Life under the sun

Maybe one way of looking at Ecclesiastes is that Solomon is painting a picture of fallen life in a fallen world, that is, life "under the sun".

Not only are human beings fallen, but the whole of creation is fallen. For example, Eccl 3:20 seems to reflect Gen 3:19. We're but dust returning to dust. We live fallen lives in a fallen world. Like nuclear radiation from Chernobyl, the fallout from the fall contaminates the whole world.

Likewise hebel could mean several different things among which is, of course, breath. The brevity of breath. God breathed life into us. We who are earthen vessels. Animated clay. But this "breath" of life - our lives - will expire as quickly as it's inspired. Breathe in, breathe out, and it's all over.

Ecclesiastes is a picture of humans "groaning" (as Paul would put it) along with the whole of creation. Groaning over how fleeting everything is. Groaning over how toilsome our labors are. Groaning over our cryptic, Sphinx-like world. Groaning over the futility of life. And so on and so forth.

This groaning arguably points to a longing in the human heart. A longing for eternity, which God himself has placed in our hearts (Eccl 3:11). A longing for life "under the sun" to end. A longing for something better that doesn't wear down or wear out but lasts forever. Something which this world can't fulfill. Only the world to come (eternity) can satisfy.

As an aside, I've always appreciated Ecclesiastes for its realism. It doesn't pull punches. It tells it like it is. It's the antidote to Hallmark card Christianity.

Chasing a mirage

The word [hebel] normally refers to warm air, briefly visible as water molecules contained in it condense when it cools. A larger body of warm air, such as mist, can remain visible for a longer time. It is a visual metaphor. Mist appears to be more substantial than it is (ephemerality), soon disappears (transience) and hides objects behind it, obscuring reality from view (illusoriness). All of these aspects of mist are especially prominent in the metaphorical use of the word hebel: its usage to describe the optical phenomenon of "mirages". The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary defines mirages as "an optical illusion caused by atmospheric conditions through the refraction of light in hot air", giving the following example: "the false appearance of a distant sheet of water in a desert". Figuratively, the word "mirage" can also mean "an illusion, a fantasy". The majority of the occurrences of the word hebel in the OT carry the meaning of "mirage", referring either to an optical illusion or to an illusion in general. In Ecclesiastes, all occurrences of the word hebel refer to an illusion. Knut Martin Heim, Ecclesiastes: An Introduction and Commentary (IVP 2019), Introduction, §5. 

As a native of the Middle East, the narrator and his audience would be familiar with mirages. This doesn't mean the narrator regards the world as illusory, like Eastern philosophy. But a mirage has a twofold effect; on the one hand an observer can't see the reality beyond the mirage. He can't see around or through the mirage. Although there's an objective reality on the other side of the mirage, the optics block the view so that an observer can't see what lies behind it. On the other hand, what the observer does see is unreal. The mirage is an optical illusion. So what can be seen is unreal while what is real can't be seen. That's the paradox. 

Assuming the narrator is exploiting the full connotations of the metaphor, our experience of the world is illusory in some degree. Things are not always as they seem. Appearances are deceptive. What we perceive is superficial and sometimes misleading. But it remains enigmatic because we're in no position to compare it to the underlying reality. An attentive observer like the narrator will discern that something is off, something doesn't make sense, but he lacks the God's-eye viewpoint to discern the correct explanation. There's a larger reality over and above sublunary events, but providence can be baffling. Everything happens according to a master plan, but it remains largely hidden from human view. Only divine revelation can dispel the mirage. Enough of the plan surfaces from time to time to disclose a plan, but too much stays out of sight to figure out the whole or the goal.  

The outlook of Ecclesiastes reflects the narrator's historical position in progressive revelation. I still think Solomon is the best candidate for authorship (a position recently defended by John Currid in his commentary). Christians know more about God's plan than OT sages like Solomon. But it's a matter of degree. Even for Christians, the way we experience the world is still filtered through a mirage. We can't remove the screen. We must use the map of Scripture rather than our own eyesight and insight to find our way through the desert to the eternal oasis. Unbelievers chase the illusory oasis until they die of thirst, lost in the labyrinth of the sand dunes. 

This too shall pass

"...What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes." (Jas 4:14)

What is your life?

Is your life a sterling success? Remember your life is a mere breath. There may be a heart-racing pause between air inhaled and air exhaled. An exciting if brief span of time when the atmosphere of the party revolves around you. Indeed, when your life is in the stratosphere. However, breath will expire, and your spirit with it. All you are, all you have, shall fade and diminish as life draws to a close. You cannot bring your social status or worldly goods into death with you. Who remembers Ozymandias? Rather remember your Maker. The one who gives and the one who takes away. The one who enrichens and the one who impoverishes. The one who elevates and the one who humbles. Your life is too short to be wasted on success. However dazzling its accoutrements, they shall fizzle away, recede to nothingness, when you turn to dust and ashes and stand naked in the light of eternity.

