Commentary on Ecclesiastes 1 part 2/10

And since he somehow makes use of rather human language, you know that there are those who are invited to perceptible feasts, not only for eating, but also for lifting away their sorrows;

these too, then, are the spiritual nourishments.

And a man receives gladness and receives a portion, that it may abide with him.

Not only from a brief and momentary encounter alone does he rejoice and is nourished and drinks, but abidingly.

Drinking from the spring and the water which Jesus gives, and it abides with him.

For he has within himself a spring that has become in him unto life eternal.

Open your eyes and be filled with bread.

He who opens the eyes of the inner man shall be filled with bread.

And so the loaves too abide, like the spring that leaps up unto life eternal.

And this came to pass usefully also in the historical sense, when the widow at Zarephath of Sidon, having but a little handful of flour, nourished both herself and Elijah, and had that supply unfailing, until abundance came from the rain.

That he will not much call to mind the days of his life, because God keeps him occupied in the gladness of his heart.

It was needful, in the day of life, to call much to mind the things that come after, the things that follow in succession, because for those who are diligent about the things here there come to be certain greater things.

He does not, then, call much to mind, but holds his hope only up to the present, saying:

'Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.'

This, then, is why God keeps him occupied? He keeps him occupied in these things, since he is unwilling to acquire the things that are of first importance, nor does he take pains for their attainment.

In order that the soul may not become motionless, other things are given to it.

I said this at the beginning of the book, when I was holding forth:

God has given an evil occupation.

That he will not much call to mind the days of his life, because God keeps him occupied in the gladness of his heart.

The true and proper life is this: to live according to wisdom and virtue.

But men do not call much to mind, nor do they make much account of this;

they attend only to the things that keep them occupied and bring them pleasures, and to what they gather up; about these alone are they diligent.

But it was needful to call much to mind ...

of the things present, the things that are to be for his life truly so called.

And here, then, there is a common life according to which we perceive, according to which we have the soul yoked to the body, and according to which the irrational animals also move and perceive.

But proper to man is the life according to reason and divine contemplation.

Of this he takes no thought? He does not call to mind the things that contribute to this life, if he has anything vain.

Again here, the heart is for us the true mind that sees God.

In fact, then, the holy one says with boldness to God:

'A crooked heart did not cleave to me.'

Again, others have hearts of flesh, on which the Spirit of the living God writes.

By 'of flesh' he means the pliable ones, those that swiftly receive the writing of the Spirit.

It is also possible † if by those † according to the literal sense, so that he gladdens his own heart.

For he chose to have a heart that hunts after pleasures.

One must interpret words with reference to those who speak them.

If the one speaking is wise, one must hear him wisely.

If, being wise, he assumes a persona and puts on another character suited to that man, one must again hear the discourse of that person.

Since the Apostle himself says:

'Whether we eat or whether we drink, we are neither the worse off nor the better; inasmuch as we are Christians, or wise, or servants of Christ, we have no addition or diminution from eating anything further.'

'Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die'—it is the same one who writes, the same one who speaks, yet not from his own persona, not as an apostle does he say it, but he took on the persona of those who say that beyond this present life there is no life to come.

There is an evil which I saw under the sun, and it is prevalent among men:

a man to whom God will give wealth and possessions and honour,

he is held fast by these evils;

and this too I saw under the sun, and it especially abounds among men.

And among the irrational animals too one may find a distinction;

Not all horses are so lavished with grooming as those set apart for the games or for wars.

And it is the same in the case of asses and dogs.

But great is the difference in the case of man.

For those creatures are otherwise disposed.

To find rest in this manner ... it is the [soul?] that is kindled.

But here it is a matter of choice — a choice distracted, a choice unable to discern between the things that profit and the things that do not profit.

In contrast to men, because he is sunk by opposite things — by dishonour and by poverty.

It is therefore a great thing, since it is grasped by the power of choice.

But it seems to take up that which neither does good nor does harm.

Yet this affliction, which one is able to receive, he does not bear.

If he has right reasoning, the man is seen to possess something surpassing, above the whole race of mankind.

The woman is not such as the man, nor is the child such as one who has come to full manhood.

If, then, a man bears these things nobly, much more do those inferior to the man.

He has, it says, riches and glory, and gains nothing more from these.

It was possible to gain more from them.

The wise man, if he has wealth, uses his wealth otherwise than the common man does.

He who has glory is not proud on account of his glory, but rather adorns it still further.

Joseph once had glory, and his own virtue further adorned it.

And the other wise men among us did this same thing.

