Ecclesiastes
Chapter 8
Royal Advisor
Who is like the wise man? Who else can solve a problem? A man’s wisdom shines through his expression—his stern look softens.
Obey the king’s command because of the oath before God, and
don’t be quick to ignore it. Do not stubbornly support a bad cause, for he will do as he pleases.
The king’s word stands. Who will say to him, “What are you doing?”
Whoever follows a royal command avoids trouble. The wise man understands the timing and the judgment—
the right time to act and the worth of everything. This misfortune weighs heavily on man:
for he does not know what will happen. Who can tell him what will happen?
No one controls the wind or delays the day of death. A struggle is pointless, and even wickedness cannot save its perpetrator.
I have observed this and have made it my aim to consider everything that occurs under the sun when man is granted the power to harm another.
Retribution
And so, I have seen the wicked buried and people come from the holy place to honor them, forgetting how they acted. This, too, is futile.
The reason evil intentions fill the human heart is that a sentence against wrongdoing is not issued immediately.
The sinner may commit wrongs a hundred times and still survive. I know well that there will be happiness for the God-fearing man because he fears God,
but there will be no happiness for the wicked; since he doesn’t fear God, he will pass away like a shadow, and his days will be brief.
Another kind of nonsense is found in what humans do on earth: the righteous are treated as the wicked deserve, and the evil, as the righteous deserve. This, too, is meaningless.
So I praise joy, since, for man, there is no happiness under the sun other than eating, drinking, and taking pleasure in his work throughout the life God gives him under the sun.
Human Destiny
When I sought wisdom and reflected on the human condition on earth, whether during the day or at night when people sleep and are unaware,
I observed that regarding God’s work as a whole, no man can fully understand what happens under the sun; even if he exhausts himself searching, he will not discover it. And if the wise man claims to understand, he does not.
Commentaries
Royal Advisor.
The previous section fits perfectly within the major themes of Israel’s traditional wisdom and its neighboring cultures. The same can be said of this new section, although it focuses on a different topic: the royal advisor. These are codes of conduct in the court that reflect a large part of Egyptian wisdom, which greatly influenced Israel—see, for example, 2 Samuel 7; Psalm 89. Many of these instructions involve the training that an elder provides to the young king.
Once again, we see the typical path taken by Qohelet: personal experience versus traditional wisdom and conclusion. In this case, the royal advisor’s attitude toward the king reflects his personal experience. The explanation of conventional wisdom is found in verse 1: wise is the one who understands the interpretation of things (Is 7:1-9; Jr 18:1-12), and he is recognized by his manner of acting and his facial expression (Job 29:24). The conclusion appears in verses 6-8, where he clearly criticizes the classical wisdom’s belief that no harm could come to the wise.
As we read Ecclesiastes, we become convinced that only wisdom results well in all its conclusions. But what is wisdom? It is not defined universally; we must consider each case individually, based on personal experience. For the Preacher, there is no infallible formula that makes someone wise.
Retribution.
Once again, Qohelet challenges what the ancient sages taught, this time with a bitter irony based on two classic postulates found in verses 12b and 13 (cf. Prov 14:27; Ps 37): there was a strong belief that those who do good cannot go wrong, and vice versa.
The wise man revisits the theme of the world’s injustices (3:16-18; 4:1-3; 5:7-9; 7:15): the wicked pretending to be pious, the lack of justice for crime, and the luck that does not favor the honest. Experience is his most persuasive proof. The solution? Qohelet doesn’t provide one, or rather, he points it elsewhere: the greatest happiness is to rejoice in what you have, as shown in 5:17-19.
We said at the beginning that Ecclesiastes reflects on the end of his life. From the perspective of someone who has had everything, he raises various questions and offers his own conclusions, seemingly unconcerned with challenging traditions. Here, the issue at stake is human happiness, or, to use the technical term, retribution. For the Preacher, the only retribution one can aspire to is to enjoy everyday things, given that unjust situations are part of the fabric of the world. According to him, anyone who insists on obtaining their reward through justice will fail. And why not seek happiness, not so much to achieve justice, but to fight for it?
Human Destiny.
The themes addressed in Ecclesiastes are not new—work, the search for knowledge, the shared destiny of humans and animals, injustices, and so on—but the way they are presented groups them around human destiny, expressed in two different ways: 1. It is impossible to determine the destiny of human beings and creation—the fear of the Lord, which we already discussed in 7:1-14, 18. 2. The same fate awaits everyone. The conclusion he reaches, as found in 9:7-10, is identical to that expressed in the previous section and elsewhere: enjoy everyday activities.
Among all the topics discussed, death is the most emphasized in this section. In 9:5, Qohelet agrees with the traditional teaching, which states that death is a place without hope, “sheol,” darkness (Nm 16:30-33; 1 Sm 28:8-14; Is 14:9-11; Ps 88:12; Job 10:21ff). He differs from some of his contemporaries, likely precursors of Dan 12:2 and Isa 26:19, whose beliefs ultimately won out, for example, that the righteous would receive a reward after death.
By this point in the book, we are already familiar with Ecclesiastes’ perspective. We see again that his reflections are not lacking in common sense, nor are they disconnected from reality. The inability to know people’s destinies, death that levels everyone and seems to destroy everything, and the fact that justice is not always rewarded—at least on this earth—are some of his conclusions. Perhaps the most crucial aspect of his teaching is the idea that even the wisdom handed down from ancient times does not influence his observations and conclusions. Hasn’t religion, in its many forms, historically been a factor that has clouded the true image and experience of God?