Is your life a disappointment and a failure? Do you despair over the foolish and even sinful decisions you've made? Is your life one unmitigated disaster after another? Do even the lowly look on you in disgust? Have close friends and beloved family lost faith in you, are unsure what to think about you, or have altogether left you? Do you have nothing? Are you no one? Remember God, for he remembers you, even if no one else does, even if your own mother has forgotten you. Turn to him, your refuge, your true life. The good news is life is a vapor, it too shall soon end; and this life isn't all there is. So much more and so much better awaits you in the world to come if only you cling to Christ. Where else will you go? Where else can you go? There is no solace in the wilderness. There is no life in the desert. There is only one who has the words of eternal life.

Is your life a middling mediocrity? Remember your life is a mist. It has some form, it has some substance, it has some function, but it is entirely fleeting. Like smoke from a cigar. It might taste pleasant enough, smoke rings look cool, but smoke dissipates. One day may bring wealth and prosperity, but the next bring doom and gloom. Or vice versa. Nothing is guaranteed in life. Not even life itself. The young may be suddenly plucked from this life like a flower in full bloom. The old may wither in sadness or harden in bitterness. Those in the middle grow old, grow old, and wear the bottoms of their trousers rolled. They were never meant to play Hamlet. Perhaps at best start a scene or two. Men won't remember their lives nor deeds, but labor in God's vineyard is never wasted. After all, God's eyes saw our unformed substance. God wrote in his book every single day formed for his children before any of them had ever come to be. Like a man in love preparing a beautiful picnic for his beloved, God has planned and prepared each day for us before we ever arrived on the scene. And each of these days, lived for him, will echo in eternity, even if they appear insignificant to the blind eyes of this world. Why trust what the blind say about that which they cannot see? Yet in God's light do we see light.

Take a deep breath in, breathe out, and the breath is gone. Life is hebel.

Life goes on

Back when I was around 35, we moved into the neighborhood where I now live. It was a fairly large old wood-frame house, built in the 1880s, near a creek, but far enough back from the creek that we wouldn’t be bothered by flooding. It was on a street that had just recently been an old dirt road; it was paved, I think, because over time, it ended up becoming a kind of shortcut between one place and another.

Our house was one of several old family homes that had been built when the area was a coal mining area (the mines are long closed off), and the families had owned the homes for at least a couple of generations, if not more.

Not our immediate neighbors, but in the second house down from us was one of those families that had owned not only a house (vintage 1880) but a very large piece of property that they had put to very good use. Probably an acre or two (along this creek), it was relatively level, and they had grown huge gardens (as I understand it) in the past, but in more recent years, they had just let it be “the field”. It was a nice grassy level area where the kids could and did play football and softball and a lot of other things that kids do.

The family was Italian. The father, who may have been a low-level criminal and owner of the property, had died some time before we moved in. The mother, Mary, was getting on in years, and so she sold the house to her daughter Susie and son-in-law Danny, with the understanding that she would always have a place to live.

Even though theirs was an old house, it was well-cared for. Susie’s older sister, Kathy, recently divorced at the time, had two young children. She spent most of her time at this house. She was probably the primary care giver for the mother, Mary.

Danny and Susie had two young sons of their own, probably around the same ages as my two older boys (my oldest son was aged seven, and in the middle of those two). I had three kids when we moved into the neighborhood. It was the first house we lived in.

There was a long driveway along the upstream the side of the house (the field was downstream). From where we lived, we could easily see a covered pavilion at the end of this driveway, and next to it, immediately behind the house, was a beautiful in-ground pool.

My wife, Beth, being the woman with the anger problem that she was, got into a tussle with Kathy about the kids soon after we moved in. But not long after that, she noticed the pavilion, and the nice homey set-up with the tables and chairs under it, and the fire pit nearby, and of course the opportunities for swimming during the days, and the socializing in the evenings, and they quickly became best friends.

Kathy and Susie had a couple of other sisters, including Donna, who turned out to be the oldest, and Bev, who lived in a small brick house just up the hill behind the pool. They had a brother, Dickie, too, who had long had kidney problems (from an abusive situation from the father). He had had a kidney transplant at one point. And my wife, in fact, was soon adopted as one of the sisters.

The pavilion and the pool were a way of life. There was always good food, and lots of beer. Kathy took care of Mary. Susie and Donna worked just up the hill at the Bettis plant (in low-level administrative positions); Danny and Dickie worked construction job for the same company, and we all got together frequently in the evenings.

In 1995, Beth and Bev were both pregnant … Beth with our 4th son, John, and Bev with her first son, Joe. In fact, Beth was pregnant when we moved there. These were the best years of Beth’s life. Our kids were small, they played nicely together, and I worked at home and made a good income. When we first moved there, I had a pretty good job as an advertising manager for a fairly large national company; later I quit that job and started a small business as sort of a one-man ad agency.

