Ecclesiastes

A unique encounter between faith and reason, and an exploration of the search for meaning in life.

From Azure magazine, Autumn 2004

Ecclesiastes,

Fleeting and Timeless

Ethan Dor-Shav

he book of Ecclesiastes is a philosophical account of the attempt to

find happiness by a man who has everything. Written in the name of

“Kohelet son of David, King in Jerusalem,” the book has traditionally been

attributed to Solomon, who reigned during the golden age of Israel’s united

kingdom, in the tenth century ... Twelve chapters long, it is one of lit-

erature’s earliest encounters between faith and reason: e author struggles

to believe that life is meaningful despite his experience of the world. e

book’s inclusion in the Hebrew Bible is therefore remarkable, testifying to

Judaism’s interest not only in divine revelation, but also in man’s exploration

of the meaning of life and mortality.

e search for meaning is an eternal one, but the use of Solomon’s voice

carries special importance for the modern reader.1 Unlike other biblical

Jewish leaders, Solomon lived in a time of unparalleled prosperity and free-

dom. As opposed to the quest of Job, Solomon’s search for wisdom did not

arise from a desire to make sense of either personal misfortune or national

catastrophe. Indeed, his was a life of unrepentant indulgence: He tempted

himself with wine, entertained himself with male and female performers,

and amassed untold treasures and hundreds of wives and concubines.

 • A

Rather, Kohelet sets out on his inquiry from the perspective of a life

replete with fortune and opportunity. He takes as his starting point not rev-

elation, but man’s personal need for meaning. In other words, Ecclesiastes is

not about what God wants of us, but about what we want for ourselves. is

approach may resonate especially strongly with Western readers of today,

since few Westerners appreciate doing things simply because they aretold,

regardless of who does the telling. We moderns are thus in a unique position

to identify with Kohelet’s quest.

To all appearances, however, it would seem that this search is doomed

from the start. Already in the opening passages, Kohelet despairs over what

he sees as the futility of life’s labors:

erefore I hated life, because the deeds that are done under the sun were

depressing to me, for all is vanity and grasping for the wind. en I hated

all my work, which I work at under the sun, because I must leave it to the

man who will come after me—and who knows whether he will be wise or

a fool? Yet he will rule over all my work which I worked at, and contrived,

under the sun.… is also is vanity, and a great evil.2

Kohelet is disillusioned with life because he believes it is all in vain; he

abhors the idea of leaving his life’s work behind for someone else to enjoy

or to squander. Whereas all the great emperors and kings of old strove to

achieve eternal life by erecting grand monuments to themselves, Kohelet

understands that such attempts are illusory. He is therefore forced to pose

the elementary question: If I die anyway, why does anything matter?

Kohelet’s first word, however, is not his last. For there are numerous

passages in Ecclesiastes that move in the opposite direction. ey affirm,

for example, the positive value of a joyful life.3 e same Kohelet who ap-

pears to say so often that “all is vanity” also exclaims that “there is nothing

better than man rejoicing,”4 and that “nothing is better for man under the

sun than to eat, drink, and be joyful.”5 Kohelet also exhorts his fellow man

to “Go, eat your bread with joy, drink your wine with a content mind; for

God has already graced your deeds.”6 ese bold affirmations of life echo

  /  • 

almost word for word the maxim of Solomon’s days, that brief flowering of

Jewish renaissance: “Judah and Israel were as numerous as the sand by the

sea in multitude; eating and drinking and rejoicing.”7 Similar verses can also

be found that affirm the importance of action in this world, as well as the

acquisition of wisdom—verses that do not square well with the belief that

all is vanity.8

Conventional interpretations of Ecclesiastes offer little help in resolving

these contradictions.9 In taking the frustration expressed by Kohelet to its

existential extreme, most commentators conclude that he rejects completely

the finite nature of life, either by means of a skeptical nihilism or fatalistic

moralism. As M. James Sawyer writes, according to Ecclesiastes “Man is

compelled to seek for an answer to the meaning of life. It is a task which

wearies him and causes him grief and is doomed to ultimate failure.”10 Yet

any reading of the book that does not account for its affirmation of joy and

wisdom misunderstands the central message of the text. For in truth, Kohe-

let is neither a determinist nor a nihilist. Rather, he is a profound humanist,

valuing both life and the process of learning that makes it worthy of our

sincerest efforts.

o be sure, Kohelet was not alone among the ancients to concern

himself with the meaning of death and the quest for eternal life.

roughout much of the ancient world, rulers built monumental structures

to establish their immortality. e pyramids of ancient Egypt, which aimed

to project the “star” of Pharaoh into the eternal sphere of the heavens, are

evidence of this.11 Furthermore, it was common to amass material riches—

what archaeologists call “grave goods”—in the hope of transferring them to

the world beyond.12 is practice was prevalent, for example, among the

Egyptians, Sumerians, Mayans, and Chinese; indeed, like King Tutankha-

mun’s numerous shabti and

shabti and

shabti ushebti companions, the Chinese emperor Qin

ushebti companions, the Chinese emperor Qin

ushebti

Shi Huang had thousands of life-size clay soldiers buried near his grave in

order to ensure victory in his battles in the afterworld.

