Singing at The Winepress

Free ebooks ==> www.Ebook777.
com
www.Ebook777.com
Free ebooks ==> www.Ebook777.com
Singing at the Winepress
www.Ebook777.com
ii
www.Ebook777.com
Singing at the Winepress
Ecclesiastes and the Ethics of Work
Tyler Atkinson
Bloomsbury T&T Clark

An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
LON DON • N E W DE L H I • N E W YOR K • SY DN EY
www.Ebook777.com
Bloomsbury T&T Clark

An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Imprint previously known as T&T Clark
50 Bedford Square 1385 Broadway

London New York
WC1B 3DP NY 10018
UK USA
www.bloomsbury.com
BLOOMSBURY, T&T CLARK and the Diana logo are trademarks of

Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
First published 2015
© Tyler Atkinson, 2015
Tyler Atkinson has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in

any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior
permission in writing from the publishers.
No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or

refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be
accepted by Bloomsbury or the author.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: HB: 978-0-567-65991-0

ePDF: 978-0-567-65992-7
ePub: 978-0-567-65993-4
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Atkinson, Tyler.
Singing at the winepress: Ecclesiastes and the ethics of work/by Tyler Atkinson.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-567-65991-0 (hdbk : alk. paper) – ISBN 978-0-567-65993-4 (epub)
– ISBN 978-0-567-65992-7 (epdf) 1.Â€Work–Biblical teaching. 2.Â€Bible. Ecclesiastes–Criticism,
interpretation, etc. 3.Â€Bonaventure, Saint, Cardinal, approximately 1217-1274.
4.Â€Luther, Martin, 1483-1546. I. Title.
BS1475.6.W735A85 2015
223’.806–dc23
2014036726
Typeset by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India
www.Ebook777.com
This book is dedicated to a “threefold cord” of dear people without whom this
project would not have been conceived, continued, or completed:
It is dedicated in loving memory to a teacher, mentor, and friend who invited me

to sit with Qoheleth as I was struggling to make sense of my own experience of
contradictions. David Knauert, though you were taken from us like Abel (‫)הבל‬,
your words, like Qoheleth’s, are still found to be pleasing and true, if not at the
same time a little enigmatic.
Also, to a steadfast and loving friend, who consistently proves that “two are better
than one.” Tyler Garrard, not only do you share my name, but your kindred
love for Ecclesiastes, as well as your willingness to mourn and dance with me
always at the right time, has been a constant source of grace in my life. I love
you, brother.
Finally, to “the wife whom I love.” Rachel Ann, during our years spent in Scotland,
I found it easy to follow Qoheleth’s imperative to enjoy life with you. I am forever
thankful for the sacrifices you have made for my sake. Yet, I am also glad that
God provided more times to laugh than to weep while we spent life together on
the Caledonian shores. And, in God’s kairos, the “time to bear” visited us when
we least expected it! Amen.
www.Ebook777.com
vi
www.Ebook777.com
Contents
Acknowledgments x
Abbreviations xiv
Introduction: Ecclesiastes: Relevant for Theological Ethics? 1

Ecclesiastes and Theological Ethics 3
Biblical Studies 4
Theological Ethics 8
Reasons for Neglect 11
Formal Reasons 11
Theological Reasons 13
Wisdom Literature 13
Ecclesiastes 17
Ecclesiastes and Contemporary Theologies of Work 22
Why St Bonaventure and Martin Luther? 26
Qoheleth on Novelty and Nostalgia 26
Historical-Critical Reasons 28
Historical-Theological Reasons 29
Contemptus Mundi and the Enjoyment of Creatures 30
Points of Theological Convergence and Divergence 32
Locating an Ethic of Work in Ecclesiastes: The Direction of this Book 35
1 Qoheleth’s Perplexing Story: Six Topics for Theological-Ethical