But he who stands gaping after walls and otherwise after transient things, and gives little thought even to them — that man suffers shipwreck in these things.

And amid these shipwrecks he bears neither poverty nobly, nor wealth, nor glory.

From which it is established that these things are, in their own nature, indifferent.

For if one is able to use them well and also worse, then in their own nature they are neither good nor bad.

They can indeed admit of a good use and a blameworthy use, one that is culpable and reproved.

And it is no wonder if we say this.

For even that Egyptian of whom they speak, Trismegistus, says that the wise man does not loose the bond of fate.

He is not under necessity, nor is he under the cosmos, but has risen above the heaven; the mind of the wise has come above the things that appear.

The common herd of men, then, they say are under it.

He, then, who has ascended above the human life and is able to say:

'I look not upon the things that appear, but upon the things that are not seen' — because the things that appear are transient, while the things not seen are eternal — that man does not sicken in these things, neither does wealth exalt him nor poverty sink him, nor because of dishonour does he seem to have gotten a great evil.

And from the honour and good repute that come from the many he reckons that he possesses nothing.

The exaltation? There are those who are rich and glorified in the wisdom of this age and of the rulers who are being brought to nought.

These do not use rightly either their glory or their prudence.

And on this account they are found guilty of great sin.

For the wise man, even if he lacks something of these things, bearing it magnanimously, is not under wickedness.

He is not sick at all but is in health; he is healthy according to virtue.

Understand 'wealth' and 'possessions' thus:

for the most part 'possessions' are said of movable goods.

And this man possesses not only these, but also wealth that lies in abundance, in properties, in lands, in houses.

In addition, then, to his wealth and his possessions, glory too has been given him.

But with respect to the mind it is said that often someone is glorified in a knowledge falsely so called and upon glory, and being high-minded on these accounts — that he is wise, that he seems to be intelligent — yet he is not given authority over them.

Sometimes he fails of the things he wills.

And he seems to lack nothing in his soul; he reckons that he possesses all wealth of soul, all glory, yet he has no authority to make use of them.

Take me the case of someone who has received a high office, but has fallen into misfortune, so as to be prevented from going forward:

he does not make use of the authority of his office.

And indeed we ourselves have often known such men.

One may find a man who is rich, as has been said by way of allegory, and yet they have nothing more.

No one welcomes them, no one praises them, they bring no benefit.

But we have known also such men who understood many things:

beholding how one ought to act and what is fitting, and yet how disagreeable they are.

'And there is nothing lacking to his soul of all that he desires, yet God will not give him authority to eat of it.'

Of the things he desires, none is present to him.

This it means: that God has not given him authority, even so, to use them as he wills, because he does not rightly pursue his desire.

Here the rich man who is mentioned along with Lazarus had everything — both possessions and wealth and glory.

He had authority over them here, but afterwards the taking away of them came about, and of the pleasure that was in them.

'Fool, this night they require your soul from you.'

'And the things you have prepared, whose shall they be?' But others, though they have these things lavishly and very richly, are not permitted to be filled with them.

They are hindered from having enjoyment of them, whether through sickness or through some other circumstance.

'Because a stranger shall devour it.'

'And this too is vanity and sickness.'

These objects of his zeal — the wealth which he has gathered together, the possessions — [the stranger] shall devour.

And this comes to pass in many ways.

Sometimes he falls among robbers and his wealth is carried off.

Often he who is accused before the king is deprived, and his goods pass to others, and he is oppressed by someone, and another enjoys those things for which he himself toiled.

Often many make use of writings which others composed, though they are not of their mind and opinion.

Often, at any rate, the wise find books over which others laboured, and use them, and yet others are nourished by them and are glorified — whenever they are able to overturn them.

It is vanity not to have mastery over one's own things and not to enjoy them.

'If a man beget a hundred, and live many years, and great be the multitude, so that his days shall be many' —

He spoke of the external objects of men's zeal — wealth, possessions, glory.

Then he speaks also concerning the begetting of children.

This very thing becomes a great sickness, and is carried to excess.

and it is carried to excess.

But let us grant that a man is able to beget a hundred children from different women;

not even this affords him anything more.

Kings, at any rate, become fathers of many children, yet this brings no benefit.

For it is not the case that, if he has a single child, he is altogether disappointed;

and he has nothing more than that even if a man should have a thousand.

For it is not the case that they are all preserved in wars.

He fittingly spoke of such things — wealth, possessions, glory, and the rest.

And he speaks of bodily goods.