We all had big yards where the kids could run and play and go swimming during the summer vacations. I owned a Mac computer, and video games were just then starting to come to personal computers. (I played a little “indy” game called Escape Velocity; later I played Dust and Titanic, for hours on end).

Things have moved on a bit. We had to move out of the upstream house in 1997, but we were able to move into a small brick house, downstream (where I still live. We’ve had three floods here over the years). But things never were the same as they were from that 1995-1997 period.

There was 9/11/2001, which “changed everything”. Mary died in 2003, when my wife was in the Army in Iraq. Danny had a drinking problem, not really evident during our socializing years, but over time it came to the surface. He and Susie had some financial troubles as a result, and they divorced. Susie declared bankruptcy and moved out. Danny never was able to recover from his drinking problem, and the related ills it caused in his life, and he shot himself in the heart about a year ago, maybe two. Dickie and his wife have both passed away in the meantime.

Last night, I was at a funeral home, and I saw all the girls for the first time in a while. Donna had passed away, having fallen and broken her femur a year earlier. She was 66. Her husband Tom has been suffering for years from a serious dementia. Recently, he didn’t even know who Donna was. (He is having some good care). Donna was stubborn, they say. She “just gave up”; she never walked after breaking her leg, and she passed away quietly at the hospital, after having some seizures.

My wife, as many may know, suffered leukemia in 2011; she had a bone marrow transplant in December of that year, which healed her from the leukemia, but she died in 2015. All the kids are grown and, except for my youngest, who is 14 (and named after Danny – we call her Dani), are in their 20s. Some married, some didn’t.

Back in the day, Donna had been the wealthy sister – she had no kids, and she and her husband Tom both worked. Kathy, the divorcee, was destitute. Last night, it was evident that Donna’s life was the tragic one. Kathy met a guy, Bill, and the two of them have been traveling and on cruises in recent years.

Interestingly, Hawk just posted a piece on Schreiner’s take on Ecclesiastes.

The Preacher advises, "There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God, for apart from him who can eat or who can have enjoyment?" (2:24–25). The Preacher is not counseling readers here to live an unrestrained, hedonistic life; rather, he is saying that human beings must live one day at a time and enjoy each day for the pleasures it brings. This is not an isolated theme, for the Preacher revisits it in 3:11–13 "He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God's gift to man."

God has so designed life that human beings see the glory and beauty of God in the world he created. But life in the world also eludes human comprehension, such that there is no evident pattern or plan in history. Vanity and futility and absurdity characterize human life. Instead of trying to figure out how everything fits together, human beings should take pleasure in God's gifts. There is a humility in accepting each day from God's hand and thanking him for the joys that he grants.

Life goes on. It surely does.

Schreiner on Ecclesiastes

The following is from Tom Schreiner's The King in His Beauty: A Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments, pp 300-312.

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Introduction

Waltke says, "The book of Ecclesiastes is the black sheep of the canon of biblical books. It is the delight of skeptics and the despair of saints."¹ It is typical for scholars to read the message of the book in bleak terms, but Waltke rightly says that "the view that Qoheleth lost faith in God's justice and goodness depends on proof texting and not on interpreting the book holistically."² If Proverbs focuses on the regularities of life, Ecclesiastes concentrates on the anomalies. I should add immediately that such a dichotomy between Proverbs and Ecclesiastes is too rigid, for Proverbs, as noted above, has often been interpreted simplistically. A careful reading of Proverbs demonstrates that Solomon and the other proverb writers were well aware that those who worked hard did not always get rich, that the poor were often victims of injustice, and that tragedies struck the righteous and not just the wicked. Nevertheless, the popular perception of Proverbs exists for a reason, for the book often emphasizes that good comes to those who do good. Ecclesiastes gazes at another dimension of reality and reflects on the irrationality and perverseness of life under the sun. Both Proverbs and Ecclesiastes are part of what is called Wisdom literature, but their profoundly different emphases demonstrate that wisdom cannot be captured by a simple formula. Wisdom perceives what ordinarily happens in life, and it attempts to discern and understand the mysteries and injustices of human existence. Ecclesiastes probes the latter. House rightly emphasizes that Ecclesiastes must be read as part of the canon, noting that apart from the canon a multiplicity of interpretations can be defended, from existentialism to pessimism.³

No one remembered him

https://epistleofdude.wordpress.com/2019/05/05/nobody-remembered-that-poor-man

Fear not Ecclesiastes

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/evangelicalpulpit/2018/01/fear-not-ecclesiastes/#

Living dogs and dead lions

4 But he who is joined with all the living has hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion. 5 For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward, for the memory of them is forgotten (Eccl 9:4-5).