 • A

us Kohelet’s bold opening—the assertion that such efforts are

futile—constitutes the first step of an intellectual revolution. However, hav-

ing rejected the notion of achieving immortality through material gains,

Kohelet must seek another way. One possibility is the negation of life in

favor of the world to come, represented in both the Christian and Islamic

approaches to immortality by means of richly described afterworlds. e

Koran, for example, emphasizes the similarity of heaven to the temporal

world: “As for the righteous, they shall surely triumph. eirs shall be gar-

“As for the righteous, they shall surely triumph. eirs shall be gar-

“

dens and vineyards, and high-bosomed maidens for companions: a truly

overflowing cup.”13 Similarly, Christian scripture includes vivid descriptions

of souls in the world to come, much of which were elaborated upon by

Dante in his visual descriptions of heaven and hell, and which were cap-

tured in the grandiose paintings of Hieronymous Bosch. In all these cases,

the afterlife is portrayed as a concrete reality, thus ingrained in its adherents

from childhood.

e religions of India and the Far East offer, instead, the idea of reincar-

nation. ey emphasize the immortality of the soul, yet attach little signifi-

cance to the self-conscious awareness of the reincarnated individual. With

the exception of certain rare enlightened beings, immortality is achieved

at the expense of identity. Yet one need only look at the elaborate Tibetan

Book of the Dead to see that the nature of the afterlife is, once again, consid-

ered concrete knowledge, and is described—and illustrated, in numerous

mandalas—in lush detail.

mandalas 14

e common denominator of all these doctrines is a detachment from

life, a dismissal of material existence in favor of a radically different reality.

Judaism, too, shares the idea of the afterlife; however, it is rarely the focus

of Jewish practice, and the rabbinic texts avoid engaging in lengthy descrip-

tions of it.15 By contrast, it is a central feature of the thinking found in

Tibet, Mecca, and the Vatican, that by means of constant, detailed attention

to the world beyond, this life becomes merely a treacherous pass leading to

the next. Indeed, detachment from the world is almost the definition of

true piety in some religions, many of which wholeheartedly embrace the

  /  • 

meaninglessness of mortal existence. In these cultures, the more one seeks

immortality, the more one detaches oneself from the physical world.

As a result of the prevalence of this asceticism in history, many people,

including Jews, have unconsciously become accustomed to seeing everyday

life as separate from spiritual existence. And since most of us embrace in-

volvement in the real world, hoping like Kohelet to make our mark in it, we

must naturally wonder whether this makes our life less meaningful. In other

words, if we focus on earthly reality and worldly wisdom, are we, therefore,

necessarily less close to God?

Conventional readings of Ecclesiastes suggest as much. e description

of Ecclesiastes provided in the Encyclopaedia Britannica is a case in point:

Encyclopaedia Britannica is a case in point:

Encyclopaedia Britannica

“e author examines everything—material things, wisdom, toil, wealth—

and finds them unable to give meaning to life.”16 And yet, this attitude is

at odds not only with numerous passages in the text itself, as cited above,

but also with classical Jewish beliefs about the nature of mortality. In fact,

visions of the afterlife are discouraged in the biblical narrative, and God is

shown to place great value on man’s actions in the material world. As such,

it seems unlikely that Ecclesiastes’ intention is to conclude that our involve-

ment in the world is without meaning.

If we are to make sense of this challenging text, we must read it another

way. We should approach it as a text that is part of, and speaks to, a broader

biblical tradition. Indeed, to the assembled Israelites of the First Temple

period, Kohelet’s famous opening line—“Vanity of vanities, all is vanity”—

would have been instantly recognizable as an allusion to another text in

their unique intellectual heritage: e story of Cain and Abel from the book

of Genesis. e most important clue to the mystery of Ecclesiastes, there-

fore, is found in the striking reference it makes to the Bible’s first book.

 • A

he central message of Ecclesiastes may be encapsulated in a single

word: Hevel, usually translated as “vanity.”

Hevel, usually translated as “vanity.”

Hevel 17 e word appears 38

times in the text, and it is clearly critical to understanding the book’s mes-

sage. It is most commonly understood to mean futility or meaninglessness,

or the idea that anything we do is in vain. Yet Hevel is also the Hebrew

name of Abel, Cain’s brother, the son of Adam and Eve. erefore we must

first remind ourselves of the original text in Genesis to which Kohelet is

referring. For the sake of clarity, we will render it using the Hebrew name

for Abel:

Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying,

“I have acquired a man from the Lord.” en she bore again, this time his

brother Hevel. Now Hevel was a pastor of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of

the ground. And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought

an offering of the fruit of the ground to the Lord. Hevel also brought of

the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. And the Lord heeded Hevel and

his offering, but he did not heed Cain and his offering. And Cain was

very angry, and his countenance fell. So the Lord said to Cain, “Why are

you angry? And why has your countenance fallen? If you better, you will

transcend. And if you do not better, sin lies at the door. And its desire is

toward you, and you will be its master.” Now Cain said to Hevel—and it

came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Hevel

his brother and killed him.18

In light of Kohelet’s preoccupation with death, his reference to Abel is strik-

ing. Abel is the first human being to die. Just two verses after humankind

was denied the tree of eternal life, his story becomes the embodiment of

human mortality. It is in this context that we may reread the verses of Eccle-

siastes: “Man sets out for his eternal abode, with mourners all around in the

street.… And the dust returns to the ground as it was, and the lifebreath re-

turns to God who bestowed it. Hevel havalim, says Kohelet. All is hevel.”

hevel.”

hevel 19

  /  • 

However, Abel’s representation of death is only one side of the story.

He is also the first human being to offer a sacrifice that God accepts. is

is no trifle. A far cry from the guilt of Adam, Eve, and Cain, all of whom

were rebuked by God, Abel was the first human whom God clearly likes.

Before him, we did not even know it was possible. When we read that

“the Lord heeded Hevel and his offering,” the verb “heeded,” vayisha, car-

ries a powerful overtone of deliverance as well as acceptance. Isaiah, for

example, declares, “Israel shall be delivered (nosha) in the Lord, an eternal

salvation (teshuat)

teshuat)

teshuat .”20 Moses, in his very last words on earth, proclaims: “O

happy Israel! Who is like you, a people delivered (nosha) in the Lord.…”21

Furthermore, God is deliberately accepting, or as the Hebrew connotes,

“delivering,” not only the offering, but Abel himself. Not until Abraham do

we find such unqualified approval by God. Not until the crowning moment

of Exodus, as God forged his eternal bond with the people of Israel, is the

cognate word for “deliverance,” yeshua, used again.22

In fact, Abel’s deliverance is not restricted to that of a single person, ei-

ther. rough Abel, God offers his first universal explanation of life’s calling.