Engagement 39
Composition and Structure 40
Qoheleth and the Figure of Solomon 49
Vanitas 53
Perception and Epistemology 56
Cult, Economy, and Politics 60
Time 61
Carpe Diem 61
Conclusion 63
www.Ebook777.com
viii Contents
2 Solomon’s Manual for Penitents: St Bonaventure on Ecclesiastes 65

The Context of Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes 67
An “Academic Commentary” 67
Bonaventure’s Place within the Interpretative Tradition 70
The Character of Solomon 74
Solomon’s Experience: The Efficient Cause of Ecclesiastes 74
Solomon’s “Dialogues”: The Formal Cause of Ecclesiastes 77
Vanitas: From Contemplative Contempt to Contemptuous Guilt 80
Bonaventure’s Nuanced Version of Contemptus Mundi 80
Bonaventure’s Metaphysics: Emanation, Exemplarity, and
Consummation 81
Creation as a Wedding Ring: Defending the Final Cause of
Ecclesiastes 86
Triplex vanitas: Defending the Material Cause of Ecclesiastes 89
Vanitas Mutabilitatis 91
Curiositas: The Corruption of the Liberal and Mechanical Arts 99
Curiositas According to Augustine 99
Solomon’s Duplex Curiositas 107
The Curiosity of the “Athenians” 113
Conclusion 118
3 Solomon’s Sermon for the Oeconomia and the Politia: Martin

Luther on Ecclesiastes 121
The Context of Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes” 123
From Bonaventure to Luther 126
The Final Cause of Ecclesiastes 127
The Material Cause of Ecclesiastes 128
The Formal Cause of Ecclesiastes 129
The Efficient Cause of Ecclesiastes 130
The Character of Solomon 133
Ecclesiastes as Solomon’s Confessions 133
Ecclesiastes as Solomon’s “Sermon on the Mount” 137
The Three Estates 142
Introduction to Luther’s drei Stände 142
The Ecclesia 153
The Oeconomia 157
The Politia 161
www.Ebook777.com
Contents ix
Time 164
The Concupiscentia Futurorum 165
The Hora (Stündelein) 168
Accipe Horam 173
Carpe Diem? 174
Rest-in-Use: Luther’s Deployment of Augustine’s
Usus/Fruitio Distinction 178
Conclusion 184
4 Qoheleth’s Work Ethic: Human Work in the Work of God 187

The Words and Works of Humanity in the Word and Work of
God: Reading Ecclesiastes Christologically 191
Ecclesiastes 1:4-11: Work as an Invitation to Perceive the
“Words” through the Word 192
Ecclesiastes 3: 1-15: Work as an Invitation to Participate in
Christ’s New Work in the Present 197
Qoheleth’s Work Ethic and Contemporary Theologies of Work 205
Work and Protology 207
Work and Eschatology 211
Ecclesiastes: Protology and Eschatology Worked through
Christology 216
Conclusion: Singing at the Winepress 224
Bibliography 227
Biblical and Apocryphal Sources 239
Name Index 243
www.Ebook777.com
Acknowledgments
Paul J. Griffiths ends his book, Intellectual Appetite: A Theological Grammar, with
a chapter entitled “Gratitude,” the conclusion of which is his bibliography. I gather
two instructive insights from Griffiths’s chapter for these acknowledgments.
First, I desire here not simply to nod my head to those who have aided me
toward the genesis and end of this project, which originated as my doctoral
thesis at the University of Aberdeen, but also sincerely to convey my gratitude
for them. Second, this gratitude extends to the authors of all the works I have
consulted, whether or not I followed their insights wholly, and even if I disagreed
vehemently with them. Choosing to write on a book with a 2,000-year reception
history means necessarily to stand on the shoulders of countless interpreters.
Being grateful, then, demands both humility and the acknowledgment that one’s
words are neither the first nor the final (and certainly not the definitive) ones.
Beyond these innumerable interpreters, for their aid in the composition of these,
my few words on what Pete Seeger has called an “extraordinary old book,” I wish
also to acknowledge a few folks in particular.
Though the proliferation of thanksgiving to God in all manner of award
ceremony and post-game interview can make such gratitude appear obligatory
at best and trite at worst, I nonetheless am compelled first of all to give thanks
to the triune God, who heard in the course of my doctoral studies everything
from sincere praise to complaints bordering on the blasphemous. Thank you for
concealing the details of your works from me so that I might live in the eager
expectation of your hora.
In the Credo, confessing belief in the sanctorum communio under the broader
confession of the Holy Spirit implies a continuing conversation with saints
who have long preceded us. While I myself was writing about the words of
St Bonaventure and Martin Luther, each of them seemed always to be preaching
a mot propre to me. Though it is the temptation of doctoral students to ingest
every book under the sun and then to spout knowledge at those conferences that
exacerbate the politics of self-assertion, Bonaventure warned me in my second
year not to become a curiosus but to locate all knowledge in the knowledge of God.
In my final year, when the temptation was to succumb to the concupiscentia
www.Ebook777.com
Acknowledgments xi
futurorum, Luther proclaimed God’s Stündelein, warning me not to forsakeÂ€God’s