And even if a man be not caught in sorrows and should live many years, since his life has endured for a long time — it is vain, having its promise only until the present life.

For this reason he strives in vain.

The anagogical sense? If a man, through instruction, begets many, and seems to be long-lived in the life he is eager to possess, he does not thereby become unfailing.

He can be deprived of his children;

for instance, this Arius of our own day begot many through his teaching and the imitation of his manner of life.

Nearly all, at any rate, were under him; but he turned aside, and all forsook him, and he had no other men who hated him so much as those who had been begotten by him.

'A multitude — however many the days of the years of his life shall be.'

He lived through the courses of a thousand years.

A multitude of their days has come to pass.

But the abundance of days will profit him nothing, since he receives it thus, according to this time which is measured by the sun.

But another becomes long-lived upon the good land, and the multitude of days benefits him.

Assuredly, then, it is said by way of promise:

'With length of days I will fill him.'

If it is better to depart and be with Christ, then he who remains in the body for a long time laments, so as to say:

'Woe is me, that my sojourning is prolonged!' — how, then, is length of days and the multitude of days given by way of blessing? This, then, is what he says:

However many years a man may live in this life, it is at some point circumscribed;

and the multitude of days will profit him nothing.

For sometimes, in the multitude of his days, his sins too are found to be more numerous, and his exaltations many.

But he who has those days multiplied — the days prepared by the risings of the Sun of Righteousness, as I said a little earlier — having transcended being under the sensible sun, has the enjoyment of the things above.

In proportion as one has advanced in virtue, he has been enlightened by it.

And the days become many in proportion as he holds fast to virtue.

If he departs from this life, he has from it a multitude of days.

Here, then, we call 'days' those illumined by the Sun of Righteousness.

As the earth revolves round about many times and ... many times the solar circle, thus ...

From a life lived with virtue he becomes long-lived and enduring through many years and blessed.

If he makes trial of these days in virtue, he does not yet long for other years.

If vanity indeed departs from his life — since he has his hope in God — he becomes ... of all of them, and to live many years is a vain thing for him.

For many years are circumscribed, but the blessed life is age-long, it is eternal.

I wish to bring forward the apostolic saying, which seems to some to be according to the literal (historical) sense.

'Godliness,' he says, 'is profitable unto all things, having the promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come.'

'Of the life that now is' — he does not mean this present one, concerning which the Apostle says:

'If in this life only we have hoped' — but rather the life which can, according to virtue, come to be here, concerning which one might say it exists in part.

That the blessed already possess this life from here below is clearly shown from the words:

'He that believes in me has eternal life'; and 'This is eternal life, that they may know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.'

The promise of godliness does not possess only this life — to live blessedly here, to pass one's course here in the practical and contemplative life — but there also succeeds this a further life, as the whole succeeds the part, as face to face succeeds the seeing through a mirror, if it is anything eternal, if it is anything age-long.

But this temporal life is not succeeded by another life — I mean for those who have supposed this alone to exist.

For it was of those hoping in this life only that they spoke:

And even if something does thus succeed it, yet it is not the age-long life.

For they depart into the lake of fire and undergo a great penalty of fire, where they have come to be in the portion of death, plainly having paid the penalties of this life.

'And his soul shall not be filled with goodness, and moreover no burial came to be for him.'

He speaks of wealth and possessions and glory as things incidental.

As he who loves silver wishes to have yet more money and the rest, so too does he who wishes to live in abundance.

For he does not yet wish even to imagine death.

And the anagogical sense of it is this:

Whoever is supposedly glorified as wise, having a knowledge falsely so called, wishes to be glorified yet more.

If he lives, forsooth, according to a knowledge falsely so called, he would wish always to be thus.

'And moreover no burial came to be for him.'

He says that he lived through the courses of many years.

He came to be a thousand years old, is filled with all pleasant things, fails of nothing;

and often he is cast out without burial.

'Good is the untimely birth beyond this man,' for whom nothing sweet existed;

the abortion had neither wealth nor possessions, nor was it glorified, and it is more fortunate than this man, because it made no trial at all of these things.

But as regards the anagogical sense — that he grew rich in those many things, yet did not find the burial that circumscribes the former life.

'Out of the house of your God I will utterly destroy the graven and molten images.'

Some have punctuated it thus: that 'the graven images I will make your burial,' and not 'I will utterly destroy these.'

'And whenever it is profitable for your soul, then I make your burial.'

For you are baptized and buried together with the things that have been utterly destroyed.

Assuredly, then, after 'I will make your burial,' he says:

'Keep, O Judah, your feasts.'