By heeding the offering of Abel and not of Cain, God teaches humanity a

fundamental law of divine justice, in his response to Cain’s vexation: “If you

better, you will transcend.”23 Life is not a game of chance.

And yet, who was this man whom God affirmed? Abel’s life was too

short to allow for the attainment of material success. Nor can he be cred-

ited with any innovation: Even the idea of sacrifice was Cain’s.24 Above

all, Abel was childless. His life, therefore, left no trace. He walked without

footprints.

If we translate Abel’s name, hevel, as “vanity,” as readers of Ecclesiastes

hevel, as “vanity,” as readers of Ecclesiastes

hevel

have long been accustomed, it is impossible to reconcile the term with

Abel’s acceptance by God. Indeed, the story of Abel teaches the exact

opposite—the possibility of salvation despite the fleeting nature of life.

Precisely because of the tragic nature of Abel’s interrupted life, we learn its

deepest message: In turning one’s life into an offering, one is not dependent

on any life circumstance, or on any achievements in the material world.

 • A

Abel, moreover, carries an additional symbol that works most strongly

against a pejorative reading of his name. He is, after all, the paradigmatic

shepherd. is is a vivid marker to anyone familiar with the Bible’s greatest

heroes: Abraham, Isaac, Rachel, and Jacob, as well as Moses and David, are

all shepherds. Shepherds are ever mobile, and their presence in the Bible

symbolizes the idea of life as a journey, and spirituality as an ongoing quest.

In fact, in Ecclesiastes and elsewhere, the image of the shepherd is extended

to God, and in the Song of Songs, also attributed to Solomon, the author

reserves the role of shepherd for himself. e idea of the roving shepherd

has ultimately come to represent the Jewish people as a whole: When, for

example, Joseph alludes to the metaphysical divide between the worldviews

of Egypt and Israel, he tells his brothers that “all shepherds are abhorrent to

Egyptians,”25 meaning that the Egyptians disdained the spiritual freedom

and “unattachment” which shepherds represent, in favor of a Cain-like

materialism. e brothers, in turn, proudly tell Pharaoh, “We your servants

are shepherds, as were also our fathers.”26 Our fathers, that is, all the way

back to Abel. Like the nomadic Abraham, who left behind all that he knew

in Ur to establish a new nation in Canaan, our self-identity as a nation of

shepherds symbolizes our dynamic historic mission. As such, Abel is the

forerunner of this spiritual lineage, and his transient life the inspiration for

all those on a quest for enlightenment. 27

A better reading of hevel, then, and one that provides us with an ex-

hevel, then, and one that provides us with an ex-

hevel

tremely important tool for understanding both Genesis and Ecclesiastes,

takes us back to the root meaning of the word: Vapor or mist. What is im-

portant about the life of Abel is not its futility, but its transience. It was as

fleeting as a puff of air, yet his life’s calling was nonetheless fulfilled.28

is, too, is the meaning of hevel in Ecclesiastes: Not the dismissive

hevel in Ecclesiastes: Not the dismissive

hevel

“vanity,” but the more objective “transience,” referring strictly to mortal-

ity and the fleeting nature of human life.29 “Fleeting transience (hevel

havalim),” says Kohelet, “All is fleeting.”30 Or, read another way: Abel is

every man. Without the negative connotations of “vanity,” we discover in

  /  • 

Kohelet a man who is tormented not by the meaninglessness of life, but by

how swiftly it comes to an end. Life is gone so very quickly, and likewise

man’s worldly deeds. We now understand the significance of Kohelet’s

opening proclamation that “all is hevel.” He seeks to confront his listeners

hevel.” He seeks to confront his listeners

hevel

with man’s own mortality—the underlying premise of any inquiry into the

meaning of life in this world.31

e reading of hevel as “vanity” is not only misleading, but in some cases

it makes the text impossible to read. Perhaps the most striking example can

be found in the book’s ninth chapter, where Kohelet discusses the value of

love in one’s life. “View life with a woman you have come to love—all the

days of your transitory life (kol yemei hayei hevlecha) which he has gifted you

under the sun—every fleeting day. For this is your share in life.…”32 Read

the traditional way, the verse is difficult to parse. It would sound something

like, “Live joyfully... all the days of your vain life.” Life is vanity, so enjoy

love? e verse makes far better sense if hevel is translated as “fleeting,” fo-

cusing on life’s brevity: Cherish your time together, for life is fleeting, and

therefore precious. en is your love that much more meaningful.

Understanding hevel in this sense is also crucial to understanding the

hevel in this sense is also crucial to understanding the

hevel

passage, in the book’s eighth chapter, which deals with the concept of injus-

tice in the world. Read the traditional way, Kohelet explains, “en I saw

the wicked buried, who had come and gone from the place of holiness, and

they were forgotten in the city where they had so done. is,” he concludes,

“is vanity.”33 Again, this is a difficult read: Why is it considered vanity if

evildoers are forgotten? e verse makes far more sense if we understand it

to relate to the illusory, temporary nature of evil’s success: Kohelet reassures

us that setbacks to justice are transient, and that evil will not prevail in the

final round: “It is of the fleeting nature of the world, that some righteous

receive what befits the acts of evildoers, while some evildoers receive what

befits the righteous; this too, I say, is only temporary.34

 • A

t is only through the corrected reading of hevel as “transience” rather

hevel as “transience” rather

hevel

than “vanity” that we may understand the structure of the book of

Ecclesiastes, and thereby learn its message. For Ecclesiastes does not offer

a single, static teaching from beginning to end, but a thematic progression,

one that follows Kohelet’s own discovery of meaning.

