all which they are fitted, and made strong by the God of nature. The Arabic version renders it, "both keepers"; and, doubtless, respects both hands and arms; and which, in old age, are not only wrinkled, contracted, and stiff, but attended with numbness, pains, and tremor. Some, not amiss, take in the head; which is placed as a watchtower over the body, the seat of the senses; which overlooks, guards, and keeps it, and which often through paralytic disorders, and even the weakness of old age, is attended with a shaking;

and the strong men shall bow themselves; it is strange the Targum and Midrash should interpret this of the arms, designed in the former clause; Jarchi and Aben Ezra, more rightly, of the thighs; it takes in thighs, legs, and feet, which are the basis and support of the human body; and are strengthened for this purpose, having stronger muscles and tendons than any other parts of the body; but these, as old age comes on, are weakened and distorted, and bend under the weight of the body, not being able, without assistance, to sustain it;

and the grinders cease because they are few; the Targum is,

"the teeth of the mouth:''

all agree the teeth are meant; only the Midrash takes in the stomach also, which, like a mill, grinds the food. There are three sorts of teeth; the fore teeth, which bite the food, and are called "incisores": the eye teeth, called "canini", which bruise and break the food; and the double teeth, the hindermost, which are called "dentes molares", the grinding teeth; and which being placed in the upper and nether jaw, are like to millstones, broad and rough, and rub against each other and grind the food, and prepare it for the stomach: these, in old age, rot and drop out, and become few and straggling, one here and another there; and, not being over against each other, are of no use, but rather troublesome;

and those that look out of the windows be darkened; the eyes, as the Targum and Ben Melech; and all agree that those that look out are the eyes, or the visive rays: the "windows" they look through are not spectacles; for it is questionable whether they were in use in Solomon's time, and, however, they are not parts of the house; but either the holes in which the eyes are, and so the Septuagint and Vulgate Latin versions render it, to which the Targum agrees, paraphrasing it, the strong bounds of the head; and which are no other than what oculists call the orbits of the eye: or else the eyelids, which open and shut like the casement of a window, and through which, being opened, the eyes look; or the humours of the eye, the watery, crystalline, and glassy, which are transparent, and through which the visive rays pass; or the tunics, or coats of the eye, particularly the "tunica aranea" and "cornea"; as also the optic nerves, and especially the "pupilla", or apple of the eye, which is perforated or bored for this purpose: now these, in old age, become weak, or dim, or thick, or contracted, or obstructed by some means or another by which the sight is greatly hindered, and is a very uncomfortable circumstance; this was Isaac's case, Gen 27:1; but Moses is an exception to the common case of old men, Deu 34:7.

Gill: Ecc 12:4 - And the doors shall be shut in the streets // when the sound of the grinding is low // and he shall rise up at the voice of the bird // and all the daughters of music shall be brought low

And the doors shall be shut in the streets,.... The Midrash and Jarchi interpret these of the holes of the body; in which they are followed by our learned and ingenuous countryman, Dr. Smith; who, by them, understands the inlets and outlets of the body; and, by the "streets", the ways and passages through which the food goes, and nourishment is conveyed; and which may be said to be shut, when they cease from their use: but it seems much better, with Aben Ezra and others, to interpret them of the lips; which are sometimes called the doors of the mouth, or lips, Psa 141:3; which are opened both for speaking and eating; but, in aged persons, are much shut as to either; they do not choose to speak much, because of the disagreeableness of their voice, and difficulty of speech, through the shortness of breath, and the loss of teeth; nor do they open them much to eat, through want of appetite; and while eating, are obliged, for want of teeth, to keep their lips close, to retain their food from falling out; they mumble with their lips both in speaking and eating; and, particularly in public, aged persons care not to speak nor eat, for the reason following: though some understand it, more literally, of their having the doors of their houses shut, and keeping within, and not caring to go abroad in the streets, because of their infirmities so the Targum,

"thy feet shall be bound from going in the streets;''

when the sound of the grinding is low; which the above Jewish writers, and, after them, Dr. Smith, understand of the stomach, grinding, digesting, and concocting food, and of other parts through which it is conveyed, and the offices they perform; but sound or voice does not seem so well to agree with that; rather therefore this is to be understood, as before, of the grinding of the teeth, through the loss of which so much noise is not heard in eating as in young men, and the voice in speaking is lower; the Targum is,

"appetite of food shall depart from thee;''

and he shall rise up at the voice of the bird; that is, the aged person, the least noise awakes him out of sleep; and as he generally goes to bed soon, he rises early at cock crowing, or with the lark, as soon as the voice of that bird or any other, is heard; particularly the cock, which crows very early, and whose voice is heard the most early, and is by some writers ^f emphatically called the bird that calls men to their work;

and all the daughters of music shall be brought low; either those that make music, and are the instruments of it, as the lungs, the throat, the teeth, mouth, and lips, so the Targum and Midrash; or those that receive music, as the ears, and the several parts of them, the cavities of them, particularly the tympanum and auditory nerve; all which, through old age, are impaired, and become very unfit to be employed in making music, or in attending to it: the voice of singing men and singing women could not be heard with pleasure by old Barzillai, 2Sa 19:36. These clauses are expressive of the weakness which generally old age brings on men; very few instances are there to the contrary; such as of Caleb, who, at eighty five years of age, was as strong as at forty; and of Moses, whose natural force abated not at an hundred and twenty; nor indeed as of Cyrus, who, when seventy years of age, and near his death, could not perceive that he was weaker then than in his youth ^g.

Gill: Ecc 12:5 - Also when they shall be afraid of that which is high // and fears shall be in the way // and the almond tree shall flourish // and the grasshopper shall be a burden // and desire shall fail // because man goeth to his long home // and the mourners go about the streets

Also when they shall be afraid of that which is high,.... Not of the most high God, before whose tribunal they must shortly appear, as some; but rather of high places, as high hills, mountains, towers, &c. which aged persons are afraid to go up, because of the feebleness and weakness of their limbs, their difficulty of breathing, and the dizziness of their heads;

and fears shall be in the way; they do not care: to go abroad, being afraid of every little stone that lies in the way, lest they should stumble at it, and fall: some understand this of their fears of spirits, good or bad; but the former sense is best;

and the almond tree shall flourish; which most interpret of the hoary head, which looks like an almond tree in blossom; and which, as it comes soon in the spring, whence it has its name of haste in the Hebrew language; see Jer 1:11; and is a sure sign of its near approach; so gray hairs, or the hoary head, sometimes appear very soon and unexpected, and are a sure indication of the approach of old age; which Cicero ^h calls "aetas praecipitata",

"age that comes hastily on;''

though the hoary head, like the almond tree, looks very beautiful, and is venerable, especially if found in the way of righteousness, Lev 19:32;

and the grasshopper shall be a burden; meaning either, should a grasshopper, which is very light, leap upon an aged person, it would give him pain, the least burden being uneasy to him; or, should he eat one of these creatures, the locusts being a sort of food in Judea, it would not sit well, on his stomach: or the grasshopper, being a crumpled and lean creature, may describe an old man; his legs and arms emaciated, and his shoulders, back, and lips, crumpled up and bunching out; and the locust of this name has a bunch on its backbone, like a camel ⁱ: Bochart ^k says, that the head of the thigh, or the hip bone, by the Arabians, is called "chagaba", the word here used for a locust or grasshopper; which part of the body is of principal use in walking, and found very troublesome and difficult to move in old men; and Aben Ezra interprets it of the thigh: the almond tree, by the Rabbins, as Jarchi says, is interpreted of the hip bone, which stands out in old age: and the Targum, of this and the preceding clause, is,

"and the top of thy backbone shall bunch out, through leanness, like the almond; and the ankles of thy feet shall be swelled.''

Some, as Ben Melech observes, understand it of the genital member, and of coitus, slighted and rejected, because of the weakness of the body; all desires of that kind being gone, as follows;

and desire shall fail; the appetite, for food, for bodily pleasures, and carnal delights; and particularly for venery, all the parts of the body for such uses being weakened, The Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Arabic versions, render it, "the caper tree shall be dissipated", or "vanish", or " its fruit shall shrink"; so Dr. Smith, who understands it of the decrease of the fluids, as he does the former clause of the solid parts of the body; and the berries of this tree are said to excite both appetite and lust ^l: and so Munster ^m interprets the word of the berries of the caper tree;

because man goeth to his long home; the grave, as the Targum, the house appointed for living, where he must lie till the resurrection morn; his eternal house, as Cicero calls it ⁿ; and so it may be rendered here, "the house of the world", common to all the world, where all mankind go: or, "to the house of his world" ^o; whether of bliss or woe, according as his state and character be, good or bad: Theognis ^p calls it the dark house of "hades", or the invisible state; and then this must be understood with respect to his separate soul, and the mansion of it; and Alshech says, every righteous man has a mansion to himself; see Joh 14:2;

and the mourners go about the streets; the relations of the deceased; or those that go to their houses to comfort them; or the mourning men and women, hired for that purpose.

Gill: Ecc 12:6 - Or ever the silver cord be loosed // or the golden bowl be broken // or the pitcher be broken at the fountain // or the wheel broken at the cistern

Or ever the silver cord be loosed,.... As the above are the symptoms and infirmities of old age; these in this verse are the immediate symptoms of death, or what attend it, or certainly issue in it. Some by "the silver cord" understand the string of the tongue; and to this purpose is the Targum,

"before thy tongue is dumb from speaking;''

and it is observed ^q in favour of this sense, that the failing of the tongue is no fallacious sign of death, of which there is no mention at all in this account, unless here; and the tongue may not unfitly be called a "cord", both from the notation of the word because it binds, and because it scourges like a cord, Job 5:21; and is compared to silver, Pro 10:20, and in this verse rather the head than the back is treated of. But best, the bond of union between soul and body is meant: the Midrash and Jarchi, and the Jewish writers in general, interpret it of the "spina dorsi", or backbone; or rather of the marrow of it, which descends like a cord from the brain through the neck, and down the backbone to the bottom of it; from whence spring the nerves, fibres, tendons, and filaments of the body, on which the life of it much depends: this spinal marrow may be called a "cord" for the length of it, as well as what arise from it; and a silver cord, from the colour of it ^r, this being white even after death; and for the excellency of it: and this may be said to be "loosened" when there is a solution of the nerves, or marrow; upon which a paralysis, or palsy, follows, and is often the immediate forerunner of death;

or the golden bowl be broken; the Targum renders it the top of the head; and the Midrash interprets it the skull, and very rightly; or rather the inward membrane of the skull, which contains the brain, called the "pia mater", or "meninx", is intended, said to be a bowl, from the form of it; a "golden" one, because of the preciousness of it, and the excellent liquor of life it contains, as also because of its colour; now when this "runs back", as the word ^s signifies, dries, shrinks up, and breaks, it puts a stop to all animal motion, and hence death;

or the pitcher be broken at the fountain; not the gall at the liver, as the Targum, which the ancients took to be the fountain of blood; but by the "fountain" is meant the heart, the fountain of life, which has two cavities, one on the right side, the other on the left, from whence come the veins and arteries, which carry the blood through the whole body; and here particularly it signifies the right ventricle of the heart, the spring and original of the veins, which are the pitcher that receives the blood and transmits it to the several parts of the body; but when thee are broke to shivers, as the word ^t signifies, or cease from doing their office, the blood stagnates in them, and death follows;

or the wheel broken at the cistern; which is the left ventricle of the heart, which by its "diastole" receives the blood brought to it through the lungs, as a cistern receives water into it; where staying a while in its "systole", it passes it into the great artery annexed to it; which is the wheel or instrument of rotation, which, together with all the instruments of pulsation, cause the circulation of the blood, found out in the last age by our countryman Dr. Harvey; but it seems by this it was well known by Solomon; now, whenever this wheel is broken, the pulse stops, the blood ceases to circulate, and death follows. For this interpretation of the several preceding passages, as I owe much to the Jewish writers, so to Rambachius and Patrick on these passages, and to Witsius's "Miscellanies", and especially to our countryman Dr. Smith, in his "Portrait of Old Age", a book worthy to be read on this subject; and there are various observations in the Talmud ^u agreeable hereunto.

Gill: Ecc 12:7 - Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was // and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it

Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was,.... The body, which is made of dust, and is no other in its present state than dust refined and enlivened; and when the above things take place, mentioned in Ecc 12:6, or at death, it returns to its original earth; it becomes immediately a clod of earth, a lifeless lump of clay, and is then buried in the earth, where it rots, corrupts, and turns into it; which shows the frailty of man, and may serve to humble his pride, as well as proves that death is not an annihilation even of the body; see Gen 3:19;

and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it; from whom it is, by whom it is created, who puts it into the bodies of men, as a deposit urn they are entrusted with, and are accountable for, and should be concerned for the safety and salvation of it; this was originally breathed into man at his first creation, and is now formed within him by the Lord; hence he is called the God of the spirits of all flesh; see Gen 2:4. Now at death the soul, or spirit of man, returns to God; which if understood of the souls of men in general, it means that at death they return to God the Judge of all, who passes sentence on them, and orders those that are good to the mansions of bliss and happiness, and those that are evil to hell and destruction. So the Targum adds,

"that it may stand in judgment before the Lord;''

or if only of the souls of good men, the sense is, that they then return to God, not only as their Creator, but as their covenant God and Father, to enjoy his presence evermore; and to Christ their Redeemer, to be for ever with him, than which nothing is better and more desirable; this shows that the soul is immortal, and dies not with the body, nor sleeps in the grave with it, but is immediately with God. Agreeably to all this Aristotle ^w says, the mind, or soul, alone enters θυραθεν, from without, (from heaven, from God there,) and only is divine; and to the same purpose are the words of Phocylides ^x,

"the body we have of the earth, and we all being resolved into it become dust, but the air or heaven receives the spirit.''

And still more agreeably to the sentiment of the wise man here, another Heathen ^y writer observes, that the ancients were of opinion that souls are given of God, and are again returned unto him after death.

Gill: Ecc 12:8 - Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher // all is vanity

Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher,.... The wise man, or preacher, set out in the beginning of the book with this doctrine, or proposition, which he undertook to prove; and now having proved it by an induction of particulars, instanced in the wisdom, wealth, honours, pleasures, and profit of men, and shown the vanity of them, and that the happiness of men lies not in these things, but in the knowledge and fear of God; he repeats it, and most strongly asserts it, as an undoubted truth beyond all dispute and contradiction, that all things under the sun are not only vain, but vanity itself, extremely vain, vain in the superlative degree;

all is vanity; all things in the world are vain; all creatures are subject to vanity; man in every state, and in his best estate, is altogether vanity: this the wise man might with great confidence affirm, after he had shown that not only childhood and youth are vanity, but even old age; the infirmities, sorrows, and distresses of which he had just exposed, and observed that all issue in death, the last end of man, when his body returns to the earth, and his soul to God the giver of it.

Gill: Ecc 12:9 - And moreover // because the preacher was wise // he still taught the people knowledge // yea, he gave good heed // and sought out // and set in order many proverbs

And moreover,.... Or "besides" ^z what has been said; or "as to what remains" ^a; or "but what is better", or "more excellent" ^b, is to "hear the conclusion of the whole matter", the sum and substance of the whole book in a few words, Ecc 12:13; to which Ecc 12:9; are a preface; and in which the wise man recommends the reading of this book, and other writings of his, and of other wise men inspired of God; and his own he particularly recommends, from his character as wise and industrious, in this verse; and from the subject matter of them, their nature, use, and excellency, and their efficacy and authority, in the two next;

because the preacher was wise; he was a "preacher", a royal one, an extraordinary preacher, and to be regarded; he urges not his title as a king, but his character as a preacher, to recommend what he had written: every good preacher should be regarded; not such who are ignorant preachers of the law, but faithful ministers of the Gospel, who are sent of God, and have felt and experienced what they deliver to others; and especially who are wise as well as faithful, as Solomon was; he had much wisdom given him at first, 1Ki 3:12; and in which he improved; and though he turned to folly in his old age, he recovered from that, and gained more wisdom through his fall, and to which he here seems to have reference; for "Koheleth", which some render the "gatherer", because he gathered much wisdom, and much people to hear it; others render "gathered", that is, into the flock and fold again, the church of God, from which he had strayed; See Gill on Ecc 1:1; and having seen through the follies and vanities of life, and being recovered and restored, was a fitter person to teach and instruct others; see Psa 51:12;

he still taught the people knowledge; or "again", as the Targum; after his fall and recovery he was communicative of his knowledge; he did not hide his talent in the earth, nor in a napkin; but having freely received he freely gave, and kept back nothing from his people, the people of the house of Israel, as the Targum, that might be profitable to them; he taught them the knowledge of themselves, as fallen men, impure, impotent, and unrighteous; the knowledge of the creatures, and the vanity of them, of riches, honours, and pleasures; and of works of righteousness to save men; the knowledge of Christ the Wisdom of God, the antiquity of his person, his glories, excellencies, and beauties, as in the books of Proverbs and Canticles; the knowledge of God, his fear and worship, mind and will; and the knowledge of a future state, and of the general judgment, as in this book; and in proportion to his own knowledge so he taught: for thus the words with the preceding may be rendered, that "the more that the preacher was wise, the more he taught the people knowledge" ^c; he taught according to the abilities he had received, as preachers should; the more he grew in grace and knowledge, the more largely be shared with others; and this he did "daily", as Aben Ezra renders the words, constantly, continually, incessantly, in season and out of season, as faithful Gospel ministers do;

yea, he gave good heed; to what he heard and to what be read, to which the apostle's advice agrees, 1Ti 4:13; or he caused others to hear, and give good heed to what is said, as Aben Ezra; he engaged their attention by his enlivening discourses; or, as Kimchi, he weighed things in his own mind, and in the balance of the sanctuary; and thoroughly considered and digested them before he delivered them to others;

and sought out; was very diligent in investigating truth, he searched into the mines of knowledge for it, the sacred writings, as one would for gold and silver, and as he himself directs, Pro 2:4;

and set in order many proverbs; three thousand of them, 1Ki 4:32; particularly those which are in the book of that name, penned by him; he selected the most choice, pithy, and sententious sayings, of his own and others; and these he huddled not up, or threw them together in a disorderly and confused manner; but put them together in proper order and method, under proper heads, as well as in a correct style, that they might be more received, and more easily retained. The Targum is,

"he attended to the voice of the wise men, and searched the books of wisdom; and by a spirit of prophecy from the Lord composed books of wisdom, and very many proverbs of understanding.''

Gill: Ecc 12:10 - The preacher sought to find out acceptable words // and that which was written was upright // even words of truth

The preacher sought to find out acceptable words,.... Not mere words, fine and florid ones, the words which man's wisdom teacheth, an elegant style, or eloquent language; not but that it is proper for a preacher to seek out and use words suitable and apt to convey right ideas to the minds of men of what he says; but doctrines are rather here meant, "words of desire", "delight", and "pleasure" ^d, as the phrase may be rendered; even of God's good will and pleasure, so Alshech; for the same word is sometimes used of God in this book and elsewhere: see Ecc 3:1; and so may take in the doctrine of God's everlasting love to his people, and his delight and pleasure in them; of his good will towards them in sending Christ to suffer and die for them, and save them; in pardoning their sins through his blood, in which he delights; in regenerating and calling them by his grace, and revealing the things of the Gospel to them, when he hides them from others, which is all of his own will and pleasure, and as it seems good in his sight: or words and doctrines, which are desirable, pleasing, and acceptable unto men; not that Solomon did, or preachers should, seek to please men, or seek to say things merely for the sake of pleasing men, for then they would not be the servants of Christ; nor are the doctrines of the Gospel pleasing to carnal men, but the reverse: they gnash their teeth at them, as Christ's hearers did at him; the preaching of a crucified Christ is foolishness, and the things of the Spirit of God are insipid things, to natural men; they are enemies to the Gospel: but to sensible sinners they are very delightful, such as peace, pardon, righteousness, and salvation, by Christ, 1Ti 1:15; for the worth of them, they are more desirable to them than gold and silver, and are more delightful to the ear than the best of music, and more acceptable to the taste than honey or the honeycomb, Psa 19:10;

and that which was written was upright; meaning what was written in this book, or in any other parts of Scripture, which the preacher sought out and inculcated; it was according to the mind and will of God, and to the rest of the sacred word; it was sincere, unmixed, and unadulterated with the doctrines and inventions of men; it showed that man had lost his uprightness, had none of himself, and where it was to be had, even in Christ; and was a means of making men sound, sincere, and upright at heart; and of directing them to walk uprightly, and to live soberly, righteously, and godly, in the world;

even words of truth; which come from the God of truth, that cannot lie, as all Scripture does; of which Christ, who is the truth, is the sum and substance; and which are inspired by the Spirit of truth, and led into by him, and made effectual to saving purposes; and which holds good of the whole Scripture, called the Scripture of truth, Dan 10:1; and of the Gospel, which is the word of truth, and of every doctrine of it, Joh 17:17.

Gill: Ecc 12:11 - The words of the wise are as goads // and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies // which are given from one Shepherd

The words of the wise are as goads,.... As the goad teacheth the ox; so the Targum. Not the words of the wise philosophers of that age, or of ages before, or since; but of the inspired penmen of the Scriptures, as Moses, David, Solomon, and of others since; and of all good men, whose doctrines are agreeably to them; these are like "goads" or "pricks", sharp pointed sticks or staves, with which men push and prick their cattle, when driving them from place to place, or ploughing with them: and of a similar use are the doctrines of the word, when attended with a divine efficacy; these are a means of pricking sinners to the heart; and of laying open their vileness and sinfulness to them; and of repentance and contrition; and of awakening them from a sleep in sin to a sense of their danger; and even of killing them, as to their own sense and apprehension of things, and, with respect to their hopes of life, by their own works; as the Philistines were slain by Shamgar with an ox goad, Jdg 3:31; see Act 2:37; and these are also of use to the saints, as goads, to stir them up, when slothful, to the discharge of duty; and to awaken them, when drowsy, out of their carnal security; and to correct them for their faults, by sharp reproofs and rebukes; as well as to excite them to go on to perfection, who are apt to sit still and lie down; and to direct them to walk straight on, without turning to the right hand or left;

and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies; like these are the truths and doctrines of the word, when they have a place in the heart, and become the "ingrafted word" there; when they are "planted" ^e in the soul, as the word signifies; when they are fixed in the mind and memory, and dwell and abide there: and when as nails, driven into anything, fasten what they are drove into; so these are the means of fastening souls; of causing them to cleave to God and Christ; to the church, and his people, and to one another; and to the Gospel, and their profession of it; hence they are not like children, tossed to and fro, wavering and unstable: of all which "the masters of the assemblies" are the instruments; that is, ministers and pastors of churches. As there were assemblies for religious worship under the law, in which the prophets, priests, and Levites, assisted; so there are assemblies or churches under the Gospel dispensation, which are gathered and meet together for the service of God, and over these the ministers of the word preside; these are set over the churches in the Lord, and have the rule of them; though they are not to lord it over God's heritage, or have the dominion over their faith; but are helpers of their joy, and useful in the above things, through their ministry. Some choose to render "masters of collections", or "gatherings" ^f; and think it may respect their gathering truths out of the sacred writings, as the bee gathers honey out of the flowers; in allusion to those that gathered together the choice and pithy sentences and sayings of others, like the men of Hezekiah, Pro 25:1; or to undershepherds, gathering the sheep into the fold ^g, by the order of the principal one; who made use of goads, to drive away thieves or wild beasts; and nails, to preserve the sheepfold whole. And others think that not the words, but the of the assemblies themselves, are compared to "nails", and read them, "and the masters of the assemblies are as nails fastened" ^h; are well established, firm and sure; see Isa 22:23; and others take it to be no other than an epithet of the nails themselves, and render it, "as nails fixed, which are binders"; that is, great binding nails, which, being fixed in boards, bind, compact, and hold them together; to which the words of the wise may be compared, being the means of compacting and holding together the church of God, comparable to a sheepfold; hence mention is made of the shepherd in the next clause: or of fixing the attention of the minds of men unto them, and of retaining them in memory, and to which they speak of as first principles, and never swerve from them ⁱ; but, that not ministers, the instruments, but the principal and efficient cause, may have the glory, is added,

which are given from one Shepherd; not Zerubbabel, as Grotius; nor Moses, as the Targum, Jarchi, and Alshech; but Christ, the one Shepherd, set over the flock; and under whom the masters of assemblies, or pastors of churches, are, Eze 37:23; from whom they have their gifts and qualifications, their mission and commissions; and are given to the churches, as pastors and teachers, to feed them, Eph 4:10; and from whom they have their food, the Gospel and the doctrines of it, to feed the flocks with, assigned to their care, Joh 17:8; though this is to be understood not to the exclusion of God, the Father of Christ, by whom all Scripture is inspired; nor of the Spirit, by whom holy men of God spake as they were moved, 2Ti 3:16.

Gill: Ecc 12:12 - And further, by these, my son, be admonished // of making many books there is no end // and much study is a weariness of the flesh

And further, by these, my son, be admonished,.... Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, may be intended, for whose sake, more especially, this book might be written; though it may take in every hearer of this divine preacher, every disciple of this teacher, every subject of his kingdom, as well as every reader of this book, whom he thus addresses, and for whom he was affectionately concerned as a father for a son; that they might be enlightened with divine knowledge, warned of that which is evil, and admonished and advised to that which is good; "by these" words and writings of his own, and other wise men; and by these masters of assemblies, who, and their words, are from the one and chief Shepherd; to these they would do well to take heed, and to these only or chiefly. It may be rendered, "and what is the more excellent of these, he admonished" ^k; to observe what is mentioned in Ecc 12:13, and lies in a few words, "Fear God", &c. and especially Jesus Christ, the "Alpha" and "Omega", the sum and substance of the whole Bible; of what had been written in Solomon's time, and has been since: he is the most excellent part of it; or that which concerns him, in his person, offices, and grace: or thus; "and what is above", or "more than these, beware of" ^l; do not trouble thyself with any other writings; these are sufficient, all that is useful and valuable is to be found in them; and as for others, if read, read them with care and caution, and only as serving to explain these, and to promote the same ends and designs, or otherwise to be rejected;

of making many books there is no end; many books, it seems, were written in Solomon's time; there was the same itch of writing as now, it may be; but what was written was not to be mentioned with the sacred writings, were comparatively useless and worthless. Or the sense is, should Solomon, or any other, write ever so many volumes, it would be quite needless; and there would be no end of writing, for these would not give satisfaction and contentment; and which yet was to be had in the word of God; and therefore that should be closely attended to: though this may be understood, not only of making or composing books, but of getting them, as Aben Ezra; of purchasing them, and so making them a man's own. A man may lay out his money, and fill his library with books, and be very little the better for them; what one writer affirms, another denies; what one seems to have proved clearly, another rises up and points out his errors and mistakes; and this occasions replies and rejoinders, so that there is no end of these things, and scarce any profit by them; which, without so much trouble, may be found in the writings of wise men, inspired by God, and in which we should rest contented;

and much study is a weariness of the flesh; the study of languages, and of each of the arts and sciences, and of various subjects in philosophy and divinity, particularly in writing books on any of these subjects; which study is as fatiguing to the body, and brings as much weariness on it, as any manual and mechanic operation; it dries up the moisture of the body, consumes the spirits, and gradually and insensibly impairs health, and brings on weakness, as well as weariness. Some render it, "much reading", as Jarchi, and so Mr. Broughton; and Aben Ezra observes, that the word in the Arabic language so signifies: the Arabic word "lahag" signifies to desire anything greedily, or to be greedily given and addicted to anything ^m; and so may denote such kind of reading here, or such a person who is "helluo", a glutton at books, as Cato is said to be. And now reading books with such eagerness, and with constancy, is very wearisome, and is to little advantage; whereas reading the Scripture cheers and refreshes the mind, and is profitable and edifying. Gussetius ⁿ interprets it of much speaking, long orations, which make weary.