present gifts in my obsessive worry about the future. I am grateful to both, not
only for providing ever-invigorating avenues of study down to the final days of
my doctoral studies, but even more so for ensuring that academic theology does
not become lifeless. Instead, it laid a concrete claim on my existence.
Life has been infused into this project not only by these saints from the past
but also by several who are still among us in the flesh. I wish to acknowledge
two academic communities. First, I am grateful to faculty and fellow students
from Duke Divinity School in Durham, North Carolina. It was there that this
project was originally conceived, as I sought to relate the deliberations in my
ethics class to what I was learning in Hebrew Bible/Old Testament courses.
I am especially grateful to Stephen Chapman, Curtis Freeman, David Knauert
(to whose memory this thesis is partially dedicated), Anathea Portier-Young,
J. Kameron Carter, Willie Jennings, Douglas Campbell, Norman Wirzba, Sam
Wells, Ellen Davis, and Kavin Rowe. Aside from these faculty members, I wish
to thank three friends in particular: Ben McNutt, Tyler Garrard (the second
person to whom this thesis is dedicated), and Matthew Nickoloff. Without your
love, your sharpening, and your encouragement, I would not have crossed the
Atlantic to continue feeding my obsession with Qoheleth!
Leaving as wonderful a community as that which I had at Duke made me not
a little apprehensive about “starting over” in Aberdeen. Yet, from the first day,
I was privileged to work in a lively and collegial environment. Among the first-
rate staff present at various points during my time there, I wish especially to thank
Tom Greggs, Mike Mawson, Francesca Murphy, Bernd Wannenwestch, and
John Webster. The postgraduate student community was incredibly supportive,
living into the oftentimes empty claim that theology is best done in community.
Thanks are due, for one reason or another (or several!), to Vanessa Platek, Ben
Wall, Shaun Price, Petre Maican, Jon Coutts, Mike Laffin, Andrew Keuer, David
Robinson, James King, the Ramirez brothers, Darren Sumner, Josh Carroll,
Adam Nigh, Jennifer LoPresti, Tim Baylor, Jordan Hillebert, Shawn Aghajan, Stu
Cozzens, Andrew Draper, Leon Harris, B. J. Hutto, John Lowery, Tyler Wittman,
Josh Malone, Julian Gutiérrez, Joseph Lear, Matt Burdette, and Ben Rhodes.
Three colleagues in particular deserve special mention: Joe McGarry, having you
as an officemate was an immense blessing, not only for its comedic relief and the
mutual encouragement necessary to keep hands toÂ€theÂ€plow, but also because
working in your presence was an unforgettable lesson in hospitality. Scott
Prather, you encouraged me to “keep it real,” in every possible way. Justin Stratis,
www.Ebook777.com
xii Acknowledgments
conversations with you, from the very beginning, in large part came to define my
experience in Aberdeen, and your cover of “Holocene” will go down in history
as the greatest open mic performance of all time.
Not only did the academic community in Aberdeen enable me to thrive there
but also friends from our church and the wider community helped me to do
so. Rev. Ewen Gilchrist and Cults Kirk received us warmly when Rachel Ann
answered the call to serve as their youth worker. The Boyd family (Jo, John,
Emily and Ben, Jane, and Rachael) accepted us as their own, welcoming us into
their home as family, caring for us lovingly, and providing not a few occasions
to laugh. John shared his love for Americana music with me, and even took an
interest in reading parts of this book, for which I am grateful. Y’all became our
Scottish family, and we love you dearly. Love and thanks also to Agnes Smith,
Louise Cho, and the McNamees, Charlotte and Kevin. My musical partner Pete
Coutts was a constant source of joy. Playing music with you was one of the most
life-giving experiences I’ve ever had. Yet, not only did you bless me by sharing the
pleasures of music, but also simply by being a wonderful friend. Goat Lonesome
forever! Sandy and the staff at the Blue Lamp graciously mediated God’s good
gifts, in both the Lutheran and the “Franklinian” sense. Likewise, Craig and the
Kilau crew served copious amounts of delicious and energizing coffee (also God’s
good gifts), always at the right time. These folks and local institutions helped to