e book can be seen as consisting of three parts. e initial stage, cov-

ering the first five chapters of the book (starting at 1:12), is characterized

by frustration with the transience of life: Kohelet bemoans the fact that all

achievements are short-lived. He is bitter about the transience of human

contentment (2:1-3), riches (2:4-11), physical existence (3:18-21), and cor-

rective social remedies (chapter 4). Stylistically, this stage is characterized

by the juxtapositions of the term hevel with words of despair and tragedy.

ough not all references to transience, even at this early stage, are decided-

ly negative, most are. It is in this first part that we learn why Kohelet “hated

life,” for he has discovered that all one’s worldly achievements are, like man

himself, in the end but dust and ashes: “For what has a man for all his work,

and for his mind’s notions, which he works at under the sun?”35

It is this bitter discovery of mortality that propels Kohelet on his quest

for meaning. We are reminded of Franz Rosenzweig’s words that “All cogni-

tion of the All originates in death, in the fear of death.”36 Or of the story

of the young Siddhartha, the first Buddha, who lived in India just a few

centuries after Solomon. His privileged upbringing, comparable to Solo-

mon’s own, shielded him from the reality of the outside world; Siddhartha

embarked on his spectacular spiritual journey “to find the real meaning of

life and death”37 only after his first confrontation with age, illness, and mor-

tality. Kohelet’s quest, as well, is triggered by the traumatic realization of hu-

man transience—that the greatest efforts of the wisest king cannot stop the

flow of time, nor can they eliminate suffering and injustice from the world.

Dejection soon gives way to acceptance, however, as the book enters

its second stage, starting at 6:4 and running through chapter 7, in which

  /  • 

Kohelet begins to view the ephemeral nature of reality more philosophically.38

Combined phrases such as “transient and grievous”39 are completely aban-

doned in this section, less than halfway through the book. e neutrality of

the six appearances of hevel in this stage is typified by the example of tem-

porary flattery: “e cheers of the ignorant,” we read, are “like the crackling

thorns under a pot; all so temporary, too.”40 Kohelet loses no sleep over the

fickle nature of fools’ praise and fleeting popularity. Having resigned himself

to transience, he has come to recognize that it may not be inherently bad

after all. is is expressed most vividly in the verses describing the stillborn

child:

If a man fathers a hundred children and lives many years, so that the days

of his years are many, but gains no pleasure from his riches, nor proper

burial for himself, I say that a stillborn child is better off than he—for in

transience it comes (behevel), in oblivion it departs, in the dark a lid is cast

behevel), in oblivion it departs, in the dark a lid is cast

behevel

over its name. ough it has not seen or known of the sun, it has more

peace than that man. Even if he lives a thousand years twice—but has not

seen goodness. Do not all go to one place?41

Again we see that the word hevel holds the key to interpreting the pas-

hevel holds the key to interpreting the pas-

hevel

sage. For if the stillborn child comes in “futility” or “vanity,” how could his

situation in any way be described as better off? If, however, we understand

behevel to mean “in transience,” the passage instead becomes a somber ac-

behevel

ceptance of the objective fact of mortality. Kohelet teaches that, indeed,

temporal existence is not an end in itself. e attitude of this stage is in some

sense reminiscent of the afterlife-centered attitudes of Christianity and East-

ern thought: A long, successful existence in the world, without merit, is

worse than no physical life at all.

Support for this interpretation can be found in the rabbinic literature,

in a midrash that relates this passage directly to the story of Cain and

Abel: “‘If a man fathers a hundred children’: is refers to Cain, who

had a hundred sons but gained no satisfaction from his wealth or the

 • A

goodness of the world…. ‘Astillborn is better’—this refers to his brother

Abel.”42 For the stillborn is born in hevel. In Kohelet’s view, man is dispar-

hevel. In Kohelet’s view, man is dispar-

hevel

aged not because fleeting life is itself unworthy, but because he has made it

so by virtue of his actions. It is better, then, to have the most transient exist-

ence of Abel, whose life was short but exemplary, than the misery of Cain,

whose long life became a curse.

e third stage covers the last four chapters of the book. By this point,

hevel has lost any trace of the negativity which it carried in the early chap-

ters. It is never tied to a second word—never “transience and,” together with

something distasteful. On the contrary, in these final chapters, all uses of

hevel are associated, directly or indirectly, with joy, or

hevel simha.

e examples are too pervasive to ignore. In one case, as we have seen,

Kohelet refers to the transience of injustice: While evildoers may succeed,

their success is only temporary. is knowledge, however, is linked directly

with Kohelet’s own happiness at the fact—“erefore,” he concludes, “I

prized joy (hasimha).” e same holds true in his statements about the

transience of youth. “Youth and virility are fleeting,” he famously declares,

yet only after admonishing his reader to “rejoice (semah).” A similar point

is made in the context of fleeting love: “Live with a woman you love all the

fleeting days of your life,” he suggests—but only immediately after having

told his reader to “Go, eat your bread with joy (besimha).”43 Indeed, only

a few verses before the end of the book, the link between transience and

joy becomes explicit, even emphatic: “Even if one lives many long years, he

should rejoice ( yismah) in them all, heeding the days of darkness, for they

shall be many; all that transpires is fleeting (hevel ).”44

From the first stage, then, in which hevel was but a small step from

hevel was but a small step from

hevel

tragedy and evil, it is now never far from happiness. us the third stage

represents a surprising turn. In it we find exuberant affirmations of life, and

the joy and wisdom that it can bring. Kohelet has now learned, and seeks to

teach, the deeper lesson of hevel: Transience as inspiration.

hevel: Transience as inspiration.

