THE QUESTION `WHAT IS THAT GOOD?'
14
`Who knows whether he will be a wise man or a fool? Yet shall he rule over all my labour wherein I have
laboured, and where I have showed myself wise under the sun. This is also vanity' (Author's translation).
The theme is restated in verse 21 with the more positive thought that the result of all his labours will go to one
who has not given one moment's thought to its production. Yet once more:
`What hath man of all his labour, and of the vexation of his heart ... all his days are sorrows, and his travail grief;
yea, his heart taketh not rest in the night. This is also vanity' (2:22,23).
How completely in harmony is this with Psalm 127, a song of degrees BY SOLOMON (see Companion Bible):
`Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman
waketh but in vain. It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so He giveth
His beloved IN (their) SLEEP' (1,2).
We must note Ecclesiastes 2:24-26 and remember that the word `than' is not in the original. The Vulgate and
Luther make the sentence interrogative. In verse 25 the weight of MS. evidence is in favour of reading `apart from
Him' instead of `more than I'. Hence the passage reads:
`Is it not good for man that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour?
This also I saw, that it (i.e. enjoyment of good) was from the hand of God'.
Man himself cannot accomplish it. `For who can eat, or who else can hasten hereunto apart from Him'? Here
Koheleth sees the truth of Romans 2:5-10:
`For God giveth to a man that is good in His sight wisdom, and knowledge, and joy: but to the sinner He giveth
travail, to gather (as the fruits Lev. 23:39) and to heap up (same word `I gathered me also silver and gold' 2:8),
that he may give to him that is good before God'.
How similar is Proverbs 28:8:
`He that by usury and unjust gain increaseth his substance, he shall gather it for him that will pity the poor'.
`This also is vanity and vexation of spirit'. Do not let us jump to the conclusion, as many do, that Koheleth is
taking sides with the sinner. He is expressing a fact, that the fraudulent accumulation of riches is simply vanity and
vexation of spirit for the sinner, for none can enjoy the results of his labours apart from God's permission.
In chapter 4:4,8 and 14 three further observations are recorded: first, the envy which even righteous work begets
in one's neighbour; secondly, the vanity of increasing and unsatisfying labour on the part of one having neither kith
nor kin; and thirdly, by the contemplation of the instability even of a despot's throne. This passage has been
paraphrased by A. A. Morgan thus:
`Better cried they, a youth the land should rule
Than one whom time and age hath made a fool.
The heir of poverty, of bondmen born
If wise, disarms hereditary scorn,
And claims a people's homage more than he,
Whose mind is wasted by infirmity'.
While an old and foolish king can be no good to a people, and while we may argue with every appearance of
right along such lines as `A man's a man, for a' that, and a' that', yet there is something very unscriptural in the
democratic view of kingship. Prophecy illuminates the goal of democratic rule. The world will not be better for
exchanging the head of gold for the feet of clay. God's ideal rule is by a king upon a throne, and nothing can finally
be right that disregards that fact. Therefore Koheleth is right when he contemplates this up to date rebellion.
`Surely this also is vanity and vexation of spirit'. Five more observations will complete our survey.
`He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance (be satisfied) with increase'
(5:10).