Gill: Ecc 12:13 - Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter // fear God, and keep his commandments // for this is the whole duty of man

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter,.... Or "the end" ^o of it. The sum and substance of it, what it all tends to and issues in; even the whole of what is contained in this book, and in all offer divinely inspired writings of Solomon or others; of all that were now written, or before, or since: this the preacher calls upon himself, as well as his hearers, to attend unto. Or it may be rendered, "the end of the whole matter is heard" ^p; here ends this book; and you have heard the whole of what deserves regard, and it lies in these few words,

fear God, and keep his commandments: "the fear of God" includes the whole of internal religion, or powerful godliness; all the graces of the Spirit, and the exercise of them; reverence of God, love to him, faith in him, and in his Son Jesus Christ; hope of eternal life from him; humility of soul, patience and submission to his will, with every other grace; so the Heathens call religion "metum Deorum" ^q, the fear of God: and "keeping of the commandments", or obedience to the whole will of God, is the fruit, effect, and evidence of the former; and takes in all the commands of God, moral and positive, whether under the former or present dispensation; and an observance of them in faith, from a principle of love, and with a view to the glory of God;

for this is the whole duty of man; or, "this is the whole man" ^r; and makes a man a whole man, perfect, entire, and wanting nothing; whereas, without this, he is nothing, let him have ever so much of the wisdom, wealth, honour, and profits of this world. Or, "this is the whole of every man" ^s; either, as we supply it, the duty, work, and business of every man, of every son of Adam, be he what he will, high or low, rich or poor, of every age, sex, and condition; or this is the happiness of every man, or that leads to it; this is the whole of it; this is the "summum bonum", or chief happiness of men: Lactantius ^t says, the "summum bonum" of a man lies in religion only; it lies in this, and not in any outward thing, as is abundantly proved in this book: and this should be the concern of everyone, this being the chief end of man, and what, as Jarchi says, he is born unto; or, as the Targum, such should be the life of every man. The Masoretes begin this verse with a larger letter than usual, and repeat it at the end of the book, though not accentuated, to raise the attention of the reader ^u; that he may make a particular observation of what is said in it, as being of the greatest moment and importance.

Gill: Ecc 12:14 - For God shall bring every work into judgment // with every secret thing // whether it be good, or whether it be evil

For God shall bring every work into judgment,.... Not in this life, but in the day of the great judgment, as the Targum explains it; that is, whatever has been done by men, from the beginning of the world, or will be to the end; all being observed and taken notice of by the omniscient God, who has registered them in the book of his remembrance, and, being Judge, will be able to bring them all into account at that awful day: which is here given as a reason why men should fear God, and keep his commandments;

with every secret thing; that has been committed in secret by men, and is unknown to others, even every secret thought of the heart; see 1Co 4:5; or, "with every secret" or "hidden man" ^w; whose works are hidden from men, and are not known to be what, they are, and who thought to hide themselves from, God; but these, with their works, shall be brought into open court in judgment;

whether it be good, or whether it be evil: it shall then be examined according to the rule of the word, and be judged, and declared to be what it truly is, good or evil; and so be either rewarded in a way of grace, or punished: or, "whether the man, the hidden man, be good or evil" ^x, so Alshech; all mankind, everyone, will he bring into judgment, whether he be good or evil. This is the last end of all things, and in which every man will be concerned. This shows, as well as many other things in this book. Solomon's belief of a future state and judgment; and that there is nothing in it to encourage the epicure and atheist: which being observed by the ancient Jews, they readily admitted it into the canon of Scripture.

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Ayat / Catatan Kaki

NET Notes: Ecc 12:1

¹ tn The imperative זְכֹר (zekhor, “Remember!”) is a figurative expression (metonymy of association) for obeying God and acknowledging his lordship over one’s life (e.g., Num 15:40; Deut 8:18; Pss 42:6-7; 63:6-8; 78:42; 103:18; 106:7; 119:52, 55; Jer 51:50; Ezek 20:43; Jonah 2:7; Mal 4:4). The exhortation to fear God and obey his commands in 12:13-14 spells out what it means to “remember” God.

² tn The temporal adjective עַד (’ad, “before”) appears three times in 12:1-7 (vv. 1b, 2a, 6a). Likewise, the temporal preposition בְּ (bet, “when”) is repeated (vv. 3a, 4b). These seven verses comprise one long sentence in Hebrew: The main clause is 12:1a (“Remember your Creator in the days of your youth”), while 12:1b-7 consists of five subordinate temporal clauses (“before…before…when…when…before…”).

³ tn The adjective רָעָה (ra’ah, “evil”) does not refer here to ethical evil, but to physical difficulty, injury, pain, deprivation and suffering (e.g., Deut 31:17, 21; 32:23; 1 Sam 10:19; Neh 1:3; 2:17; Pss 34:20; 40:13; 88:4; 107:26; Eccl 11:10; Jer 2:27; Lam 3:38); see HALOT 1263 s.v. רָעָה 4.b; BDB 949 s.v. רָעָה 2.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:2

¹ tn Heb “the light and the moon and the stars.” The phrase “the light and the moon” is a hendiadys (two separate terms denoting one idea) or perhaps even a hendiatris (three separate terms denoting one idea) for “the light of the moon and stars” (e.g., Gen 1:14).

² tn The verb שׁוּב (shuv, “to return”) here denotes “to desist” (HALOT 1430 s.v. שׁוּב 3). It pictures the disappearance of the clouds as a result of the precipitation of their contents.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:3

¹ tn Heb “the watchers of the house.”

² tn The verb זְוּעַ (zÿua’, “to tremble”) probably does not refer to physical tremors but to trembling in fear (e.g., Esth 5:9; Hab 2:7; Sir 48:12); cf. HALOT 267 s.v. זוע). At the onset of old age, those who had been the most courageous during their youth suddenly become fearful.

³ tn The verb עָוַת (’avat, “to bend; to stoop”) means “to be stooped” (HALOT 804 s.v. עות) rather than “to bend themselves” (BDB 736 s.v. עות). The perfect tense may be taken in an ingressive sense (“begin to stoop over”).

⁴ tn The term הַטֹּחֲנוֹת (hattokhanot, Qal active participle feminine plural from טָחַן, takhan, “to grind”) is a double entendre. In its literal sense, it refers to female mill-grinders; in its figurative sense, it refers to molar teeth (HALOT 374 s.v. *טֹחֲנָה). The related Hebrew noun טַחֲנָה (takhanah) refers to a “mill,” and the related Arabic noun tahinat means “molar tooth” (HALOT 374 s.v. *טַחֲנָה).

⁵ tn The verb חָשַׁךְ (khashakh, “to grow dim”) is used elsewhere in reference to failing eyesight (e.g., Ps 69:24; Lam 5:17); see HALOT 361 s.v. חשׁך 2. Therefore, the phrase “those who look through the windows” is probably a figurative description of the eyes, picturing failing eyesight at the onset of old age.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:4

¹ tn The noun טַחֲנָה (takhanah) refers to a “grinding-mill” where grain is ground into flour (HALOT 374 s.v. טַחֲנָה). The term is here used as a double entendre, figuratively describing the loss of one’s teeth at the onset of old age. The figurative usage also draws upon the polysemantic nature of this noun; the related Arabic root tahinat means “molar tooth” (HALOT 374 s.v. *טֹחֲנָה).

² tn Heb “rises up.” The verb קוּם (qum, “to arise”) refers to being awakened from sleep in the middle of the night by a sound (e.g., Exod 12:30; 1 Sam 3:6, 8) and waking up early in the morning (e.g., Gen 24:54; Judg 16:3; Ruth 3:14; Neh 2:12; Job 14:12; 24:14); see HALOT 1086 s.v. קוּם 1; BDB 877 s.v. קוּם 1.a. Here it describes one of the frustrations of old age: the elderly person is unable to get a full night’s sleep because every little sound awakens him in the middle of the night or too early in the morning.

³ tn The term “their” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity and smoothness.

⁴ tn Heb “all the daughters of song.” The expression “the daughters of song” (בְּנוֹת הַשִּׁיר, bÿnot hashir) is an idiom for “songs; musical sounds; melodious notes” (HALOT 166 s.v. I בַּת 2; BDB 123 s.v. בַּת 5; GKC 418 §128.v). The genitive הַשִּׁיר (“song”) represents the nature, quality, character or condition of the construct בְּנוֹת (“daughters”); see IBHS 149-51 §9.5.3b. The idiom refers to the musical songs sung during one’s youth or to the ability to hear songs that are sung. This line is lamenting the loss of hearing which occurs at the onset of old age.

⁵ tn Heb “are brought low.”

NET Notes: Ecc 12:5

¹ tn The Hebrew noun חַתְחַתִּים (khatkhattim) literally means “terrors” (HALOT 363 s.v. חַתְחַת; BDB 369 s.v. חַתְחַת). Here it is used as a metonymy (cause for effect) to refer to dangers that cause the elderly to be fearful of going outside or walking along the streets. The form חַתְחַתִּים is a reduplicated noun stem from the root חתת (“terror”); HALOT 363 s.v. חַתְחַת; BDB 369 s.v. חַתְחַת. The reduplication of the noun stem intensifies its meaning: the noun חִתַּת (khittat) means “terror,” so the intensified reduplicated form חַתְחַת (khatkhat) connotes something like “great terror” (see S. Moscati, Comparative Grammar, 78-79, §12.9-13). The plural form חַתְחַתִּים (“great terrors”) denotes plural of number (more than one) or plural of intensity (which would further intensify the experience of fear); see IBHS 122 §7.4.3a.

² tn The noun שָׁקֵד (shaqed) is used in the OT in reference to the “almond nut” (e.g., Gen 43:11; Num 17:23) and metonymically (product for thing producing it) for the “almond tree” (e.g., Jer 1:11); cf. HALOT 1638 s.v. שָׁקֵד; BDB 1052 s.v. שָׁקֵד 2.

³ tn The verb נצץ (“to blossom”) is a geminate verb (II = III) that, in this case, is written with a matres lectionis (plene spelling) rather than the normal spelling of וינץ (GKC 204 §73.g). The Hiphil verb יָנֵאץ (yane’ts) is from the root נצץ “to shine; to sparkle; to blossom” (HALOT 717 s.v. נצץ; BDB 665 s.v. נָצַץ). It is used in reference to almond blossoms whose color progresses from pink to white as they ripen (e.g., Song 6:11). This is an appropriate metaphor (comparison of sight) to describe white hair that often accompanies the onset of old age.

⁴ tn Or “locust.”

⁵ tn The verb סָבַל (saval, “to bear a heavy load”) means “to drag oneself along” as a burden (BDB 687 s.v. סָבַל) or “to become thick; to move slowly forward; to clear off” (HALOT 741 s.v. סבל).

⁶ tn The noun אֲבִיּוֹנָה (’aviyyonah, “caper berry, caper fruit”) is a hapax legomenon, occurring only here in the Hebrew Bible. It refers to the Capparis spinosa fruit which was eaten as an aphrodisiac in the ancient Near East (HALOT 5 s.v. אֲבִיּוֹנָה; BDB 2–3 s.v. אֲבִיּוֹנָה). There are two options for the interpretation of this figure: (1) At the onset of old age, the sexual virility that marked one’s youth is nothing more than a distant memory, and even aphrodisiacs fail to stimulate sexual desire to allow for sexual intercourse. (2) The onset of old age is like the shriveling up of the caper berry fruit; the once virile youth has passed his prime just like a shriveled caper berry can no longer provide a sexual stimulant.

⁷ tc The MT vocalizes consonantal ותפר as וְתָפֵר (vÿtafer, conjunction + Hiphil imperfect 3rd person feminine singular from פָּרַר , parar, “to burst”). However, an alternate vocalization tradition of וְתֻפַּר (vÿtupar, conjunction + Hophal imperfect 3rd person feminine singular “to be broken down”) is reflected in the LXX which reads καὶ διασκεδασθῇ (kai diaskedasqh, “is scattered”) and Symmachus καὶ διαλυθῇ (kai dialuqh, “is broken up”) which is followed by the Syriac. On the other hand, Aquila’s καὶ καρπεύσει (kai karpeusei, “are enjoyed,” of fruits) reflects וְתִפְרֶה (Qal imperfect 3rd person feminine singular from פָרַה, “to bear fruit”); this does not reflect an alternate reading but a translator’s error in word division between וְתָפֵר הָאֲבִיּוֹנָה (vÿtafer ha’aviyyonah, “the caper berry bursts”) and וְתִפְרֶה אֲבִיּוֹנָה (vÿtifreh ’aviyyonah, “the caper berry bears fruit”).

tn Or “fails”; or “bursts.” The meaning of the verb פָּרַר (parar, “to break; to make ineffectual”) is debated: (1) “to be ineffectual,” that is, to fail to provide sexual power as an aphrodisiac, or (2) “to break; to burst,” that is, the caper berry fruit shrivels as it lingers on its branch beyond its period of ripeness (HALOT 975 s.v. פרר 2.f; BDB 830 s.v. I. פָּרַר 2.d).

⁸ tn In the construct phrase בֵּית עוֹלָמוֹ (bet ’olamo, “house of his eternity”), the genitive עוֹלָמוֹ (“eternity”) functions as an attributive adjective: “his eternal home.” This is an idiom for the grave as the resting place of the body (e.g., Ps 49:12 [11]; Job 7:9; 14:10-12; Eccl 12:5) or Sheol as the residence of the dead (e.g., Job 17:13; 30:23); see HALOT 124 s.v. I בַּיִת 2; 799 (5); BDB 109 s.v. בַּיִת 1.d. For example, the term בֵּית (“house”) is used in Job 30:23 in parallelism with “death” (מָוֶת, mavet). The same idiom appears in postbiblical Hebrew: “the house of eternity” (בֵּית עוֹלָם, bet ’olam) is a euphemism for a burial ground or cemetery (e.g., Lamentations Rabbah 1:5); see Jastrow 1084-85 s.v. עָלַם III. This idiom is also found in a Moabite text in reference to the grave (Deir Alla Inscription 2:6). A similar idiom is found in Phoenician and Palmyrene in reference to the grave (DISO 35). The idiom appears to have originated in Egyptian literature (H. A. Hoffner, TDOT 2:113). See F. Cumont, Afterlife in Roman Paganism, 48-50.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:6

¹ tn Heb “water-spring.”

² tn The term גַּלְגַּל (galgal, “wheel”) refers to the “water wheel” or “paddle wheel” for drawing water from a well (HALOT 190 s.v. I גַּלְגַּל 2; BDB 165 s.v. גַּלְגַּל 1.b). This Hebrew noun is related to the Akkadian term gulgullu (“pot”), as well as Phoenician (?) גלגל (“wheel for drawing water”). The Latin term girgillus (“lever for the bucket”) is a late derivation from this term. See G. Dalman, Arbeit und Sitte in Palästina, 2:225-28.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:7

¹ tn Or “spirit.” The likely referent is the life’s breath that originates with God. See Eccl 3:19, as well as Gen 2:7; 6:17; 7:22.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:8

¹ tn Heb “futility of futilities.” The phrase “absolutely futile” (הֲבֶל הֲבָלִים, havel havalim) is a superlative genitive construction (GKC 431 §133.i). See note on “futile” at 1:2.

² tn Elsewhere in the book, the author is identified with the anarthrous term קֹהֶלֶת (qohelet, Eccl 1:1, 2, 12; 7:27; 12:9, 10); however, in 12:8 it is used with the article, indicating that it is a professional title rather than a personal surname: הַקּוֹהֶלֶת (haqqohelet, “the Teacher”). Numerous English translations render קֹהֶלֶת as a professional title: “the Speaker” (NEB, Moffatt); “the Preacher” (KJV, RSV, YLT, MLB, ASV, NASB); “the Teacher” (NIV, NRSV); “the Leader of the Assembly” (NIV margin); “the Assembler” (NJPS margin). Others render it as a personal surname: “Koheleth” (JPS, NJPS) and “Qoheleth” (NAB, NRSV margin).

³ tn Heb “Everything.” The term is rendered “all of these things” for clarity. Although כֹּל (kol, “everything; all”) is often used in an absolute or comprehensive sense (BDB 481 s.v. כֹּל 1), it is frequently used as a synecdoche of the general for the specific, that is, its sense is limited contextually to the topic at hand (BDB 482 s.v. 2). This is particularly true of הַכֹּל (hakkol, BDB 482 s.v. 2.b) in which the article particularizes or limits the referent to the contextual or previously mentioned topic (e.g., Gen 16:12; 24:1; Exod 29:24; Lev 1:9, 13; 8:27; Deut 2:36; Josh 11:19 [see 2 Sam 19:31; 1 Kgs 14:26 = 2 Chr 12:9]; 21:43; 1 Sam 30:19; 2 Sam 17:3; 23:5; 24:23; 1 Kgs 6:18; 2 Kgs 24:16; Isa 29:11; 65:8; Jer 13:7, 10; Ezek 7:14; Pss 14:3; 49:18; 1 Chr 7:5; 28:19; 29:19; 2 Chr 28:6; 29:28; 31:5; 35:7; 36:17-18; Ezra 1:11; 2:42; 8:34-35; 10:17; Eccl 5:8). Thus, “all” does not always mean “all” absolutely or universally in comprehension. In several cases the context limits its reference to two classes of objects/issues being discussed, so הַכֹּל means “both” (e.g., 2:14; 3:19: 9:1, 2). Thus, הַכֹּל (“all; everything”) refers only to what Qoheleth characterizes as “futile” (הֶבֶל, hevel) in the context. This does not mean that everything is futile. For example, fearing God is not “futile” (2:26; 3:14-15; 11:9-10; 12:1, 9, 13-14). Only those objects/issues that are contextually placed under כֹּל are designated as “futile” (הֶבֶל).

⁴ tn The term הֶבֶל (hevel, “futile”) is repeated three times within the six words of this verse for emphasis. See footnote on “futile” at 1:2.

sn Absolutely futile!…All of these things are futile! This motto is the theme of the book. Its occurs at the beginning (1:2) and end of the book (12:8), forming an envelope structure (inclusio). Everything described in 1:2—12:8 is the supporting proof of the thesis of 1:2. With few exceptions (e.g., 2:24-26; 3:14-15; 11:9–12:1, 9), everything described in 1:2—12:8 is characterized as “futile” (הֶבֶל, hevel).

NET Notes: Ecc 12:9

¹ sn Eccl 12:9-12 fits the pattern of a concluding colophon that draws from a conventional stock of ancient Near Eastern scribal practices and vocabulary. See M. A. Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, 29–31.

² tn Heb “he weighed and studied.” The verbs וְאִזֵּן וְחִקֵּר (vÿ’izzen vekhiqqer, “he weighed and he explored”) form a hendiadys (a figurative expression in which two separate terms used in combination to convey a single idea): “he studiously weighed” or “carefully evaluated.” The verb וְאִזֵּן (conjunction + Piel perfect 3rd person masculine singular from II אָזַן (’azan) “to weigh; to balance”) is related to the noun מֹאזֵן (mo’zen) “balances; scales” used for weighing money or commercial items (e.g., Jer 32:10; Ezek 5:1). This is the only use of the verb in the OT. In this context, it means “to weigh” = “to test; to prove” (BDB 24 s.v. מאזן) or “to balance” (HALOT 27 II אָזַן). Cohen suggests, “He made an examination of the large number of proverbial sayings which had been composed, testing their truth and worth, to select those which he considered deserving of circulation” (A. Cohen, The Five Megilloth [SoBB], 189).

³ tn The verb תָּקַן (taqan, “to make straight”) connotes “to put straight” or “to arrange in order” (HALOT 1784 s.v. תקן; BDB 1075 s.v. תָּקַן).This may refer to Qoheleth’s activity in compiling a collection of wisdom sayings in an orderly manner, or writing the wisdom sayings in a straightforward, direct manner.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:10

¹ tn In the construct phrase דִּבְרֵי־חֵפֶץ (divre-khefets, “words of delight”) the noun חֵפֶץ (“delight”) functions as an attributive genitive (“delightful words”) or a genitive of estimation or worth (“words viewed as delightful by Qoheleth” or “words that he took delight in”). For another example of a genitive of estimation of worth, see זִבְחֵי אֱלֹהִים (zivkhe ’elohim) “sacrifices of God” = “sacrifices viewed as acceptable to God” (Ps 51:19). In other words, Qoheleth wrote his proverbs so effectively that he was able to take moral and aesthetic delight in his words.

² tc The consonantal form וכתוב has been revocalized in three ways: (1) The Masoretes read וְכָתוּב (vÿkhatuv, conjunction + Qal passive participle ms from כָּתַב, katav, “to write”): “Qoheleth sought to find pleasant words, what was written uprightly, namely, words of truth.” This is supported by the LXX’s καὶ γεγραμμένον (kai gegrammenon, conjunction + masculine accusative singular perfect passive participle from γράφω, grafw, “to write). (2) The BHS editors suggest the vocalization וְכָתוֹב (vÿkhatov, conjunction + Qal infinitive absolute). The infinitive וְכָתוֹב (“and to write”) in the B-line would parallel the infinitive of purpose לִמְצֹא (limtso’, “to find”) in the A-line: “Qoheleth sought to find pleasant words, and to write accurately words of truth.” (3) Several medieval Hebrew mss preserve an alternate textual tradition of וְכָתַב (vÿkhatav, conjunction + Qal perfect 3rd person masculine singular). This is reflected in the Greek versions (Aquila and Symmachus), Syriac Peshitta and Vulgate. The major English versions are divided among these three textual options: (1) וְכָתוּב (Qal passive participle): “and that which was written was upright, even words of truth” (KJV); “and that which was written uprightly, even words of truth” (ASV); “and, written by the upright, words of truth” (YLT); “but what he wrote was the honest truth” (NEB); “and what he wrote was upright and true” (NIV). (2) וְכָתוֹב (Qal infinitive absolute): “and to write words of truth correctly” (NASB); “and to write correctly the reliable words of truth” (MLB); “and to write down true sayings with precision” (NAB). (3) וְכָתַב (Qal perfect 3rd person masculine singular): “and uprightly he wrote words of truth” (RSV); “and he wrote words of truth plainly” (NRSV); “even as he put down plainly what was true” (Moffatt); “and he wrote words most right, and full of truth” (Douay); and “and he recorded genuinely truthful sayings” (NJPS). The editors of the Jerusalem Hebrew Bible project favor וְכָתוֹב “and to write” (option 2): see D. Barthélemy, ed., Preliminary and Interim Report on the Hebrew Old Testament Text Project, 3:596–97.

³ tn The construct phrase דִּבְרֵי אֱמֶת (divre ’emet, “words of truth”) is a genitive of content (“words containing truth”) or an attributive genitive (“truthful words”). Depending upon the vocalization of וכתוב, the phrase functions in one of two ways: (1) as direct object of וְכָתוֹב יֹשֶׁר (vÿkhatov yosher) “and he accurately wrote truthful words”; or (2) in apposition to וְכָתוּב יֹשֶׁר (vÿkhatuv yosher) “and what is written uprightly, namely, truthful words.”

NET Notes: Ecc 12:11

¹ tn Or “goads”; NCV “sharp sticks used to guide animals.” For further information see M. A. Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation, 29–32.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:12

¹ sn The exhortation may be understood in two ways: (1) to avoid any so-called wisdom sayings beyond those mentioned in vv. 10-11: “The words of the wise…are given from one shepherd. And of anything beyond these, my son, be warned!” (see RSV, NRSV, NAB, Douay, NIV). This is paraphrased well by Moffatt: “My son, avoid anything beyond the scriptures of wisdom” (Moffatt). (2) The exhortation refers to the concerns of v. 12b, namely, diligent study is wearisome, i.e., “Furthermore, my son, be warned: there is no end to the making of books, and much study is wearisome to the body” (see NEB, ASV, NASB, MLB).

² tn The verb עָשָׂה (’asah, “to do”) may mean “to make” (HALOT 890 s.v. I עשׂה 3) or “to acquire” (HALOT 891 s.v. I עשׂה 6). The LXX rendered it as ποιῆσαι (poihsai, “making”), as do most English versions: “making” (KJV, YLT, RSV, NRSV, NAB, ASV, MLB, NIV, NJPS). However, several English versions reflect a different nuance: “there is no end to the buying of books” (Moffatt); “the use of books is endless” (NEB); and “the writing of many books is endless” (NASB).

³ tn Heb “the flesh.” The term בָּשָׂר (basar, “flesh”) refers to the body, functioning as a synecdoche or part (i.e., flesh, skin) for the whole (i.e., body), e.g., Gen 17:13; Ps 16:9; Prov 14:30 (see E. W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech, 642).

NET Notes: Ecc 12:13

¹ tn Heb “The end of the matter, everything having been heard.”

² tn Heb “This is all men”; or “This is the whole of man.” The phrase זֶה כָּל־הָאָדָם (zeh kol-ha’adam, “this is all men”) features rhetorical elision of a key word. The ambiguity over the elided word has led to no less than five basic approaches: (1) “this is the whole duty of man” (KJV, ASV, RSV, NAB, NIV); (2) “this is the duty of all men” (MLB, ASV margin, RSV margin); (3) “this applies to all men” (NASB, NJPS); (4) “this is the whole duty of all men” (NRSV, Moffatt); and (5) “there is no more to man than this” (NEB). The four-fold repetition of כֹּל (kol, “all”) in 12:13-14 suggests that Qoheleth is emphasizing the “bottom line,” that is, the basic duty of man is simply to fear and obey God: After “all” (כֹּל) has been heard in the book, his conclusion is that the “whole” (כֹּל) duty of man is to obey God because God will bring “all” (כֹּל) acts into judgment, including “all” (כֹּל) that is hidden, whether good or bad. See D. Barthélemy, ed., Preliminary and Interim Report on the Hebrew Old Testament Text Project, 3:596.

NET Notes: Ecc 12:14

¹ tn Heb “will bring every deed into judgment.”

Geneva Bible: Ecc 12:2

While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, are not darkened, nor the ^{( a )} clouds return after the rain:

^{( a )} Before you come to a continual misery: for when the clouds remain after the rain, man's grief is increased.

Geneva Bible: Ecc 12:3

In the day when the ^{( b )} keepers of the house shall tremble, and the ^{( c )} strong men shall bow themselves, and the ^{( d )} grinders cease because they are few, and those that ^{( e )} look out of the windows shall be darkened,

^{( b )} The hands which keep the body.

^{( c )} The legs.

^{( d )} The teeth.

^{( e )} The eyes.

Geneva Bible: Ecc 12:4

And the ^{( f )} doors shall be shut in the streets, when the sound of the ^{( g )} grinding shall be low, and he shall rise up at the voice of the ^{( h )} bird, and all the ^{( i )} daughters of music shall be brought low;

^{( f )} The lips or mouth.

^{( g )} When the jaws will scarce open and not be able to chew any more.

^{( h )} He will not be able to sleep.

^{( i )} That is the wind pipes or the ears will be deaf and not able to hear singing.

Geneva Bible: Ecc 12:5

Also [when] they shall be afraid of [that which is] ^{( k )} high, and fears [shall be] in the ^{( l )} way, and the almond tree shall ^{( m )} flourish, and the ^{( n )} grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets:

^{( k )} To climb high because of their weakness, or they stoop down as though they were afraid lest anything should hide them.

^{( l )} They will tremble as they go, as though they were afraid.

^{( m )} Their head will be as white as the blossoms of an almond tree.

^{( n )} They will be able to bear nothing.

Geneva Bible: Ecc 12:6

Or ever the ^{( o )} silver cord shall be loosed, or the golden ^{( p )} bowl be broken, or the ^{( q )} pitcher be broken at the ^{( r )} fountain, or the ^{( s )} wheel broken at the ^{( t )} cistern.

^{( o )} Meaning, the marrow of the backbone and the sinews.

^{( p )} The little skin that covers the brain, which is in colour like gold.

^{( q )} That is, the veins.

^{( r )} Meaning the liver.

^{( s )} Which is the head.

^{( t )} That is, the heart out of which the head draws the powers of life.

Geneva Bible: Ecc 12:7

Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the ^{( u )} spirit shall return to God who gave it.

^{( u )} The soul unconsciously goes either to joy or torment, and sleeps not as the wicked imagine.

Geneva Bible: Ecc 12:11

The words of the wise [are] as goads, and as nails ^{( x )} fastened [by] the masters of assemblies, [which] are given from one ^{( y )} shepherd.