hevel

is lesson is later echoed in other systems of thought. Nowhere is it

clearer, perhaps, than in the words of the Buddha: “is existence of ours

  /  • 

is as transient as autumn clouds. To watch the birth and death of beings is

like looking at the movements of a dance. A lifetime is a flash of lightning

in the sky. Rushing by like a torrent down a steep mountain.” is insight,

according to the Buddha’s last sermon, has the most profound impact on

our lives. “By always thinking about the transience of your life, you will be

able to resist green and anger, and will be able to avoid all evils.”45

In our own text, the wisest of Israel’s kings realizes that not only good

fortune and success, but also sorrow, power, jealousy, and oppression are all,

in the end, fleeting. It is this realization that opens the doors to redemption.

e true spirit of this third stage is crystallized in the following passage:

Go, eat your bread with joy, drink your wine with a content mind; for God

has already graced your deeds…. Whatever you find in your power to do,

do it. For there are no deeds, no contriving, no knowledge, and no wisdom

in the abyss you are bound for.46

Like fleeting cherry blossoms, almost sacredly ephemeral, the transi-

ence of hevel inspires Kohelet’s existential transformation. It encapsulates

the beauty of sunsets, autumn leaves, or the Impressionist’s fascination with

fleeting light. For it is precisely the transience of these things that moves us.

By understanding the fleeting nature of life as a whole, Kohelet is no longer

paralyzed by the burden of death. Life’s transience is dynamically trans-

formed into a powerful motivational force: An urgency to live, to experience

joy, to take action, and above all, to learn. e key to embracing transience,

Kohelet discovers, is not to build monuments or expand empires, but to

find the truth and inner understanding that flows from the eye-opening

insight into the fleeting nature of it all.

Kohelet thus ends his quest by affirming the absolute value of mortal

existence. In this way he resolves the existential frustration that tormented

him at the beginning of the book: While Jewish tradition undoubtedly

accepts the idea of an afterlife, it is never to be allowed to take over our con-

sciousness. To the end, life itself must remain the focus of man’s existence.

 • A

An appreciation for joy grows steadily out of such an understanding. In

truth, Judaism has long recognized its spiritual value. For example, the Tal-

mud teaches that divine inspiration cannot be attained in a state of sadness,

for it dwells only in a mind that has trained itself in joy.47 Many centuries

later, the Hasidic sage Rabbi Nahman of Breslav taught that it is a great

thing always to be in a state of joy. As Kohelet writes: “Rejoice, O lad, in

your childhood, let your mind elevate you in the days of your youth… clear

your mind of grievance and relieve your body of harm.…”48To Kohelet, joy

is not a consolation prize, or an elixir for life’s pains. Neither is it related to

the promise of a life to come. Rather, joy is a value in and of itself; it is what

it means to be truly alive.49

Yet even joy, it seems, is not the final destination for Kohelet. Ulti-

mately, if there is an underlying message in the book of Ecclesiastes, it is

this: at only in understanding the transience of life do we attain the be-

ginning of wisdom; and in turn, only through the wisdom derived from our

experience of life may we in some way take part in that which is eternal. e

importance of wisdom is mentioned repeatedly in Ecclesiastes: “Wisdom

excels folly as light excels darkness”;50 “Wisdom preserves the lives of its

possessors”;51 “Wisdom empowers the wise”;52 “A man’s wisdom illuminates

his face, and its power is transformed.”53 Moreover, Kohelet refers to man’s

judgment before God when one inevitably leaves this world. It is in this

context that he provides his most important conclusion regarding the na-

ture of wisdom: “I say, dwell upon the King’s commandment, and discourse

of God’s covenant.… He who follows the commands will avoid misconcep-

tions; come the hour of judgment, he will know a wise mind.”54 Kohelet

realizes that true wisdom is the one thing that is not dependent on transient

circumstances. Yet all of the transient circumstances in this world serve as

the means of acquiring it. is was the meaning of Abel’s life, which served

as the inspiration for the book of Ecclesiastes.55

is ultimate lesson—fleeting life yielding eternal truth—touches on

the very core of the Bible’s imagery. It is found in the book of Exodus, at the

very point where Moses begins his own spiritual path. A shepherd like his

  /  • 

forefathers, he is tending his flock when he comes across an amazing revela-

tion: “And the Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire from the

midst of a bush. So he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire,

but the bush was not consumed. en Moses said, ‘I will now turn aside

and see this great sight, why the bush does not burn...’”56 In the burning

bush, Moses perceived the powerful image of ephemeral, physical existence

sustaining in it a fire of the eternal, two realities which seemingly cannot

coexist but in truth are inseparable. Moses would himself come to resemble

this image, when, having heard the word of God on Mount Sinai, descend-

ing from the mountain, now his own temporal, fleeting body radiating the

eternal light.57 Indeed, the Zohar affirms this connection when it states that

Moses was a reincarnation of Abel.58 is parable linking Abel with the

greatest biblical prophet validates the hidden promise of hevel, which, as

hevel, which, as

hevel

we have seen, is Ecclesiastes’ central innovation. “Fleeting transience,” con-

cludes Kohelet, “fleeting transience, it is all thin air.” Yet at the core of such

thorny transience, we find a timeless flame.

Everything but wisdom is transient, teaches the king, and history has

proven him right. Neither Solomon’s riches, nor his power, nor even his

monumental temple in Jerusalem survived under the sun. What has indeed

lasted, however, is the legacy of his wisdom, embodied in the book of Ec-

clesiastes. is belief in knowledge as the highest form of spirituality has

served as the Jewish torch throughout the ages. And no small measure of

that light is reflected in the understanding that only ideas can defy time,

transforming the world.

Ethan Dor-Shav is an Associate Fellow at the Shalem Center in Jerusalem. He is

currently working on a study of the soul in the Hebrew Bible. His last essay in A

was “e Israel Museum and the Loss of Jewish Memory” (A

was “e Israel Museum and the Loss of Jewish Memory” ( 5, Autumn 1998).