make Aberdeen feel like home.
Making a home in Aberdeen meant leaving a home in North Carolina. I wish
to thank both my parents (Shawn and Jeff Sharpe) and Rachel Ann’s (Charlene
and Wilton Smith) for your support to both of us, and for even coming to visit
us in tartan country. We also gladly received encouraging visits from my sister,
Katie, and her husband, Chris, as well as Rachel Ann’s sister, Melanie, and her
husband, Matthew. I would like to thank Matthew especially for taking such an
interest in my research. Writing a book is a vulnerable exercise, not least for the
(albeit misplaced) worry that one is writing for no one. While perhaps I do not
express it well enough, your interest in my work is not lost on me. Rachel Ann’s
brother, Jacob and my father, Greg Atkinson have been loving and supportive.
Finally, all of our grandparents (Naydine and Grant Sharpe, Ann Holland, Jerri
White, Rachel and Jarvis Smith, and Dixie and Bill Atkinson) have shown us
nothing but love and have made us feel so special with each call and visit home.
After moving back to the United States with a freshly minted doctoral
diploma and, more importantly, a brand new wee one, I sought to turn my
doctoral thesis into a book. Having a deep respect for Bloomsbury T&T Clark,
I am honored to have my name added to the publisher’s roster, which includes
www.Ebook777.com
Acknowledgments xiii
many of my theological heroes. From the very beginning, Anna Turton and
Miriam Cantwell have been wonderful people with whom to work, not least for
gently reminding me of important deadlines and teaching me what is involved
in getting from manuscript to book. I wish to thank Anna and Miriam, as well
as the editorial team, for your work on this project. Of course, any outstanding
errors are mine.
Two journals have graciously allowed me to reuse previously published
works of mine in this book. Thanks are due to Susan Parsons and Studies
in Christian Ethics, who published my article, “Overcoming Competition
through Kairological Enjoyment: The Implications of Qoheleth’s Theology of
Time for the Ethics of Work,” in the November, 2013 issue (26:4, pp. 395–409;
DOI:10.1177/0953946813492915). Parts of and themes from this article appear
in Chapters 3 and 4 of the present book. I wish also to express my gratitude to
Morag Torrance and the Scottish Journal of Theology, who published my article,
“Contemplation as an alternative to curiosity: St Bonaventure on Ecclesiastes
1:3-11,” © 2015 Scottish Journal of Theology. Originally published in Scottish
Journal of Theology 68:1 (2015), pp. 16–33. Reprinted with permission. Parts
of and themes from this article appear in Chapters 2 and 4 of the present book.
Susan and Morag, it was your acceptance of these articles that gave me the
confidence to pursue the publication of my thesis. Thank you.
I have reserved acknowledgment of the two people most significant for
helping me complete this book for the end. First, I could not imagine having
a more fitting and wonderful doctoral supervisor. Brian Brock knew precisely
when to keep silent and when to speak, giving me room to take rabbit trails,
but also reeling me back when necessary. Ever since I read Brian’s account of
“ethical exegesis” in his Singing the Ethos of God, I desired to learn firsthand what
it means to sing Scripture’s songs as a theological ethicist. I am so thankful to
have been mentored by a person for whom I have the utmost respect in so many
areas: musical taste (Jack White), preferences in literature (Cormac McCarthy),
theological acumen, and, most importantly, the realm of faith in the face of the
unknown. Rachel Ann and I have learned what it means to be faithful in trusting
the faithfulness of God from the entire Brock family (Stephanie, Brian, Adam,
Caleb, and Agnes). We are thankful for you and love you.
I wish finally to thank my wife, Rachel Ann (the third of the “threefold cord” in
my dedication). For six years, you made countless sacrifices to assist me in pursuing
my academic dreams. I really cannot express enough how thankful I am. You bring
me so much joy, and, though we do not keep track of debts owed to one another,
IÂ€do hope that I will live a life characterized by persistent gratitude. I love you.
www.Ebook777.com
Abbreviations
BHS Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia

