We have seen that the Wisdom of Sirach betrays a taste for Egyptian festivity (p. 191). May we not suppose that Koheleth too had travelled to Alexandria? This view commends itself to Kleinert, and I have no objection to it with due limitations. Koheleth may have envied and sought to copy the light-hearted gaiety of the valley of the Nile. But we ought not to conceal the fact that the lines quoted above are followed by others which have no parallel in Koheleth.
There is a wide difference between a people who believed in a happy Amenti where Osiris himself dwelt and the Jew who doubted much but believed firmly in Sheól. I admit then the probability that the latter had travelled, and was not unaffected by the brightness of Egyptian society, but I see no reason to suppose that he knew and was influenced by the expressions of Egyptian songs. The resemblances adduced are to me as fortuitous as those between the love-poems of the Nile valley and the Hebrew Song of Songs, or (we may add) as that striking one between Eccles. i. 4 and some of the opening lines of the ‘Song of the Harper,’—
I make no excuse for the length of this inquiry. If we could trace Greek influences, linguistic or philosophical, in the strange book before us, its date would be decided. Taking into account the circumstances of the writer, we might assign it to the reign of Ptolemy IV. Philopator, when the Egyptian rule began to be calamitous for Judæa. Kleinert would place it rather in one of the early, fortunate reigns (Herzog-Plitt, xii. 173); but he forms perhaps too favourable a view of the social picture in Koheleth. Hitzig, who gives a very restricted range to Greek philosophical influence upon our book, and accepts none of Zirkel’s Græcisms, fixes the date in the first year of Ptolemy V. Epiphanes. Geiger, Nöldeke, Kuenen, Tyler, and Plumptre, on various grounds, think this the most probable period,[415] and the view is endorsed by Zeller, the historian of Greek philosophy.
A Maccabæan and still more a Herodian date seem to me absolutely excluded, though Zirkel and Renan have advocated the one, and Heinrich Grätz (see p. 240) the other. The book is certainly pre-Maccabæan, not merely because of a Talmudic anecdote,[416] but because of its want of religious fervour (comp. Esther) and its cosmopolitanism. The germs of the Jewish parties may be there, but only the germs. To me Hitzig’s is the latest possible date; but if we must admit a vague and indirect Greek influence, should we not place the book a little earlier as suggested above? But I do not see that we must admit even a vague Greek influence. The inquiring spirit was present in the class of ‘wise men’ even before the Exile, and the circumstances of the later Jews were, from the Exile onwards, well fitted to exercise and develope it. Hellenic teaching was in no way necessary to an ardent but unsystematic thinker like Koheleth. The date proposed by Ewald and Delitzsch is on this and other grounds probable, and on linguistic grounds not impossible.
There are two recent treatises on the philosophical affinities of Koheleth which may be mentioned here, though only the first is known to me. Paul Kleinert, who has long made a special study of Koheleth (see his Prediger Salomo, 1864), contributed to the Theolog. Studien und Kritiken, 1883, p. 761, &c., a striking paper called ‘Sind im Buche Koheleth ausserhebräische Einflüsse anzuerkennen,’ and August Palm in 1885 published a programme entitled ‘Qohelet und die nacharistotelische Philosophie’ (Mannheim).
According to Delitzsch, the Song of Solomon is the most difficult book in the Old Testament. If so, Ecclesiastes comes next in order. None of the attempts to discover a logical plan having been successful, Gustav Bickell’s new hypothesis (1884) deserves a respectful hearing, since it endeavours to solve the enigma in a most original way, connecting it with the problem of the text. This critic starts from the observation that continuous passages of some extent are suddenly closed by an abrupt transition, and that such passages are pretty equal in length. His explanation of this is a purely mechanical one. The troubles of the commentators have arisen principally from an accident which happened to a standard MS., called by Bickell, ‘die Unfallshandschrift’ (the Accident-manuscript). This MS. seems to have consisted of 21 or 22 leaves, with an average of 518 to 535 letters to a leaf. To speak more precisely, it was composed of fasciculi of four double leaves each; the book began on the sixth leaf of the first fasciculus, and ended on the second, or more probably on the third leaf of the fourth. Through a loosening of the two middle fasciculi, a dislocation took place, and an almost entirely new order arose, though with one exception the leaves which had been placed in pairs remained together. But the story of the fortunes of Ecclesiastes has not yet been told. Three hands, besides the original writer, have worked on this ill-fated book. One of these is considered to have been a downright ‘enemy’ who tampered with the text before the dislocation had taken place. From him proceed ‘the protests against Koheleth’s principles on the obedience due to the king in viii. 1, 5a as well as the offensive expressions in xi. 5, xii. 4, 5, by which he sought to make the book ridiculous and contemptible.’ Subsequently to him, and after the leaves had been thrown into confusion, another writer made ‘well-meaning additions,’ and so brought the book into nearly its present form; among these additions was the Epilogue. His aim was ‘to brighten Koheleth’s gloomy view of the world, partly by emphasising the doctrine of a present retribution, but still more by pointing to a future judgment in which inequalities should be rectified.’ The third hand is that of the so-called pseudo-Solomonic interpolator. He must have gone to work after the Epilogist, for the latter simply knows Koheleth as a wise man skilled in proverbial composition. Bickell also claims to make transpositions on a small scale, and offers many emendations sometimes based on the Septuagint. ‘Habent sua fata libelli.’