 • A

Notes

e author wishes to express his deep gratitude to Professor Menachem Fisch, who

opened that door so many years ago.

1. For the purpose of this essay, it is of little significance whether or not the

historical king Solomon actually wrote the work of Ecclesiastes. It is clear both from

the opening verse and from numerous other examples that its author intended it to

be read as a statement of Solomon’s wisdom.

2. Ecclesiastes 2:17-21. All verse translations are mine, based on the New King

James Version.

3. Although mistaking hevel for “emptiness,” Rami Shapiro fleshes out the

hevel for “emptiness,” Rami Shapiro fleshes out the

hevel

pro-joy theme in his e Way of Solomon: Finding Joy and Contentment in the Wis-

dom of Ecclesiastes (San Francisco: Harper, 2000). Other scholars have also alluded

dom of Ecclesiastes

to this theme, albeit sporadically; see, for example, Daniel C. Fredericks, who writes

of Kohelet’s “timely laughter, dancing and embracing, and love and peace,” in Cop-

ing with Transience:Ecclesiastes on Brevity in Life(Sheffield: , 1993), p. 68.

4. Ecclesiastes 3:22.

5. Ecclesiastes 8:15.

6. Ecclesiastes 9:7.

7. I Kings 4:20.

8. Ecclesiastes 2:13, 7:12, 7:19, 8:1-5, and elsewhere.

9. Indeed, the Talmud tells us how the rabbis considered suppressing the en-

tire book as a result of its apparent inner contradictions. Shabbat 30b.

10. M. James Sawyer, “e eology of Ecclesiastes,” Biblical Studies Founda-

tion website, www.bible.org/docs/ot/books/ecc/theoecc.htm.

11. Cf. Giorgio de Santillana, Hamlet’s Mill: An Essay on Myth and the Frame

of Time (Boston: David Godine, 1994).

of Time

12. Cf. Jan Assmann, e Mind of Egypt: History and Meaning in the Time of

the Pharaohs (New York: Metropolitan, 2002); Serge Sauneron,

the Pharaohs e Search for God

in Ancient Egypt, trans. David Lorton (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell, 2000).

in Ancient Egypt

13. e Koran, trans. N.J. Dawood (Middlesex: Penguin, 1974), 78:31,

p. 53.

14. John Woodroffe, in his introduction to e Tibetan Book of the Dead, ex-

e Tibetan Book of the Dead, ex-

e Tibetan Book of the Dead

plains, “e after-death apparitions are ‘real’ enough for the deceased.” (London:

Oxford, 1960), p. lxxiii.

15. Cf. Maimonides, Mishneh Tora, Laws of Repentance 8:6.

  /  • 

16. From the entry for “Biblical Literature” in Encyclopaedia Britannica

(Chicago: University of Chicago, 2003), vol. xiv, p. 951.

17. From the Latin Vanitas vanitatum omina vanitas, Jerome’s Latin Vulgate

(405 ..).

18. Genesis 4:1-8.

19. Ecclesiastes 12:5-8. e word hevel, moreover, resembles a number of He-

hevel, moreover, resembles a number of He-

hevel

brew roots clearly dealing with demise over time: “And we all do wither (navel) as a

navel) as a

navel

leaf”(Isaiah 64:5); “ey shall perish... all of them shall wear out (yivlu

leaf”(Isaiah 64:5); “ey shall perish... all of them shall wear out ( )... and they

shall pass” (Psalms 102:27); “And your dead shall live; corpses (nevelati) shall arise...

(Isaiah 26:19). is root, moreover, finds cognates in Old South Arabian, where

blwt is “grave”; the Ugaritic

blwt bly and the Ethopic

bly and the Ethopic

bly balya (“to be consumed”); and the

balya (“to be consumed”); and the

balya

Akkadian balu (“to fade, pass away”). Cf. Cyrus H. Gordon, Ugaritic Textbook, en-

try #471; ZAW 75:307; Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner, e Hebrew and

Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Boston: Brill, 2001), p. 132.

Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament

20. Isaiah 45:17.

21. Deuteronomy 33:29.

22. Exodus 14:30.

23. Cf. Numbers 6:26. is teaching, it should be noted, rejects the pagan

view of a mechanistic element to worship and sacrifice, according to which humans

manipulate the gods through ritual, independent of their purity of intentions.

24. Abel, however, might very well have been the first to take a life: Whereas

take a life: Whereas

take

Cain’s sacrifice was a portion of his harvest, Abel’s was an animal. In light of the

questions of life and death that pervade his story, this fact takes on new meaning.

In sacrificing an animal’s life, Abel ascertained a higher value: Something for which

it is worth forfeiting a life.

25. Genesis 46:34.

26. Genesis 47:3.

27. Indeed, the thread runs through Genesis 4:25-26: “And Adam knew his

wife again, and she bore a son and named him Seth, ‘For God has appointed an-

other seed for me instead of Hevel, whom Cain killed.’ And as for Seth, to him also

a son was born; and he named him Enosh; then [man] began to call on the name of

the Lord....” e very next person to “call on the name of the Lord” was Abraham

(Genesis 13:4), further solidifying the link between Abel and the Jewish people.

28. Translations of hevel as “fleeting” have appeared in the past. Notably, the

hevel as “fleeting” have appeared in the past. Notably, the

hevel

Jewish Publication Society Bible—as opposed to the Artscroll and Judaica Press

renditions—translates verse 11:10 as “youth and black hair are fleeting.” e JPS

version, in fact, goes even further, substituting “fleeting” for the appearances of

 • A

hevel in 6:12 and 9:9. However, these are clearly exceptions resulting from the mis-

hevel

reading of re’ut ruah, and not the consistent rule. See note 29 below.