This is a prooftext for annihilationism. But bracketing other objections, a basic problem with that interpretation is that it fails to take the epistemological viewpoint of the narrator into account. A common refrain in Ecclesiastes is the narrator's appeal to what he saw, viz. Eccl 2:13,24; 3:16,22; 4:1,4,7,15; 8:9-10,17; 9:11. So he's speaking from experience. His statements and generalizations are literally observations. 

What he says is true from that perspective. And that accounts for the pessimism and cynicism which pervades the book. If you judge the world by appearances, then reality is pretty depressing. 

But that frame of reference, while true insofar as it goes, has decided limitations. There's more to reality than meets the eye. Existence doesn't begin and end with the physical and sensory dimension of existence. Empirical knowledge is informative and indispensable within the inherent limitations of empirical knowledge. That's just a sample of reality. 

The annihilationist interpretation overlooks the epistemological reference frame of the narrator. Throughout the book, he is speaking from the standpoint of an observer. Judging by appearances. By this life. 

Life under the sun

To understand Ecclesiastes, we need to understand recurrent catchphrases like "under the sun". In his new book on The Christ of Wisdom (P&R, 2017), O. Palmer Robertson has an interesting take on that phrase. He thinks it refers to the diurnal cycle (253-55). I'd like to expand on his observation and perhaps develop it in a somewhat different, though probably complementary direction, than he does.

Given that Ecclesiastes alludes to Gen 1-3 in some other respects, it's quite possible or even probable that "under the sun" evokes the creation account, where God makes the sun, thereby generating the recurrent alternation between dawn and dusk, day and night, light and darkness.  

So "under the sun" may refer to human life as regulated by the alternation of day and night. Especially before the advent of electrical lighting, you'd rise at sunrise and retire at sunset. Unlike nocturnal animals, humans need sunlight to see by. 

To some degree, the need to sleep every night breaks up the monotony of continuous existence. We take a break, then get a fresh start the next day. 

At the same time, the inexorable repetition of the diurnal cycle can be somewhat deadening. It's inescapable. Like it or not, there's always another day that you must get through. Another day waiting for you. An unrelenting challenge. 

Especially in a fallen world, this can be a challenge. That ties into something else Robertson says. He thinks the meaning of hebel varies according to the context. It means more than one thing. That includes "ephemeral, incomprehensible," enigmatic", 249n79. And that suits some passages in Ecclesiastes. 

But he thinks it also has the sense of "frustration". And he thinks that suits many other passages in Ecclesiastes (1:14; 2:1,11,15,17,19,21,23; 3:19; 4:7-8; 5:10; 6:2; 7:15; 8:10).

And indeed, life in a fallen world is often aggravating for believers and unbelievers alike. A source of intermittent or even chronic frustration. 

When Christians die, they put that behind them. They enter peace (Isa 57:2). They rest from their labors (Rev 14:13). They enter God's eternal Sabbath.  

Hevel

“Be Weird. Be Random.”

I’ve been spending an inordinate amount of time on Facebook these days.

When I set my wife up with a Facebook account, after she came home from the hospital following her bone marrow transplant, I had connected her with maybe 100 of my friends from church and work. She took a liking to it. By adding her work friends, her old military friends, and friends from a Stephen King fan club group, she built her network of friends to more than 500. (She’s down to only 300 friends now. That could be my influence, or the influence of her death, or maybe both. How would we test something like that?)

A handwritten note that I found showed what she liked about Facebook: she could contact anyone, any time.

I’ve been posting frequently to her Facebook timeline. Facebook enables you to “memorialize” an account; so her account now is “Remembering Bethany Bugay” (and I would encourage you to visit there and look around to see what I’m talking about).

She was a remarkable woman in many ways. She kept journals throughout her life, and I’ve been finding and working my way through some of them. I’ve thought about writing more about her life, and a number of her Facebook friends have asked me to continue writing about her.

I may or may not continue to do that. Some of the things I’m finding have not been flattering, in a way that I’ll try to describe below.

Elsewhere, where Facebooks suggests friends, one of them was a person named “Gifted Dreamdancer”, a friend of one of my wife’s friends whose profile photo appeared to be a meme that featured someone nearing the edge of a cliff, and this saying:

“Be Weird. Be Random. Be Who You Are. Because You Never Know Who Would Love The Person You Hide”.

My thought was, if this person were truly “gifted”, he or she would understand that “weird” and “random” are not commensurate with being gifted. If you are hiding “weirdness” or “randomness”, what would make this person think that that is what you truly are? Certainly, it is a lack of a Christian viewpoint, which would hold that “what you truly are” is “created in the image of God”. And that a true gift is a kindness; it is not something that should seek to distort or to be harmful in any way.

And yet this type of attitude – wrongheaded as we would see it – is actually quite widespread in our culture. It brought to mind an Avril Lavigne song that featured this “lost-and-wandering” message:

Isn't anyone trying to find me?
Won't somebody come take me home?