^{( x )} Which are well applied by the ministers, whom he calls masters.

^{( y )} That is by God.

Geneva Bible: Ecc 12:12

And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many ^{( z )} books [there is] no end; and much study [is] a weariness of the flesh.

^{( z )} These things cannot be comprehended in books or learned by study, but God must instruct your heart that you may only know that wisdom is the true happiness and the way to it is to fear God.

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Rentang Ayat

Maclaren: Ecc 12:1-7 - A Libation To Jehovah

The Conclusion Of The Matter

Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them; 2. While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened, nor the clouds return after the rain: 3. In the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those that look out of the windows be darkened, 4. And the doors shall be shut in the streets, when the sound of the grinding is low, and he shall rise up at the voice of the bird, and all the daughters of musick shall be brought low; 5. Also when they shall be afraid of that which is high, and fears shall be in the way, and the almond tree shall flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail : because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets : 6. Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern. 7. Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it 13. Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter : Fear God, and keep His commandments : for this is the whole duty of man. 14. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil'--Eccles. 12:1-7, 13, 14.

THE Preacher has passed in review all the works that are done under the sun,' and has now reached the end of his long investigation. It has been a devious path. He has announced many provisional conclusions, which are not intended for ultimate truths, but rather represent the progress of the soul towards the final, sufficient ground and object of belief and aim of all life, even God Himself. Vanity of vanities' is a cheerless creed and a half-truth. Its completion lies ill being driven, by recognising vanity as stamped on all creatures, to clasp the one reality. All is vanity' apart from God, but He is fullness, and possessed and enjoyed and endured in Him, life is not' a striving after wind.' Leave out this last section, and this book of so-called Wisdom' is one-sided and therefore error, as is modern pessimism, which only says more feebly what the Preacher had said long ago. Take the rest of the book as the autobiography of a seeker after reality, and this last section as his declaration of where he had found it, and all the previous parts fall into their right places.

Our passage omits the first portion of the closing section, which is needed in order to set the counsel to remember the Creator in its right relation. Observe that, properly rendered, the advice in Eccles. 12:1 is remember also,' and that takes us back to the end of the preceding chapter. There the young are exhorted to enjoy the bright, brief blossom-time of their youth, withal keeping the consciousness of responsibility for its employment. In earlier parts of the book similar advice had been given, but based on different grounds. Here religion and full enjoyment of youthful buoyancy and delight in fresh, unhackneyed, homely pleasures are proclaimed to be perfectly compatible. The Preacher had no idea that a devout young man or woman was to avoid pleasures natural to their age. Only he wished their joy to be pure, and the stern law that whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap' to be kept in mind. Subject to that limitation, or rather that guiding principle, it is not only allowable, but commanded, to put away sorrow and evil.' Young people are often liable to despondent moods, which come over them like morning mists, and these have to be fought against. The duty of joy is the more imperative on the young because youth flies so fast, or, as the Preacher says, is vanity.'

Now these advices sound very like the base incitements to sensual and unworthy delight which poets of the meaner sort, and some, alas i of the nobler in their meaner moments, have presented. But this writer is no teacher of Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,' and wicked trash of that sort. Therefore he brings side by side with these advices the other of our passage. That also' saves the former from being misused, just as the thought of judgment did.

That possible combination of hearty, youthful glee and true religion is the all-important lesson of this passage. The word for Creator is in the plural number, according to the Hebrew idiom, which thereby expresses supremacy or excellence. The name of Creator' carries us back to Genesis, and suggests one great reason for the injunction. It is folly to forget Him on whom we depend for being; it is ingratitude to forget, in the midst of the enjoyments of our bright, early days, Him to whom we owe them all. The advice is specially needed; for youth has so much, that is delightful in its novelty, to think about, and the world, on both its innocent and its sinful side, appeals to it so strongly, that the Creator is only too apt to be crowded out of view by His works. The temptation of the young is to live in the present. Reflection belongs to older heads; spontaneous action is more characteristic of youth. Therefore, they specially need to make efforts to bring clearly to their thoughts both the unseen future and Him who is invisible. The advice is specially suitable for them; for what is begun early is likely to last and be strong.

It is hard for older men, stiffened into habits, and with less power and love of taking to new courses, to turn to God, if they have forgotten Him in early days. Conversion is possible at any age, but it is less likely as life goes on. The most of men who are Christians have become so in the formative period between boyhood and thirty. After that age, the probabilities of radical change diminish rapidly. So, Remember… in the days of thy youth,' or the likelihood is that you will never remember. To say, I mean to have my fling, and I shall turn over a new leaf when I am older,' is to run dreadful risk. Perhaps you will never be older. Probably, if you are, you will not want to turn the leaf. If you do, what a shame it is to plan to give God only the dregs of life! You need Him quite as much, if not more, now in the flush of youth as in old age. Why should you rob yourself of years of blessing, and lay up bitter memories of wasted and polluted moments? If ever you turn to God in your older days, nothing will be so painful as the remembrance that you forgot Him so long.

The advice is further important, because it presents the only means of delivering life from the vanity' which the Preacher found in it all. Therefore he sets it at the close of his meditations. This is the practical outcome of them all. Forget God, and life is a desert. Remember Him, and the desert will rejoice and blossom as the rose.'

The verses from the middle of Eccles. 12:1 to the end of Eccles. 12:7 enforce the exhortation by the consideration of what will certainly follow youth, and advise remembrance of the Creator before that future comes. So much is clear, but the question of the precise meaning of these verses is much too large for discussion here. The older explanation takes them for an allegory representing the decay of bodily and mental powers in old age, whilst others think that in them the advance of death is presented under the image of an approaching storm. Wright, in his valuable commentary, regards the description of the gradual waning away of life in old age, in the first verses, as being set forth under images drawn from the closing days of the Palestinian winter, which are dreaded as peculiarly unhealthy, while Eccles. 12:4b and Eccles. 12:5 present the advent of spring, and contrast the new life in animals and plants with the feebleness of the man dying in his chamber and unable to eat. Still another explanation is that the whole is part of a dirge, to be taken literally, and describing the mourners in house and garden. I venture, though with some hesitation, to prefer, on the whole, the old allegorical theory, for reasons which it would be impossible to condense here. It is by no means free from difficulty, but is, as I think, less difficult than any of its rivals.

Interpreters who adopt it differ Somewhat in the explanation of particular details, but, on the whole, one can see in most of the similes sufficient correspondence for a poet, however foreign to modern taste such a long-drawn and minute allegory may be. The keepers of the house' are naturally the arms; the strong men,' the legs; the grinding women,' the teeth; the women who look out at the windows,' the eyes; the doors shut towards the street,' either the lips or, more probably, the ears. The sound of the grinding,' which is low,' is by some taken to mean the feeble mastication of toothless gums, in which case the doors' are the lips, and the figure of the mill is continued. Arising at the voice of the bird' may describe the light sleep or insomnia of old age; but, according to some, with an alteration of rendering (The voice riseth into a sparrow's'), it is the childish treble' of Shakespeare. The former is the more probable rendering and reference. The allegory is dropped in Eccles. 12:5a, which describes the timid walk of the old, but is resumed in the almond trees shall flourish'; that is, the hair is blanched, as the almond blossom, which is at first delicate pink, but fades into white. The next clause has an appropriate meaning in the common translation, as vividly expressing the loss of strength, but it is doubtful whether the verb here used ever means to be a burden.' The other explanations of the clause are all strained. The next clause is best taken, as in the Revised Version, as describing the failure of appetite, which the stimulating caper-berry is unable to rouse. All this slow decay is accounted for, because the man is going to his long home,' and already the poet sees the mourners gathering for the funeral procession.

The connection of the long-drawn-out picture of senile decay with the advice to remember the Creator needs no elucidation. That period of failing powers is no time to begin remembering God. How dreary, too, it will be, if God is not the strength of the heart,' when heart and flesh fail'! Therefore it is plain common sense, in view of the future, not to put off to old age what will bless youth, and keep the advent of old ago from being wretched.

Eccles. 12:6-7 still more stringently enforce the precept by pointing, not to the slow approach, but to the actual arrival of death. If a future of possible weakness and gradual creeping in on us of death is reason for the exhortation, much more is the certainty that the crash of dissolution will come. The allegory is partially resumed in these verses. The golden bowl' is possibly the head, and, according to some, the silver cord' is the spinal marrow, while others think rather of the bowl or lamp as meaning the body, and the cord the soul which, as it were, holds it up. The pitcher' is the heart, and the wheel' the organs of respiration. Be this as it may, the general thought is that death comes, shivering the precious reservoir of light, and putting an end to drawing of life from the Fountain of bodily life. Surely these are weighty reasons for the Preacher's advice. Surely it is well for young hearts sometimes to remember the end, and to ask, What will ye do in the end?' and to do before the end what is so hard to begin doing at the end, and so needful to have done if the end is not to be worse than vanity.'

The collapse of the body is not the end of the man, else the whole force of the argument in the preceding verses would disappear. If death is annihilation, what reason is there for seeking God before it comes? Therefore Eccles. 12:7 is no interpolation to bring a sceptical book into harmony with orthodox Jewish belief, as some commentators affirm. The contradiction' between it and Ecclesiastes 3:21 is alleged as proof of its having been thus added. But there is no contradiction. The former passage is interrogative, and, like all the earlier part of the book, sets forth, not the Preacher's ultimate convictions, but a phase through which he passed on his way to these. It is because man is twofold, and at death the spirit returns to its divine Giver, that the exhortation of Eccles. 12:1 is pressed home with such earnestness.

The closing verses are confidently asserted to be, like Eccles. 12:7, additions in the interests of Jewish' orthodoxy.' But Ecclesiastes is made out to be a sceptical book' by expelling these from the text, and then the character thus established is taken to prove that they are not genuine. It is a remarkably easy but not very logical process.

The end of the matter' when all is heard, is, to fear God and keep His commandments.' The inward feeling of reverent awe which does not exclude love, and the outward life of conformity to His will, is the whole duty of man,' or the duty of every man.' And that plain summary of all that men need to know for practical guidance is enforced by the consideration of future judgment, which, by its universal sweep and all-revealing light, must mean the judgment in another life.

Happy they who, through devious mazes of thought and act, have wandered seeking for the vision of any good, and having found all to be vanity, have been led at last to rest, like the dove in the ark, in the broad simplicity of the truth that all which any man needs for blessedness in the buoyancy of fresh youthful strength and in the feebleness of decaying age, in the stress of life, in the darkness of death, and in the day of judgment, is to fear God and keep His commandments'!

THE END

Isaiah

MHCC: Ecc 12:1-7

We should remember our sins against our Creator, repent, and seek forgiveness. We should remember our duties, and set about them, looking to him for grace and strength. This should be done early, while the body is strong, and the spirits active. When a man has the pain of reviewing a misspent life, his not having given up sin and worldly vanities till he is forced to say, I have no pleasure in them, renders his sincerity very questionable. Then follows a figurative description of old age and its infirmities, which has some difficulties; but the meaning is plain, to show how uncomfortable, generally, the days of old age are. As the four verses, Ecc 12:2-5, are a figurative description of the infirmities that usually accompany old age, Ecc 12:6 notices the circumstances which take place in the hour of death. If sin had not entered into the world, these infirmities would not have been known. Surely then the aged should reflect on the evil of sin.

MHCC: Ecc 12:8-14

Solomon repeats his text, VANITY OF VANITIES, ALL IS VANITY. These are the words of one that could speak by dear-bought experience of the vanity of the world, which can do nothing to ease men of the burden of sin. As he considered the worth of souls, he gave good heed to what he spake and wrote; words of truth will always be acceptable words. The truths of God are as goads to such as are dull and draw back, and nails to such as are wandering and draw aside; means to establish the heart, that we may never sit loose to our duty, nor be taken from it. The Shepherd of Israel is the Giver of inspired wisdom. Teachers and guides all receive their communications from him. The title is applied in Scripture to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. The prophets sought diligently, what, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. To write many books was not suited to the shortness of human life, and would be weariness to the writer, and to the reader; and then was much more so to both than it is now. All things would be vanity and vexation, except they led to this conclusion, That to fear God, and keep his commandments, is the whole of man. The fear of God includes in it all the affections of the soul towards him, which are produced by the Holy Spirit. There may be terror where there is no love, nay, where there is hatred. But this is different from the gracious fear of God, as the feelings of an affectionate child. The fear of God, is often put for the whole of true religion in the heart, and includes its practical results in the life. Let us attend to the one thing needful, and now come to him as a merciful Saviour, who will soon come as an almighty Judge, when he will bring to light the things of darkness, and manifest the counsels of all hearts. Why does God record in his word, that ALL IS VANITY, but to keep us from deceiving ourselves to our ruin? He makes our duty to be our interest. May it be graven in all our hearts. Fear God, and keep his commandments, for this is all that concerns man.

Matthew Henry: Ecc 12:1-7

Here is, I. A call to young people to think of God, and mind their duty to him, when they are young: Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth. This is, 1. The royal preacher's application of his sermon concerning the vanity of the world and every thing in it. "You that are young flatter yourselves with expectations of great things from it, but believe those that have tried it; it yields no solid satisfaction to a soul; therefore, that you may not be deceived by this vanity, nor too much disturbed by it, remember your Creator, and so guard yourselves against the mischiefs that arise from the vanity of the creature."2. It is the royal physician's antidote against the particular diseases of youth, the love of mirth, and the indulgence of sensual pleasures, the vanity which childhood and youth are subject to; to prevent and cure this, remember thy Creator. Here is, (1.) A great duty pressed upon us, to remember God as our creator, not only to remember that God is our Creator, that he made us and not we ourselves, and is therefore our rightful Lord and owner, but we must engage ourselves to him with the considerations which his being our Creator lay us under, and pay him the honour and duty which we owe him as our Creator. Remember thy Creators; the word is plural, as it is Job 35:10, Where is God my Makers? For God said, Let us make man, us, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. (2.) The proper season for this duty - in the days of thy youth, the days of thy choice (so some), thy choice days, thy choosing days. "Begin in the beginning of thy days to remember him from whom thou hadst thy being, and go on according to that good beginning. Call him to mind when thou art young, and keep him in mind throughout all the days of thy youth, and never forget him. Guard thus against the temptations of youth, and thus improve the advantages of it."

II. A reason to enforce this command: While the evil days come not, and the years of which thou shalt say I have no pleasure in them.

1. Do it quickly, (1.) "Before sickness and death come. Do it while thou livest, for it will be too late to do it when death has removed thee from this state of trial and probation to that of recompence and retribution."The days of sickness and death are the days of evil, terrible to nature, evil days indeed to those that have forgotten their Creator. These evil days will come sooner or later; as yet they come not, for God is long-suffering to us-ward, and gives us space to repent; the continuing of life is but the deferring of death, and, while life is continued and death deferred, it concerns us to prepare, and get the property of death altered, that we may die comfortably. (2.) Before old age comes, which, if death prevent not, will come, and they will be years of which we shall say, We have no pleasure in them, - when we shall not relish the delights of sense, as Barzillai (2Sa 19:35), - when we shall be loaded with bodily infirmities, old and blind, or old and lame, - when we shall be taken off from our usefulness, and our strength shall be labour and sorrow, - when we shall either have parted with our relations, and all our old friends, or be afflicted in them and see them weary of us, - when we shall feel ourselves die by inches. These years draw nigh, when all that comes will be vanity, the remaining months all months of vanity, and there will be no pleasure but in the reflection of a good life on earth and the expectation of a better life in heaven.

2. These two arguments he enlarges upon in the following verses, only inverting the order, and shows,

(1.) How many are the calamities of old age, and that if we should live to be old, our days will be such as we shall have no pleasure in, which is a good reason why we should return to God, and make our peace with him, in the days of our youth, and not put it off till we come to be old; for it will be no thanks to us to leave the pleasures of sin when they have left us, nor to return to God when need forces us. It is the greatest absurdity and ingratitude imaginable to give the cream and flower of our days to the devil, and reserve the bran, and refuse, and dregs of them for God; this is offering the torn, and the lame, and the sick for sacrifice; and, besides, old age being thus clogged with infirmities, it is the greatest folly imaginable to put off that needful work till then, which requires the best of our strength, when our faculties are in their prime, and especially to make the work more difficult by a longer continuance in sin, and, laying up treasures of guilt in the conscience, to add to the burdens of age and make them much heavier. If the calamities of age will be such as are here represented, we shall have need of something to support and comfort us then, and nothing will be more effectual to do that than the testimony of our consciences for us that we begin betimes to remember our Creator and have not since laid aside the remembrance of him. How can we expect God should help us when we are old, if we will not serve him when we are young? See Psa 71:17, Psa 71:18.

[1.] The decays and infirmities of old age are here elegantly described in figurative expressions, which have some difficulty in them to us now, who are not acquainted with the common phrases and metaphors used in Solomon's age and language; but the general scope is plain - to show how uncomfortable, generally, the days of old age are. First, Then the sun and the light of it, the moon and the stars, and the light which they borrow from it, will be darkened. They look dim to old people, in consequence of the decay of their sight; their countenance is clouded, and the beauty and lustre of it are eclipsed; their intellectual powers and faculties, which are as lights in the soul, are weakened; their understanding and memory fail them, and their apprehension is not so quick nor their fancy so lively as it has been; the days of their mirth are over (light is often put for joy and prosperity) and they have not the pleasure either of the converse of the day or the repose of the night, for both the sun and the moon are darkened to them. Secondly, Then the clouds return after the rain; as, when the weather is disposed to wet, no sooner has one cloud blown over than another succeeds it, so it is with old people, when they have got free from one pain or ailment, they are seized with another, so that their distempers are like a continual dropping in a very rainy day. The end of one trouble is, in this world, but the beginning of another, and deep calls unto deep. Old people are often afflicted with defluxions of rheum, like soaking rain, after which still more clouds return, feeding the humour, so that it is continually grievous, and therein the body, as it were, melts away. Thirdly, Then the keepers of the house tremble. The head, which is as the watch-tower, shakes, and the arms and hands, which are ready for the preservation of the body, shake too, and grow feeble, upon every sudden approach and attack of danger. That vigour of the animal spirits which used to be exerted for self-defence fails and cannot do its office; old people are easily dispirited and discouraged. Fourthly, Then the strong men shall bow themselves; the legs and thighs, which used to support the body, and bear its weight, bend, and cannot serve for travelling as they have done, but are soon tired. Old men that have been in their time strong men become weak and stoop for age, Zec 8:4. God takes no pleasure in the legs of a man (Psa 147:10), for their strength will soon fail; but in the Lord Jehovah there is everlasting strength; he has everlasting arms. Fifthly, Then the grinders cease because they are few; the teeth, with which we grind our meat and prepare it for concoction, cease to do their part, because they are few. They are rotted and broken, and perhaps have been drawn because they ached. Some old people have lost all their teeth, and others have but few left; and this infirmity is the more considerable because the meat, not being well chewed, for want of teeth, is not well digested, which has as much influence as any thing upon the other decays of age. Sixthly, Those that look out of the windows are darkened; the eyes wax dim, as Isaac's (Gen 27:1), and Ahijah's, 1Ki 14:4. Moses was a rare instance of one who, when 120 years old, had good eye-sight, but ordinarily the sight decays in old people as soon as any thing, and it is a mercy to them that art helps nature with spectacles. We have need to improve our sight well while we have it, because the light of the eyes may be gone before the light of life. Seventhly, The doors are shut in the streets. Old people keep within doors, and care not for going abroad to entertainments. The lips, the doors of the mouth, are shut in eating, because the teeth are gone and the sound of the grinding with them is low, so that they have not that command of their meat in their mouths which they used to have; they cannot digest their meat, and therefore little grist is brought to the mill. Eightly, Old people rise up at the voice of the bird. They have no sound sleep as young people have, but a little thing disturbs them, even the chirping of a bird; they cannot rest for coughing, and therefore rise up at cock-crowing, as soon as any body is stirring; or they are apt to be jealous, and timorous, and full of care, which breaks their sleep and makes them rise early; or they are apt to be superstitious, and rise up as in a fright, at those voices of birds, as of ravens, or screech-owls, which soothsayers call ominous. Ninthly, With them all the daughters of music are brought low. They have neither voice nor ear, can neither sing themselves nor take any pleasure, as Solomon had done in the days of his youth, in singing men, and singing women, and musical instruments, Ecc 2:8. Old people grow hard of hearing, and unapt to distinguish sounds and voices. Tenthly, They are afraid of that which is high, afraid to go to the top of any high place, either because, for want of breath, they cannot reach it, or, their heads being giddy or their legs failing them, they dare not venture to it, or they frighten themselves with fancying that that which is high will fall upon them. Fear is in the way; they can neither ride nor walk with their former boldness, but are afraid of every thing that lies in their way, lest it throw them down. Eleventhly, The almond-tree flourishes. The old man's hair has grown white, so that his head looks like an almond-tree in the blossom. The almond-tree blossoms before any other tree, and therefore fitly shows what haste old age makes in seizing upon men; it prevents their expectations and comes faster upon them than they thought of. Gray hairs are here and there upon them, and they perceive it not. Twelfthly, The grasshopper is a burden and desire fails. Old men can bear nothing; the lightest thing sits heavily upon them, both on their bodies and on their minds, a little thing sinks and breaks them. Perhaps the grasshopper was some food that was looked upon to be very light of digestion (John Baptist's meat was locusts ), but even that lies heavily upon an old man's stomach, and therefore desire fails, he has no appetite to his meat, neither shall he regard the desire of woman, as that king, Dan 11:37. Old men become mindless and listless, and the pleasures of sense are to them tasteless and sapless.

[2.] It is probable that Solomon wrote this when he was himself old, and could speak feelingly of the infirmities of age, which perhaps grew the faster upon him for the indulgence he had given himself in sensual pleasures. Some old people bear up better than others under the decays of age, but, more or less, the days of old age are and will be evil days and of little pleasure. Great care therefore should be taken to pay respect and honour to old people, that they may have something to balance these grievances and nothing may be done to add to them. And all this, put together, makes up a good reason why we should remember our Creator in the days of our youth, that he may remember us with favour when these evil days come, and his comforts may delight our souls when the delights of sense are in a manner worn off.

(2.) He shows how great a change death will make with us, which will be either the prevention or the period of the miseries of old age. Nothing else will keep them off, nor any thing else cure them. "Therefore remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, because death is certainly before thee, perhaps it is very near thee, and it is a serious thing to die, and thou shouldst feel concerned with the utmost care and diligence to prepare for it."[1.] Death will fix us in an unchangeable state: Man shall then go to his long home, and all these infirmities and decays of age are harbingers of and advances towards that awful remove. At death man goes from this world and all the employments and enjoyments of it. He has gone for good and all, as to his present state. He has gone home, for here he was a stranger and pilgrim; both soul and body go to the place whence they came, Ecc 12:7. He has gone to his rest, to the place where he is to fix. He has gone to his home, to the house of his world (so some), for this world is not his. He has gone to his long home, for the days of his lying in the grave will be many. He has gone to his house of eternity, not only to his house whence he shall never return to this world, but to the house where he must be for ever. This should make us willing to die, that, at death, we must go home; and why should we not long to go to our Father's house? And this should quicken us to get ready to die, that we must then go to our long home, to an everlasting habitation. [2.] Death will be an occasion of sorrow to our friends that love us. When man goes to his long home the mourners go about the streets - the real mourners, and those, as now with us, distinguished by their habits as they go along the streets, - the mourners for ceremony, that were hired to weep for the dead, both to express and to excite the real mourning. When we die we not only remove to a melancholy house before us, but we leave a melancholy house behind us. Tears are a tribute due to the dead, and this, among other circumstances, makes it a serious thing to die. But in vain do we go to the house of mourning, and see the mourners go about the streets, if it do not help to make us serious and pious mourners in the closet. [3.] Death will dissolve the frame of nature and take down the earthly house of this tabernacle, which is elegantly described, Ecc 12:6. Then shall the silver cord, by which soul and body were wonderfully fastened together, be loosed, that sacred knot untied, and those old friends be forced to part; then shall the golden bowl, which held the waters of life for us, be broken; then shall the pitcher with which we used to fetch up water, for the constant support of life and the repair of its decays, be broken, even at the fountain, so that it can fetch up no more; and the wheel (all those organs that serve for the collecting and distributing of nourishment) shall be broken, and disabled to do their office any more. The body shall become like a watch when the spring is broken, the motion of all the wheels is stopped and they all stand still; the machine is taken to pieces; the heart beats no more, nor does the blood circulate. Some apply this to the ornaments and utensils of life; rich people must, at death, leave behind them their clothing and furniture of silver and gold, and poor people their earthen pitchers, and the drawers of water will have their wheel broken. [4.] Death will resolve us into our first principles, Ecc 12:7. Man is a strange sort of creature, a ray of heaven united to a clod of earth; at death these are separated, and each goes to the place whence it came. First, The body, that clod of clay, returns to its own earth. It is made of the earth; Adam's body was so, and we are of the same mould; it is a house of clay. At death it is laid in the earth, and in a little time will be resolved into earth, not to be distinguished from common earth, according to the sentence (Gen 3:19), Dust thou art and therefore to dust thou shalt return. Let us not therefore indulge the appetites of the body, nor pamper it (it will be worms' meat shortly), nor let sin reign in our mortal bodies, for they are mortal, Rom 6:12. Secondly, The soul, that beam of light, returns to that God who, when he made man of the dust of the ground, breathed into him the breath of life, to make him a living soul (Gen 2:7), and forms the spirit of every man within him. When the fire consumes the wood the flame ascends, and the ashes return to the earth out of which the wood grew. The soul does not die with the body; it is redeemed from the power of the grave (Psa 49:15); it can subsist without it and will in a state of separation from it, as the candle burns, and burns brighter, when it is taken out of the dark lantern. It removes to the world of spirits, to which it is allied. It goes to God as a Judge, to give account of itself, and to be lodged either with the spirits in prison (1Pe 3:19) or with the spirits in paradise (Luk 23:43), according to what was done in the body. This makes death terrible to the wicked, whose souls go to God as an avenger, and comfortable to the godly, whose souls go to God as a Father, into whose hands they cheerfully commit them, through a Mediator, out of whom sinners may justly dread to think of going to God.

Matthew Henry: Ecc 12:8-12

Solomon is here drawing towards a close, and is loth to part till he has gained his point, and prevailed with his hearers, with his readers, to seek for that satisfaction in God only and in their duty to him which they can never find in the creature.

I. He repeats his text (Ecc 12:8), 1. As that which he had fully demonstrated the truth of, and so made good his undertaking in this sermon, wherein he had kept closely to his text, and both his reasons and his application were to the purpose. 2. As that which he desired to inculcate both upon others and upon himself, to have it ready, and to make use of it upon all occasions. We see it daily proved; let it therefore be daily improved: Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.

II. He recommends what he had written upon this subject by divine direction and inspiration to our serious consideration. The words of this book are faithful, and well worthy our acceptance, for,

1. They are the words of one that was a convert, a penitent, that could speak by dear-bought experience of the vanity of the world and the folly of expecting great things from it. He was Coheleth , one gathered in from his wanderings and gathered home to that God from whom he had revolted. Vanity of vanities, saith the penitent. All true penitents are convinced of the vanity of the world, for they find it can do nothing to ease them of the burden of sin, which they complain of.

2. They are the words of one that was wise, wiser than any, endued with extraordinary measures of wisdom, famous for it among his neighbours, who all sought unto him to hear his wisdom, and therefore a competent judge of this matter, not only wise as a prince, but wise as a preacher - and preachers have need of wisdom to win souls.

3. He was one that made it his business to do good, and to use wisdom aright. Because he was himself wise, but knew he had not his wisdom for himself, any more than he had it from himself, he still taught the people that knowledge which he had found useful to himself, and hoped might be so to them too. It is the interest of princes to have their people well taught in religion, and no disparagement to them to teach them themselves the good knowledge of the Lord, but their duty to encourage those whose office it is to teach them and to speak comfortably to them, 2Ch 30:22. Let not the people, the common people, be despised, no, not by the wisest and greatest, as either unworthy or incapable of good knowledge: even those that are well taught have need to be still taught, that they may grow in knowledge.

