{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"ECC","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Ecclesiastes","commonName":"Ecclesiastes","introduction":"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 (Kg1 3:5-14; Kg1 6:11-12; Kg1 9:1-9; Kg1 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\"); Kg1 4:34; Kg1 10:2, Kg1 10:8, Kg1 10:24; Ch2 9:1, Ch2 9:7, Ch2 9:23, plainly refer to a somewhat public divan met for literary discussion. So \"spake,\" thrice repeated (Kg1 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).\n\nSolomon 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 (Kg1 11:14, Kg1 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.\n\nTHE 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).\n\nIt 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.\n\nTHE 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.\n\nIt 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. \n\n\n\nNext: Ecclesiastes Chapter 1\n\n","order":21,"numberOfChapters":12,"sha256":"62a4e2df92d463e33901953fd7e9216b7cdda1901a15b41c1d5d575025baa481","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ECC/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ECC","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":12,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ECC/12.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ECC","chapter":12},"totalNumberOfVerses":202},"chapter":{"number":12,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["Illustrating \"the evil days\" (Jer 13:16). \"Light,\" \"sun,\" &c., express prosperity; \"darkness,\" pain and calamity (Isa 13:10; Isa 30:26). \n\nclouds . . . 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.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["keepers of the house--namely, the hands and arms which protected the body, as guards do a palace (Gen 49:24; Job 4:19; Co2 5:1), are now palsied. \n\nstrong men . . . bow-- (Jdg 16:25, Jdg 16:30). Like supporting pillars, the feet and knees (Sol 5:15); the strongest members (Psa 147:10). \n\ngrinders--the molar teeth. \n\ncease--are idle. \n\nthose 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.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["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). \n\nin the streets--that is, toward the street, \"the outer doors\" [MAURER and WEISS]. \n\nsound of . . . grinding--The teeth being almost gone, and the lips \"shut\" in eating, the sound of mastication is scarcely heard. \n\nthe 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]. \n\ndaughters of music--the organs that produce and that enjoy music; the voice and ear.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["that which is high--The old are afraid of ascending a hill. \n\nfears . . . in the way--Even on the level highway they are full of fears of falling, &c. \n\nalmond . . . 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. \n\ngrasshoppers--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]. \n\na burden--namely, to himself. \n\ndesire shall fail--satisfaction shall be abolished. For \"desire,\" Vulgate has \"the caper tree,\" provocative of lust; not so well. \n\nlong home-- (Job 16:22; Job 17:13). \n\nmourners-- (Jer 9:17-20), hired for the occasion (Mat 9:23).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["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).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["dust--the dust-formed body. \n\nspirit--surviving the body; implying its immortality (Ecc 3:11).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["A summary of the first part. \n\nVanity, &c.--Resumption of the sentiment with which the book began (Ecc 1:2; Jo1 2:17).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["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 (Kg1 4:34). \n\nthat 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.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["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. \n\nfastened--rather, on account of the Hebrew genders, (The words) \"are fastened (in the memory) like nails\" [HOLDEN]. \n\nmasters 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 (Pe1 5:2-4). SCHMIDT translates, \"The masters of assemblies are fastened (made sure) as nails,\" so Isa 22:23.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["(See on Ecc 1:18). \n\nmany books--of mere human composition, opposed to \"by these\"; these inspired writings are the only sure source of \"admonition.\" \n\n(over much) study--in mere human books, wearies the body, without solidly profiting the soul.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["The grand inference of the whole book. \n\nFear 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). \n\nthis 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 (Jo1 3:22-24; Rev 22:14).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["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.\n\n\n\n\n\nNext: Song of Solomon (Canticles) Introduction\n\n"]}],"introduction":"(Ecc 12:1-14)\n\nAs Ecc 11:9-10 showed what youths are to shun, so this verse shows what they are to follow. \n\nCreator--\"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). \n\nwhile . . . 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). \n\nno pleasure--of a sensual kind (Sa2 19:35; Psa 90:10). Pleasure in God continues to the godly old (Isa 46:4).\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ECC/12.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ECC","chapter":12},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/SNG/1.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"SNG","chapter":1},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/ECC/11.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"ECC","chapter":11},"numberOfVerses":12}