It's a damn cold night
Trying to figure out this life
Won't you take me by the hand?
Take me somewhere new
I don't know who you are
But I... I'm with you
I'm with you

More straightforwardly, this kind of confusion was described in a song about Marilyn Monroe:

And it seems to me you lived your life
Like a candle in the wind
Never knowing who to cling to
When the rain set in …

I say these things to note that, before we met, my wife had this kind of characteristic in her life. She had been sexually abused as a child, and not only as a small child, but on a continuing basis. She ran away from this, but the very act of running away set off a chain of events that got her into even more trouble, which I would say, shaped the rest of her entire life.

Beth not only kept journals, but cards and letters and other memorabilia as well. When we were married, I actively stayed away from these people (and I certainly didn’t want Beth to contact them – old boyfriends included).

But now that she is gone, I’m finding that I have a kind of curiosity to “fill in the gaps”, to add pieces to the puzzle that I had not found before. Really, to understand what made her tick. I’ve contacted several of the individuals who played a role in her earlier life, and virtually all of them have said, in one way or another, “we were young”, as a way of explaining away some of the really stupid and harmful things that they did. One person said that she was “spontaneous”.

When you’re young, that’s decidedly NOT the time to “be weird” or “be random”. In your youth is precisely time to “Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth”. The reason for this, according to the writer of Ecclesiastes, is because “the evil days [will] come” and “the years [will] draw near of which you will say, ‘I have no pleasure in them’”.

In your youth is the time to understand that you are capable of making very bad decisions that can affect the rest of your life. Since, as young people, you have most of your life yet to live, for that reason, you have the very most to lose as well.

Beth was abused, and that led her to get herself into a position to make decisions that affected her life for the rest of her life. One thing led to another, setting off a chain of events that led her to the military in 1980, to the military again in 2002, got her deployed to Iraq, exposed to Benzene, which caused her leukemia, and led to her eventual early death.

She made bad decisions, but others, instead of legitimately caring for her, took advantage of her, and took what they could for themselves of her bad decisions. The results, I find, were devastating, in more ways than one.

The world is not enough

Some readers may well consider Ecclesiastes to be the most worldly book of the Bible. And there's a grain of truth to that. It's focused on what happens "under the sun."

Even so, there's an implicit doctrine of the afterlife. There's a doctrine of final judgment. Ecclesiastes notes the deplorable fact that in this life the wicked often elude justice while the righteous are often denied justice. A reversal of fortunes in the afterlife could be the only compensation.

However, I'd like to draw attention to a somewhat different point. Ecclesiastes encourages people to make the most of what this life has to offer. Earthly goods are good. Enjoy it while you have it. 

At the same time, no book of the Bible is more dissatisfied with what this fallen world has to offer. Throughout Ecclesiastes is an unrequited yearning for something greater, something better, than this fleeting, fallen world has to offer. In that respect, Ecclesiastes is one of the most heavenly-minded books of the Bible. This life is unfulfilling. The world is not enough. It longs for more than life "under the sun" can furnish–even at its best. In that respect, Ecclesiastes is a preparation for the Gospel.

All good things must end

i) Scholars debate the meaning of hebel in Ecclesiastes. Popular offerings include fleeting, futile, enigmatic, and meaningless.

ii) One source of ambiguity is that we need to distinguish between appearance and reality in Ecclesiastes. Life could be "meaningless," not in the sense that it has no intrinsic purpose, but that it's ultimate is elusive. Everything happens for a reason, but we can't figure that out. In that respect, "enigmatic" is clearer than "meaningless." 

iii) Likewise, there are two senses in which it could be futile. It could be futile in the sense that trying to understand divine providence is an exercise in futility. Futility in an epistemic sense. Ecclesiastes is, in part, a frustrated quest for the meaning of life. He senses that there's more to reality than meets the eye, but providence is perplexing. 

Or it could be futile in the sense that even though we can plan for the future, even though we ought to plan for the future, life is fickle and unpredictable. Life is unfair. You can be responsible, do all the right things, yet lose the race. In addition, everything we have and do is ephemeral. Futility in a metaphysical, mundane sense. This life is futile. 

iv) Fredericks makes a strong case that hebel means fleeting. However, he admits that hebel (lit. "breath") is used metaphorically. So the question concerns the figurative connotations of the word.

v) There's also the danger of committing the word-concept fallacy, as well as the illegitimate totality transfer fallacy. The meaning of one oft-used word in Ecclesiastes isn't necessarily the interpretive key to the whole book. Moreover, whatever the word means, the concepts of life as fleeting and inscrutable are certainly pervasive in Ecclesiastes.

vi) One challenge for translators is whether to use the same English synonym throughout, or more than one synonym if they think the sense varies with the context. Using different English synonyms for the same Hebrew word will obscuring the function of the Hebrew term as a leading word. If, however, the sense varies, then it's inaccurate to settle on one synonym. 

vii) In addition, what we think hebel means (or connotes) in Ecclesiastes depends in part on how we interpret the writer's worldview. For instance, Fredericks' commentary is one of the best. But he pursues a relentlessly claustrophobic, this-worldly interpretation. That forces a simplistic consistency onto the book, as if the author's outlook must be one-dimensional. 