I have said that Bickell’s explanation of the want of order in Ecclesiastes is a purely mechanical one. It is not on that account to be rejected. A German reviewer[417] has mentioned a case within his own experience in which the double leaves of one of the fasciculi of an Oriental MS. had been disarranged in the binding, a circumstance which had led to various additions and alterations. It may indeed be urged as an objection that the Septuagint text differs in no very material respect from the Massoretic. But a work like Ecclesiastes had at first in all probability but a very slight circulation, so that an accident to a single MS. would naturally involve unusually serious consequences. Still from the possibility to the actuality of the ‘accident’ is a long step. Apart from other difficulties in the theory, the number and arbitrariness of the transpositions, additions, and alterations are reason enough to make one hesitate to accept it; and when we pass from the very plausible arrangement of the contents (Bickell, pp. 53, 54) to the translation of the text, it is often only possible to make them tally by a violent and imaginative exegesis.
Among the transpositions (to which I have no theoretic objection[418]) are the following:
Bickell’s theory that the passages which assert or suggest Solomonic authorship in i. 1, 12, 16, ii. 7, 8, 9, [12], are due to an interpolator,[419] is plausible; it throws a new light on the statement of the Epilogue (xii. 9) that ‘Koheleth was a wise man,’ and a motive for the interpolation can be readily imagined—the desire to obtain ecclesiastical sanction for the book. It is, however, incapable of proof.
There are in fact few books on Ecclesiastes so stimulating as Bickell’s, though it needs to be read with discrimination[420] (comp. p. 241). Putting aside the author’s peculiar theory, it must be owned that he has enabled us to realise the inherent difficulties of the text as it stands, and contributed some very happy corrections. All critics will admit the need of such emendations. The text of Koheleth is even more faulty than that of Job, Psalms, or Proverbs. We cannot wonder at this. Meditations often so fragmentary on such a difficult subject were foredoomed to suffer greatly at the hands of copyists. A minute study of the various readings and of the corrections which have been proposed would lead us too far, interesting as it would be (compare Renan’s remarks, L’Ecclésiaste, p. 53). Cappellus (Louis Cappel) has done most for the text among the earlier critics (see his Critica Sacra, Par. 1650); Grätz has also made useful suggestions based upon the versions. Renan, and (as we have seen) Bickell, have corrected the text on a larger scale; occasional emendations of great value are due to Hitzig, Delitzsch, Klostermann, and Krochmal. The notes in the expected new edition of Eyre and Spottiswoode’s Variorum Bible will indicate the most important various readings and corrections; to these I would refer the reader. The corrections of Bickell are those least known to most students. In considering them, we must distinguish between those which arise out of his peculiar critical theory and those which are simply the outcome of his singular and brilliant insight. Of the latter, I will here only mention two. One occurs in iii. 11, where for אֶת־הָעֹלָם (or אֶת־הָעוֹלָם the Oriental or Babylonian reading), he gives (see below, p. 299) לְבַקֵּשׁ אֶת־כָּל־הֶעָלֻם, remarking that כָּל־ survived in the text translated in the Septuagint. The fact is, however, that though Cod. Vat. does read σύμπαντα τὸν αἰῶνα, Cod. Alex., Cod. Sin., and the Complutensian ed. all read σὺν τὸν αἰῶνα, and as the verse begins Τὰ σύμπαντα (v. l. Σύμπαντα) it is probable enough that σύμπαντα was written the second time in Cod. Vat. by mistake. At any rate, copyists both of the Greek and of the Hebrew were sometimes inclined to insert or omit ‘all’ at haphazard; thus, in iv. 2, Cod. Vat. inserts ‘all,’ which is omitted in Cod. Alex. and Cod. Sin.