4. He took a great deal of pains and care to do good, designing to teach the people knowledge. He did not put them off with any thing that came next to hand, because they were inferior people, and he a very wise man, but considering the worth of the souls he preached to and the weight of the subject he preached on, he gave good heed to what he read and heard from others, that, having stocked himself well, he might bring out of his treasury things new and old. He gave good heed to what he spoke and wrote himself, and was choice and exact in it; all he did was elaborate. (1.) He chose the most profitable way of preaching, by proverbs or short sentences, which would be more easily apprehended and remembered than long and laboured periods. (2.) He did not content himself with a few parables, or wise sayings, and repeat them again and again, but he furnished himself with many proverbs, a great variety of grave discourses, that he might have something to say on every occasion. (3.) He did not only give them such observations as were obvious and trite, but he sought out such as were surprising and uncommon; he dug into the mines of knowledge, and did not merely pick up what lay on the surface. (4.) He did not deliver his heads and observations at random, as they came to mind, but methodized them, and set them in order that they might appear in more strength and lustre.

5. He put what he had to say in such a dress as he thought would be most pleasing: He sought to find out acceptable words, words of delight (Ecc 12:10); he took care that good matter might not be spoiled by a bad style, and by the ungratefulness and incongruity of the expression. Ministers should study, not for the big words, nor the fine words, but acceptable words, such as are likely to please men for their good, to edification, 1Co 10:33. Those that would win souls must contrive how to win upon them with words fitly spoken.

6. That which he wrote for our instruction is of unquestionable certainty, and what we may rely upon: That which was written was upright and sincere, according to the real sentiments of the penman, even words of truth, the exact representation of the thing as it is. Those are sure not to miss their way who are guided by these words. What good will acceptable words do us if they be not upright and words of truth? Most are for smooth things, that flatter them, rather than right things, that direct them (Isa 30:10), but to those that understand themselves, and their own interest, words of truth will always be acceptable words.

7. That which he and other holy men wrote will be of great use and advantage to us, especially being inculcated upon us by the exposition of it, Ecc 12:11. Here observe, (1.) A double benefit accruing to us from divine truths if duly applied and improved; they are profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and instruction in righteousness. They are of use, [1.] To excite us to our duty. They are as goads to the ox that draws the plough, putting him forward when he is dull and quickening him, to amend his pace. The truths of God prick men to the heart (Act 2:37) and put them upon bethinking themselves, when they trifle and grow remiss, and exerting themselves with more vigour in their work. While our good affections are so apt as they are to grow flat and cool, we have need of these goads. [2.] To engage us to persevere in our duty. They are as nails to those that are wavering and inconstant, to fix them to that which is good. They are as goads to such as are dull and draw back, and nails to such as are desultory and draw aside, means to establish the heart and confirm good resolutions, that we may not sit loose to our duty, nor even be taken off from it, but that what good there is in us may be as a nail fastened in a sure place, Ezr 9:8. (2.) A double way of communicating divine truths, in order to those benefits: - [1.] By the scriptures, as the standing rule, the words of the wise, that is, of the prophets, who are called wise men, Mat 23:34. These we have in black and white, and may have recourse to them at any time, and make use of them as goads and as nails. By them we may teach ourselves; let them but come with pungency and power to the soul, let the impressions of them be deep and durable, and the will make us wise to salvation. [2.] By the ministry. To make the words of the wise more profitable to us, it is appointed that they should be impressed and fastened by the masters of assemblies. Solemn assemblies for religious worship are an ancient divine institution, intended for the honour of God and the edification of his church, and are not only serviceable, but necessary, to those ends. There must be masters of these assemblies, who are Christ's ministers, and as such are to preside in them, to be God's mouth to the people and theirs to God. Their business is to fasten the words of the wise, and drive them as nails to the head, in order to which the word of God is likewise as a hammer, Jer 23:29.

8. That which is written, and thus recommended to us, is of divine origin. Though it comes to us through various hands (many wise men, and many masters of assemblies ), yet it is given by one and the same shepherd, the great shepherd of Israel, that leads Joseph like a flock, Psa 80:1. God is that one Shepherd, whose good Spirit indited the scriptures, and assists the masters of the assemblies in opening and applying the scriptures. These words of the wise are the true sayings of God, on which we may rest our souls. From that one Shepherd all ministers must receive what they deliver, and speak according to the light of the written word.

9. The sacred inspired writings, if we will but make use of them, are sufficient to guide us in the way of true happiness, and we need not, in the pursuit of that, to fatigue ourselves with the search of other writings (Ecc 12:12): " And further, nothing now remains but to tell thee that that of making many books there is no end, "that is, (1.) Of writing many books. "If what I have written, serve not to convince thee of the vanity of the world, and the necessity of being religious, neither wouldst thou be convinced if I should write ever so much."If the end be not attained in the use of those books of scripture which God has blessed us with, neither should we obtain the end, if we had twice as many more; nay, if we had so many that the whole world could not contain them (Joh 21:25), and much study of them would but confound us, and would rather be a weariness to the flesh than any advantage to the soul. We have as much as God saw fit to give us, saw fit for us, and saw us fit for. Much less can it be expected that those who will not by these be admonished should be wrought upon by other writings. Let men write ever so many books for the conduct of human life, write till they have tired themselves with much study, they cannot give better instructions than those we have from the word of God. Or, (2.) Of buying many books, making ourselves master of them, and masters of what is in them, by much study; still the desire of learning would be unsatisfied. It will give a man indeed the best entertainment and the best accomplishment this world can afford him; but if we be not by these admonished of the vanity of the world, and human learning, among other things, and its insufficiency to make us happy without true piety, alas! there is no end of it, nor real benefit by it; it will weary the body, but never give the soul any true satisfaction. The great Mr. Selden subscribed to this when he owned that in all the books he had read he never found that on which he could rest his soul, but in the holy scripture, especially Tit 2:11, Tit 2:12. By these therefore let us be admonished.

Matthew Henry: Ecc 12:13-14

The great enquiry which Solomon prosecutes in this book is, What is that good which the sons of men should do? Ecc 2:3. What is the true way to true happiness, the certain means to attain our great end? He had in vain sought it among those things which most men are eager in pursuit of, but here, at length, he has found it, by the help of that discovery which God anciently made to man (Job 28:28), that serious godliness is the only way to true happiness: Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter, the return entered upon the writ of enquiry, the result of this diligent search; you shall have all I have been driving at in two words. He does not say, Do you hear it, but Let us hear it; for preachers must themselves be hearers of that word which they preach to others, must hear it as from God; those are teachers by the halves who teach others and not themselves, Rom 2:21. Every word of God is pure and precious, but some words are worthy of more special remark, as this; the Masorites begin it with a capital letter, as that Deu 6:4. Solomon himself puts a nota bene before it, demanding attention in these words, Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Observe here,

I. The summary of religion. Setting aside all matters of doubtful disputation, to be religious is to fear God and keep his commandments. 1. The root of religion is fear of God reigning in the heart, and a reverence of his majesty, a deference to his authority, and a dread of his wrath. Fear God, that is, worship God, give him the honour due to his name, in all the instances of true devotion, inward and outward. See Rev 14:7. 2. The rule of religion is the law of God revealed in the scriptures. Our fear towards God must be taught by his commandments (Isa 29:13), and those we must keep and carefully observe. Wherever the fear of God is uppermost in the heart, there will be a respect to all his commandments and care to keep them. In vain do we pretend to fear God if we do not make conscience of our duty to him.

II. The vast importance of it: This is the whole of man; it is all his business and all his blessedness; our whole duty is summed up in this and our whole comfort is bound up in this. It is the concern of every man, and ought to be his chief and continual care; it is the common concern of all men, of their whole time. It is nothing to a man whether he be rich or poor, high or low, but it is the main matter, it is all in all to a man, to fear God and do as he bids him.

III. A powerful inducement to this, Ecc 12:14. We shall see of what vast consequence it is to us that we be religious if we consider the account we must every one of us shortly give of himself to God; thence he argued against a voluptuous and vicious life (Ecc 11:9), and here for a religious life: God shall bring every work into judgment. Note, 1. There is a judgment to come, in which every man's eternal state will be finally determined. 2. God himself will be the Judge, God-man will, not only because he has a right to judge, but because he is perfectly fit for it, infinitely wise and just. 3. Every work will then be brought into judgment, will be enquired into and called over again. It will be a day to bring to remembrance every thing done in the body. 4. The great thing to be then judged of concerning every work is whether it be good or evil, conformable to the will of God or a violation of it. 5. Even secret things, both good and evil, will be brought to light, and brought to account, in the judgment of the great day (Rom 2:16); there is no good work, no bad work, hid, but shall then be made manifest. 6. In consideration of the judgment to come, and the strictness of that judgment, it highly concerns us now to be very strict in our walking with God, that we may give up our account with joy.

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:1

With Ecc 12:1 (where, inappropriately, a new chapter begins, instead of beginning with Ecc 11:9) the call takes a new course, resting its argument on the transitoriness of youth: "And remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, ere the days of evil come, and the years draw nigh, of which thou shalt say: I have no pleasure in them."The plur. majest . בּוראיך = עשׂים as a designation of the Creator, Job 35:10; Isa 54:5; Psa 149:2; in so recent a book it cannot surprise us, since it is also not altogether foreign to the post-bibl. language. The expression is warranted, and the Midrash ingeniously interprets the combination of its letters.

(Note: It finds these things expressed in it, partly directly and partly indirectly: remember בארך , thy fountain (origin); בורך , thy grave; and בוראיך , thy Creator. Thus, Jer. Sota ii. 3, and Midrash under Ecc 12:1.)

Regarding the words 'ad asher lo , commonly used in the Mishna ( e.g. , Horajoth iii. 3; Nedarim x. 4), or 'ad shello (Targ. 'ad delo ), antequam . The days of evil (viz., at least, first, of bodily evil, cf. κακία , Mat 6:34) are those of feeble, helpless old age, perceptibly marking the failure of bodily and mental strength; parallel to these are the years of which ( asher , as at Ecc 1:10) one has to say: I have no pleasure in them (bahěm for bahěn , as at Ecc 2:6, mehěm for mehěn ). These evil days, adverse years, are now described symptomatically, and that in an allegorical manner, for the "ere"of Ecc 12:1 is brought to a grand unfolding.

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:2

"Ere the sun becomes dark, and the light, and the moon, and the stars, and the clouds return after the rain."Umbreit, Elster, and Ginsburg find here the thought: ere death overtakes thee; the figure under which the approach of death is described being that of a gathering storm. But apart from other objections ( vid ., Gurlitt, "zur Erlk. d. B. Koheleth,"in Sutd. u. Krit . 1865), this idea is opposed by the consideration that the author seeks to describe how man, having become old, goes forth ( חלך , Ecc 12:5 ) to death, and that not till Ecc 12:7 does he reach it. Also Taylor's view, that what precedes Ecc 12:5 is as a dirge expressing the feelings experienced on the day of a person's death, is untenable; it is discredited already by this, that it confuses together the days of evil, Ecc 12:1 , and the many days of darkness, i.e. , the long night of Hades, Ecc 11:8; and besides, it leaves unanswered the question, what is the meaning of the clouds returning after the rain. Hahn replies: The rain is death, and the return is the entrance again into the nothingness which went before the entrance into this life. Knobel, as already Luther and also Winzer (who had made the exposition of the Book of Koheleth one of the labours of his life), sees in the darkening of the sun, etc., a figure of the decay of hitherto joyful prosperity; and in the clouds after the rain a figure of the cloudy days of sorrow which always anew visit those who are worn out by old age. Hitz., Ewald, Vaih., Zöckl., and Tyler, proceeding from thence, find the unity of the separate features of the figure in the comparison of advanced old age, as the winter of life to the rainy winter of the (Palestinian) year. That is right. But since in the sequel obviously the marasmus senilis of the separate parts of the body is set forth in allegorical enigmatic figures, it is asked whether this allegorical figurative discourse does not probably commence in Ecc 12:2. Certainly the sun, moon, and stars occur also in such pictures of the night of judgment, obscuring all the lights of the heavens, as at Isa 13:10; but that here, where the author thus ranks together in immediate sequence והךּ ... השּׁ , and as he joins the stars with the moon, so the light with the sun, he has not connected the idea of certain corresponding things in the nature and life of man with these four emblems of light, is yet very improbable. Even though it might be impossible to find out that which is represented, yet this would be no decisive argument against the significance of the figures; the canzones in Dante's Convito , which he there himself interprets, are an example that the allegorical meaning which a poet attaches to his poetry may be present even where it cannot be easily understood or can only be conjectured.

The attempts at interpreting these figures have certainly been wholly or for the most part unfortunate. We satisfy ourselves by registering only the oldest: their glosses are in matter tasteless, but they are at least of linguistic interest. A Barajtha, Shabbath 151-152 a , seeking to interpret this closing picture of the Book of Koheleth, says of the sun and the light: "this is the brow and the nose;"of the moon: "this is the soul;"of the stars: "this the cheeks."Similarly, but varying a little, the Midrash to Lev. c. 18 and to Koheleth: the sun = the brightness of the countenance; light = the brow; the moon = the nose; the stars = the upper part of the cheeks (which in an old man fall in). Otherwise, but following the Midrash more than the Talmud, the Targum: the sun = the stately brightness of thy countenance; light = the light of thine eyes; the moon = the ornament of thy cheeks; the stars = the apple of thine eye. All the three understand the rain of wine (Talm. בכי ), and the clouds of the veil of the eyes (Targ.: "thy eye-lashes"), but without doing justice to אחר שׁוב ; only one repulsive interpretation in the Midrash takes these words into account. In all these interpretations there is only one grain of truth, this, viz., that the moon in the Talm. is interpreted of the נשׁמה , anima , for which the more correct word would have been נפשׁ ; but it has been shown, Psychol . p. 154, that the Jewish, like the Arab. psychology, reverses terminologically the relation between רוח ( נשׁמה ), spirit, and נפשׁ , soul.

The older Christian interpretations are also on the right track. Glassius (as also v. Meyer and Smith in "The portraiture of old age") sees in the sun, light, etc., emblems of the interna microcosmi lumina mentis ; and yet better, Chr. Friedr. Bauer (1732) sees in Ecc 12:2 a representation of the thought: "ere understanding and sense fail thee."We have elsewhere shown that חיים רוח ( נשׁמת ) and חיּה נפשׁ (from which nowhere חיים נפשׁ ) are related to each other as the principium principians and principium principatum of life ( Psychol . p. 79), and as the root distinctions of the male and female, of the predominantly active and the receptive ( Psychol . p. 103). Thus the figurative language of Ecc 12:3 is interpreted in the following manner. The sun is the male spirit רוח (which, like שׁמשׁ , is used in both genders) or נשׁמה , after Pro 20:27, a light of Jahve which penetrates with its light of self-examination and self-knowledge the innermost being of man, called by the Lord, Mat 6:23 (cf. 1Co 2:11), "the light that is in thee."The light, viz., the clear light of day proceeding from the sun, is the activity of the spirit in its unweakened intensity: sharp apprehension, clear thought, faithful and serviceable memory. The moon is the soul; for, according to the Heb. idea, the moon, whether it is called ירח or לבנה is also in relation to the sun a figure of the female (cf. Gen 37:9., where the sun in Joseph's dream = Jacob-Israel, the moon = Rachel); and that the soul, viz., the animal soul, by means of which the spirit becomes the principle of the life of the body (Gen 2:7), is related to the spirit as female σκεῦος ἀστηενέστερον , is evident from passages such as Psa 42:6, where the spirit supports the soul ( animus animam ) with its consolation. And the stars? We are permitted to suppose in the author of the book of Koheleth a knowledge, as Schrader

(Note: Vid ., "Sterne"in Schenkel's Bibl Lex . and Stud. u. Krit . 1874.)

has shown, of the old Babyl.-Assyr. seven astral gods, which consisted of the sun, moon, and the five planets; and thus it will not be too much to understand the stars, as representing the five planets, of the five senses (Mish. הרגּשׁות ,

(Note: Thus the five senses are called, e.g. , Bamidbar rabba , c. 14.)

later הוּשׁים , cf. the verb, Ecc 2:25) which mediate the receptive relation of the soul to the outer world ( Psychol . p. 233). But we cannot see our way further to explain Ecc 12:2 patholo.-anatom., as Geier is disposed to do: Nonnulli haec accommodant ad crassos illos ac pituosos senum vapores ex debili ventriculo in cerebrum adscendentes continuo, ubi itidem imbres ( נשׁם ) h.e. destillationes creberrimae per oculos lippientes, per nares guttatim fluentes, per os subinde excreans cet., quae sane defluxiones, tussis ac catharri in juvenibus non ita sunt frequentia, quippe ubi calor multo adhuc fortior, consumens dissipansque humores . It is enough to understand עבים of cases of sickness and attacks of weakness which disturb the power of thought, obscure the consciousness, darken the mind, and which ahhar haggěshěm , after they have once overtaken him and then have ceased, quickly again return without permitting him long to experience health. A cloudy day is = a day of misfortune, Joe 2:2; Zep 1:15; an overflowing rain is a scourge of God, Eze 13:13; Eze 38:22; and one visited by misfortune after misfortune complains, Psa 42:7 : "Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy waterspouts: all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me."

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:3

To the thought: Ere the mind and the senses begin to be darkened, and the winter of life with its clouds and storms approaches, the further details here following stand in a subordinate relation: "That day when the watchers of the house tremble, and the strong men bow themselves, and the grinders rest, because they have become few, and the women looking out of the windows are darkened."Regarding בּיּום with art.: eo ( illo ) tempore , vid ., under Son 8:8. What follows is regarded by Winzer, with Mich., Spohr, and partly Nachtigal, as a further description of the night to which old age, Ecc 12:2, is compared: Watchers then guard the house; labourers are wearied with the labours and cares of the day; the maids who have to grind at the mill have gone to rest; and almost all have already fallen asleep; the women who look out from the windows are unrecognisable, because it has become dark. But what kind of cowardly watchers are those who "tremble,"and what kind of ( per antiphrasin ) strong men who "bow themselves"at evening like children when they have belly-ache! Ginsburg regards Ecc 12:2-5 as a continuation of the description of the consequences of the storm under which human life comes to an end: the last consequence is this, that they who experience it lose the taste for almonds and the appetite for locusts. But what is the meaning of this quaint figure? it would certainly be a meaningless and aimless digression. Taylor hears in this verse the mourning for the dead from Ecc 12:2, where death is described: the watchers of the house tremble; the strong men bow themselves, viz., from sorrow, because of the blank death has made in the house, etc.; but even supposing that this picture had a connection in Ecc 12:2, how strange would it be! - the lookers out at the windows must be the "ladies,"who are fond of amusing themselves at windows, and who now - are darkened. Is there anything more comical than such little ladies having become darkened (whether externally or internally remains undetermined)? However one may judge of the figurative language of Ecc 12:2, Ecc 12:3 begins the allegorical description of hoary old age after its individual bodily symptoms; interpreters also, such as Knobel, Hitz., and Ewald, do not shrink from seeking out the significance of the individual figures after the old Haggadic manner. The Talm. says of shomrē habbayith : these are the loins and ribs; of the anshē hehhayil : these are the bones; of harooth baarǔbboth : these, the eyes. The Midrash understand the watchers of the house, of the knees of the aged man; the men of strength, of his ribs or arms; the women at the mill, of the digestive organs ( המסס ,

(Note: This hamses is properly the second stomach of the ruminants, the cellular caul.)

the stomach, from omasum ); those who have become few, of the teeth; the women looking out at the window, of the eyes; another interpretation, which by harooth thinks of the lungs, is not worth notice.

Here also the Targ. principally follows the Midrash: it translates the watchers of the house by "thy knees;"strong men by "thine arms;"the women at the mill by "the teeth of thy mouth;"the women who look out at the window by "thine eyes."These interpretations for the most part are correct, only those referable to the internal organs are in bad taste; references to these must be excluded from the interpretation, for weakness of the stomach, emphysema of the lungs, etc., are not appropriate as poetical figures. The most common biblical figures of the relation of the spirit or the soul to the body is, as we have shown, Psychol . p. 227, that of the body as of the house of the inner man. This house, as that of an old man, is on all sides in a ruinous condition. The shomrē habbayith are the arms terminating in the hands, which bring to the house whatever is suitable for it, and keep away from it whatever threatens to do it injury; these protectors of the house have lost their vigour and elasticity (Gen 49:24), they tremble, are palsied ( יזעוּ , from זוּע , Pilp . זעזע , bibl. and Mishn.: to move violently hither and thither, to tremble, to shake),

(Note: Vid ., Friedr. Delitzsch's Indogerm.-Sem. Stud . p. 65f.)

so that they are able neither to grasp securely, to hold fast and use, nor actively to keep back and forcibly avert evil. Anshē hěhhayil designates the legs, for the shoqē haish are the seat of his strength, Psa 147:10; the legs of a man in the fulness of youthful strength are like marble pillars, Son 5:15; but those of the old man hith'authu ( Hithpa . only here) have bowed themselves, they have lost their tight form, they are shrunken ( כּרעות , Job 4:4, etc.) and loose; 4 Macc. 4:5 calls this τὴν ἐκ τοῦ γήρως νωθρότητα ποδῶν ἐπικύφοον . To maidens who grind (cf. טח בר , Num 11:8 and Isa 47:2) the corn by means of a hand-mill are compared the teeth, the name of which in the old language is masc., but in the modern (cf. Pro 29:19), as also in the Syr. and Arab., is fem.; the reference of the figure to these instruments for grinding is not to be missed; the Arab. ṭḥinat and the Syr. ṭaḥonto signify dens molaris , and we now call 6 of the 32 teeth Mahlzähne (molar teeth, or grinders); the Greeks used for them the word μύλαι (Psa 57:7, lxx). Regarding בּטלוּ , lxx ἤργησαν (= ἀερτοὶ ἐγενήθησαν )

(Note: We find a similar allegory in Shabbath 152 a . The emperor asked the Rabbi Joshua b. Chananja why he did not visit בי אבידן (a place where learned conversation, particularly on religious subjects, was carried on). He answered: "The mount is snow (= the hair of the head is white), ice surrounds me (= whiskers and beard on the chin white), its (of my body) dogs bark not (the voice fails), and its grinders (the teeth) grind not."The proper meaning of בי אבידן , Levy has not been able clearly to bring to light in his Neuhebr. u. Chald. W.B. )

The clause מעטוּ כּי (lxx ὃτι ὠλιγώθησαν ) assigns the reason that the grinders rest, i.e. , are not at work, that they have become few: they stand no longer in a row; they are isolated, and (as is to be supposed) are also in themselves defective. Taylor interprets mi'etu transitively: the women grinding rest when they have wrought a little, i.e. , they interrupt their labour, because on account of the occurrence of death, guests are now no longer entertained; but the beautiful appropriate allegory maintains its place against this supposed lamentation for the dead; also מעט does not signify to accomplish a little (Targ.), but to take away, to become few (lxx, Syr., Jerome, Venet. Luther), as such as Pih . as Ecc 10:10, קהה , to become blunt. And by הראות בּא we are not to think, with Taylor, of women such as Sidera's mother or Michal, who look out of the window, but of the eyes, more exactly the apples of the eyes, to which the orbita (lxx ἐν ταῖς ὀπαῖς ; Symm. διὰ τῶν ὀπῶν ) and the eyelids with the eye-lashes are related as a window is to those who look out; ארבּה (from ארב , R. רב , to entwine firmly and closely) is the window, consisting of a lattice of wood; the eyes are, as Cicero ( Tusc . i. 20) calls them, quasi fenestrae animi ; the soul-eyes, so to speak, without which it could not experience what sight is, look by means of the external eyes; and these soul-bodily eyes have become darkened in the old man, the power of seeing is weakened, and the experiences of sight are indistinct, the light of the eyes is extinguished (although not without exception, Deu 34:7).

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:4

From the eyes the allegory proceeds to the mouth, and the repugnance of the old man to every noise disturbing his rest: "And the doors to the street are closed, when the mill sounds low; and he rises up at the voice of a bird; and all the daughters of song must lower themselves."By the door toward the street the Talm. and Midrash understand the pores or the emptying members of the body, - a meaning so far from being ignoble, that even in the Jewish morning prayer a Beracha is found in these words: "Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, King of the world, who hast wisely formed man, and made for him manifold apertures and cavities. It is manifest and well known before the throne of Thy Majesty, that if one of these cavities is opened, or one of these apertures closed, it is impossible for him to exist and to stand before Thee; blessed art Thou, O Lord, the Physician of the body, and who doest wondrous words!"The words which follow הטּ ... בּשׁ are accordingly to be regarded as assigning a reason for this closing: the non-appearance of excretion has its reason in defective digestion in this, that the stomach does not grind (Talm.: וגו בשרקבן

(Note: Cf. Berachoth 61 b : The stomach ( קורקבן ) grinds. As hamses is properly the caul of the ruminant, so this word קוּרקבן is the crop (bibl. מראה ) of the bird.)

בשביל ). But the dual דּלתים suggests a pair of similar and related members, and בּשּׁוּק a pair of members open before the eyes, and not such as modesty requires to be veiled. The Targum therefore understands the shutting of the doors properly; but the mills, after the indication lying in הטּ grinding maids, it understands of the organs of eating and tasting, for it translates: "thy feet will be fettered, so that thou canst not go out into the street; and appetite will fail thee."But that is an awkward amalgamation of the literal with the allegorical, which condemns itself by this, that it separates the close connection of the two expressions required by בּשׁפל , which also may be said of the reference of dlt' to the ears, into which no sound, even from the noisy market, penetrates (Gurlitt, Grätz). We have for דלתים a key, already found by Aben Ezra, in Job 41:2, where the jaws of the leviathan are called פּניו דּלתי ; and as Herzf. and Hitz. explain, so Samuel Aripol in his Commentary, which appeared in Constantinople, 1855, rightly: "He calls the jaws דלתים , to denote that not two דלתות in two places, but in one place, are meant, after the manner of a door opening out to the street, which is large, and consists of two folds or wings, דלתות , which, like the lips ( השׂפתים , better: the jaws), form a whole in two parts; and the meaning is, that at the time of old age the lips are closed and drawn in, because the teeth have disappeared, or, as the text says, because the noise of the mill is low, just because he has no teeth to grind with."The connection of סגּרוּ and בּשׁפל is, however, closer still: the jaws of an old man are closed externally, for the sound of the mill is low; i.e. , since, when one masticates his food with the jaws of a toothless mouth, there is heard only a dull sound of this chewing ( Mumpfelns , vid ., Wiegand's Deut. W.B. ), i.e. , laborious masticating. He cannot any more crack or crunch and break his food, one hears only a dull munching and sucking. - The voice of the mouth (Bauer, Hitz., Gurlitt, Zöckl.) cannot be the meaning of קול הט ; the set of teeth (Gurlitt indeed substitutes, Ecc 12:3 , the cavity of the mouth) is not the organ of voice, although it contributes to the formation of certain sounds of words, and is of importance for the full sound of the voice.

בּשּׁוּק , "to the street,"is here = on the street side; שׁפל is, as at Pro 16:19, infin. (Symmachus: ἀχρειωθείσης τῆς φωνῆς ; the Venet.: ἐν τῷ ταπεινῶσθαι τὴν φωνήν ), and is to be understood after Isa 29:4; טחנה stands for רחים , as the vulgar Arab. tahûn and matḥana instead of the antiquated raḥâ . Winzer now supposes that the picture of the night is continued in 4 b : et subsistit ( vox molae ) ad cantum galli, et submissius canunt cantatrices (viz., molitrices ). Elster, with Umbreit, supposes the description of a storm continued: the sparrow rises up to cry, and all the singing birds sink down (flutter restlessly on the ground). And Taylor supposes the lament for the dead continued, paraphrasing: But the bird of evil omen [owl, or raven] raises his dirge, and the merry voice of the singing girls is silent.

