The Project Gutenberg eBook of A commentary on Ecclesiastes
Title: A commentary on Ecclesiastes
Author: Thomas Pelham Dale
Release date: January 20, 2024 [eBook #72761]
Language: English
Original publication: London: Rivingtons, 1873
Credits: Richard Hulse, Tony Browne, Brian Wilson, Bryan Ness and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Books project.)
A COMMENTARY
ON
ECCLESIASTES
Transcriber’s Notes
The cover image was provided by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
The original text displayed the Authorized Version of Scripture on the left page and the author’s paraphrase on the facing right page. For the electronic formats, these two versions for each verse have been placed in two columns followed immediately by the corresponding commentary.
Punctuation has been standardized.
Most of the non-common abbreviations used to save space in printing have been expanded to the non-abbreviated form for easier reading.
The text may show quotations within quotations, all set off by similar quote marks. The inner quotations have been changed to alternate quote marks for improved readability.
This book has illustrated drop-caps at the start of each chapter. These illustrations may adversely affect the pronunciation of the word with screen-readers or not display properly in some handheld devices.
This book was written in a period when many words had not become standardized in their spelling. Words may have multiple spelling variations or inconsistent hyphenation in the text. These have been left unchanged unless indicated with a Transcriber’s Note.
Index references have not been checked for accuracy.
The symbol ‘‡’ indicates the description in parenthesis has been added to an illustration. This may be needed if there is no caption or if the caption does not describe the image adequately.
Footnotes are identified in the text with a superscript number and are shown immediately below the paragraph in which they appear.
Transcriber’s Notes are used when making corrections to the text or to provide additional information for the modern reader. These notes are identified by ♦♠♥♣ symbols in the text and are shown immediately below the paragraph in which they appear.
A COMMENTARY
ON
ECCLESIASTES
RIVINGTONS
| London | Waterloo Place | |
| Oxford | High Street | |
| Cambridge | Trinity Street |
A COMMENTARY
ON
ECCLESIASTES
BY THE REV.
THOMAS PELHAM DALE, M.A.
LATE FELLOW OF SIDNEY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE,
AND RECTOR OF ST. VEDAST WITH ST. MICHAEL LE QUERNE, LONDON.
דִּבְרֵי חֲכָמִים וְחִידֹתָם׃ יִרְאַת יְהוָה♦ רֵאשִׁית דָּעַת
RIVINGTONS
London, Oxford, and Cambridge
1873
TO
JOHN HALL GLADSTONE, Esq. Ph. D. F.R.S.
THROUGH WHOSE LIBERALITY IT SEES THE LIGHT,
IS THIS WORK AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED BY
The Author.
PREFACE.
THE following Commentary differs from many of its predecessors in the greater weight given to the interpretation of the LXX., and the closer investigation of their peculiar renderings. In many cases these strange renderings on the part of the LXX. are dismissed by commentators as simply errors. But this is not consistent with what true criticism ought to do. The LXX. is not only the oldest translation we have, but also the only one made when Hebrew was yet a living language. Its peculiar renderings then deserve our most serious attention. The investigation of them will fully reward the inquirer. This, then, is the cause of the special line of interpretation adopted in this Commentary.
With regard to the Book of Ecclesiastes itself, the writer must confess himself homo unius libri; for some years past all his Hebrew and Greek studies have been devoted to the investigation of the meaning of this one book in the Sacred Canon, and all his conclusions must be taken with the reservation that they apply, directly, to this one book alone. Such a concentration of effort may be expected to produce results which might not be arrived at by a far wider and more extensive research, just as a few rays of sunlight concentrated by a small lens will burn where the sun himself will only warm.
Nevertheless, this book does not profess to be anything in the nature of a new discovery. Sense is attempted to be made of difficult passages by what may be called a microscopic attention to the grammar of the writer, and a minute and careful analysis of every form and expression he uses. The test of the correctness of the meaning thus found is displayed in the way in which it falls into place in the context, and squares with its tenor. But nothing novel in the way of Hebrew grammar is urged, or anything which may not be found in ordinary commentaries, except, perhaps, it be the fact of the difference of signification between the contracted and full relative pronoun——a usage which is peculiar to the Book of Ecclesiastes. This has hitherto been dismissed by other commentators as evidence of late composition, without giving it the notice it merited.
Many points of interest are started in these pages, which would well repay a more careful investigation than I have either leisure or learning to follow out. They are only presented so far as necessary to illustrate and clear up difficulties in the interpretation of that marvellous book which is the subject of this Commentary. If I have succeeded, the Church will be benefited; if I have altogether failed, my book will only add a few pages more to the vast literature which this, the scientific treatise of the Divine Word, has elicited.
London, Oct. 1873.