BZAW Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft
CEB Common English Bible
Conf. Confessiones (Confessions). St Augustine
DDC De Doctrina Christiana (On Christian Doctrine). St Augustine
De Trin.
De Trinitate (On the Trinity). St Augustine
JSOT Journal for the Study of the Old Testament
KJV King James (Authorized) Version
LB Luther Bibel
LW Luther’s Works. Martin Luther. Edited by Jaroslav Pelikan and Helmut
Lehman, 55 vols. Philadelphia and St Louis: Fortress and Concordia,
1955–1986
LXX Septuagint
MT Masoretic Text
NASB New American Standard Bible
NIV New International Version
NJPSV New Jewish Publication Society Version
NRSV New Revised Standard Version
NT New Testament
OT Old Testament
PL Patrologia Latina
QuarEd Opera omnia S. Bonaventure. St Bonaventure. Florence: Quaracchi,
1882–1902
SJT Scottish Journal of Theology
WA Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe. Martin Luther.
Weimar: H. Böhlau, 1883–1993 (Tischreden abbreviated “WAT”)
WSB Works of St. Bonaventure. St Bonaventure. Edited by Robert Karris,
OFM, 15 vols. St Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications,
1996–2010
www.Ebook777.com
‫הוא‬ ׁ‫חדש‬ ‫ראה־זה‬ ‫שׁיאמר‬ ‫דבר‬ ׁ‫יש‬
‫מלפננו‬ ‫היה‬ ‫אשׁר‬ ‫לעלמים‬ ‫היה‬ ‫כבר‬
Qoheleth, Eccl. 1:10
“Verbum divinum est omnis creatura, quia Deum loquitur;