These three pictures, however, are mere fancies, and are also evidently here forced upon the text; for יקוט קול cannot mean subsistit vox , but, on the contrary (cf. Hos 10:14), surgit ( tollitur ) vox ; and יקום לקול cannot mean: it (the bird) raises itself to cry, which would have required יקום לתת קולו , or at least לקּול , after למלחמה קום , etc.; besides, it is to be presumed that צפור is genit., like קול עוגב and the like, not nom. of the subj. It is natural, with Hitz., Ewald, Heiligst., Zöck., to refer qol tsippor to the peeping, whispering voice ("Childish treble"of Shakespeare) of the old man (cf. stiphtseph , Isa 29:4; Isa 38:14; Isa 10:14; Isa 8:19). But the translation: "And it (the voice) approaches a sparrow's voice,"is inadmissible, since for ל קום the meaning, "to pass from one state to another,"cannot be proved from 1Sa 22:13; Mic 2:8; קום signifies there always "to rise up,"and besides, qol tahhanah is not the voice of the mouth supplied with teeth, but the sound of the chewing of a toothless mouth. If leqol is connected with a verb of external movement, or of that of the soul, it always denotes the occasion of this movement, Num 16:34; Eze 27:28; Job 21:12; Hab 3:16. Influenced by this inalienable sense of the language, the Talm. explains צף ... ויקום by "even a bird awakes him."Thus also literally the Midrash, and accordingly the Targ. paraphrasing: "thou shalt awaken out of thy sleep for a bird, as for thieves breaking in at night."That is correct, only it is unnecessary to limit ויקוּם (or rather ויקום ,

(Note: Vav with Cholem in H. F. Thus rightly, according to the Masora, which places it in the catalogue of those words which occur once with a higher ( יקום ) and once with a lower vowel (y קוּם ), Mas. fin. 2a b, Ochlaweochla , No. 5; cf. also Aben Ezra's Comm . under Psa 80:19; Zachoth 23 a , Safa berura 21 b (where Lipmann is uncertain as to the meaning).)

which accords with the still continued subordination of Ecc 12:4 to the eo die quo of Ecc 12:3 ) to rising up from sleep, as if it were synonymous with ויעור : the old man is weak (nervously weak) and easily frightened, and on account of the deadening of his senses (after the figure of Ecc 12:2, the darkening of the five stars) is so liable to mistake, that if even a bird chirps, he is frightened by it out of his rest (cf. hēkim , Isa 14:9).

Also in the interpretation of the clause ha שׁיר ... וישּׁחוּ , the ancients are in the right track. The Talm. explains: even all music and song appear to him like common chattering ( שׂוּחה or, according to other readings, שׂיחה ); the proper meaning of ychsw is thus Haggad. twisted. Less correctly the Midrash: בנות השיר are his lips, or they are the reins which think, and the heart decides (on this curious psychol. conception, cf. Chullin 11 a , and particularly Berachoth 61 a , together with my Psychol . p. 269). The reference to the internal organs if à priori improbable throughout; the Targ. with the right tact decides in favour of the lips: "And thy lips are untuned, so that they can no more say (sing) songs."In this translation of the Talm. there are compounded, as frequently, two different interpretations, viz., that interpretation of בן השׁ , which is proved by the כל going before to be incorrect, because impossible; and the interpretation of these "daughters of song"of "songs,"as if these were synonymous designations, as when in Arab. misfortunes are called banatu binasan , and the like ( vid ., Lane's Lex . I p. 263); בּת קול , which in Mish. denotes a separate voice (the voice of heaven), but in Syr. the separate word, may be compared. But ישׁחוּ (fut. Niph . of שׁחח ) will not accord with this interpretation. For that בן השׁ denotes songs (Hitz., Heiligst.), or the sound of singing (Böttch.), or the words (Ewald) of the old man himself, which are now softened down so as to be scarcely audible, is yet too improbable; it is an insipid idea that the old man gives forth these feeble "daughters of song"from his mouth. We explain ישׁחו of a being bowed down, which is external to the old man, and accordingly understand benoth hashshir not of pieces of music (Aq. πάντα τὰ τῆς ᾠδῆς ) which must be lowered to pianissimo , but according to the parallel already rightly acknowledge by Desvoeux, 2Sa 19:36, where the aged Barzillai says that he has now no longer an ear for the voice of singing men and singing women, of singing birds (cf. בּר זמירא of a singing bird in the Syrian fables of Sophos, and banoth of the branches of a fruit tree, Gen 49:22), and, indeed, so that these are a figure of all creatures skilled in singing, and taking pleasure in it: all beings that are fond of singing, and to which it has become as a second nature, must lower themselves, viz., the voice of their song (Isa 29:4) (cf. the Kal , Psa 35:14, and to the modal sense of the fut. Ecc 10:10, יגּבּר , and Ecc 10:19, ישׂמּח ), i.e. , must timidly retire, they dare not make themselves heard, because the old man, who is terrified by the twittering of a little bird, cannot bear it.

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:5

Ecc 12:5

From this his repugnance to singing, and music, and all loud noises, progress in the description is made to the difficulty such aged men have in motion: "Also they are afraid of that which is high; and there are all kinds of fearful things in the way ... ."The description moves forward in a series of independent sentences; that שׁ בּיּום to which it was subordinate in Ecc 12:3, and still also in Ecc 12:4, is now lost sight of. In the main it is rightly explained by the Talm., and with it the Midrash: "Even a little hillock appears to him like a high mountain; and if he has to go on a journey, he meets something that terrifies him;"the Targ. has adopted the second part of this explanation. גּבהּ (falsely referred by the Targ. to the time lying far back in the past) is understood neut.; cf. 1Sa 16:7. Such decrepid old men are afraid of ( ייראוּ , not videbunt , as the lxx, Symm., Ar., and the Venet. translate, who seem to have had before them the defective יראו ) a height, - it alarms them as something unsurmountable, because their breath and their limbs fail them when they attempt it; and hathhhattim (plur. of the intensifying form of hat, consternatio, Job 41:25), i.e. , all kinds of formidines (not formido , Ewald, §179 a , Böttch. §762, for the plur. is as in salsilloth , 'aph'appim , etc., thought of as such), meet them in the way. As the sluggard says: there is a lion in the way, and under this pretence remains slothfully at home, Pro 24:13; Pro 22:13, so old men do not venture out; for to them a damp road appears like a very morass; a gravelly path, as full of neck-breaking hillocks; an undulating path, as fearfully steep and precipitous; that which is not shaded, as oppressively hot and exhausting-they want strength and courage to overcome difficulties, and their anxiety pictures out dangers before them where there are none.

Ecc 12:5

The allegory is now continued in individual independent figures: "And the almond tree is in blossom."The Talm. explains וין הש of the haunch-bone projecting (from leanness); the Midrash, of the bones of the vertebral column, conceived of as incorruptible and as that round which will take place the future restoration of the human body, - probably the cross bone, os sacrum ,

(Note: The Jewish opinion of the incorruptible continuance of this bone may be connected with the designation os sacrum ; the meaning of this is controverted, vid ., Hyrtl's Anatomie , §124.)

inserted between the two thigh bones of the pelvis as a pointed wedge; cf. Jerome in his Comm .: quidam sacram spinam interpretantur quod decrescentibus natium cornibus spina accrescat et floreat ; לוּז is an Old Heb., Aram., and Arab. name of the almond tree and the almond nut ( vid ., under Gen 30:37), and this, perhaps, is the reason of this identification of the emblematic שׁקד with לוז (the os sacrum , or vertebra magna ) of the spine. The Targ. follows the Midrash in translating: the רישׁ שׁז (the top of the spine) will protrude from leanness like an almond tree (viz., from which the leaves have been stripped). In these purely arbitrary interpretations nothing is correct but (1) that שׁקד is understood not of the almond fruit, but of the almond tree, as also at Jer 1:11 (the rod of an almond tree); (2) that ינאץ (notwithstanding that these interpreters had it before them unpointed) is interpreted, as also by the lxx, Syr., Jerome, and the Venet., in the sense of blossoming, or the bursting out of blossoms by means of the opening up of the buds. Many interpreters understand שׁקר of almond fruit (Winzer, Ewald, Ginsb., Rödiger, etc.), for they derive ינאץ from נאץ , as Aben Ezra had already done, and explain by: fastidit amygdalam ( nucem ), or fastidium creat amygdala . But (1) ינאץ for ינאץ ( Hiph . of נאץ , to disdain, to treat scornfully) is a change of vowels unexampled; we must, with such an explanation, read either ינּאץ , fastiditur (Gaab), or ינאץ ; (2) almond nuts, indeed, belong to the more noble productions of the land and the delicacies, Gen 43:11, but dainties, κατ ̓ ἐξ , at the same time they are not, so that it would be appropriate to exemplify the blunted sensation of taste in the old man, by saying that he no more cracks and eats almonds. The explanation of Hitzig, who reads ינאץ , and interprets the almond tree as at Son 7:9 the palm, to denote a woman, for he translates: the almond tree refuses (viz., the old man), we set aside as too ingenious; and we leave to those interpreters who derive ינאץ from נאץ , and understand השקד

(Note: Abulwalîd understands שקר and חגב sexually, and glosses the latter by jundub (the locust), which in Arab. is a figure of suffering and patience.)

of the glans penis (Böttch., Fürst, and several older interpreters), to follow their own foul and repulsive criticism. ינאץ is an incorrect reading for ינץ , as at Hos 10:14, קאם for קם , and, in Prov., ראשׁ for רשׁ (Gesen. §73. 4); and besides, as at Son 6:11, הנצוּ , regular Hiph . of נצץ ( נוּץ , Lam 4:15), to move tremblingly (vibrate), to glisten, blossom (cf. נוס , to flee, and ניסן , Assyr. nisannu , the flower-month). Thus deriving this verbal form, Ewald, and with him Heiligst., interprets the blossoming almond tree as a figure of the winter of life: "it is as if the almond tree blossomed, which in the midst of winter has already blossoms on its dry, leafless stem."But the blossoms of the almond tree are rather, after Num 17:2-8, a figure of special life-strength, and we must thus, thrown back to ינאץ from נאץ (to flourish), rather explain, with Furrer (in Schenkel's B. L. ), as similarly Herzf.: the almond tree refuses, i.e. , ceases, to blossom; the winter of old age is followed by no spring; or also, as Dale and Taylor: the almond tree repels, i.e. , the old man has no longer a joyful welcome for this messenger of spring. But his general thought has already found expression in Ecc 12:2; the blossoming almond tree must be here an emblem of a more special relation. Hengst. supposes that "the juniper tree (for this is the proper meaning of שקד ) is in bloom"is = sleeplessness in full blossom stands by the old man; but that would be a meaningless expression. Nothing is more natural than that the blossoming almond tree is intended to denote the same as is indicated by the phrase of the Latin poet: Intempestivi funduntur vertice cani (Luther, Geiger, Grot., Vaih., Luzz., Gurlitt, Tyler, Bullock, etc.).

It has been objected that the almond blossoms are not pure white, but according to the variety, they are pale-red, or also white; so that Thomson, in his beautiful Land and the Book , can with right say: "The almond tree is the type of old age whose hair is white;"and why? "The white blossoms completely cover the whole tree."Besides, Bauer (1732) has already remarked that the almond blossoms, at first tinged with red, when they are ready to fall off become white as snow; with which may be compared a clause cited by Ewald from Bodenstedt's A Thousand and One Days in the Orient : "The white blossoms fall from the almond trees like snow-flakes."Accordingly, Dächsel is right when he explains, after the example of Zöckler: "the almond tree with its reddish flower in late winter, which strews the ground with its blossoms, which have gradually become white like snow-flakes, is an emblem of the winter of old age with its falling silvery hair."

Ecc 12:5

From the change in the colour of the hair, the allegory now proceeds to the impairing of the elasticity of the highs and of their power of bearing a load, the malum coxae senile (in a wider than the usual pathological sense): "And the grasshopper ( i.e. , locust, חגב , Samar. חרגבה = חרגּל , Lev 11:22) becomes a burden."Many interpreters (Merc., Döderl., Gaab, Winz., Gesen., Winer, Dale) find in these words הח ויס the meaning that locust-food, or that the chirping of grasshoppers, is burdensome to him (the old man); but even supposing that it may at once be assumed that he was a keen aeridophagus (locusts, steeped in butter, are like crabs (shrimps) spread on slices of butter and bread), or that he had formerly a particular delight in the chirping of the τέττιξ , which the ancients number among singing birds (cf. Taylor, l.c. ), and that he has now no longer any joy in the song of the τέττιξ , although it is regarded as soothing and tending to lull to rest, and an Anacreon could in his old days even sing his μακαρίζομέν σε τέττιξ , - yet these two interpretations are impossible, because הס may mean to burden and to move with difficulty, but not "to become burdensome."For the same reason, nothing is more absurd than the explanation of Kimchi and Gurlitt: Even a grasshopper, this small insect, burdens him; for which Zöckl., more naturally: the hopping and chirping of the grasshopper is burdensome to him; as we say, The fly on the wall annoys him. Also Ewald and Heiligstedt's interpretation: "it is as if the locust raised itself to fly, breaking and stripping off its old husk,"as inadmissible; for הסתבל can mean se portare laboriose , but not ad evolandum eniti ; the comparison (Arab.) tahmmal gains the meaning of hurry onwards, to proceed on an even way, like the Hebr. השכים , to take upon the shoulder; it properly means, to burden oneself, i.e. , to take on one's back in order to get away; but the grasshopper coming out of its case carries away with it nothing but itself. For us, such interpretations - to which particularly, the advocates of the several hypotheses of a storm, night, and mourning, are constrained - are already set aside by this, that according to the allegory וין השׁ , הח ויס must also signify something characteristic of the body of an old man. The lxx, Jerome, and Ar. translate: the locust becomes fat; the Syr.: it grows. It is true, indeed, that great corpulence, or also a morbid dropsical swelling of the belly ( ascites ), is one of the symptoms of advanced old age; but supposing that the (voracious) locust might be en emblem of a corpulent man, yet הסתבל means neither to become fat nor to grow. But because the locust in reality suggests the idea of a corpulent man, the figure cannot at the same time be intended to mean that the old man is like a skeleton, consisting as it were of nothing but skin and bone (Lyra, Luther, Bauer, Dathe); the resemblance of a locust to the back-bone and its joints (Glassius, Köhler, Vaih.) is not in view; only the position of the locusts's feet for leaping admits the comparison of the prominent scapulae (shoulder-blades); but shoulder-blades ( scapulae alatae ), angular and standing out from the chest, are characteristics of a consumptive, not of a senile habit. Also we must cease, with Hitz., Böttch., Luzz., and Gratz, to understand the figure as denoting the φαλλός to be now impotent; for relaxation and shrinking do not agree with hctbl, which suggests something burdensome by being weighty.

The Midrash interprets החגב by "ankles,"and the Targ. translates accordingly: the ankles ( אסתּורי , from the Pers. ustuwâr , firm) of thy feet will swell-unsuitably, for "ankles"affords no point of comparison with locusts, and they have no resemblance to their springing feet. The Talm., glossing החגב by "these are the buttocks"( nates ) (cf. Arab. 'ajab , the os coccygis , Syn. 'ajuz , as the Talm. עגבות interchanges with עבוז ), is on the right track. There is nothing, indeed, more probably than that הגב is a figure of the coxa , the hinder region of the pelvis, where the lower part of the body balances itself in the hip-joint, and the motion of standing up and going receives its impulse and direction by the muscular strength there concentrated. This part of the body may be called the locust, because it includes in itself the mechanism which the two-membered foot for springing, placed at an acute angle, presents in the locust. Referred to this coxa , the loins, יסתבל has its most appropriate meaning: the marrow disappears from the bones, elasticity from the muscles, the cartilage and oily substance from the joints, and, as a consequence, the middle of the body drags itself along with difficulty; or: it is with difficulty moved along ( Hithpa . as pass., like Ecc 8:10); it is stiff, particularly in the morning, and the old man is accustomed to swing his arms backwards, and to push himself on as it were from behind. In favour of this interpretation (but not deciding it) is the accord of חגב with עגב = κόκκυξ (by which the os coccygis is designated as the cuckoo's bone). Also the verbal stem (Arab.) jaḥab supplies an analogous name: not jaḥab , which denotes the air passage (but not, as Knobel supposes, the breath itself; for the verb signifies to separate, to form a partition, Mish. מחיצח ), but (Arab.) jaḥabat , already compared by Bochart, which denotes the point (dual), the two points or projections of the two hip-bones ( vid ., Lane's Lex .), which, together with the os sacrum lying between, form the ring of the pelvis.

Ecc 12:5

From the weakening of the power of motion, the allegory passes on to the decay of sensual desires, and of the organs appertaining thereto: "And the caper-berry fails ... ."The meaning "caper"for האב is evidence by the lxx ( ἡ κάππαρις , Arab. alkabar ), the Syr., and Jerome ( capparis ), and this rendering is confirmed by the Mishnic אביונות , which in contradistinction to תמרות , i.e. , the tender branches, and קפריסין , i.e. , the rind of fruit, signifies the berry-like flower-buds of the caper bush,

(Note: The caper-bush is called in the Mish. צלף , and is celebrated, Beza 25 a, cf. Shabbath 30 b (where, according to J. S. Bloch's supposition, the disciple who meets Gamaliel is the Apostle Paul), on account of its unconquerable life-power, its quick development of fruit, and manifold products. The caper-tree is planted, says Berachoth 36a, "with a view to its branches;"the eatable branches or twigs here meant are called שיתי ( שותי ). Another name for the caper-tree is נצפה , Demai i. 1, Berachoth 36 a , 40 b ; and another name for the bud of the caper-blossom is פרחא רבוטיתא , Berachoth 36b (cf. Aruch, under the words aviyonoth and tselaph ).)

according to Buxtorf. This Talm. word, it is true, is pointed אביונות ; but that makes no difference, for אביּונה is related to אביונה merely as making the word emphatic, probably to distinguish the name of the caper from the fem. of the adj. אביון , which signifies avida , egena . But in the main they are both one; for that נביּונה may designate "desire"(Abulwalîd:

(Note: In his Dictionary of Roots (kitâb el -utṣûl ), edited by Neubauer, Oxford 1873-4.)

aliradat ; Parchon: התאוה ; Venet.: ἡ ὄρεξις ; Luther: alle Lust ), or "neediness,""poverty"(the Syr. in its second translation of this clause), is impossible, because the form would be unexampled and incomprehensible; only the desiring soul, or the desiring, craving member ( vid ., Kimchi), could be so named. But now the caper is no named, which even to this day is used to give to food a more piquant taste (cf. Plutarch's Sympos . vi. qu . 2). It is also said that the caper is a means of exciting sexual desire ( aphrodisiacum ); and there are examples of its use for this purpose from the Middle Ages, indeed, but none from the records of antiquity; Pliny, Hist. Nat . xx. 14 (59), knew nothing of it, although he speaks at length of the uses and effects of the capparis . The Talm. explains האבי by חמדה , the Midrash by תאוה , the Targ. by משכבא , interpreting the word directly without reference to the caper in this sense. If haaviyonah thus denotes the caper, we have not thence to conclude that it incites to sexual love, and still less are we, with the Jewish interpreters, whom Böttch. follows, to understand the word of the membrum virile itself; the Arab. name for the caper, 'itar , which is compared by Grätz, which has an obscene meaning, designates also other aromatic plants. We shall proceed so much the more securely if we turn away from the idea of sexual impulse and hold by the idea of the impulse of self-preservation, namely, appetite for food, since אביון (from אבה , the root-meaning of which, "to desire,"is undoubted

(Note: Vid ., Fried. Delitzsch's Indogerman.-Sem. Stud . I p. 62f. Also the Arab. âby in the language of the Negd means nothing else.))

denotes a poor man, as one who desires that which is indispensable to the support of life; the caper is accordingly called aviyonah , as being appetitiva , i.e. , exciting to appetite for food, and the meaning will not be that the old man is like a caper-berry which, when fully ripe, bursts its husks and scatters its seed (Rosenm., Winer in his R. W., Ewald, Taylor, etc.), as also the lxx, Symm. ( καὶ διαλυθῇ ἡ ἐπίπονος , i.e. , as Jerome translates it, et dissolvetur spiritus fortitudo , perhaps ἐπίτονος , the strength or elasticity of the spirit), and Jerome understand the figure; but since it is to be presupposed that the name of the caper, in itself significant, will also be significant for the figure: capparis est irrita sive vim suam non exerit ( ותפר as inwardly trans. Hiph . of פרר , to break in pieces, frustrate), i.e. , even such means of excitement as capers, these appetite-berries, are unable to stimulate the dormant and phlegmatic stomach of the old man (thus e.g. , Bullock). Hitzig, indeed, maintains that the cessation of the enjoyment of love in old age is not to be overlooked; but (1) the use of artificial means for stimulating this natural impulse in an old man, who is here described simply as such, without reference to his previous life and its moral state, would make him a sensualist; and (2) moral statistics show that with the decay of the body lust does not always (although this would be in accordance with nature, Gen 17:17; Rom 4:19) expire; moreover, the author of the Book of Koheleth is no Juvenal or Martial, to take pleasure, like many of his interpreters, in exhibiting the res venereae .

Ecc 12:5

And in view of the clause following, the ceasing from nourishment as the last symptom of the certain approach of death is more appropriate than the cessation from sexual desire: "For,"thus the author continues after this description of the enfeebled condition of the hoary old man, "man goeth to his everlasting habitation, and the mourners go about the streets."One has to observe that the antequam of the memento Creatoris tui in diebus junvetutis tuae is continued in Ecc 12:6 and Ecc 12:7. The words 'ad asher lo are thrice repeated. The chief group in the description is subordinated to the second 'ad asher lo ; this relation is syntactically indicated also in Ecc 12:4 by the subjective form ויקום , and continues logically in Ecc 12:5, although without any grammatical sign, for ינאצו and ותפר are indicative. Accordingly the clause with כּי , Ecc 12:5 , will not be definitive; considerately the accentuation does not begin a new verse with כּי : the symptoms of marasmus already spoken of are here explained by this, that man is on his way to the grave, and, as we say, has already one foot in it. The part. חלך is also here not so much the expression of the fut. instans ( iturus est ), like Ecc 9:10, as of the present (Venet.: ἄπεισι ); cf. Gen 15:2, where also these two possible renderings stand in question. "Everlasting house"is the name for the grave of the dead, according to Diodorus Sic. i. 51, also among the Egyptians, and on old Lat. monuments also the expression domus aeterna is found ( vid ., Knobel); the comfortless designation, which corresponds

(Note: The Syr. renders beth 'olam by domus laboris sui , which is perhaps to be understood after Job 3:17 .)

to the as yet darkened idea of Hades, remained with the Jews in spite of the hope of the resurrection they had meanwhile received; cf. Tob. 3:6; Sanhedrin 19 a , "the churchyard of Huṣal ;""to be a churchyard"(beth 'olam ); "at the door of the churchyard"(beth 'olam ), Vajikra rabba , c. 12. Cf. Assyr. bit 'idii = עד בּית of the under-world (Bab.-Assyr. Epic, "Höllenfahrt der Istar,"i. 4).

The clause following means that mourners already go about the streets (cf. סבב , Son 3:3, and Pil . Son 3:2; Psa 59:7) expecting the death of the dying. We would say: the undertaker tarries in the neighbourhood of the house to be at hand, and to offer his services. For hassophdim are here, as Knobel, Winz., and others rightly explain, the mourners, saphdanin (sophdanin ), hired for the purpose of playing the mourning music (with the horn שיפורא , Moëd katan 27 b , or flute, חלילים , at the least with two, Kethuboth 46 b ; cf. Lat. siticines ) and of singing the lament for the dead, qui conducti plorant in funere (Horace, Poet. 433), along with whom were mourning women, מקוננות (Lat. praeficae ) (cf. Buxtorf's Lex. Talm . col. 1524 s.), - a custom which existed from remote antiquity, according to 2Sa 3:31; Jer 34:5. The Talm. contains several such lamentations for the dead, as e.g. , that of a "mourner"( ההוא ספדנא ) for R. Abina: "The palms wave their heads for the palm-like just man,"etc.; and of the famed "mourner"Bar-Kippuk on the same occasion: "If the fire falls upon the cedar, what shall the hyssop of the walls do?"etc. ( Moëd katan 25 b )

(Note: Given in full in Wiss. Kunst Judenth. p. 230ff. Regarding the lament for the dead among the Haurans, vid ., Wetzstein's treatise on the Syrian Threshing-Table in Bastian's Zeitsch. für Ethnologie , 1873.)

- many of the ספנים were accordingly elegiac poets. This section of Ecc 12:5 does not refer to the funeral itself, for the procession of the mourners about the bier ought in that case to have been more distinctly expressed; and that they walked about in the streets before the funeral (Isa 15:3) was not a custom, so far as we know. They formed a component part of the procession following the bier to the grave in Judea, as Shabbath 153 a remarks with reference to this passage, and in Galilee going before it; to mourn over the death, to reverse it, if possible, was not the business of these mourners, but of the relatives (Hitz.), who were thus not merely called הסופדים . The Targ. translates: "and the angels will go about, who demand an account of thee, like the mourning singers who go about the streets, to record what account of thee is to be given."It is unnecessary to change כּסופד into כּספר ( intar scribarum ). According to the idea of the Targumist, the sophdim go about to collect materials for the lament for the dead. The dirge was not always very scrupulously formed; wherefore it is said in Berachoth 26 a , "as is the estimate of the dead that is given, so is the estimate of the mourners (singers and orators at the funeral), and of those who respond to their words."It is most natural to see the object of the mourners going about in their desire to be on the spot when death takes place.

(Note: The Arab. funeral dirge furnishes at once an illustration of "and the mourners go about the streets."What Wetzstein wrote to me ought not, I believe, to be kept from the reader: "In Damascus the men certainly take part in the dirge; they go about the reservoir in the court of the house along with the mourning women, and behave themselves like women; but this does not take place in the villages. But whether the 'going about the streets' might seem as an evidence that in old times in the towns, as now in the villages, the menaṣṣa (bed of state) was placed with the mourning tent in the open street without, is a question. If this were the case, the sôphdim might appear publicly; only I would then understand by the word not hired mourners, but the relatives of the dead."But then מטּה , as at Psa 26:6 מזבח , ought to have been joined to סבב as the object of the going about.)

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:6-7

A third 'ad asher lo now follows (cf. Ecc 5:1-2); the first placed the old man in view, with his désagrément in general; the second described in detail his bodily weaknesses, presenting themselves as forerunners of death; the third brings to view the dissolution of the life of the body, by which the separation of the soul and the body, and the return of both to their original condition is completed. "Ere the silver cord is loosed, and the golden bowl is shattered, and the pitcher is broken at the fountain, and the wheel is shattered in the well, and the dust returns to the earth as that which it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it."Before entering into the contents of these verses, we shall consider the form in which some of the words are presented. The Chethı̂b ירחק we readily let drop, for in any case it must be said that the silver cord is put out of action; and this word, whether we read it ירחק or ירחק (Venet. μακρυνθῇ ), is too indefinite, and, supposing that by the silver cord a component part of the body is meant, even inappropriate, since the organs which cease to perform their functions are not removed away from the dead body, but remain in it when dead. But the Keri ירתק ("is unbound") has also its difficulty. The verb רתק signifies to bind together, to chain; the bibl. Heb. uses it of the binding of prisoners, Nah 3:18, cf. Isa 40:19; the post-bibl. Heb. of binding = shutting up (contrast of פתח , Pesikta , ed. Buber, 176 a , whence Mezia 107 b , שורא וריתקא , a wall and enclosure); the Arab. of shutting up and closing a hole, rent, split ( e.g. , murtatiḳ , a plant with its flower-buds as yet shut up; rutûḳ , inaccessibleness). The Targumist

(Note: Similarly the lxx understands ונרץ , καὶ συντροχάσῃ ( i.e. , as Jerome in his Comm . explains: si fuerit in suo funiculo convoluta ), which is impossible.)

accordingly understands ירתק of binding = lameness (palsy); Rashi and Aben Ezra, of shrivelling; this may be possible, however, for נרתּק , used of a "cord,"the meaning that first presents itself, is "to be firmly bound;"but this affords no appropriate sense, and we have therefore to give to the Niph . the contrasted meaning of setting free, discatenare (Parchon, Kimchi); this, however, is not justified by examples, for a privat. Niph . is unexampled, Ewald, §121 e ; נלבּב , Job 11:12, does not mean to be deprived of heart (understanding), but to gain heart (understanding). Since, however, we still need here the idea of setting loose or tearing asunder (lxx ἀνατραπῇ ; Symm. κοπῆναι ; Syr. נתפסק , from פּסק , abscindere ; Jerome, rumpatur ), we have only the choice of interpreting yērathēq either, in spite of the appearance to the contrary, in the meaning of constingitur , of a violent drawing together of the cord stretched out lengthwise; or, with Pfannkuche, Gesen., Ewald, to read ינּתק ("is torn asunder"), which one expects, after Isa 33:20; cf. Jdg 16:9; Jer 10:20. Hitzig reaches the same, for he explains ירחק = יחרק , from (Arab.) kharaḳ , to tear asunder (of the sound of the tearing);

(Note: Vid ., my treatise, Psyciol. u. Musik, u.s.w ., p. 31.)

and Böttcher, by adopting the reading יחרק ; but without any support in Heb. and Chald. usus loq .

