qoheleths world and life view - ….docVIP

Westminster Theological Journal 37 (1974) 57-73. Copyright ? 1974 by Westminster Theological Seminary, cited with permission. QOHELETHS WORLD AND LIFE VIEW AS SEEN IN HIS RECURRING PHRASES H. CARL SHANK WITHIN the scope of Old Testament ethical problems falls the viewpoint of Qoheleth, or the Preacher, of Ecclesiastes. A superficial reading of the book reveals a man who definitely has a negative viewpoint of life in its many facets. If indeed the book is a unity, composed by one wise man, then the theme of pessi- mism or cynicism becomes a suggested option. But the ethical questions arising from such an understanding of the book become crucial. Can a thoroughly pessimistic view of life have any place in the canonical books of Scripture? What exactly is the goal of Qoheleths ethics? Further, what does the God of Qoheleth really have to do with his life and standards of conduct? Again, does not the recurring theme of there is nothing better for a man than that he should eat and drink and make his soul enjoy good in his labor (cf. 2:24; 3:12,13, etc.) denote a sort of Epicurean sentiment? A. QOHELETHS ETHICAL PERSPECTIVE: CRITICAL VIEWS Of course the modern critics of the Bible have seized upon the pessimism-cynicism suggestion with a vengeance. Morris Jastrow has suggested that the book teaches an ethical cynicism, where, in the face of no real goal to life, good humor is still to be main- tained. 1 A popular view, held until recently, noted the phrase Vanity of vanities and attempted to draw certain parallelisms in thought and perspective between Qoheleths notion of vanity and Heraclituss view that all is flux.2 However, most critical 1 Cf. Morris Jastrow, A Gentle Cynic (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1919). 2 Cf. Carl Knopf, The Optimism of Ecclesiastes, Journal of Biblical Literature, XLIX (1930), 195-199. 57 58 WESTMINSTER THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL scholars today reject this argument as unconvincing. The recog- nized modern critical writer, G. Von Rad, has