Furthermore, Christian readings have referred to the etymological root of the

word, whose meaning is close to that of vapor or steam, in an effort to explain the

source of Ecclesiastes’ hevel as a metaphor for the insubstantial: Daniel Lys calls it

hevel as a metaphor for the insubstantial: Daniel Lys calls it

hevel

the “present but evanescent.” Lys, Ecclesiastes, or What is Life Worth? Translation,

General Introduction, and Commentary on 1/1 to 4/3 (Paris: Letouzey, 1977), pp.

75, 275, A. Heler (7:6)calls hevel “all that is doomed, by its very essence, to disap-

pear.” [French] Notes on Kohelet (Paris, 1951), p. 72 [French]; and Jean-Luc Marion

Notes on Kohelet (Paris, 1951), p. 72 [French]; and Jean-Luc Marion

Notes on Kohelet

determines the word to mean “all that is can dissipate,” then explains in the context

of this discussion that “man finds himself carried away by the breath of his own

defeat.” Cited in Jean-Luc Marion, God Without Being, trans. omas A. Carlson

God Without Being, trans. omas A. Carlson

God Without Being

(Chicago: University of Chicago, 1991), pp. 125-126.

All of these readings, however, while understanding hevel to mean the transient

hevel to mean the transient

hevel

nature of vapor, still see the borrowed use as implying worthlessness, or vanity,

rather than the objective, non-pejorative, fleeting reality of mortal life. Some schol-

ars use “transience” in some verses but not in others (as is the case in the JPS Bible).

ese include Douglas B. Miller, in his Symbol and Rhetoric in Ecclesiastes: e Place

of Hevel in Kohelet’s Work (Leiden: Brill, 2002), p. 180, who concludes that “some

of Hevel in Kohelet’s Work

aspects of human existence, even humans themselves, are insubstantial, while other

things are transient, and others are foul.” e admirable exception is found in

Daniel C. Fredericks’ treatise, Coping with Transience, in which he notes correctly

the presence of ephemeral efforts, passing pleasures, and transient tragedies, while

insisting on linguistic and symbolic consistency throughout Ecclesiastes. But even

here, as is evident from the title, transience is viewed as innately problematic: It is,

according to Fredericks, part of “a cursed world.” Fredericks, Coping with Transi-

ence, p. 11. is becomes evident in the tone of his conclusion as well: Kohelet

“also depends heavily on joy of work, even strenuous labor, to counterbalance the

pains of a fleeting world which consists only as moments.” Fredericks, Coping with

Transience, p. 97. What is missing in Fredericks’ analysis is the awareness of Kohe-

let’s existential revolution—that is, Fredericks does not concede the fact of an all-

encompassing transience as the positive message—and the intellectual development

within the book that eventually embraces the fleeting nature of pain, suffering,

evil, and even death itself. At the opposite pole we find Rami Shapiro, who turns

transience into the be-all and end-all of existence. ough there is much to respect

in his radical Taoist reading of Ecclesiastes, which correctly integrates core insights

in the book (“Nothing lasts, Solomon tells us, and that is the most liberating truth

of all,” p. 119), he lacks the linguistic proficiency to decode its systematic termi-

nology, hence missing Kohelet’s rationalistic metaphysics. Shapiro asserts that the

literal meaning of hevel (“breath,” in his view) connotes the “fleeting, ephemeral,

impermanent” (p. 96), but he then takes the leap to seeing hevel as a metaphoric

hevel as a metaphoric

hevel

signifier of a greater Taoist idea of “emptiness.” us, even Kohelet’s first encounters

with transience, explicitly causing him to hate life (Ecclesiastes 2:17), are colored by

  /  • 

Shapiro with detached contemplativeness (“how foolish this quest for permanence”;

p. 27). Indeed, “emptiness” implies “empty of permanence” (p. 2), but, for Shapiro,

it encompasses a much more radical negation of an eternal “self,” creation, God’s

judgment, and ultimately wisdom as the crux of redemption. All in all, Shapiro’s

imaginative rendering is too deliberately loose, with respect to the Hebrew, to be of

concrete interpretive use.

Nevertheless, both Fredericks and Shapiro offer landmark steps in rescuing Ec-

clesiastes from sixteen centuries of misreading. I believe that a sensitive, intertextual

biblical approach, as well as a structured approach towards Ecclesiastes’ take on

natural philosophy (in dialogue with other, pre-Socratic elemental cosmologies),

constitutes the golden path that balances both their readings in search of Ecclesi-

astes’ straightforward, original intent.

29. In objecting to this value-neutral definition of hevel, the most common

hevel, the most common

hevel

claim is the repeated use of the phrase “hevel and re’ut ruah,” which is traditionally

translated as “vanity and (the innately futile) pursuit of wind.” However, this treat-

ment of re’utruah (a term unique to Ecclesiastes) misreads the original Hebrew at

least as much as does the translation of hevel as “vanity.” Scholars are in agreement

hevel as “vanity.” Scholars are in agreement

hevel

about rejecting the old notion of re’ut as “vexation of spirit,” in favor of translations

that see re’ut as a reflex of

re’ut as a reflex of

re’ut ra’ah. Nonetheless, the continuing misconception misses

the core meaning of this precise root-verb, “to meander”; feeding, grazing, and

herding are secondary transpositions. Critically, the Hebrew root ra’ah does not

ra’ah does not

ra’ah

imply gathering, chasing, or herding-in; rather, it connotes the typical (outward-

bound) movement of grazing over pasturelands. is is why the verb can easily ap-

ply to the roaming of a single animal, with no flock or shepherd about. Cf. Genesis