Another, adopted above at p. 220, is in viii. 10. Read וְּבָמקוֹם קָדוֹשׁ ויהַלְּכוּ (or נִקְבָּדִים) כְּבֵדִים. ובאו is a fragment of the correct reading ובמקום which stood side by side with the alternative reading וממקום.
On the question of interpolations, enough has been said already. Probably Cornill’s book on Ezekiel will dispose many critics to look more favourably on attempts to purify Biblical texts from glosses and other interpolations. Grätz’s conclusion certainly cannot be maintained, ‘Sämmtliche Sentenzen gehören streng zu ihrer nachbarlichen Gedankengruppe, führen den Gedanken weiter oder spitzen ihn zu.’
I have still to speak of the Septuagint version. Its importance for textual criticism is great; indeed, we may say with Klostermann that the Massoretic text and this translation are virtually two copies of one and the same archetype. It is distinguished from the Septuagint versions of the Books of Job, Proverbs, and even Psalms by its fidelity. Those versions approximate more or less closely to the elegant manner of Symmachus, but the Greek style of the Septuagint Koheleth is most peculiar, admitting such words as ἀντίῤῥησις, ἔγκοπος, ἐκκλησιαστής, ἐντρύφημα, ἐπικοσμειν, παραφορά, περιουσιασμός, περιφέρεια, περισπασμός, προαίρεσις (in special sense, ii. 17) ἐξουσιάζειν (not less than eleven times), and such abnormal phrases as ὑπὸ τὸν ἥλιον (i. 3 and often), and especially σὺν, as an equivalent of את when distinctive of the accusative (ii. 17, iii. 10, iv. 3, vii. 15, and nine other passages; elsewhere σύμπαντα or the like). The last-named peculiarity reminds us strongly of Aquila[421] (comp. [God created] σὺν τὸν οὐρανὸν καὶ σὺν τὴν γην, Aquila’s rendering of Gen. i. 1); but it must be also mentioned that in more than half the passages in which את of the accusative occurs in the original, this characteristic rendering of Aquila is not found. This fact militates against the theory of Grätz,[422] that the Septuagint version of Ecclesiastes is really the second improved edition of Aquila, and against that of Salzberger,[423] who argues that the fragments given as from Aquila in Origen’s Hexapla are not really Aquila’s at all, the one and only true edition of Aquila’s Ecclesiastes being that now extant in the Septuagint (comp. the case of Theodotion’s Daniel). It seems clear that the Septuagint version, as it stands, is a composite one, but it is possible, as Montfaucon long ago pointed out,[424] that an early version once existed, independent of Aquila. The question of the origin of this version is of some critical importance, for if the work of Aquila, the Septuagint Ecclesiastes cannot be earlier than 130 A.D. Supposing this to be the first Greek version of the book, we obtain an argument in favour of the Herodian date of Ecclesiastes advocated by Grätz. Upon the whole, however, there seems no sufficient reason for doubting that there was a Septuagint version of the book distinct from Aquila’s, as indeed Origen’s Hexapla and St. Jerome in the preface to his commentary attest, and that this version in its original form goes back, like the versions of Job and Proverbs, to one of the last centuries before Christ.
On the Peshitto version of Koheleth and Ruth there is a monograph by G. Janichs, Animadversiones criticæ &c. (Breslau, 1871), with which compare Nöldeke’s review, Lit. Centralblatt, 1871, No. 49. For the text of the Græcus Venetus, see Gebhardt’s edition (Leipz. 1874). Ginsburg’s well-known work (1861) contains sections on the versions.