hoc verbum percipit oculus.”
St Bonaventure, Commentarius in librum Ecclesiastae
¡'/' :62/ f/f!¡=%= +/3'f #+/3¡+) !#& =#:+# =#=f+#¡+#)+ !6'¡:f #& '1 '=':¡:f !1!
#1// +)+ #&'+f!# -'2)1# :f3 -'!+! #+¡1=1 :f -!¡+) - #9+% #!¡') -'!+! #+¡1=1¡:f #'%
!13/ -'!+! ') #''% '/'¡= :)$' !:! + ') '! -'!+ ==/ !$ #+/3 %/g+# #9+%¡= =g+#
#+ =%/g
Qoheleth, Eccl. 5:17-19 [18-20, Engl.]
“Sic habet hic gaudium in labore et hic ingreditur in mediis

malis in paradisum.”
Martin Luther, Annotationes in Ecclesiasten
www.Ebook777.com
xvi
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction
Ecclesiastes: Relevant for Theological Ethics?
The book of Qoheleth presents a special challenge not only for professional
commentators but also for “normal” readers of the Hebrew text (or a modern
translation). The themes treated by the book still address even modern read-
ers directly—or in any case more directly than large portions of the historical
sections and prophetic books of the OT. Even if most people in modern “West-
ern” industrial societies no longer work in fields or are subjects of a king, they
can relate without great difficulty to the reflections of the book of Qoheleth on
work and rest or on behavior vis-à-vis those in power; and they can under-
stand these reflections in terms of their own experiences.1
This book is borne out of a conviction that resonates with Krüger’s comment
above. Ecclesiastes (or “Qoheleth”)2 is a deeply challenging book that
consistently stumps professional commentators and lay readers alike. Yet,
despite the difficulties it poses, and despite the chronological (as well as
geographical and socioeconomic) distance between the modern industrial
West and Hellenistic Jerusalem,3 Ecclesiastes possesses a strange timeliness
for contemporary reflections on economics and politics (among other topics).
Though Krüger suggests that Qoheleth’s themes are more immediately
applicable to contemporary readers than those arising from historical and
prophetic sections of the Old Testament,4 scholars writing on OT ethics (in the
fields of both biblical studies and theological ethics) have barely scratched the
1
Thomas Krüger, Qoheleth: A Commentary, Hermeneia—A Critical and Historical Commentary
on the Bible, ed. Klaus Baltzer, trans. O. C. Dean, Jr. (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press,
2004), p. 1.
2
“Qoheleth” is a transliteration of the name of the persona ‫קהלת‬, which is a substantive participle
from the verb ‫“( קהל‬to assemble, to gather”). ‫ קהלת‬is also the Hebrew title of the book of Ecclesiastes.
The English title is derived from the Vulgate’s transliteration of the LXX’s rendering of ‫ קהלת‬as
ἘkklhsiastὴV, which indicates an assembler of a congregation. In Chapter 1, I will consider
whether the ecclesial overtones are significant.
3
See Chapter 1 for a brief justification of this assumption regarding Qoheleth’s provenance.
4
Henceforth, I will refer to the Old Testament with the abbreviation “OT.”
www.Ebook777.com
2 Introduction
surface of Ecclesiastes. In spite of a broader interest within the field of biblical

studies in the ethics of wisdom literature, particularly Proverbs, there is still a
considerable lack of extended ethical attention being paid to Ecclesiastes. The
various attempts at comprehensive ethical considerations of the OT as a whole
have tended to subordinate the message of Ecclesiastes to overarching canonical
themes, granting the book a primarily illustrative significance. This generalizing
move is problematic with a book as difficult as Ecclesiastes, which eludes total
comprehension and thus resists reduction. Yet, even an attempt at grasping the
entire scope of only Qoheleth’s ethical vision is daunting. Therefore, I have chosen
to attempt a modest contribution to filling the gap regarding the theological-
ethical consideration of Ecclesiastes by considering primarily one ethical topic
within the book. Put simply, in this book, I seek to locate an ethic of work in the
thought world presented by Ecclesiastes.
I am not writing this book because no one else has reflected on Qoheleth’s
work ethic. If Qoheleth is correct in his observation that there is nothing new
under the sun (Eccl. 1:9), then I can hardly claim novelty in writing on the
topic of work in Ecclesiastes. Biblical commentators, ancient and modern
alike, have long considered this topic.5 Yet, there is room for more reflection
from the perspective of theological ethics on Qoheleth’s work ethic. The main
contribution of this book to the broad field of theological ethics, and to the
particular field of the theology of work, will be its proposal that Ecclesiastes
enhances both protological and eschatological accounts of work, especially in
the way it works protology and eschatology through christology. In making
this proposal, I will seek assistance from two figures from historical theology:
St Bonaventure and Martin Luther. Unwilling and unable to divorce ethics from
exegesis, these two readers of Scripture provide crucial insights into reading
Ecclesiastes. While they lack many of the critical tools available to contemporary
exegetes, I will show that the tensions present in their commentaries on
Ecclesiastes nonetheless anticipate the tensions present in historical-critical
ones. Ecclesiastes has been a divisive book since its inception, one that, perhaps
more than any other in the Christian canon, forces the “theological hand” of its
readers. The current critical debates reflect earlier, more explicitly theological
5
Among modern commentators, Elsa Tamez and William P. Brown offer especially compelling
accounts of Qoheleth’s work ethic. See Elsa Tamez, When the Horizons Close: Rereading Ecclesiastes,
trans. Margaret Wilde (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2000); William P. Brown, Ecclesiastes,
Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville: John Knox Press,
2000); and idem, “‘Whatever Your Hand Finds to Do’: Qoheleth’s Work Ethic,” Interpretation 55
(2001), pp. 271–84.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 3
ones. Therefore, in working my way through historical-critical treatments of