In this life, all good things must end. Yet death is not the end–but a new beginning. 

The seasons of life

11 Cast your bread upon the waters,    for you will find it after many days.2 Give a portion to seven, or even to eight,    for you know not what disaster may happen on earth.3 If the clouds are full of rain,    they empty themselves on the earth,and if a tree falls to the south or to the north,    in the place where the tree falls, there it will lie.4 He who observes the wind will not sow,    and he who regards the clouds will not reap.5 As you do not know the way the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God who makes everything.6 In the morning sow your seed, and at evening withhold not your hand, for you do not know which will prosper, this or that, or whether both alike will be good.7 Light is sweet, and it is pleasant for the eyes to see the sun.8 So if a person lives many years, let him rejoice in them all; but let him remember that the days of darkness will be many. All that comes is vanity.9 Rejoice, O young man, in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and the sight of your eyes. But know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment.10 Remove vexation from your heart, and put away pain from your body, for youth and the dawn of life are vanity.12 Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near of which you will say, “I have no pleasure in them”; 2 before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars are darkened and the clouds return after the rain, 3 in the day when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men are bent, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those who look through the windows are dimmed, 4 and the doors on the street are shut—when the sound of the grinding is low, and one rises up at the sound of a bird, and all the daughters of song are brought low— 5 they are afraid also of what is high, and terrors are in the way; the almond tree blossoms, the grasshopper drags itself along, and desire fails, because man is going to his eternal home, and the mourners go about the streets— 6 before the silver cord is snapped, or the golden bowl is broken, or the pitcher is shattered at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern, 7 and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it. 8 Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher; all is vanity.

Eccl 12 is a famous passage about aging and death. It's usually taken to be an allegorical description of the aging body. However, the anatomical interpretation is difficult to carry through consistently. For that reason, some commentators reject the allegorical understanding. 

I think the problem is not with the allegorical understanding, but identifying a single controlling metaphor. Fredericks has argued, the dominant metaphor is the storm. The direct comparison is not between a house, birds, trees, grasshoppers, and the aging body, but between the approaching storm or its aftermath and the aging process. 

This also means we should interpret chap. 12 in conjunction with chap. 11, as part of a thematic unit. They share a common meteorological motif. 

So this involves a poetic comparison between the cycle of life and the seasons of life. Unfortunately, that's such a cliche that it's lost some of its power. Yet when this was originally written, about 3000 years ago, it wasn't such a cliche! 

In this metaphor, Spring and Summer represent youth and the prime of life, while Fall and Winter represent middle age and old age. You can have Spring and Summer storms, but after the storm, the sun returns. Yet there comes a time when the weather turns. When the sun doesn't return after the rain. There are parts of the world where the sun doesn't shine in winter. It disappears behind the clouds and remains out of sight until next Spring. 

Unfortunately, the aging process can be like that. In youth you have mostly good days–with a few stormy days. In old age, you alternate between good days and bad days, then bad days and worse days. 

The skies darkens with the approaching storm front. The sun disappears behind the lowering clouds. In a dry, sunny climate like Palestine, people generally work out of doors. But when a storm front approaches, the noisy, busy streets empty as people take shelter indoors–peering through windows at the angry skies. Even the songbirds fly away. Houses are buffeted by high winds. 

After the storm has passed, people emerge to survey the damage. The battered landscape. Lighting or whirlwinds can down trees, ruin crops, or smash hanging pottery, If they live by a river, torrential rain can cause flooding. 

That, in turn, becomes an allegory (or partial allegory) for the aging process. The elderly withdraw from public life. Spend more time indoors. Their eyes dim, their hearing hardens, their hands tremble. They lose balance. They suffer from sensory deprivation and social isolation. Living alone, they suffer the loss of physical affection. A simple hug. Their world grows ever smaller. 

Under the sun

http://www.sbts.edu/resources/files/2013/08/Pages-from-SBJT-V15-N3_Caneday.pdf

Solomonic authorship of Ecclesiastes

Let’s consider some of Tremper Longman’s work for example.  In His argument against Solomonic authorship of Ecclesiastes in his commentary, he commits several basic errors.
One that comes to mind combines a grammatical error with a procedural problem.  

Working off of the NIV, rather than the Hebrew text, He cites Ecc. 1:12 as an argument against Solomonic authorship.  It states, “I, the Teacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem” (NIV).  He then argues that the verse identifies a time when Solomon had been alive but not king, basically concluding that since this doesn’t fit with what we know of Solomon it wasn’t really him. 