נּלּה , which is applied to the second figure, is certainly

(Note: The lxx, unsuitably, τὸ ἀνθέμιον , which, per synecdochen partis pro toto , signifies the capital (of a pillar). Thus, perhaps, also are meant Symm. τὸ περιφερές , Jerome vitta , Venet. τὸ στέφος , and the Syr. "apple."Among the Arabs, this ornament on the capital is called tabaryz ("prominence").)

a vessel of a round form (from גּלל , to roll, revolve round), like the נּלּה which received the oil and conducted it to the seven lamps of the candlestick in Zec 4:1-14; but to understand ותרץ of the running out of the oil not expressly named (Luther: "and the golden fountain runs out") would be contrary to the usus loq .; it is the metapl. form for ותרץ , et confringitur , as ירוּץ , Isa 42:4, for ירץ , from רצץ , cogn. רעע , Psa 2:9, whence נרץ , Ecc 12:6 , the regularly formed Niph . (the fut. of which, תּרוץ , Eze 29:7). We said that oil is not expressly named. But perhaps it is meant by הזּהב . The gullah above the candlestick which Zechariah saw was, according to Zec 4:12, provided with two golden pipes, in which were two olive trees standing on either side, which sunk therein the tuft-like end of their branches, of which it is said that they emptied out of themselves hazzahav into the oil vessels. Here it is manifest that hazzahav means, in the one instance, the precious metal of which the pipes are formed; and in the other, the fluid gold of the oil contained in the olive branches. Accordingly, Hitzig understands gullath hazzahav here also; for he takes gullah as a figure of the body, the golden oil as a figure of the soul, and the silver cord as a figure of vital energy.

Thus, with Hitz., understanding gullath hazzahav after the passage in Zechariah, I have correctly represented the meaning of the figures in my Psychol . p. 228, as follows: - "The silver cord = the soul directing and bearing the body as living; the lamp hanging by this silver cord = the body animated by the soul, and dependent on it; the golden oil = the spirit, of which it is said, Pro 20:27, that it is a lamp of God."I think that this interpretation of the golden oil commends itself in preference to Zöckler's interpretation, which is adopted by Dächsel, of the precious fluidum of the blood; for if hazzahav is a metaphorical designation of oil, we have to think of it as the material for burning and light; but the principle of bright life in man is the spirit (ruahh hhayim or nishmath hhayim ); and in the passage in Zechariah also, oil, which makes the candlestick give light, is a figure of the spirit (Ecc 12:6, ki im -beruhhi ). But, as one may also suppose, it is not probable that here, with the same genit. connection, הכסף is to be understood of the material and the quality; and hazzqahav , on the contrary, of the contents. A golden vessel is, according to its most natural meaning, a vessel which is made of gold, thus a vessel of a precious kind. A golden vessel cannot certainly be broken in pieces, but we need not therefore understand an earthenware vessel only gilded, as by a silver cord is to be understood only that which has a silver line running through it (Gesen. in the Thes .); רצוּץ may also denote that which is violently crushed or broken, Isa 42:3; cf. Jdg 9:53. If gullath hazzahav , however, designates a golden vessel, the reference of the figure to the body, and at the same time of the silver cord to the vital energy or the soul, is then excluded, - for that which animates stands yet above that which is animated, - the two metallic figures in this their distribution cannot be comprehended in this reference. We have thus to ask, since gullath hazzahav is not the body itself: What in the human body is compared to a silver cord and to a golden vessel? What, moreover, to a pitcher at the fountain, and to a wheel or a windlass? Winzer settles this question by finding in the two double figures only in general the thoughts represented: antequam vita ex tenui quasi filo suspensa pereat , and (which is essentially the same) antequam machina corporis destruatur .

Gurlitt also protests against the allegorical explanation of the details, but he cannot refrain from interpreting more specially than Winzer. Two momenta , he says, there are which, when a man dies, in the most impressive way present themselves to view: the extinction of consciousness, and the perfect cessation, complete ruin, of the bodily organism. The extinction of consciousness is figuratively represented by the golden lamp, which is hung up by a silver cord in the midst of a house or tent, and now, since the cord which holds it is broken, it falls down and is shattered to pieces, so that there is at once deep darkness; the destruction of the bodily organism, by a fountain, at which the essential parts of its machinery, the pitcher and windlass, are broken and rendered for ever useless. This interpretation of Gurlitt's affords sufficient support to the expectation of the allegorical meaning with which we approached Ecc 12:6; and we would be satisfied therewith, if one of the figures did not oppose us, without seeking long for a more special allegorical meaning: the pitcher at the fountain or well ( כּד , not הכּד , because determined by 'al -hammabu'a ) is without doubt the heart which beats to the last breath of the dying man, which is likened to a pitcher which, without intermission, receives and again sends forth the blood. That the blood flows through the body like living water is a fact cognizable and perceptible without the knowledge of its course; fountain ( מקור ) and blood appear also elsewhere as associated ideas, Lev 12:7; and nishbar , as here vetishshaběr , into a state of death, or near to death, Jer 23:9; Psa 69:21. From this gullath hazzahav must also have a special allegorical sense; and if, as Gurlitt supposes, the golden vessel that is about to be destroyed is a figure of the perishing self-consciousness (whereby it is always doubtful that, with this interpretation, the characteristic feature of light in the figure is wanting), then it is natural to go further, and to understand the golden vessel directly of the head of a man, and to compare the breaking of the skull, Jdg 9:53, expressed by vataritz eth -gulgolto , with the words here before us, vatharutz gullath hazzahav ; perhaps by gullath the author thought of the cogn. - both as to root and meaning - גלגלת ; but, besides, the comparison of the head, the bones of which form an oval bowl, with gullath is of itself also natural. It is true that, according to the ancient view, not the head, but the heart, is the seat of the life of the spirit; "in the heart, Ephrem said ( Opp. Syr . ii. 316), the thinking spirit (shuschobo ) acts as in its palace;"and the understanding, the Arabians

(Note: Vid ., Noldeke's Poesien d. alten Araber , p. 190.)

also say, sits in the heart, and thus between the ribs. Everything by which בשׂר and נפשׁ is affected - thus, briefly formulated, the older bibl. idea - comes in the לב into the light of consciousness. But the Book of Koheleth belongs to a time in which spiritual-psychical actions began to be placed in mediate causal relation with the head; the Book of Daniel represents this newer mode of conception, Dan 2:28; Dan 4:2; Dan 7:10, Dan 7:15. The image of the monarchies seen in Nebuchadnezzar's dream, Dan 2:32, Dan 2:28, had a golden head; the head is described as golden, as it is the membrum praecipuum of the human body; it is compared to gold as to that which is most precious, as, on the other hand, ראשׁ is used as a metaphorical designation of that which is most precious. The breaking to pieces of the head, the death-blow which it receives, shows itself in this, that he who is sick unto death is unable to hold his head erect, that it sinks down against his will according to the law of gravity; as also in this, that the countenance assumes the aspect which we designate the facies hippocratica , and that feeling is gradually destroyed; but, above all, that is thought of which Ovid says of one who was dying: et resupinus humum moribundo vertice pulsat .

If we now further inquire regarding the meaning of the silver cord, nothing can obviously be meant by it which is locally above the golden bowl which would be hanging under it; also הכסף גלת itself certainly admits no such literal antitype, - the concavity of the גלגלת is below, and that of a גלה , on the other hand, is above. The silver cord will be found if a component part of the structure of the body is pointed to, which stands in a mutually related connection with the head and the brain, the rending asunder of which brings death with it. Now, as is well known, dying finally always depends on the brain and the upper spinal marrow; and the ancients already interpreted the silver cord of the spinal marrow, which is called by a figure terminologically related to the silver cord, חוּט השּׂדרה (the spinal cord), and as a cord-like lengthening of the brain into the spinal channel could not be more appropriately named; the centre is grey, but the external coating is white. We do not, however, maintain that hakkěsěph points to the white colour; but the spinal marrow is related, in the matter of its value for the life of man, to the brain as silver is to gold. Since not a violent but a natural death is the subject, the fatal stroke that falls on the spinal marrow is not some kind of mechanical injury, but, according as ירתק is unbound is explained or is changed into ינּתק is torn asunder, is to be thought of either as constriction = shrinking together, consuming away, exhaustion; or as unchanging = paralysis or disabling; or as tearing asunder = destruction of the connection of the individual parts. The emendation ינתק most commends itself; it remains, however, possible that ינתק is meant in the sense of morbid contraction ( vid ., Rashi); at any rate, the fate of the גלה is the consequence of the fate of the חבל , which carries and holds the gullah, and does not break without at the same time bringing destruction on it; as also the brain and the spinal marrow stand in a relation of solidarity to each other, and the head receives

(Note: Many interpreters (lately Ewald, Hengst., Zöckl., Taylor, and others) understand the silver cord of the thread of life; the spinal marrow is, without any figure, this thread of life itself.)

from the spinal marrow (as distinguished from the so-called prolonged marrow) the death-stroke. As the silver cord and the bowl, so the pitcher and the well and the wheel stand in interchangeable relation to each other.

We do not say: the wheel at the fountain, as is translated by Hitz., Ewald, and others; for (1) the fountain is called בּאר , not בּור ( באר ), which, according to the usage ( vid ., Hitz. under Jer 7:9), signifies a pit;, and particularly a hole, for holding water, a cistern, reservoir; but for this there was no need for a wheel, and it is also excluded by that which had to be represented; (2) the expression galgal ěl -habor is purposely not used, but hagalgal ěl -habor , that we may not take ěl -habor as virtual adj. to galgal (the wheel being at the בור ), but as the designation of the place into which the wheel falls when it is shattered. Rightly, the lxx renders 'al -hammabu'a by ἐπὶ τῇ πηγῇ , and el -habor by ἐπὶ τὸν λάκκον . The figure of a well (mabbu'a ) formed by means of digging, and thus deep, is artistically conceived; out of this the water is drawn by means of a pitcher ( כּד , Gen 24:14, a word as curiously according with the Greek κάδος as those mentioned in pp. 505 and 552, whence Arab. kadd , to exhaust, to pitcher-out, as it were; syn. דּלי , a vessel for drawing out water; Assyr. di -lu , the zodiacal sign of the water-carrier), and to facilitate this there is a wheel or windlass placed above (Syr. gilgla devira ), by which a rope is wound up and down ( vid ., Smith's Bibl. Dict . under "well").

(Note: Wetzstein remarks, that it is translated by "cylinder"better than by "wheel,"since the galgal is here not at a river, but over a draw-well.)

The Midrash refers to the deep draw-well of the hill town of Sepporis, which was supplied with such rollers serving as a pulley (polyspast). Wheel and pitcher stand in as close mutual relation as air and blood, which come into contact in the lungs. The wheel is the figure of the breathing organ, which expands and contracts (winds and unwinds) itself like a draw-rope by its inhaling and exhaling breath. The throat, as the organ of respiration and speech, is called גּרון (Psa 115:7) and גּרגּות ( vid ., under Pro 1:9), from גּרה or גּרר to draw, σπᾶν ( τὸν ἀέρα , Wisd. 7:3). When this wheel makes its last laborious revolution, there is heard the death-rattle. There is a peculiar rattling sound, which they who once hear it never forget, when the wheel swings to an end-the so-called choking rheum, which consists in this, that the secretion which the dying cannot cough up moves up and down in the air-passage, and finally chokes him. When thus the breathings become always weaker, and sometimes are interrupted for a minute, and at last cease altogether, there takes place what is here designated as the breaking to pieces of the wheel in the pit within - the life is extinguished, he who has breathed his last will be laid as a corpse in the grave ( בּור , Psa 28:1, and frequently), the σῶμα has become a πτῶμα (Mar 6:29; cf. Num 14:32). The dust, i.e. , the dust of which the body was formed, goes back to the earth again like as it was (originally dust), and the spirit returns to God who gave it. וישׁב subordinates itself to the 'ad asher lo , also in the form as subjunct.; the interchange of the full and the abbreviated forms occurs, however, elsewhere is the indic. sense, e.g. , Job 13:27; Ewald, §343 b . Shuv 'al occurs also at 2Ch 30:9; and אל and על interchange without distinction in the more modern language; but here, as also at Ecc 12:6 , not without intention, the way downwards is to be distinguished from the way upwards (cf. Ecc 3:21). כּשׁהיה is = כּאשׁר היה , instar ejus quod fuit . The body returns to the dust from which it was taken, Gen 3:19, to the dust of its original material, Psa 104:29; and the spirit goes back to the God of its origin, to whom it belongs.

We have purposely not interrupted our interpretation of the enigmatical figures of Ecc 12:6 by the citation and criticism of diverging views, and content ourselves here with a specification of the oldest expositions. The interpretation of Shabbath 152 a does not extend to Ecc 12:6. The Midrash says of the silver cord: זו חוט השדרה (as later, Rashi, Aben Ezra, and many others), of the golden vessel: גלגלת זו (as we), and it now adds only more in jest: "the throat which swallows up the gold and lets the silver run through."The pitcher becoming leaky must be כרס , the belly, which three days after death is wont to burst. And as for hagalgal , reference is made to the draw-wells of Sepporis; so for el havor , after Job 21:33, to the clods of Tiberias: he lies deep below, "like those clods of the deep-lying Tiberias."The Targ takes its own way, without following the Midrash, and translates: "before thy tongue [this of חבל ] is bound and thou art unable to speak any more, and the brain of thy head [this the גלה ] is shattered, and thy gall [= כד ] is broken with thy liver [= המבוע ], and thy body [= הגלגל ] hastens away [ נרץ of רוץ ] into the grave."These interpretations have at least historical and linguistic value; they also contain separate correct renderings. A quodlibet of other interpretations

(Note: Geiger in the Deut. Morg. Zeitsch . xxvii. 800, translates Ecc 12:6 arbitrarily: and the stone-lid ( גלגל in the sense of the Mish.-Targ. גולל ) presses on the grave.)

is found in my Psychol . p. 229, and in Zöckler, ad loc . A principal error in these consists in this, that they read Koheleth as if he had been a disciple of Boerhaave, and Harvey, and other masters. Wunderbar in his Bibl.-Talm. medicin (1850) takes all in earnest, that the author knew already of the nervous system and the circulation of the blood; for, as he himself says, there is nothing new under the sun. As far as concerns my opinion, says Oetinger in his exposition ( Sämmt. Schrift. herausg. von Ehmann , IV p. 254), I dare not affirm that Solomon had a knowledge systematis nervolymphatici , as also circuli sanguinis , such as learned physicians now possess; yet I believe that the Holy Spirit spake thus through Solomon, that what in subsequent times was discovered as to these matters might be found under these words. This judgment also goes too far; the figure of death which Koheleth presents contains no anticipation of modern discoveries; yet it is not without its value for the historical development of anthropology, for science and poetry combine in it; it is as true to fact as it is poetically beautiful.

The author has now reached the close. His Koheleth-Solomon has made all earthly things small, and at last remains seated on this dust-heap of vanitas vanitatum. The motto-like saying, Ecc 1:2, is here repeated as a quod erat demonstrandum , like a summary conclusion. The book, artistically constructed in whole and in its parts, comes to a close, rounding itself off as in a circle in the epiphonema:

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:8

"O vanity of vanities, saith Koheleth, all is vain."If we here look back to Ecc 12:7, that which is there said of the spirit can be no consolation. With right, Hofmann in his Schriftbeweis , I 490, says: "That it is the personal spirit of a man which returns to God; and that it returns to God without losing its consciousness, is an idea foreign to this proverb."Also, Psychol . p. 410, it is willingly conceded that the author wished here to express, first, only the fact, in itself comfortless, that the component parts of the human body return whence they came. But the comfortless averse of the proverb is yet not without a consoling reverse. For what the author, Ecc 3:21, represents as an unsettled possibility, that the spirit of a dying man does not downwards like that of a beast, but upwards, he here affirms as an actual truth.

(Note: In the Rig-Veda that which is immortal in man is called manas ; the later language calls it âtman ; vid ., Muir in the Asiatic Journal , 1865, p. 305.)

From this, that he thus finally decides the question as an advantage to a man above a beast, it follows of necessity that the return of the spirit to God cannot be thought of as a resumption of the spirit into the essence of God (resorption or emanation), as the cessation of his independent existence, although, as also at Job 34:14; Psa 104:29, the nearest object of the expression is directed to the ruin of the soul-corporeal life of man which directly follows the return of the spirit to God. The same conclusion arises from this, that the idea of the return of the spirit to God, in which the author at last finds rest, cannot yet stand in a subordinate place with reference to the idea of Hades, above which it raises itself; with the latter the spirit remains indestructible, although it has sunk into a silent, inactive life. And in the third place, that conclusion flows from the fact that the author is forced by the present contradiction between human experience and the righteousness of God to the postulate of a judgment finally settling these contradictions, Ecc 3:17; Ecc 11:9, cf. Ecc 12:14, whence it immediately follows that the continued existence of the spirit is thought of as a well-known truth ( Psychol . p. 127). The Targ. translates, not against the spirit of the book: "the spirit will return to stand in judgment before God, who gave it to thee."In this connection of thoughts Koheleth says more than what Lucretius says (ii. 998 ss.):

Cedit item retro, de terra quod fuit ante,

In terras, et quod missum est ex aetheris oris

Id rursum caeli rellatum templa receptant .

A comforting thought lies in the words נתנהּ אשׁר . The gifts of God are on His side ἀμεταμέλητα (Rom 11:29). When He receives back that which was given, He receives it back to restore it again in another manner. Such thoughts connect themselves with the reference to God the Giv. Meanwhile the author next aims at showing the vanity of man, viz., of man as living here. Body and spirit are separated, and depart each in its own direction. Not only the world and the labours by which man is encompassed are "vain,"and not only is that which man has and does and experiences "vain,"but also man himself as such is vain, and thus - this is the facit - all is הבל , "vain."

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:9

In connection with Ecc 12:8, where Koheleth has spoken his last word, the author, who has introduced him as speaking thereto, continues: "And, moreover, because Koheleth was wise he taught the people knowledge; he applied and searched out and formed may proverbs."The postscript begins with "and"because it is connected with the concluding words of the book - only externally, however; nothing is more unwarrantable than to make Ecc 12:8 the beginning of the postscript on account of the vav . The lxx translate καὶ περισσὸν (Venet. περιττὸν ) ὃτι ; as Hitz.: "it remains (to be said) that Koheleth was a wise man,"etc.; and Dale may be right, that ויתר is in this sense as subj., pointed with Zakeph gadhol (cf. Gen 16:16; Gen 20:4, and the obj. thus pointed, Exo 23:3). But that Koheleth was "a wise man"is nothing remaining to be said, for as such he certainly speaks in the whole book from beginning to end; the עוד , unconnected, following, shows that this his property is presupposed as needing no further testimony. But untenable also is the translation: So much the greater Koheleth was as a wise man so much the more, etc. (Heinem., Südfeld); עוד does not signify eo magis ; the Heb. language has a different way of expressing such an intensification: כל הגדול מחברו יצרו גדול ממנו , i.e. , the higher the position is which one assumes, so much the greater are the temptations to which he is exposed. Rightly, Luther: "This same preacher was not only wise, but,"etc. ויתר signifies, Ecc 7:11, "and an advance (benefit, gain);"here שׁ ויתר , "and something going beyond this, that,"etc. - thought of as accus.-adv.: "going beyond this, that = moreover, because"(Gesen., Knobel, Vaih., Ginsb., Grätz); vid . Thus 'od is in order, which introduces that which goes beyond the property and position of a "wise man"as such. That which goes beyond does not consist in this, that he taught the people knowledge, for that is just the meaning of the name Koheleth ; the statement which 'od introduces is contained in the concluding member of the compound sentence; the after-word begins with this, that it designates the Koheleth who appears in the more esoteric book before us as חכם , as the very same person who also composed the comprehensive people's book, the Mishle . He has taught the people knowledge; for he has placed, i.e. , formed "stellen," to place, as " Schriftsteller "= author; modern Heb. מחבּר ; Arab. muṣannif ),

(Note: Cogn. in the meaning "verfassen "= to compose, is יסד ; vid ., Zunz' Aufs.: "To compose and to translate,"expressed in Heb. in Deut. Morg. Zeitsch . xxv. p. 435ff.)

many proverbs, as the fruit of nature reflection and diligent research. The obj. meshalim harbēh belongs only to tiqqēn , which ἀσυνδέτως (according to the style of the epilogue and of the book, as is shown above) follows the two preparative mental efforts, whose resultat it was. Rightly, as to the syntax, Zöckler, and, as to the matter, Hitzig: "Apparently the author has here not 1Ki 5:12, but the canonical Book of Proverbs in his eye."The language is peculiar. Not only is תּקּן exclusively peculiar to the Book of Koheleth, but also אזן , perpendere (cf. Assyr. uzunu , reflection), to consider, and the Pih . חקּר . Regarding the position of harbeh ,

(Note: Harbeh běchěh , Ezr 10:1, which signifies "making much weeping,"makes not exception in favour of the scribe. Cf. hatsne'a lecheth , Mic 6:8; haphlē vaphělě , Isa 29:14.)

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:10

It is further said of Koheleth, that he put forth efforts not only to find words of a pleasant form, but, above all, of exact truth: "Koheleth strove to find words of pleasantness, and, written in sincerity, words of truth."The unconnected beginning biqqesh Koheleth is like dibbarti ani , Ecc 1:16, etc., in the book itself. Three objects follow limtso. But Hitz. reads the inf . absol . וכתוב instead of וכתוּב , and translates: to find pleasing words, and correctly to write words of truth. Such a continuance of the inf . const . by the inf . absol . is possible; 1Sa 25:26, 1Sa 25:31. But why should וכתוב not be the continuance of the finite (Aq., Syr.), as e.g. , at Ecc 8:9, and that in the nearest adverbial sense: et scribendo quidem sincere verba veritatis , i.e. , he strove, according to his best knowledge and conscience, to write true words, at the same time also to find out pleasing words; thus sought to connect truth as to the matter with beauty as to the manner? Vechathuv needs no modification in its form. But it is not to be translated: and that which was right was written by him; for the ellipsis is inadmissible, and כתוב מן is not correct Heb. Rightly the lxx, καὶ γεγραμμένον εὐθύτητος . כּתוּב signifies "written,"and may also, as the name of the Hagiographa כּתוּבים shows, signify "a writing;"kakathuvah , 2Ch 30:5, is = "in accordance with the writing;"and belo kǎkathuv , 2Ch 30:18, "contrary to the writing;"in the post-bibl. the phrase אמר הכּתוּב = ἡ γραφὴ λέγει , is used. The objection made by Ginsburg, that kathuv never means, as kethav does, "a writing,"is thus nugatory. However, we do not at all here need this subst. meaning, וכתוב is neut. particip., and ישׁר certainly not the genit., as the lxx renders (reading וּכתוּב ), but also not the nom. of the subj. (Hoelem.), but, since ישׁר is the designation of a mode of thought and of a relation, the accus. of manner, like veyashar , Psa 119:18; emeth , Psa 132:11; emunah , Psa 119:75. Regarding the common use of such an accus. of the nearer definition in the passive part., vid ., Ewald, §284 c . The asyndeton vechathuv yosher divre emeth is like that at Ecc 10:1, mehhochmah michvod . That which follows limtso we interpret as its threefold object. Thus it is said that Koheleth directed his effort towards an attractive form (cf. avne -hephets , Isa 54:12); but, before all, towards the truth, both subjectively ( ישׁר ) and objectively ( אמת ), of that which was formulated and expressed in writing.

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:11

From the words of Koheleth the author comes to the words of the wise man in general; so that what he says of the latter finds its application to himself and his book: "Words of the wise are as like goads, and like fastened nails which are put together in collections - they are given by one shepherd."The lxx, Aq., and Theod. translate darvonoth by βούκεντρα , the Venet. by βουπλῆγες ; and that is also correct. The word is one of three found in the Jerus. Gemara, Sanhedrin x. 1, to designate a rod for driving (oxen) - דרבן (from דרב , to sharpen, to point), מלמד (from למד , to adjust, teach, exercise), and מרדּע (from רדע , to hold back, repellere ); we read ka -dārevonoth ; Gesen., Ewald, Hitz., and others are in error in reading dorvonoth ; for the so-called light Metheg , which under certain circumstances can be changed into an accent, and the Kametz chatuph exclude one another.

(Note: The Kametz is the Kametz gadhol (opp. Kametz chatuph ), and may for this reason have the accent Munach instead of Metheg . Vid ., Michlol 153 b , 182 b . The case is the same as at Gen 39:3, where mimmachoraath is to be read. Cf. Baer's Metheg -Setz. §27 and §18.)

If דרבן is the goad, the point of comparison is that which is to be excited intellectually and morally. Incorrectly, Gesen., Hitz., and others: like goads, because easily and deeply impressing themselves on the heart as well as on the memory. For goads, aculei , the Hebrews use the word קוצים ; darevonoth also are goads, but designed for driving on, thus stimuli (Jerome); and is there a more natural commendation for the proverbs of the wise men than that they incite to self-reflection, and urge to all kinds of noble effort? Divre and darevonoth have the same three commencing consonants, and, both for the ear and the eye, form a paronomasia. In the following comparison, it is a question whether ba'ale asuppoth (plur. of ba'al asuppoth , or of the double plur. ba'al asuppah , like e.g. , sare missim , Exo 1:11, of sar mas ) is meant of persons, like ba'al hallashon , Ecc 10:11, cf. ba'al kenaphayim , Ecc 10:20, or of things, as ba'al piphiyoth , Isa 41:15; and thus, whether it is a designation parallel to חכמים or to דברי . The Talm. Jer. Sanhedrin x. 1, wavers, for there it is referred first to the members of the assemblies (viz., of the Sanedrium ), and then is explained by "words which are spoken in the assembly."If we understand it of persons, as it was actually used in the Talm., then by asuppoth we must understand the societies of wise men, and by ba'ale asuppoth , of the academicians (Venet.: δεσπόται ξυναγμάτων ; Luther: "masters of assemblies") belonging to such academies. But an appropriate meaning of this second comparison is not to be reached in this way. For if we translate: and as nails driven in are the members of the society, it is not easy to see what this wonderful comparison means; and what is then further said: they are given from one shepherd, reminds us indeed of Eph 4:11, but, as said of this perfectly unknown great one, is for us incomprehensible. Or if we translate, after Isa 28:1 : and (the words of the wise are) like the fastened nails of the members of the society, it is as tautological as if I should say: words of wise men are like fastened nails of wise men bound together in a society (as a confederacy, union). Quite impossible are the translations: like nails driven in by the masters of assemblies (thus e.g. , Lightfoot, and recently Bullock), for the accus. with the pass. particip. may express some nearer definition, but not (as of the genit.) the effective cause; and: like a nail driven in are the (words) of the masters of assemblies (Tyler: "those of editors of collections"), for ellipt. genit., dependent on a governing word carrying forward its influence, are indeed possible, e.g. , Isa 61:7, but that a governing word itself, as ba'ale , may be the governed genit. of one omitted, as here divre , is without example.