It is not surprising that these strange Meditations should have had great difficulty in penetrating into the Canon. There is sufficient evidence (see the works of Plumptre and Wright)[425] that the so-called Wisdom of Solomon is in part a deliberate contradiction of sentiments expressed in our book. The most striking instance of this antagonism is in Wisd. ii. 6-10 (cf. Eccles. ix. 7-9), where the words of Koheleth are actually put into the mouth of the ungodly libertines of Alexandria. The date of Wisdom is disputed, but cannot be earlier than the reign of Ptolemy VII. Physcon (B.C. 145-117). The attitude of the writer towards Koheleth may perhaps be compared with that of the Palestinian teachers who relegated the book among the apocrypha on this among other grounds, that it contained heretical statements, e.g. ‘Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth’ &c. (xi. 9). Nothing is more certain than that the Book of Koheleth was an Antilegomenon in Palestine in the first century before Christ. And yet it certainly had its friends and supporters both then and later. Simeon ben Shetach and his brother-in-law, King Alexander Jannæus (B.C. 105-79), were as familiar with Koheleth as the young men of Alexandria, and Simeon, according to the Talmudic story[426] (Bereshith Rabba, c. 91), quoted Eccles. vii. 12a with a prefix (דכתיב ‘as it is written’) proper to a Biblical quotation. From another Talmudic narrative (Baba bathra, 4a) it would seem that Koheleth was cited in the time of Herod the Great as of equal authority with the Pentateuch, and from a third (Shabbath, 30b) that St. Paul’s teacher, Gamaliel, permitted quotations from our book equally with those from canonical Scriptures. Like the Song of Songs, however, it called forth a lively opposition from severe judges. The schools of Hillel and Shammai were divided on the merits of these books. At first the Shammaites, who were adverse to them, carried a majority of the votes of the Jewish doctors. But when, after the destruction of Jerusalem, Jewish learning reorganised itself at Jamnia (4-½ leagues south of Jaffa), the opposite view (viz. that the Song and Koheleth ‘defile the hands’—i.e. are holy Scriptures) was again brought forward in a synod held about A.D. 90, and finally sanctioned in a second synod held A.D. 118. The arguments urged on both sides were such as belong to an uncritical age. No attempt was made to penetrate into the spirit and object of Koheleth, but test passages were singled out. The heretically sounding words in xi. 9a were at first held by some to be decisive against the claim of canonicity, but—we are told—when the ‘wise men’ took the close of the verse into consideration (‘but know that for all this God will bring thee into the judgment’), they exclaimed יפה אמר שלמה, ‘Solomon has spoken appropriately.’[427]
This first synod or sanhedrin of Jamnia has played an important part in recent arguments. According to Krochmal, Grätz, and Renan, one object of the Jewish doctors was to decide whether the Song and Koheleth ought to be admitted into the Canon. It seems, however, to have been satisfactorily shown[428] that their uncertainty was not as to whether these books ought to be admitted, but whether they had been rightly admitted. It is true that there was, even as late as A.D. 90, a chance for any struggling book (e.g. Sirach) to find its way into the Canon. But in the case of the Song and Koheleth a preliminary canonisation had taken place; it only remained to set at rest all lingering doubts in the minds of those who disputed the earlier decision. Another matter was also considered, according to Krochmal, at the synod of A.D. 90, viz. how to indicate that with the admission of Ecclesiastes the Canon of the Hagiographa was closed. I have already referred to this scholar’s view of the Epilogue (p. 232 &c.), and need only add that, if we may trust the statement of the Talmud, the canonicity of Koheleth was finally carried in deference to an argument which presupposes that xii. 13, 14 was already an integral part of Koheleth. The Talmudic passage is well known; it runs thus—
‘The wise men’ [i.e. the school of Shammai] ‘sought to “hide” the Book of Koheleth because of its contradictory sayings. And why did they not “hide” it? Because the beginning and the close of it consist of words of Tōra’ [i.e. are in harmony with revealed truth][429]. By the ‘beginning’ the Jewish doctors meant Koheleth’s assertion that ‘all a man’s toil which he toileth under the sun’ (i.e. all earthly, unspiritual toil) is unprofitable (i. 3), and by the ‘close’ the emphatic injunction and dogmatic declaration of the epilogist in xii. 13, 14. The Talmudic statement agrees, as is well known, with the note of St. Jerome on these verses. ‘Aiunt Hebræi quum inter cætera scripta Salomonis quæ antiquata sunt, nec in memoriâ duraverunt, et hic liber obliterandus videretur, eo quòd vanas Dei assereret creaturas, et totum putaret esse pro nihilo, et cibum, et potum, et delitias transeuntes præferret omnibus; ex hoc uno capitulo meruisse auctoritatem, ut in divinorum voluminum numero poneretur, quòd totam disputationem suam, et omnem catalogum hâc quasi ἀνακεφαλαιώσει coarctaverit, et dixerit finem sermonum auditu esse promtissimum, nec aliquid in se habere difficile: ut scilicet Deum timeamus, et ejus præcepta faciamus’ (Opera, ii. 787).