This is a scandalous assertion.  Longman seems not to know that, 1.) Hebrew uses the perfect conjugation to express either simple past or past perfect verbal ideas.  Thus, “I was king” or “I have been king” are equally valid translations that any student of basic Hebrew would know—seriously.  2.) A consultation of other translations should have at least tempered his argument. 3.) In actuality, the statement seems merely to place Qoheleth’s attitude within its historical setting.  This deficiency on the part of Longman suggests either incompetence in the language, or some unargued philosophical bias that prevents honest assessment here.  But there’s more. 

Citing 1:16, he argues, “It would be strange to hear Solomon state: I said to myself, ‘Behold, I have magnified and increased wisdom more than all who were over Jerusalem before me; and my mind has observed a wealth of wisdom and knowledge.’”  Why is this strange—because there was only one king before Solomon?  However, the chronicler in 1 Chronicles 29:25 uses this exact language to make the same case.  He says, “The LORD highly exalted Solomon in the sight of all Israel, and bestowed on him royal majesty which had not been on any king before him in Israel” (1Ch 29:25 [emphasis mine]).  Longman seems to arrive at his conclusion without adequate scholarly reflection on the wording.  Is the phrase an idiom, figure of speech, a common way of taking into consideration powerful men including but not limited to the reigning monarch?  These would be the normal sorts of questions to ask.  These are not addressed though.  When combined with other textual arguments, one can only conclude that Longman simply didn’t read/think carefully about this.  So, failure at this juncture also looks suspicious.  But there’s more. 

Longman argues that Qoheleth is a pseudonym for the one assuming the Solomonic persona, or if applied to Solomon, a “nick-name.”  He writes: 

“One must ask what is gained or what possible reason could Solomon have had for adopting a name other than his own in this book?  Is he hiding his identity from someone?  If so, for what possible reason?  Does the nickname add anything to the message of the book? After all, the connection to Solomon is tenuous, and no one has argued that the name contributes to the meaning of the book.  It is much more likely that the nickname Qohelet was adopted by the actual writer to associate himself with Solomon, while retaining his distance from the actual person” (p. 4). 

Apparently, Longman is unaware that Hebrew nouns typically come from verbs, so that the title Qoheleth is most likely derived from some activity for which he was noted.  Since the verb is qahal, the title Qoheleth is connected with some assembling activity, perhaps the assembling of people or proverbs, etc. 

Finally, at least for this interview, it is notable that Longman begins his arguments against Solomonic authorship seemingly by committing the “snob approach” variety of the argumentum ad poplum fallacy.  He states, “Attentive readers of the Bible have felt uneasy about the simple identification of Qohelet with Solomon for a long time” (p. 4).  And, “Even in the light of strong internal and external testimony to the contrary, a small, but vocal group of evangelical scholars still advocate this [Solomonic authorship] view” (p. 3).  He then props this up with poor arguments including the ones above. 

Notice how he is arguing that anyone who fails to recognize the truth of his assertion is not an intellectual (“attentive”), and it would be in the best interest of the reader to listen to himself.  There are additional points in this particular case to argue, but this is not the place for that.  I would just say that Longman’s argumentation against Solomonic authorship is scurrilous.  To answer the question, is apologetics helpful for biblical studies generally and OT specifically, again, yes.  Perhaps if more biblical scholars were trained in apologetics, a lot of the stuff that passes for biblical scholarship would never gain a legitimate hearing.  Instead, junk scholarship is published and passed off as cutting edge and respectable.

http://veritasdomain.wordpress.com/2014/03/26/interview-with-a-calvinistic-dispensational-presuppositionalist-brian-rickett/

Ecclesiastes and the New Testament

"Ecclesiastes and the New Testament" by Paul Helm.

Biblical "fatalism"

Many commentators find Ecclesiastes puzzling. For centuries, they've found it puzzling. Different commentators offer different interpretive strategies.

They reach for different adjectives. Is Ecclesiastes "cynical"? "Pessimistic"? "Hedonistic"? 

I'd suggest that, in a qualified sense, Ecclesiastes is fatalistic. Fatalistic in an epistemological rather than ontological sense. Ecclesiastes has a strong doctrine of providence. Everything happens for a reason. 

But from a human viewpoint, life often seems to be pointless or perverse. Judging by appearances, there often seems to be no logic or pattern to events. 

The attitude Ecclesiastes seeks to foster isn't resignation in the face of the inevitable, but resignation in the face of the inscrutable. 

i) One of the book's themes is the cyclical nature of life. Nothing lasts. The same kinds of things recur over and over again. The younger generation replaces the older generation.  Things reach a certain point, then start all over again. We are quickly forgotten. Time erodes our sand castles. Nothing we do in this life makes any ultimate difference in this life. That's "fatalistic." 

What do people gain from all their labors
    at which they toil under the sun?

Generations come and generations go,
    but the earth remains forever (1:3-4).