(Note: Regarding this omission of the muḍâf the governing noun, where this is naturally supplied before a genitive from the preceding, cf. Samachschari's Mufaṣṣal , p. 43, l. 8-13.)

It is also inconsistent to understand ba'ale asuppoth after the analogy of ba'ale masoreth (the Masoretes) and the like. It will not be meant of the persons of the wise, but of the proverbs of the wise. So far we agree with Lang and Hoelem. Lang (1874) thinks to come to a right understanding of the "much abused"expression by translating, "lords of troops,"- a designation of proverbs which, being by many acknowledged and kept in remembrance, possess a kind of lordship over men's minds; but that is already inadmissible, because asuppoth designates not any multitude of men, but associations with a definite end and aim. Hoelem. is content with this idea; for he connects together "planted as leaders of assemblies,"and finds therein the thought, that the words of the wise serve as seeds and as guiding lights for the expositions in the congregation; but ba'ale denotes masters, not in the sense of leaders, but of possessors; and as ba'ale berith , Gen 14:13, signifies "the confederated,"ba'ale shevu'ah , Neh 6:18, "the sworn,"and the frequently occurring ba'ale ha'ir , "the citizens;"so ba'ale asuppoth means, the possessors of assemblies and of the assembled themselves, or the possessors of collections and of the things collected. Thus ba'ale asuppoth will be a designation of the "words of the wise"(as in shalishim , choice men = choice proverbs, Pro 22:20, in a certain measure personified), also of those which form or constitute collections, and which stand together in order and rank (Hitz., Ewald, Elst., Zöckl., and others). Of such it may properly be said, that they are like nails driven in, for they are secured against separations, - they are, so to speak, made nail-feast, they stand on one common ground; and their being fixed in such connection not only is a help to the memory, but also to the understanding of them. The Book of Koheleth itself is such an asuppah ; for it contains a multitude of separate proverbs, which are thoughtfully ranged together, and are introduced into the severe, critical sermon on the nothingness of all earthly things as oases affording rest and refreshment; as similarly, in the later Talmudic literature, Haggadic parts follow long stretches of hair-splitting dialectics, and afford to the reader an agreeable repose.

And when he says of the "proverbs of the wise,"individually and as formed into collections: אחד נתּנוּ מרעה , i.e. , they are the gift of one shepherd, he gives it to be understood that his "words of Koheleth,"if not immediately written by Solomon himself, have yet one fountain with the Solomonic Book of Proverbs, - God, the one God, who guides and cares as a shepherd for all who fear Him, and suffers them to want nothing which is necessary to their spiritual support and advancement (Psa 23:1; Psa 28:9). "Mēro'eh ehad ,"says Grätz, "is yet obscure, since it seldom, and that only poetically, designates the Shepherd of Israel. It cannot certainly refer to Moses."Not to Moses, it is true (Targ.), nor to Solomon, as the father, the pattern, and, as it were, the patron of "the wise,"but to God, who is here named the ἀρχιποίμην as spiritual preserver (provider), not without reference to the figure of a shepherd from the goad, and the figure of household economy from the nails; for רעה , in the language of the Chokma (Pro 5:21), is in meaning cogn. to the N.T. conception of edification.

(Note: Vid ., my Heb. Römerbrief , p. 97.)

Regarding masmeroth (iron nails), the word is not used of tent spikes (Spohn, Ginsb.), - it is masc., the sing. is משׂמר ( מסמר ), Arab. mismâr . נטוּעים is = תּקוּעים (cf. Dan 11:45 with Gen 31:25), post-bibl. ( vid ., Jer. Sanhedrin ) קבוּעים (Jerome, in altum defixi ). Min with the pass., as at Job 21:1; Job 28:4; Psa 37:23 (Ewald, §295 b ), is not synonymous with the Greek ὑπό . The lxx well: "given by those of the counsel from one shepherd."Hitzig reads מרעה , and accordingly translates: "which are given united as a pasture,"but in mēro'eh ehad there lies a significant apologetic hint in favour of the collection of proverbs by the younger Solomon (Koheleth) in relation to that of the old. This is the point of the verse, and it is broken off by Hitzig's conjecture.

(Note: J. F. Reimmann, in the preface to his Introduction to the Historia Litterarum antediluviana , translates, Ecc 12:11 : "The words of the wise are like hewn-out marble, and the beautiful collectanea like set diamonds, which are presented by a good friend."A Disputatio philologica by Abr. Wolf, Königsberg 1723, contends against this παρερμεενεία .)

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:12

With veyother mehemmah the postscript takes a new departure, warning against too much reading, and finally pointing once more to the one thing needful: "And besides, my son, be warned: for there is no end of much book-making; and much study is a weariness of the body."With "my son,"the teacher of wisdom here, as in the Book of Proverbs, addresses the disciple who places himself under his instruction. Hitzig translates, construing mehemmah with hizzaher : "And for the rest: by these (the 'words of Koheleth,' Ecc 12:10) be informed."But (1) נזהר , according to usage, does not signify in general to be taught, but to be made wiser, warned; particularly the imper. הזּהר is cogn. with השּׁמר (cf. Targ. Jer. Exo 10:28, אזדּהר לך = השּׁמר לך ), and in fact an object of the warning follows; (2) min after yothēr is naturally to be regarded as connected with it, and not with hizzaher (cf. Est 6:6, Sota vii. 7; cf. Psa 19:12). The punctuation of veyother and mehemmah is thus not to be interfered with. Either hēmmah points back to divre (Ecc 12:11): And as to what goes beyond these (in relation thereto) be warned (Schelling: quidquid ultra haec est, ab iis cave tibi , and thus e.g. , Oehler in Herzog's R. E. vii. 248); or, which is more probable, since the divre are without a fixed beginning, and the difference between true and false "wise men"is not here expressed, hemmah refers back to all that has hitherto been said, and veyother mehemmah signifies not the result thereof (Ewald, §285e), but that which remains thereafter: and what is more than that (which has hitherto been said), i.e. , what remains to be said after that hitherto said; Lat. et quod superest, quod reliquum est .

In Ecc 12:12, Hitzig also proposes a different interpunction from that which lies before us; but at the same time, in the place of the significant double sentence, he proposes a simple sentence: "to make many books, without end, and much exertion of mind (in making these), is a weariness of the body."The author thus gives the reason for his writing no more. But with Ecc 12:8 he has certainly brought his theme to a close, and he writes no further; because he does not write for hire and without an aim, but for a high end, according to a fixed plan; and whether he will leave off with this his book or not is a matter of perfect indifference to the readers of this one book; and that the writing of many books without end will exhaust a man's mind and bring down his body, is not that a flat truism? We rather prefer Herzfeld's translation, which harmonizes with Rashbam's: "But more than these (the wise men) can teach thee, my son, teach thyself: to make many books there would be no end; and much preaching is fatiguing to the body."But נזהר cannot mean to "teach oneself,"and ēn qētz does not mean non esset finis , but non est finis ; and for lahach the meaning "to preach"(which Luther also gives to it) is not at all shown from the Arab. lahjat , which signifies the tongue as that which is eager (to learn, etc.), and then also occurs as a choice name for tongues in general. Thus the idea of a double sentence, which is the most natural, is maintained, as the lxx has already rendered it. The n. actionis עשׂות with its object is the subject of the sentence, of which it is said een qeets, it is without end; Hitzig's opinion, that ēn qēts is a virtual adj., as ēn 'avel , Deu 33:4, and the like, and as such the pred. of the substantival sentence. Regarding להג , avidum discendi legendique studium . C. A. Bode (1777) renders well: polygraphiae nullus est finis et polymathia corpus delessat . Against this endless making of books and much study the postscript warns, for it says that this exhausts the bodily strength without (for this is the reverse side of the judgment) truly furthering the mind, which rather becomes decentralized by this polupragmosu'nee. The meaning of the warning accords with the phrase coined by Pliny ( Ep . vii. 9), multum non multa . One ought to hold by the "words of the wise,"to which also the "words of Koheleth,"comprehended in the asuppah of the book before us, belong; for all that one can learn by hearing or by reading amounts at last, if we deduct all that is unessential and unenduring, to a unum necessarium :

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:13

"The final result, after all is learned, (is this): Fear God and keep His commandments; for this is the end of every man."Many expositors, as Jerome, the Venet., and Luther, render נשׁמע as fut.: The conclusion of the discourse we would all hear (Salomon); or: The conclusion of the whole discourse or matter let us hear (Panzer, 1773, de Wette-Augusti); Hitzig also takes together soph davar hakol = soph davar kol -haddavar : The end of the whole discourse let us hear. But הכּל for כּלּנוּ is contrary to the style of the book; and as a general rule, the author uses הכל for the most part of things, seldom of persons. And also soph davar hakol , which it would be better to explain ("the final word of the whole"), with Ewald, §291 a , after yemē -olam mosheh , Isa 63:11, than it is explained by Hitzig, although, in spite of Philippi's ( Sta. const . p. 17) doubt, possible in point of style, and also exemplified in the later period of the language (1Ch 9:13), is yet a stylistic crudeness which the author could have avoided either by writing soph devar hakol , or better, soph kol -haddavar . נשׁמע , Ewald, §168 b , renders as a particip. by audiendum ; but that also does not commend itself, for נשמע signifies nothing else than auditum , and acquires the meaning of audiendum when from the empirical matter of fact that which is inwardly necessary is concluded; the translation: The final word of the whole is to be heard, audiendum est , would only be admissible of also the translation auditum est were possible, which is not the case. Is נשׁמע thus possibly the pausal form of the finite נשׁמע ? We might explain: The end of the matter ( summa summarum ), all is heard, when, viz., that which follows is heard, which comprehends all that is to be known. Or as Hoelem.: Enough, all is heard, since, viz., that which is given in the book to be learned contains the essence of all true knowledge, viz., the following two fundamental doctrines. This retrospective reference of hakol nishm'a is more natural than the prospective reference; but, on the other hand, it is also more probable that soph davar denotes the final resultat than that it denotes the conclusion of the discourse. The right explanation will be that which combines the retrospective reference of nakol nishm'a and the resultative reference of soph davar . Accordingly, Mendelss. appears to us to be correct when he explains: After thou hast heard all the words of the wise ... this is the final result, etc. Finis ( summa ) reî omnia audita is = omnibus auditis , for the sentence denoting the conditions remains externally undesignated, in the same way as at Ecc 10:14; Deu 21:1; Ezr 10:6 (Ewald, §341 b ). After the clause, soph ... nishm'a , Athnach stands where we put a colon: the mediating hocce est is omitted just as at Ecc 7:12 (where translate: yet the preference of knowledge is this, that, etc.).

The sentence, eth -naeolohim yera ("fear God"), repeating itself from Ecc 5:6, is the kernel and the star of the whole book, the highest moral demand which mitigates its pessimism and hallows its eudaemonism. The admonition proceeding therefrom, "and keep His commandments,"is included in lishmo'a , Ecc 5:1, which places the hearing of the divine word, viz., a hearing for the purpose of observing, as the very soul of the worship of God above all the opus operatum of ceremonial services.

The connection of the clause, ki -zeh kol -haadam , Hitzig mediates in an unnecessary, roundabout way: "but not thou alone, but this ought every man."But why this negative here introduced to stamp כי as an immo establishing it? It is also certainly suitable as the immediate confirmation of the rectitude of the double admonition finally expressing all. The clause has the form of a simple judgment, it is a substantival clause, the briefest expression for the thought which is intended. What is that thought? The lxx renders: ὃτι τοῦτο πᾶς ὁ ἄνθρωπος ; also Symm. and the Venet. render kol haadam by πᾶς ὁ ἄνθρ ., and an unnamed translator has ὃλος ὁ ἄνθρ ., according to which also the translation of Jerome is to be understood, hoc est enim omnis homo . Thus among the moderns, Herzf., Ewald, Elst., and Heiligst.: for that is the whole man, viz., as to his destiny, the end of his existence (cf. as to the subject-matter, Job 28:28); and v. Hofmann ( Schriftbew . II 2, p. 456): this is the whole of man, viz., as Grotius explains: totum hominis bonum ; or as Dale and Bullock: "the whole duty of man;"or as Tyler: "the universal law ( כל , like the Mishnic כּלל ) of man;"or as Hoelem.: that which gives to man for the first time his true and full worth. Knobel also suggests for consideration this rendering: this is the all of man, i.e. , on this all with man rests. But against this there is the one fact, that kol -haadam never signifies the whole man, and as little anywhere the whole (the all) of a man. It signifies either "all men"( πάντες οἱ ἄνθρωποι , οἱ πά ἄνθρ οἱ ἄνθρ πά ), as at Ecc 7:2, hu soph kol -haadam , or, of the same meaning as kol -haadam , "every man"( πᾶς ἄντηρωπος ), as at Ecc 3:13; Ecc 5:18 (lxx, also Ecc 7:2 : τοῦτο τέλος παντὸς ἀντηρώπου ); and it is yet more than improbable that the common expression, instead of which haadam kullo was available, should here have been used in a sense elsewhere unexampled. Continuing in the track of the usus loq ., and particularly of the style of the author, we shall thus have to translate: "for this is every man."If we use for it: "for this is every man's,"the clause becomes at once distinct; Zirkel renders kol -haadam as genit., and reckons the expression among the Graecisms of the book: παντὸς ἀντηρώπου, Ϛιζ., πρᾶγμα . Or if, with Knobel, Hitz., Böttch., and Ginsburg, we might borrow a verb to supplement the preceding imperat.: "for this ought every man to do,"we should also in this way gain the meaning to be expected; but the clause lying before us is certainly a substantival clause, like meh haadam , Ecc 2:12, not an elliptical verbal clause, like Isa 23:5; Isa 26:9, where the verb to be supplied easily unfolds itself from the ל of the end of the movement.

We have here a case which is frequent in the Semitic languages, in which subj. and pred. are connected in the form of a simple judgment, and it is left for the hearer to find out the relation sustained by the pred. to the subj. - e.g. , Psa 110:3; Psa 109:4, "I am prayer;"and in the Book of Koheleth, Ecc 3:19, "the children of men are a chance."

(Note: Vid ., Fleischer's Abh. ü. einige Arten der Nominalapposition , 1862, and Philippi's St. const . p. 90ff.)

In the same way we have here to explain: for that is every man, viz., according to his destiny and duty; excellently, Luther: for that belongs to all men. With right, Hahn, like Bauer (1732), regards the pronoun as pred. (not subj. as at Ecc 7:2): "this, i.e. , this constituted, that they must do this, are all men,"or rather: this = under obligation thereto, is every man.

(Note: Hitz. thus renders היא , Jer 45:4, predicat.: "And it is such, all the world.")

It is a great thought that is thereby expressed, viz., the reduction of the Israelitish law to its common human essence. This has not escaped the old Jewish teachers. What can this mean: zeh kol -haadam ? it is asked, Berachoth 6 b ; and R. Elazar answers: "The whole world is comprehended therein;"and R. Abba bar-Cahana: "This fundamental law is of the same importance to the universe;"and R. Simeon b. Azzai: "The universe has been created only for the purpose of being commanded this."

(Note: Cf. Jer. Nedarim ix. 3: "Thou oughtest to love thy neighbour as thyself,"says R. Akiba, is a principal sentence in the Law. Ben-Azzai says: "The words zěh ... adam (Gen 5:1) are it in a yet higher degree,"because therein the oneness of the origin and the destiny of all men is contained. Aben Ezra alludes to the same thing, when at the close of his Comm . he remarks: "The secret of the non-use of the divine name יהוה in Gen 1:1-2:3 is the secret of the Book of Koheleth.")

Keil-Delitzsch: Ecc 12:14

As we render zeh kol -haadam as expressive of the same obligation lying on all men without exception, this verse appropriately follows: "For God shall bring every work into the judgment upon all that is concealed, whether it be good or bad."To bring into judgment is, as at Ecc 11:9 = to bring to an account. There the punctuation is בּמּשׁ , here בּמשׁ , as, according to rule, the art. is omitted where the idea is determined by a relative clause or an added description; for bemishpat 'al kol -ne'llam are taken together: in the judgment upon all that is concealed (cf. Rom 2:16; 1Co 4:5, τὰ κρυπτά ). Hitzig, however, punctuates here בּמשׁ , and explains על as of the same meaning as the distributive ל , e.g. , Gen 9:5, Gen 9:10; but in this sense על never interchanges with ל . And wherefore this subtlety? The judgment upon all that is concealed is a judgment from the cognition of which nothing, not even the most secret, can escape; and that על משׁפט is not a Germanism, is shown from Ecc 11:9; to execute judgment on (Germ. steplang7 an ) any one is expressed by ב , Psa 119:84, Wisd. 6:6; judgment upon (steplang7 über ) any one may be expressed by the genit. of him whom it concerns, Jer 51:9; but judgment upon anything (Symm. περὶ παντὸς παροραθέντος ) cannot otherwise be expressed than by על . Rather על may be rendered as a connecting particle: "together with all that is concealed"(Vaih., Hahn); but כל־מעשׂה certainly comprehends all, and with כל־נעלם this comprehensive idea is only deepened. The accent dividing the verse stands rightly under נעלּם ;

(Note: Thus rightly pointed in F. with Dagesh in lamed , to make distinct the ע as quiescent (cf. 1Ki 10:3; and, on the other hand, Neh 3:11; Psa 26:4). Cf. תּחשּׁ with Dagesh in shin , on account of the preceding quiescent guttural, like יח , Ecc 9:8; התּ , Lev 11:16; נח , Num 1:7, etc.; cf. Luth. Zeitsch . 1863, p. 413.)

for sive bonum sive malum (as at Ecc 5:11) is not related to ne'llam as disjoining, but to kol̇ma'aseh .

This certainty of a final judgment of personal character is the Ariadne-thread by which Koheleth at last brings himself safely out of the labyrinth of his scepticism. The prospect of a general judgment upon the nations prevailing in the O.T., cannot sufficiently set at rest the faith ( vid ., e.g. , Ps 73; Jer 12:1-3) which is tried by the unequal distributions of present destiny. Certainly the natural, and particularly the national connection in which men stand to one another, is not without an influence on their moral condition; but this influence does not remove accountability, - the individuum is at the same time a person; the object of the final judgment will not be societies as such, but only persons, although not without regard to their circle of life. This personal view of the final judgment does not yet in the O.T. receive a preponderance over the national view; such figures of an universal and individualizing personal judgment as Mat 7:21-23; Rev 20:12, are nowhere found in it; the object of the final judgment are nations, kingdoms, cities, and conditions of men. But here, with Koheleth, a beginning is made in the direction of regarding the final judgment as the final judgment of men, and as lying in the future, beyond the present time. What Job 19:25-27 postulates in the absence of a present judgment of his cause, and the Apocalyptic Dan 12:2 saw as a dualistic issue of the history of his people, comes out here for the first time in the form of doctrine into that universally-human expression which is continued in the announcements of Jesus and the apostles. Kleinert sees here the morning-dawn of a new revelation breaking forth; and Himpel says, in view of this conclusion, that Koheleth is a precious link in the chain of the preparation for the gospel; and rightly. In the Book of Koheleth the O.T. religion sings its funeral song, but not without finally breaking the ban of nationality and of bondage to this present life, which made it unable to solve the mysteries of life, and thus not without prophesying its resurrection in an expanded glorified form as the religion of humanity.

The synagogal lesson repeats the 13th verse after the 14th, to gain thereby a conclusion of a pleasing sound. The Masoretic Siman ( vox memorialis ) of those four books, in which, after the last verse, on account of its severe contents, the verse going before is repeated in reading, is קק '' ית . The י refers to ישׁעיה (Isaiah), ת to תריסר (the Book of the Twelve Prophets), the first ק to קהלת , the second ק to קינות (Lamentations). The Lamentations and Koheleth always stand together. But there are two different arrangements of the five Megilloth , viz., that of the calendar of festivals which has passed into our printed editions: the Song, Ruth, Lamentations, Koheleth, and Esther; and the Masoretic arrangement, according to the history of their origin: Ruth, the Song, Koheleth, Lamentations, and Esther.

rdrb rdrs rdrw30 rsp20

Constable: Ecc 11:7--Sos 1:1

IV. THE WAY OF WISDOM 11:7--12:14

In 1:12-6:9, Solomon demonstrated that all work is ultimately futile for two reasons. It does not yield anything really permanent under the sun. Moreover we can never be sure we will enjoy the fruits of our labor before we die. In 6:10-11:6 he pointed out that we can never be sure which of our efforts will succeed because we do not know God's plans or what the future holds. In 11:7-12:14 he emphasized how to live acceptably before God in view of these realities.

"The Teacher has discussed how we should act in view of the uncertainties of life. We must recognize the certainties but must plan in such a way as not to be thrown off balance when the unexpected happens. Now the Teacher goes on to speak of the certainty of growing up and growing old."⁷⁴

Constable: Ecc 11:7--12:8

A. Joyous and Responsible Living 11:7-12:7

Solomon had already advocated the enjoyment of life and responsible living in several of the preceding sections (2:24-26; 3:12-13, 22; 5:18-19; 8:15; 9:7-10). Now he stressed these points.

Constable: Ecc 12:1-7

2. Responsible living 12:1-7

This pericope expands the ideas Solomon introduced in 11:9-10 by focusing on advancing old age and death.⁷⁷ These ideas are the ultimate frustration and vanity that we can experience.

Constable: Ecc 12:1

The basic imperative 12:1

Again Solomon began with a clear statement of his point and then proceeded to prove and illustrate its truth in the verses that follow. "Remember" means to live your life with what you know about God clearly in view, not just to remember that there is a God (cf. 11:9-10; 12:13; Deut. 8:18; Ps. 119:55). "Creator" connotes God as the One to whom we are responsible because we are His creatures (cf. v. 7; Gen. 2:7; 3:19). The "evil days" are the days of old age and death (cf. 11:10; 12:2-5).⁷⁸

Constable: Ecc 12:2-5

The coming of old age 12:2-5

Verses 2-7 are full of figures of speech that picture old age and death.⁷⁹

12:2-3 Solomon likened the evil days first to an approaching rainstorm (v. 2) that is fearful and uncertain (cf. 11:7-8). The Hebrews regarded any decline in a person's vital energy as a sign that death was beginning to set in (cf. 1 Kings 1:1-4; Ps. 18:4-5; 88:3-5).

The "watchmen of the house" (v. 3) probably refer to one's arms and hands, and the "mighty men" to the legs. The "grinding ones" are probably the teeth, and "those who look through windows" the eyes.

12:4 "The doors to the street" are probably the lips that are shut because of the absence of teeth in the mouth, "the grinding mill." The writer alluded to the inability of old people to sleep soundly as well as to their loss of hearing.

12:5 Aged individuals become more fearful of heights, traffic, and travel. The "almond tree" blossoms white as the hair of an old person. An elderly person is less sprightly in his or her movements. The "caperberry," apparently an appetite stimulant, is a poor translation that the Septuagint introduced. The text should read "and desire fails," which gives the same meaning. Man's "dark house" (rather than "eternal home") is a reference to the grave, Sheol.⁸⁰

Constable: Ecc 12:6-7

The coming of death 12:6-7

12:6 Solomon described the end of life first as the extinguishing of a light. The "golden bowl" is a bowl that holds a flame. When the "silver cord" that holds it breaks, the bowl crashes to the floor and the light goes out. Gold and silver express the great value of life.

The second description of death is water that one can no longer draw out of a well.

The "wording gives us a picture of the ruined apparatus plus the wheel as they have crashed down into the old cistern. So man breaks down and falls into a pit also."⁸¹

Whereas the first figure emphasizes the value of life, this one stresses its fragile nature. The pitcher would have been clay.

12:7 This verse describes the reversal of the process by which God originally created man (Gen. 2:7; cf. Job 34:14-15; Ps. 104:29-30).

Constable: Ecc 12:8-14

B. The Concluding Summary 12:8-14

In conclusion Solomon repeated his original thesis (v. 8; cf. 1:2) and his counsel in view of life's realities (vv. 13-14). In between these statements he set forth his source of authority for writing what we have in Ecclesiastes (vv. 9-12).

12:8 All human work (1:12-6:9) and wisdom (6:10-11:6) are ultimately futile (i.e., lacking ability to produce anything of ultimate worth in this life).

12:9-12 The phrase "these collections" (v. 11) refers to other collections of wise sayings (e.g., Job and Proverbs). Ultimately all wisdom comes from God. "Goads" (v. 11) are prodding sticks, and people who master this wisdom literature are similar to "well-driven nails" in that they are stable and secure.

"Beyond this" (v. 12) evidently refers to beyond the wisdom literature that God has revealed, in view of verse 11. Solomon warned his disciple that looking elsewhere in other books for divine wisdom would only wear him out. This verse does not say that all study is tiring, though that is true. It means that study of books other than what God has revealed to learn wisdom is an endless, wearisome occupation. This is not to say we should avoid reading books other than the Bible. Nonetheless the main place to look when you want to find true wisdom is in God's Word.

12:13-14 Solomon's concluding statement reiterated what he said earlier (2:24-26; 7:15-18; 11:9-10; 12:1) and elsewhere (Prov. 1:7; cf. Job 28:28). Trust and obedience are what everyone owes God in view of future judgment.

"Though a future judgment after death is indeed the solution to the enigma Solomon had observed in the unequal distribution of justice in human history (cf. 7:15; 8:14), no evidence suggests that Solomon believed in [i.e., was aware of] such a judgment. Life after death was as enigmatic to him (cf. 11:8) as the unequal distribution of justice. His emphasis was on this life (under the sun') and its opportunities for service (cf. 9:10; 12:1-7) and enjoyment (cf. 2:24-26; 3:12, 22; 5:18-20; 8:15; 9:7-9; 11:7-10); he thought life after death offered no such opportunities (cf. 9:5-6, 10). Therefore he did not comment on any differences after death between the righteous and the wicked, the wise and the fools, man and beast."⁸²

With the greater light of revelation that we enjoy it is even more incumbent on us to follow Solomon's counsel. We should be content to leave the enigmas of life in God's hands. We should also follow Solomon's wise counsel to enjoy life as God enables us to do so and to serve God acceptably while we can.

"What is the profit' of living? What does a man get for all his work? He gets the living God! And his whole profit consists of fearing Him and obeying His Word."⁸³

Pendahuluan / Garis Besar

JFB: Ecclesiastes (Pendahuluan Kitab)

The Hebrew title is Koheleth, which the speaker in it applies to himself (Ecc 1:12), "I, Koheleth, was king over Israel." It means an Assembler or Convener of a meeting and a Preacher to such a meeting. The feminine form of the Hebrew noun, and its construction once (Ecc 7:27) with a feminine verb, show that it not only signifies Solomon, the Preacher to assemblies (in which case it is construed with the verb or noun masculine), but also Divine Wisdom (feminine in Hebrew) speaking by the mouth of the inspired king. In six cases out of seven it is construed with the masculine. Solomon was endowed with inspired wisdom (1Ki 3:5-14; 1Ki 6:11-12; 1Ki 9:1-9; 1Ki 11:9-11), specially fitting him for the task. The Orientals delight in such meetings for grave discourse. Thus the Arabs formerly had an assembly yearly, at Ocadh, for hearing and reciting poems. Compare "Masters of assemblies" (see on Ecc 12:11, also Ecc 12:9). "The Preacher taught the people knowledge," probably viva voce ("orally"); 1Ki 4:34; 1Ki 10:2, 1Ki 10:8, 1Ki 10:24; 2Ch 9:1, 2Ch 9:7, 2Ch 9:23, plainly refer to a somewhat public divan met for literary discussion. So "spake," thrice repeated (1Ki 4:32-33), refers not to written compositions, but to addresses spoken in assemblies convened for the purpose. The Holy Ghost, no doubt, signifies also by the term that Solomon's doctrine is intended for the "great congregation," the Church of all places and ages (Psa 22:25; Psa 49:2-4).