It remains, then, in the feast to be earnest in prayers.

He who of old was filled with carved and molten images was laid in a grave, so as to be buried together with Christ.

For the rest, he has called us to keep festival, that is, to do well.

For a festival is nothing other than the doing of what is fitting; and we add to this the labouring at this or that particular task.

So then, with a view to the higher (anagogical) sense, the text:

He was zealous in many things and grew rich — as he supposed in a false judgement, not being filled with virtuous knowledge — and there was no burial for him.

I said that the untimely birth is better than he, in that it came in vanity and walks in darkness.

Neither movable nor immovable, neither reputation nor rank;

and if, once dead, he be found outside all of these things, then you would say that the untimely birth is better than he — that is, the one who has not experienced this life at all.

But with a view to the higher sense it must be taken thus, as was said a little before: it were better for him if he had not been born.

It is better, then, than both — those still leading a life and those who have died — the one who has not yet come into being.

For it came in vanity and walks in darkness.

Other men, when they have been well born and well reared, but have made ill use of what was given them, have come to have this vanity;

but the untimely birth has its very coming-into-being in vain;

it was conceived not that it might live, not that it might become an embryo, but that the seed might straightway perish, straightway when the conception is present.

So again it did not come among men in darkness, it was not known, in that it came in vanity and walks in darkness.

It did nothing, it thought nothing, nor did it come to know anything of human affairs having known it.

And for this reason, as it came in ignorance and in the not having experienced these things, so again it departs.

There is much concerning that of which the discourse treats, and it is inquired into by many who are perplexed as to this: if conceptions come to be in order that men may be born — even if it rests with God to grant a child or not, and to be long-lived or short-lived — how is it that some conceptions are not brought to completion, are not brought to birth, while others — even after this has taken place — live but two or three hours, though let us grant even ten years?

Do these things happen without judgement? Are not these judgements like a great abyss? Only this do we know in general, that it has not come to be in vain;

for even if it had vanity in that it was neither born nor reared, most certainly our Begetter does not do these things in vain.

Why is that thing not known? Because we have the reasonings of men.

But this too comes to pass for the sake of the salvation which God gives to each one.

And what resolves all these things is that his soul does not pay the same penalty.

For if it were sown together (with the body), all these things would be in vain.

But conceptions come to be by the judgement of God;

and God says that He gives children.

And if ever, then, some ask children of Him, the gifts of God are things judged (measured out).

If one obtains them in many ways, he prays with reason — with the reason of wisdom and knowledge — to possess these gifts.

... the discourse ... the sequence ... suggests ... (the text here is defective).

According to the higher sense, for the rest, it means that they were born — who indeed, if not the offspring of divine teaching? — having been conceived that they might be brought to birth, and were straightway injured.

In this way, then, that which is said in the Gospel was also brought up to the higher sense.

When great tribulation comes, He says:

Woe to those who are with child and to those who give suck in those days.

The woman with child, having received the tribulation and not enduring it, miscarries.

And that thing was conceived in vain.

But some were indeed born, yet did not come to be perfect (full-term), but bore the ... of those who suck (the text is corrupt here).

And again, the soul quickly coming into tribulation, they were injured, having a newly-fixed virtue, being in their first catechesis.

It is possible also to take this as it were as a piece of history:

when that tribulation mentioned in the Gospel came upon them, there was need of flight.

Take the whole passage according to the literal sense:

Those with child were hindered from making swift flight, and were overtaken.

And gently he also hints at the war of the Romans against the Hebrews.

The woman with child cannot suffer hardship either in fleeing or in not being fed as the other woman, the nursing one.

So he hints at the intensity of the famine and the great evils in the Lamentations — that even compassionate women ate their own children.

For it was open to others, not being compassionate, simply to use for food whatever was found, even were it their own child;

but it signifies the intensity of the affliction and the scarcity of necessities.

So those who were affected in sympathy not only towards their children but also towards others, boiled their own children and ate them.

Such a thing is recorded of that Mariamme in the accounts concerning the capture of Jerusalem.

She was fond of her child — she had but one child — and she was also of the well-to-do and the very rich.

And she spent much of her wealth, I suppose, on food;

sometimes she would buy a she-goat or some kid.

But because of those who were plundering in the sedition, and worse still because of the men of war, there arose a scarcity.

And if the insurgents caught the smell of smoke, they would come in and carry off the meals.

So, taking her own child — he was about three years old — she said to him certain words, among which she also said this: 'It is better for you to be eaten by me than to fall into evil and endure slavery at the hands of the enemy.'