The canonicity of Ecclesiastes was rarely disputed in the ancient Church. The fifth œcumenical council at Constantinople pronounced decisively in its favour. On the Christian heretics in the fourth century who rejected it, see Ginsburg, Coheleth, p. 103.
Let me refer again, in conclusion, to the story in which that remarkable man—‘the restorer of the Law’—Simeon ben Shetach plays a chief part. It not only shows that Koheleth was a religious authority at the end of the second or beginning of the first century B.C., but implies that at this period the book was already comparatively old, and, one may fairly say, pre-Maccabæan. I presume too that the addition of the Epilogue (see pp. 234-5) with the all-important 13th and 14th verses had been made before Simeon’s time.
It was remarked above that as late as A.D. 90 there was a chance for any struggling book to gain admission into the Canon. Now for at least 180 years the Wisdom of Ben Sira had been struggling for recognition as canonical. In spite of the fact that it did not claim the authorship of any ancient sage, and that, like Koheleth, it contained some questionable passages, it was certainly in high favour both in Alexandria and in Palestine. As Delitzsch points out, ‘the oldest Palestinian authorities (Simeon ben Shetach, the brother of Queen Salome, about B.C. 90, seems to be the earliest) quote it as canonical, and the censures of Babylonian teachers only refer to the Aramaic Targum, not to the original work. The latter was driven out of the field by the Aramaic version, which, though very much interpolated, was more accessible to the people.’[430] Simeon ben Shetach was counted among the Jewish ‘fathers,’ and a saying of his is given in Pirke Aboth, i. 10. It is remarkable that the very same passage of Bereshith Rabba (c. 91) which contains this wise man’s quotations from Koheleth (see above) also contains one from Sirach introduced with the formula בספרא דבן סירא כתיב, ‘in the book of Ben Sira it is written.’ The quotation is, ‘Exalt her, and she shall set thee between princes’—apparently a genuine saying of Ben Sira (Sirach), though not found in our Ecclesiasticus. The first word (‘Exalt her’) comes, it is true, from Prov. iv. 8, but, as Dr. Wright remarks,[431] Ben Sira ‘was fond of tacking on new endings to old proverbs.’ At a much later period, a quotation from Ben Sira (Sir. vii. 10?) is made by Rab (about 165-247 A.D.) introduced with the formula משום שנאמר, ‘because it is said,’ Erubin, c. 65a. Strack indeed supposes that Rab meant to quote from canonical Scripture, but by a slip quoted from Ben Sira instead; but this is too bold a conjecture. Lastly, Rabba (about 270-330 A.D.) quotes a saying of our book (Sir. xiii. 15; xxvii. 9) as ‘repeated a third time in the Kethubhim (the Hagiographa)’—משולש בכתובים, Baba Kamma, c. 92b.
It is quite true that, according to the Talmudic passage referred to on p. 196, the Book of Ben Sira stands on the border-line between the canonical and the non-canonical literature: the words are, ‘The Books of Ben Sira, and all books which were written thenceforward, do not defile the hands.’ But taking this in connection with the vehement declaration of Rabbi Akiba that the man who reads Ben Sira and other ‘extraneous’ books has no portion in the world to come,[432] we may safely assume that the Book of Ben Sira had a position of exceptional authority with not a few Jewish readers. It is equally certain, as the above quotations show, that even down to the beginning of the fourth century A.D. sayings of Sirach were invested with the authority of Scripture. Whatever, then, may have been the theory (and no one pretends that the Synods of Jamnia placed Sirach on a level with Koheleth), the practice of some Jewish teachers was to treat Sirach as virtually canonical, which reminds us of the similar practice of some Christian Fathers. St. Augustine says (but he retracted it afterwards) of the two books of Wisdom, ‘qui quoniam in auctoritatem recipi meruerunt, inter propheticos numerandi sunt’ (De doctr. Christianâ, ii. 8), and both Origen and Cyprian quote Sirach as sacred scripture. Probably, as Fritzsche remarks, Sirach first became known to Christian teachers at Alexandria at the end of the second century.