Solomon was plainly the author (Ecc 1:12, Ecc 1:16; Ecc 2:15; Ecc 12:9). That the Rabbins attribute it to Isaiah or Hezekiah is explicable by supposing that one or the other inserted it in the canon. The difference of its style, as compared with Proverbs and Song of Solomon, is due to the difference of subjects, and the different period of his life in which each was written; the Song, in the fervor of his first love to God; Proverbs, about the same time, or somewhat later; but Ecclesiastes in late old age, as the seal and testimony of repentance of his apostasy in the intervening period: Psa 89:30, Psa 89:33 proves his penitence. The substitution of the title Koheleth for Solomon (that is, peace), may imply that, having troubled Israel, meantime he forfeited his name of peace (1Ki 11:14, 1Ki 11:23); but now, having repented, he wishes to be henceforth a Preacher of righteousness. The alleged foreign expressions in the Hebrew may have been easily imported, through the great intercourse there was with other nations during his long reign. Moreover, supposed Chaldaisms may be fragments preserved from the common tongue of which Hebrew, Syriac, Chaldee, and Arabic were offshoots.

THE SCOPE of Ecclesiastes is to show the vanity of all mere human pursuits, when made the chief end, as contrasted with the real blessedness of true wisdom, that is, religion. The immortality of the soul is dwelt on incidentally, as subsidiary to the main scope. Moses' law took this truth for granted but drew its sanctions of rewards and punishments in accordance with the theocracy, which was under a special providence of God as the temporal King of Israel, from the present life, rather than the future. But after Israel chose an earthly king, God withdrew, in part, His extraordinary providence, so that under Solomon, temporal rewards did not invariably follow virtue, and punishments vice (compare Ecc 2:16; Ecc 3:19; Ecc 4:1; Ecc 5:8; Ecc 7:15; Ecc 8:14; Ecc 9:2, Ecc 9:11). Hence the need arises to show that these anomalies will be rectified hereafter, and this is the grand "conclusion," therefore, of the "whole" book, that, seeing there is a coming judgment, and seeing that present goods do not satisfy the soul, "man's whole duty is to fear God and keep his commandments" (Ecc 12:13-14), and meanwhile, to use, in joyful and serene sobriety, and not abuse, the present life (Ecc 3:12-13).

It is objected that sensual epicurism seems to be inculcated (Ecc 3:12-13, Ecc 3:22, &c.); but it is a contented, thankful enjoyment of God's present gifts that is taught, as opposed to a murmuring, anxious, avaricious spirit, as is proved by Ecc 5:18, compare with Ecc 5:11-15, not making them the chief end of life; not the joy of levity and folly; a misunderstanding which he guards against in Ecc 7:2-6; Ecc 11:9; Ecc 12:1. Again, Ecc 7:16; Ecc 9:2-10, might seem to teach fatalism and skepticism. But these are words put in the mouth of an objector; or rather, they were the language of Solomon himself during his apostasy, finding an echo in the heart of every sensualist, who wishes to be an unbeliever, and, who, therefore, sees difficulties enough in the world around wherewith to prop up his wilful unbelief. The answer is given (Ecc 7:17-18; Ecc 9:11-12; Ecc 11:1, Ecc 11:6; Ecc 12:13). Even if these passages be taken as words of Solomon, they are to be understood as forbidding a self-made "righteousness," which tries to constrain God to grant salvation to imaginary good works and external strictness with which it wearies itself; also, that speculation which tries to fathom all God's inscrutable counsels (Ecc 8:17), and that carefulness about the future forbidden in Mat 6:25.

THE CHIEF GOOD is that the possession of that which makes us happy, is to be sought as the end, for its own sake; whereas, all other things are but means towards it. Philosophers, who made it the great subject of inquiry, restricted it to the present life, treating the eternal as unreal, and only useful to awe the multitude with. But Solomon shows the vanity of all human things (so-called philosophy included) to satisfy the soul, and that heavenly wisdom alone is the chief good. He had taught so when young (Pro 1:20; Pro 8:1); so also; in Song of Solomon, he had spiritualized the subject in an allegory; and now, after having long personally tried the manifold ways in which the worldly seek to reach happiness, he gives the fruit of his experience in old age.

It is divided into two parts-- Ecc. 1:1-6:10 showing the vanity of earthly things; Ecc. 6:10-12:14, the excellence of heavenly wisdom. Deviations from strict logical methods occur in these divisions, but in the main they are observed. The deviations make it the less stiff and artificial, and the more suited to all capacities. It is in poetry; the hemistichal division is mostly observed, but occasionally not so. The choice of epithets, imagery, inverted order of words, ellipses, parallelism, or, in its absence, similarity of diction, mark versification.

JFB: Ecclesiastes (Garis Besar)

• INTRODUCTION. (Ecc. 1:1-18)

TSK: Ecclesiastes 12 (Pendahuluan Pasal)

Overview

Ecc 12:1, The Creator is to be remembered in due time; Ecc 12:8, The preacher’s care to edify; Ecc 12:13, The fear of God is the chief antidote of vanity.

Poole: Ecclesiastes 12 (Pendahuluan Pasal)

CHAPTER 12

Early piety recommended before old age come on and death be near: old age described, and death, Ecc 12:1-7 . The conclusion: all is vanity, Ecc 12:8 . The preacher’ s end in this book, Ecc 12:9-12 . The sum of all learning, experience, and happiness is to fear God, and keep his commandments, because God will bring all to judgment, Ecc 12:13,14 .

MHCC: Ecclesiastes (Pendahuluan Kitab)

The name of this book signifies " The Preacher." The wisdom of God here preaches to us, speaking by Solomon, who it is evident was the author. At the close of his life, being made sensible of his sin and folly, he recorded here his experience for the benefit of others, as the book of his repentance; and he pronounced all earthly good to be " vanity and vexation of spirit." It convinces us of the vanity of the world, and that it cannot make us happy; of the vileness of sin, and its certain tendency to make us miserable. It shows that no created good can satisfy the soul, and that happiness is to be found in God alone; and this doctrine must, under the blessed Spirit's teaching, lead the heart to Christ Jesus.

MHCC: Ecclesiastes 12 (Pendahuluan Pasal)

(Ecc 12:1-7) A description of the infirmities of age.

(Ecc 12:8-14) All is vanity: also a warning of the judgment to come.

Matthew Henry: Ecclesiastes (Pendahuluan Kitab)

An Exposition, with Practical Observations, of The Book of Ecclesiastes

We are still among Solomon's happy men, his happy servants, that stood continually before him to hear his wisdom; and they are the choicest of all the dictates of his wisdom, such as were more immediately given by divine inspiration, that are here transmitted to us, not to be heard, as by them, but once, and then liable to be mistaken or forgotten, and by repetition to lose their beauty, but to be read, reviewed, revolved, and had in everlasting remembrance. The account we have of Solomon's apostasy from God, in the latter end of his reign (1Ki 11:1), is the tragical part of his story; we may suppose that he spoke his Proverbs in the prime of his time, while he kept his integrity, but delivered his Ecclesiastes when he had grown old (for of the burdens and decays of age he speaks feelingly Ecc 12:1-14), and was, by the grace of God, recovered from his backslidings. There he dictated his observations; here he wrote his own experiences; this is what days speak, and wisdom which the multitude of years teaches. The title of the book and the penman we shall meet with in the first verse, and therefore shall here only observe,

I. That it is a sermon, a sermon in print; the text is (Ecc 1:2), Vanity of vanities, all is vanity; that is the doctrine too; it is proved at large by many arguments and an induction of particulars, and divers objections are answered, and in the close we have the use and application of all, by way of exhortation, to remember our Creator, to fear him, and to keep his commandments. There are indeed many things in this book which are dark and hard to be understood, and some things which men of corrupt minds wrest to their own destruction, for want of distinguishing between Solomon's arguments and the objections of atheists and epicures; but there is enough easy and plain to convince us (if we will admit the conviction) of the vanity of the world, and its utter insufficiency to make us happy, the vileness of sin, and its certain tendency to make us miserable, and of the wisdom of being religious, and the solid comfort and satisfaction that are to be had in doing our duty both to God and man. This should be intended in every sermon, and that is a good sermon by which these points are in any measure gained. II. That it is a penitential sermon, as some of David's psalms are penitential psalms; it is a recantation-sermon, in which the preacher sadly laments his own folly and mistake, in promising himself satisfaction in the things of this world, and even in the forbidden pleasures of sense, which now he finds more bitter than death. His fall is a proof of the weakness of man's nature: Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, nor say, " I shall never be such a fool as to do so and so," when Solomon himself, the wisest of men, played the fool so egregiously; nor let the rich man glory in his riches, since Solomon's wealth was so great a snare to him, and did him a great deal more hurt than Job's poverty did him. His recovery is a proof of the power of God's grace, in bringing one back to God that has gone so far from him; it is a proof too of the riches of God's mercy in accepting him notwithstanding the many aggravations of his sin, pursuant to the promise made to David, that if his children should commit iniquity they should be corrected, but not abandoned and disinherited, 2Sa 7:14, 2Sa 7:15. Let him therefore that thinks he stands take heed lest he fall; and let him that has fallen make haste to get up again, and not despair either of assistance or acceptance therein. III. That it is a practical profitable sermon. Solomon, being brought to repentance, resolves, like his father, to teach transgressors God's way (Psa 51:13) and to give warning to all to take heed of splitting upon those rocks which had been fatal to him; and these were fruits meet for repentance. The fundamental error of the children of men, and that which is at the bottom of all their departures from God, is the same with that of our first parents, hoping to be as gods by entertaining themselves with that which seems good for food, pleasant to the eyes, and desirable to make one wise. Now the scope of this book is to show that this is a great mistake, that our happiness consists not in being as gods to ourselves, to have what we will and do what we will, but in having him that made us to be a God to us. The moral philosophers disputed much about man's felicity, or chief good. Various opinions they had about it; but Solomon, in this book, determines the question, and assures us that to fear God and to keep his commandments is the whole of man. He tried what satisfaction might be found in the wealth of the world and the pleasures of sense, and at last pronounced all vanity and vexation; yet multitudes will not take his word, but will make the same dangerous experiment, and it proves fatal to them. He, 1. Shows the vanity of those things in which men commonly look for happiness, as human learning and policy, sensual delight, honour and power, riches and great possessions. And then, 2. He prescribes remedies against the vexation of spirit that attends them. Though we cannot cure them of their vanity, we may prevent the trouble they give us, by sitting loose to them, enjoying them comfortable, but laying our expectations low from them, and acquiescing in the will of God concerning us in every event, especially by remembering God in the days of our youth, and continuing in his fear and service all our days, with an eye to the judgment to come.

Matthew Henry: Ecclesiastes 12 (Pendahuluan Pasal)

The wise and penitent preacher is here closing his sermon; and he closes it, not only lie a good orator, but like a good preacher, with that which was likely to make the best impressions and which he wished might be powerful and lasting upon his hearers. Here is, I. An exhortation to young people to begin betimes to be religious and not to put it off to old age (Ecc 12:1), enforced with arguments taken from the calamities of old age (Ecc 12:1-5). and the great change that death will make upon us (Ecc 12:6, Ecc 12:7). II. A repetition of the great truth he had undertaken to prove in this discourse, the vanity of the world (Ecc 12:8). III. A confirmation and recommendation of what he had written in this and his other books, as worthy to be duly weighed and concluded, with a charge to all to be truly religious, in consideration of the judgment to come (Ecc 12:13, Ecc 12:14).

Constable: Ecclesiastes (Pendahuluan Kitab)

Introduction

Title

The title of this book in the Hebrew text is all of verse 1. The Septuagint translation (third century B.C.) gave it the name "Ekklesiastes" from which the English title is a transliteration. This word is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word qohelet that the NASB translated "Preacher" in verse 1. The Hebrew word designates a leader who speaks before an assembly of people. The NIV translation "Teacher" is also a good one.

Writer and Date

The commentators sometimes treat the Hebrew word qohelet ("Preacher"; 1:1-2, 12; 7:27; 12:8-10) as a proper name.¹ However the fact that the article is present on the Hebrew word in 12:8, and perhaps in 7:27, seems to indicate that qohelet is a title: "the preacher" or "the teacher."

Internal references point to Solomon as this preacher (cf. 1:1, 12-2:26; 2:4-9; 12:9). Both Jewish and Christian interpreters believed Solomon was the writer until the eighteenth century. With the rise of literary and historical Bible criticism a widespread rejection of Solomonic authorship set in. Rejection of Solomonic authorship rests mainly on linguistic factors (vocabulary and syntax) that some scholars feel were more characteristic of a time much later than Solomon's, namely, about 450-250 B.C.² Conservative scholars have refuted this linguistic argument.³ Several more or less conservative scholars have rejected Solomonic authorship.⁴ Yet there is no information in the Bible that would eliminate Solomon as the writer.

Assuming that Solomon wrote the book in its entirety, he must have done so during his lifetime and probably during his reign (971-931 B.C.). It has seemed probable to some expositors that he may have written Song of Solomon in his youth, Proverbs in his middle life, and Ecclesiastes in his old age (cf. 2:1-11; 11:9; 12:1). This theory rests on the contents of the three inspired Bible books that he evidently wrote, specifically clues in these books about the age of their writer.

"Ecclesiastes is best placed after his apostasy, when both his recent turmoil and repentance were still fresh in his mind."⁵

Purpose

This book helps the reader develop a God-centered worldview and recognize the dangers of a self-centered worldview. It does not describe the life of faith or teach what the responsibilities of faith in God are. It also prescribes the limits of human philosophy (cf. 3:11; 8:16-17). The book teaches that people are accountable to God and that we should avoid self-indulgence that leads to the exploitation of others for selfish gain.

"Christians may ask how the stress on using and enjoying life tallies with the NT command Do not love the world' (1 John 2:15). The answer is that the Teacher (Ecclesiastes) would have agreed fully with John's next statement that everything in the world--the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does--comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away' (vv. 16-17). One could hardly find a better statement than this of the whole theme of Ecclesiastes (e.g., 2:1-11; 5:10). Life in the world has significance only when man remembers his Creator (12:1).

"There always have been two kinds of teaching about the way to holiness. One is by withdrawal as far as possible from the natural in order to promote the spiritual. The other is to use and transform the natural into the expression of the spiritual. While each kind of teaching has its place, some people need one emphasis rather than the other. Ecclesiastes definitely teaches the second."⁶

"Ecclesiastes does not pretend to preach the Gospel. Rather, it encourages the reader to a God-centered worldview rather than falling victim to frustrations and unanswered questions. None of its contents has to be rejected in the light of the NT. Although the NT revelation is vastly greater than that in Ecclesiastes, the two are not devoid of similarities (e.g., James 4:13-17). Like the people of God in Solomon's time, believers today are subject to the unexpected changes and chances common to mankind. Yet they know that God works through every vicissitude of life. Respecting the future, which for Solomon was shrouded in a shadow land, Christians have the glorious hope of being in the presence of Christ himself (2 Cor 5:6; Phil 1:23)."⁷

Message⁸

I believe that the message of Ecclesiastes is essentially a positive one. This may seem strange since the vanity of various human endeavors is such a major theme of this book. Nevertheless the total statement that Solomon made was positive.

He was saying, I believe, that even though every human endeavor lacks ultimate value, we should live life in the fear of God (i.e., with the proper recognition of Him). Furthermore we should enjoy life maximally as a gift from God. Ecclesiastes 12:13 is very similar to Proverbs 1:7 and 3:5-6. In both these books, as well as in Job, the fear of God is the prerequisite for successful living here and now.

The difference between Ecclesiastes and Proverbs is that in Ecclesiastes the emphasis is on the inability of every human endeavor to provide ultimate value. In Proverbs the emphasis is on the comparative value of living in the fear of God.

Solomon's attitude is very important for us to grasp to understand this book. He never lost sight of God's existence. He was not an atheist or even an apostate. The fact that Solomon kept God in view throughout the book enabled him to see that all is vanity under the sun. The person who disregards God does not say that. For him what is under the sun is all that is meaningful.

I do not believe Solomon did everything he said he did in rebellion against God. Some things were acts of disobedience, but many other things were experiments in living designed to discover the relative value of various experiences.

The major revelations of the book are three.

First, Ecclesiastes reveals that every human endeavor lacks ultimate value. All is vanity in that sense.

Solomon stated this thesis in 1:2.

Then Solomon supported his thesis with examples he took from nature (1:3-11).

Next Solomon appealed to various human achievements to apply his thesis. He did this first by citing his own personal experiments and observations on this subject (1:12-2:17). Then he referred to facts observable by all people that confirm the same conclusion (2:18-6:9).

Solomon next showed that every human endeavor lacks ultimate value by reminding us of the limits of human wisdom (6:10-11:6). He supported these assertions also with empirical evidence (what people experience generally in life). God's will will indeed happen. However man does not know God's plan fully. Therefore man does not know exactly what will happen.

The second major revelation of this book is that people should live life in the fear of God and enjoy life as much as they can. This is really Solomon's practical conclusion to the truthfulness of the thesis that he proved in 1:3-11:6.

Since death is coming we should enjoy life now, not in disregard for God, but in the fear of God (11:7-8).

We should enjoy life in our youth while at the same time remembering that God will judge our lives (11:9-10). Moreover we should behave responsibly in our youth since old age is coming (12:1-7).

The third major revelation of the book is its statement of what true wisdom is (12:13). God intends people to rejoice, but to remember God and to live with recognition of Him (cf. Prov. 3:5-6). Failing to fear God will result in a life of vanity. To fear God and live in harmony with His will will result in a life of fullness.

Let me point out some implications of the teaching of this book.

Conviction results in conduct that produces character. That is a basic reality of life regardless of what one's convictions may be. When we have a conviction that God exists and we live under His loving authority, our conduct will be obedience to His will. Furthermore responsibility and joy will mark our character. However if we believe that God either does not exist or is not worth consideration, our conduct will be disregard of His will, and vanity will mark our character.

To dethrone God is to lose the key to life. We may pursue many human endeavors, but all we will find is vanity, lack of ultimate fulfillment. On the other hand if we enthrone God we will enter into the fullness of life (John 17:3; Ps. 16:11).

Outline⁹

I. The introductory affirmation 1:1-11

A. Title and theme 1:1-2

1. The title 1:1

2. The theme 1:2

B. The futility of all human endeavor 1:3-11

1. The vanity of work 1:3

2. The illustrations from life 1:4-11

II. The futility of work 1:12-6:9

A. Personal observations 1:12-2:17

1. Solomon's investigation of human achievement 1:12-15

2. Solomon's evaluation of his investigation of human achievement 1:16-18

3. Solomon's investigation of pleasure 2:1-11

4. Solomon's evaluation of his investigation of pleasure 2:12-17

B. General observations 2:18-6:9

1. The outcome of labor 2:18-26

2. Labor and divine providence 3:1-4:3

3. The motivations of labor 4:4-16

4. The perishable fruits of labor 5:1-6:9

III. The limitations of wisdom 6:10-11:6

A. God's sovereign foreordination of all things 6:10-12

B. God's inscrutable plan chs. 7-8

1. Adversity and prosperity 7:1-14

2. Righteousness and wickedness 7:15-27

3. The value and limitations of wisdom ch. 8

C. Man's ignorance of the future 9:1-11:6

1. The future of the righteous on earth 9:1-10

2. The future of the wise on earth 9:11-10:11

3. The folly of criticism in view of the uncertain future 10:12-20

4. Wise behavior in view of the uncertain future 11:1-6

IV. The way of wisdom 11:7-12:14

A. Joyous and responsible living 11:7-12:7

1. Joyful living 11:7-10

2. Responsible living 12:1-7

B. The concluding summary 12:8-14

Constable: Ecclesiastes

Ecclesiastes

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Ginsburg, Christian D. Song of Songs and Coheleth. Reprint ed., New York: KTAV Publishing House, 1970.

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Good, Edwin M. "The Unfilled Sea: Style and Meaning in Ecclesiastes 1:2-11." In Israelite Wisdom: Theological and Literary Essays in Honor of Samuel Terrien, pp. 59-73. Edited by John G. Gammie, Walter A. Brueggemann, W. Lee Humphryes, and James M. Ward. New York: Union Theological Seminary, 1978.

Gordis, Robert. Koheleth--The Man and His World. Schocken Paperbacks on Jewish Life and Religion series. 1951; 3rd ed., New York: Schocken Books, 1968.

Gray, George Buchanan. The Forms of Hebrew Poetry. Library of Biblical Studies series. 1915; reprint ed. New York: KTAV Publishing House, 1972.

Haden, N. Karl. "Qoheleth and the Problem of Alienation." Christian Scholar's Review 17:1 (1987):52-66.

Hengstenberg, Ernest W. A Commentary on Ecclesiastes. 1869; reprint ed., Minneapolis: Klock and Klock Christian Publishing Co., 1977.

Holm-Nielsen, Svend. "The Book of Ecclesiastes and the Interpretation of It in Jewish and Christian Theology." Annual of the Swedish Theological Institute 10 (1976):38-96.

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_____. "Integrating Wisdom Theology into Old Testament Theology: Ecclesiastes 3:10-15." In A Tribute to Gleason Archer, pp. 197-209. Edited by Walter C. Kaiser Jr. and Ronald F. Youngblood. Chicago: Moody Press, 1986.

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_____. "Qoheleth the Immoralist? (Qoh 7:16-17). In Israelite Wisdom: Theological and Literary Essays in Honor of Samuel Terrien, pp. 191-204. Edited by John G. Gammie, Walter A. Brueggemann, W. Lee Humphreys, and James M. Ward. New York: Union Theological Seminary, 1978.

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Copyright 2003 by Thomas L. Constable

Haydock: Ecclesiastes (Pendahuluan Kitab)

ECCLESIASTES.

INTRODUCTION.

This Book is called Ecclesiastes, or the preacher, (in Hebrew, Coheleth ) because in it Solomon, as an excellent preacher, setteth forth the vanity of the things of this world, to withdraw the hearts and affections of men from such empty toys. (Challoner) --- Coheleth is a feminine noun, to indicate the elegance of the discourse. It is very difficult to discriminate the objections of free-thinkers from the real sentiments of the author. It is most generally supposed that Solomon wrote this after his repentance; but this is very uncertain. St. Jerome (in chap. xii. 12.) informs us that the collectors of the sacred books had some scruple about admitting this; and Luther speaks of it with great disrespect: (Coll. conviv.) but the Church has always maintained its authority. See Conc. v. Act. 4. Philast. 132. (Calmet) --- It refutes the false notions of worldlings, concerning felicity; and shews that it consists in the service of God and fruition. (Worthington)

Gill: Ecclesiastes (Pendahuluan Kitab)

INTRODUCTION TO ECCLESIASTES

This book has been universally received into the canon of the Scriptures, by Jews and Christians. The former, indeed, had once some controversy ^a about it; and they thought to have hid it, or put it among the apocryphal books; because, at first sight, some things seemed contradictory to each other ^b, and to incline to heresy ^c, atheism, and epicurism, and to assert the eternity of the world ^d: but they better considered of it; and when they observed those passages were capable of a good sense, and that the whole agreed with the law of God, they changed their minds ^e. And so likewise it has been rejected by some heretical persons, of the Christian name, as Theodore and Mopsuest, and others; and by deists, and some deistically inclined. But it carries in it such internal evidences of a divine original, as cannot well be denied; it delivers out and inculcates such divine instructions, concerning the duties of men to God, and one another; concerning the contempt of the world, and the carnal pleasures of it; the fear and worship of God, and a future judgment; as none but the wisdom of God could suggest. There are various things in it which seem to be referred to by Christ and his apostles; at least there is an entire agreement between them: among the many things that might be observed, compare Ecc 11:5 with Joh 3:8; and Ecc 11:9 with 2Co 5:10; and Ecc 7:20 with 1Jo 1:8. As to the author of it, there are evident marks of its being written by Solomon; yet, by some Jewish writers, it is ascribed to Isaiah ^f, which seems exceeding strange; for though he was a great prophet, and an evangelical preacher, yet no king in Jerusalem; whatever may be said for his being of the house of David, and of the royal family, as some have thought: and, besides, there is no agreement in style between this book and the writings of Isaiah. Others of them ascribe it to Hezekiah and his men ^g: Hezekiah was indeed the son of David, and David in expressly called his father; and he was a prince of great character, both with respect to religion, and to wealth and grandeur; see 2Ch 29:2; which might induce them to such a conceit; though it seems to take its rise from Hezekiah's men being the copiers of some of Solomon's proverbs, Pro 25:1; but the proof from thence must be exceeding weak; that because they were the transcribers of some of his proverbs, therefore were the writers of this book; and especially King Hezekiah; for, whatever may be said of his character, it falls greatly short of Solomon's wisdom or riches; and such things are said, with for respect to both, in this book, as cannot agree with him: and, on the other hand, it does not appear that he was addicted to wine and women, and gave himself a loose to carnal pleasures, as the writer of this book had formerly done. Grotius thinks it was written by some persons in the times of Zerubbabel, and published under the name of Solomon, as a penitent; which is quite shocking, that an inspired writing should have a false title put to it, and be imposed upon the church of God under a wrong name: besides, the name of Solomon is never mentioned in it; though this, by the way, betrays a conviction that he is intended in the title of it: nor are many persons concerned in it; it appears throughout the whole to be the work of a single person, who often speaks as such in it. That Zerubbabel should be meant by the one shepherd, Ecc 12:11, is a mere fancy; it is better interpreted, as by many, of Jesus Christ: his chief argument for this conjecture is, because there are three or four Chaldee words in it, as he supposes; which yet does not appear, and are nowhere to be found but in Daniel, Ezra, and the Chaldee interpreter: and so there are in the book of Proverbs, Pro 31:2; but it does not follow, that because these words, or others, are but once used in Scripture, that they are not originally Hebrew; since the language was more extensive and better understood in Solomon's time than now, when we have only the copy of the Old Testament in which it is preserved. In short, what is said of the descent and dignity of the writer of this book, of his wisdom, wealth, riches, and grandeur, of his virtues and of his vices, agrees with none as with Solomon; to which may be added, that there is one passage in it, the same he used in his prayer at the dedication of the temple, Ecc 7:20; compared with 1Ki 8:46. As to the time in which it was written by him, it seems to have been in his old age, as the Jewish writers observe ^h; after his sin and fall, and recovery out of it, and when he was brought to true repentance for it: it was after he had made him great works, and built houses, his own house and the house of God, which were twenty years in building; it was after he had acquired not only vast riches and treasures, which must require time, but had gotten knowledge of all things in nature; and had seen all the works that are done under the sun, and had made trial of all pleasures that were to be enjoyed; see Ecc 1:1; it was after he had been ensnared by women, which he confesses and laments, Ecc 7:26; and his description of old age seems to be made, not merely upon the theory of it, but from a feeling experience of the evils and infirmities of it, Ecc 12:1. The general scope and design of it is to expose the vanity of all worldly enjoyments; to show that a man's happiness does not lie in natural wisdom and knowledge; nor in worldly wealth; nor in civil honour, power, and authority; nor in the mere externals of religion; but in the fear of God, and the worship of him. It encourages men to a free use of the good things of life in a moderate way, with thankfulness to God; to submit with cheerfulness to adverse dispensations of Providence; to fear God and honour the king; to be dutiful to civil magistrates, and kind to the poor; to expect a future state, and an awful judgment; with many other useful things.

Gill: Ecclesiastes 12 (Pendahuluan Pasal)

INTRODUCTION TO ECCLESIASTES 12

This chapter begins with advice to young men, which is continued from the preceding; and particularly to remember their Creator in the days of their youth; enforced from the consideration of the troubles and inconveniences of old age, Ecc 12:1; which, in an allegorical way, is beautifully described, Ecc 12:2; and from the certainty of death, when it would be too late, Ecc 12:7. And then the wise man returns to his first proposition, and which he kept in view all along, that all is vanity in youth or old age, Ecc 12:8; and recommends the reading of this book, from the diligence, pains and labour, he used in composing it; from the sententious matter in it; from the agreeable, acceptable, and well chosen words, in which he had expressed it; and from the wisdom, uprightness, truth, efficacy, and authority of the doctrines of it, Ecc 12:9; and from its preference to other books, which were wearisome both to author and reader, Ecc 12:12. And it is concluded with the scope and design, the sum and substance of the whole of it, reducible to these two heads; the fear of God, and obedience to him, Ecc 12:13; and which are urged from the consideration of a future judgment, into which all things shall be brought, Ecc 12:14.