'Come then, and become food for me.'

And having slaughtered it, she roasted it.

A little later the insurgents burst in, and she did not prevent them from entering, but said to them:

'Come, eat the half.'

And so she as it were vanquished them.

And his name shall be covered in darkness, and it has not seen the sun nor known rest — better is this one than that one.

This means that this one is altogether nothing.

The darkness signifies the unknown name, the ignorance concerning it, because of its not being known.

It came to us by a way neither perceptible nor led up out of darkness.

Nor did it make use of perception, nor did it have any other rest.

For it is possible to behold the sun with the sight.

But if it did not have the apprehension of this sense (of sight), it is manifest that it did not have that of the other senses either.

But I do not say this in an unqualified, universal sense;

'better is this one than that one' — than the one who has possessed the wealth, glory, and abundance of children he esteemed, and a long life, since having experienced these things he came to be outside them all, and was not even quickly counted worthy.

The untimely birth had none of these things, while that other man did not even suffer the same things as it.

Again you take the higher sense in a corresponding manner: that many, having experienced the pleasures which those who pursue glory chase after, while another has not even from the outset experienced them.

This man is better than that one.

For that one will give account for the things he pursued and possessed, and he shall be punished;

but this man does not undergo this, having neither at the outset been put to shame before the man ... nor having had any experience of them.

Again, he does not judge the man who has died in ignorance to be better than everyone, whereas he judges the one who in falsely-named knowledge supposed he possessed all things.

Peter hints at this in his second epistle:

It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, having known it, to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them.

For he does not say outright that it is a good thing not to have known the way of righteousness, but rather that it is better not to have known it than, having known it, to despise it.

He has not said anything different, just as concerning Judas, even as the Saviour did:

It would have been good for him if he had not been born.

It would have been good for him if he had not been called;

if he had not been called, he would not have betrayed.

It would not have been good for Saul in any other way, except if he had not become king;

for he would not have fallen among the lawless deeds into which he fell when he became king.

And what if one lived through the recurrences of a thousand years, yet saw no good? If he lived through the recurrences of a thousand years, then he was a father of a thousand children.

If a man beget a hundred.

Take, then, the living itself as a name corresponding to the begetting.

Would there not be a conception of seed and of an infant only if his sowing takes place?

So too these things would not come to pass unless a soul has descended.

Concerning the constitution that has come to be, there are two causes:

of the body, marriage; of the soul, its descent.

Again they speak thus of 'recurrences,' the periods of years.

Each year has a certain beginning, which we call its 'descent.'

So even if someone has become advanced in years by the multitude of years, they have wasted away in the life he had — that much-coveted life which renders pitiable those who pursue it;

he gains nothing from this, so that becoming a thousand years old is the same as living through the recurrences of a thousand years.

Is it, according to the literal sense, both improbable and impossible? It is neither improbable nor impossible;

it is said by way of hyperbole.

Things said hyperbolically are not improbable and impossible — impossible sometimes, yet not on that account improbable.

If a man is able to beget ten, he is able also to beget a hundred, and to live so many years, if he lived fifty.

At any rate, those of former times, such as Methuselah, lived close to a thousand years.

Overstating the truth.

When the height of the cities built by those who held the land before Israel is spoken of — that 'we saw there cities walled up, whose walls reach to heaven' — it was said hyperbolically.

The Apostle too knows the manner of hyperbole and the use of the term.

And yet I show you a still more excellent way, beyond measure.

If I have all knowledge and understand all mysteries, but have not love, I gain nothing.

For it does not profit to know knowledge and all the mysteries apart from divine love.

If we have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, then even the greatness of faith is nothing.

He says that love is greater even than faith;

and grant that it can say to the mountains to remove;

this is no falsehood, even if it overstates the truth so as to appear to be incredible.

And Asahel was light on his feet, like a gazelle in the field.

And, according to allegory, the life of men and their manner of living is often named 'a sea.'

Here 'waves' can signify the things that befall a man.

Of the judgements that befall him: he goes up to the heavens and goes down to the depths.

What advantage has the man? ...

... therefore he speaks universally concerning man; ... are not universal ...

... of a year and of a season ...

but here concerning ... universally ...

... the Jews stronger ...

to the authorities the oracles of God and ...

And those from among the Greeks who believed were called ...

... the Jews, being here a portion ...

a holy commonwealth and the rest, but inferior ... the affairs ...

named for the things on account of which they were called.

According to this, then, what advantage is there to say, if someone is first called and ...

He speaks concerning the manner of life and living here.