What has been will be again,
    what has been done will be done again (1:9).

No one remembers the former generations,
    and even those yet to come
will not be remembered
    by those who follow them (1:11).

The wise have eyes in their heads,
    while the fool walks in the darkness;
but I came to realize
    that the same fate overtakes them both.

 Then I said to myself,

“The fate of the fool will overtake me also.
    What then do I gain by being wise?”
I said to myself,
    “This too is enigmatic.”

For the wise, like the fool, will not be long remembered;
    the days have already come when both have been forgotten.
Like the fool, the wise too must die! (2:14-16).

Everyone comes naked from their mother’s womb,
    and as everyone comes, so they depart.
They take nothing from their toil
    that they can carry in their hands (5:15).

for death is the destiny of everyone;
    the living should take this to heart (7:2).

ii) Another theme is the apparent randomness of life. Good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people. Some good people have bad luck while some bad people have good luck. 

Life is unpredictable. You can plan. Make preparations. Take precautions. But it only takes one unforeseeable accident or illness or natural disaster for all your fond hopes to end in tragedy. That, too, is "fatalistic"–you can't avoid it.  

Since no one knows the future,
    who can tell someone else what is to come? (8:7).

There is something else enigmatic that occurs on earth: the righteous who get what the wicked deserve, and the wicked who get what the righteous deserve. This too, I say, is enigmatic (8:14).

So I reflected on all this and concluded that the righteous and the wise and what they do are in God’s hands, but no one knows whether love or hate awaits them (9:1).

I have seen something else under the sun:

The race is not to the swift
    or the battle to the strong,
nor does food come to the wise
    or wealth to the brilliant
    or favor to the learned;
but time and chance happen to them all.

 Moreover, no one knows when their hour will come:

As fish are caught in a cruel net,
    or birds are taken in a snare,
so people are trapped by evil times
    that fall unexpectedly upon them (9:11-12).

14 There was once a small city with only a few people in it. And a powerful king came against it, surrounded it and built huge siege works against it. 15 Now there lived in that city a man poor but wise, and he saved the city by his wisdom. But nobody remembered that poor man. 16 So I said, “Wisdom is better than strength.” But the poor man’s wisdom is despised, and his words are no longer heeded (9:14-16).

iii) This outlook seems despairing, and if that's all we had to go by, it would be pretty bleak, but even if we make allowances for the mundane outlook, there are some things it has to teach us. This outlook can be liberating. 

There are people who are very future-oriented. Very goal-oriented. They have great discipline. They sacrifice many opportunities to enjoy the present because they are aiming for a big payoff in the future. 

And there's a measure of wisdom to their approach. Living for short-term pleasure can lead to long-term misery. A measure of patience is a good thing. A measure of self-denial is a good thing.

But because life is unpredictable and sometimes fickle, you may forfeit both present and future happiness by a single-minded focus on a future that will never be. If you burn today to light tomorrow, you may lose both. 

There are two extremes to avoid: being so future-oriented that you neglect the present; being so present-oriented that you neglect the future.

Take parents who are very ambitious for their children. They push their children to be overachievers. They miss out on many opportunities to just enjoy their children when they are young. But what happens if your teenager dies of bone cancer or leukemia? You didn't plan for that. And you can't make up for the lost years. What happens when you watch your grown child waste away from drug addiction? 

There are men who slave away at a job they hate for the pension. Everything is put off for retirement. But what happens if they lose their pension because their company is bought out? Or because the pension fund was mismanaged? 

What happens if you have to take early retirement due to Parkinson's disease? That's not something you planned for. 

This is where the author's carpe diem passages come into play. Where possible, take time to enjoy the moment. Don't just look ahead–look around. 

12 I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. 13 That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God (3:12-13).

Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this enigmatic life that God has given you under the sun—all your enigmatic days. For this is your lot in life and in your toilsome labor under the sun (9:9).

You who are young, be happy while you are young,
    and let your heart give you joy in the days of your youth.
Follow the ways of your heart
    and whatever your eyes see,
but know that for all these things
    God will bring you into judgment (11:9).

Likewise, consider all the ruinous revolutions or social programs by idealistic do-gooders who are determined to improve the world. Yet when the dust settles, things are no better than they were before. Sometimes worse. Or just as bad in a different way. 

iv) Ecclesiastes is a book that cries out for a doctrine of the afterlife to set things right. It just hints at this, with its reference to final judgment. 

Although there's not much we can do to make the world a better place, there are things we can do to prepare some people for a better world. Raising your kids in the Christian faith. Practicing friendship evangelism. Nothing we do in this life makes any ultimate difference in this life, but it may make all the difference in the next life. Preparing for the world to come. 

By all means plan ahead–way ahead. 

For the great day thyself prepare

"The Message of Ecclesiastes - Living Presently" by Paul Helm.

Nigel Styles on Ecclesiastes

(Source)