41:1-2; Song of Songs 4:5, 6:2. Similarly, it applies where no feeding is involved;

cf. Numbers 14:33. Hence, even if we knew no more than this, re’ut is to be under-

stood as a fleeting movement of wind, or air, such as a gust or a breeze. is is cog-

nate to tir’eh-ruah in Jeremiah 22:22 (“a puff of wind,” or “scattered by the wind”).

tir’eh-ruah in Jeremiah 22:22 (“a puff of wind,” or “scattered by the wind”).

tir’eh-ruah

us, a close approximation of the phrase hevel u’re’ut ruach, would be “vapor and a

stirring of air,” or “vapor and a puff of wind.” In this light, the entire idiom stresses

transient phenomena, of no material value. However, the etymology of re’ut itself

re’ut itself

re’ut

may give us a clue to uncovering its original connotation; for its Semitic root had

an additional meaning, one with a close affinity to the word “vapor.” While the He-

brew language lost this variant, it survives to this day in Arabic: e Arabic root of

r-gh-w, as in the noun ragha—froth or foam—and the verb

ragha—froth or foam—and the verb

ragha ragha—to froth. Like

ragha—to froth. Like

ragha

vapor, it is a potent metaphor of fleeting, passing phenomena. Froth and foam, of

course, are made of air, which in the biblical Hebrew is always ruah, bringing us

back again to Ecclesiastes’ idiom, “hevel ure’ut ruah,” which we may now render:

Vapor and froth (cf. Shakespeare, e Rape of Lucrece: “What win I if I gain the

thing I seek? A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy”).

is also helps us to understand Ecclesiastes 4:6, where re’ut ruah is depicted as

re’ut ruah is depicted as

re’ut ruah

something that, figuratively, one can grab “handfuls” of, albeit without much gain;

 • A

of course, one cannot grab a “pursuit of” anything in one’s hand. Moreover, the two

parts of the idiom, vapor and froth, become nouns corresponding to two physical

entities (re’ut ruah as object rather than action). As a result, the entire phrase,

re’ut ruah as object rather than action). As a result, the entire phrase,

re’ut ruah hevel

ure’ut ruah, constitutes a uniform, objective, double-metaphor about the factual

transience of human life and worldly achievements.

Finally, it is difficult to ignore the striking similarity between Abel the shepherd

(hevel ro’eh, Genesis 4:2), and the form of hevel ure’ut: Just as Kohelet succeeded

in bringing Abel’s mortality to mind with the simile of vapor, so, too, “froth” (or

“gust”) recalls the core characteristic of Abel’s impermanent life.

30. Ecclesiastes 12:8.

31. Note that the Greek term in the Septuagint from which the Latin vanitas

derives has the alternative meaning of “transitory” or “illusory,” in addition to that

of “empty” or “pointless.” is ambiguity is likely the source of the word’s erroneous

use in later interpretations.

32. Ecclesiastes 9:9.

33. Ecclesiastes 8:10.

34. Ecclesiastes 8:14.

35. Ecclesiastes 2:22.

36. Franz Rosenzweig, Star of Redemption, trans. William Hallo (Notre Dame:

Notre Dame, 1985), p. 3.

37. See “e Legend of the Buddha Shakyamuni,” in Buddhist Scriptures (Bal-

Buddhist Scriptures (Bal-

Buddhist Scriptures

timore: Penguin, 1959), pp. 39-40.

38. Here Kohelet also begins to discuss the relativity of theories of knowledge.

Ecclesiastes 6:8-12.

39. Ecclesiastes 4:8.

40. Ecclesiastes 7:6.

41. Ecclesiastes 6:3-6.

42. Kohelet Rabba 6:3.

43. Ecclesiastes 8:15, 11:9-12, 9:7-9.

44. Ecclesiastes 11:8.

45. As quoted by Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche; “e Last Teaching of the Bud-

dha,” in e Teaching of the Buddha, 128th revised edition (Tokyo: Bukkyo Dendo

Kyokai, 1986), accessed via trang.quoc.org/eTeachingOfBuddha.htm#10.

46. Ecclesiastes 9:7-10.

  /  • 

47. “e Divine Presence does not rest among men in their sadness… but in

their joy of the following of the commandments,” Shabbat 30b; and “e Holy

Spirit dwells only in a heart filled with gladness,” Jerusalem Succah 5:1.

48. Ecclesiastes 11:9-10.

49. is is reminiscent, as well, of Aristotle’s “perfect condition.” Cf. Aristotle,

Nicomachean Ethics, book x.

50. Ecclesiastes 2:13.

51. Ecclesiastes 7:12.

52. Ecclesiastes 7:19.

53. Ecclesiastes 8:1.

54. Ecclesiastes 8:2-5. Although the concept of davar or

davar or

davar lev lie beyond the

scope of this essay, the translation of these verses relies on an understanding of the

terms as consistent references to “teaching” (or “saying”) and “mind,” respectively.

consistent references to “teaching” (or “saying”) and “mind,” respectively.

consistent

ese terms highlight Ecclesiastes’ advanced epistemology in verses such as 1:8,10,

5:1-2, 6:10-11, 8:1, and 12:13. Cf. Genesis 11:1.

55. It is interesting to note that the two biblical books attributed to Solomon,

Proverbs and the Song of Songs, also have as a central focus the affirmation of

youthful love and joy, and of wisdom, respectively.

56. Exodus 3:2-3.

57. Exodus 34:30-35.

58. Zohar 3:106a. is parable also draws on a sense of morality. Unlike Cain,

and for that matter Adam, who toil inanimate soil, Abel was the first to pursue

an intersubjective vocation, which tended to other living beings. Furthermore,

through his death humanity learned, for the first time, of man’s moral obligation

toward his fellow. is was a central element of Abel’s spirituality, and it is also

manifest in Moses’ extraordinary care for the weakest of his lambs, which according

to the Midrash, resulted in God’s entrusting Moses with his own flock, the people

of Israel.

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