Ecclesiastes and the commentaries of Bonaventure and Luther to the ethics
of work, I hope also to contribute to the presently popular field of theological
interpretation of Scripture by highlighting the continued relevance of those
precritical readers who find it inconceivable to divorce theological deliberation
from scriptural interpretation.
In the remainder of this introduction, I will set out the content and architecture
of this work. First, I will broadly survey the landscape of discussions regarding the
relationship between ethics and the OT in the fields of both biblical studies and
theological ethics in order to show the importance of an additional theological-
ethical treatment of Ecclesiastes. Next, I will outline in brief the basic tropes in
contemporary theologies of work that I aim to engage in this book and suggest
why turning to Ecclesiastes will deepen discussion. Thus, if the first section of
this introduction argues that there is a gap to be filled in terms of theological-
ethical treatments of Ecclesiastes, and promises to make a start in filling that
gap, then the second section suggests that work is one topic of consideration
to which a theological-ethical treatment of Ecclesiastes would contribute and
particularly enhance. In other words, the first section defends my selection of
Ecclesiastes, while the second defends my selection of the topic of work. After
stating my case for considering Qoheleth’s work ethic from a theological-ethical
perspective, IÂ€ will provide both historical-critical and historical-theological
grounds for my engagement with St Bonaventure and Martin Luther to assist my
pursuit. Finally, I will give a framework for how I shall arrive at my conclusions
about Qoheleth’s work ethic by briefly summarizing the content of the four
primary chapters of this book.
Ecclesiastes and theological ethics
Above, I stated that current trends in the discussion of OT ethics seem to

contradict Krüger’s suggestion that Ecclesiastes is more immediately relevant
to contemporary considerations of economics and politics than historical and
prophetic portions of the OT. Here, I will survey relevant aspects of the field
of OT ethics, first from the field of biblical studies and then from the field of
theological ethics. I will then suggest why I think there are considerable lacunae in
theological-ethical treatments of Ecclesiastes, at the same time directing attention
to relatively recent trends in biblical studies and theological disciplines that hold
out the promise for a recovery of theological-ethical interest in Ecclesiastes.
www.Ebook777.com
4 Introduction
Biblical studies
Thirty years ago, there was a renewed interest in the relationship between the OT
and ethics in both biblical studies and theological ethics. On this phenomenon
in biblical studies, Christopher J. H. Wright says,
In 1983 a long silence was broken. After more than half a century when no
book had been published in English on the subject of Old Testament ethics, two
arrived almost simultaneously, their authors quite unaware of each other’s work.
One [was] my own Living as the People of God. ... The other [was] Toward Old
Testament Ethics by Walter C. Kaiser, Jr.6
While these two works represent an important turn in biblical studies, they
both tend to emphasize the covenantal themes of the Law and the Prophets,
subordinating insights from the writings to overarching patterns detected in the
other two portions rather than offering substantial treatments of the writings
themselves.7 What Roland Murphy says of OT theology and its relation to
wisdom literature in general applies to Kaiser and Wright’s studies in OT ethics:
“The usual approach in Old Testament theology is by way of the biblical record
of God’s revelation to the people by prophets and deeds—the rigid axis of
history—which leaves little room for wisdom literature.”8 Kaiser, for instance,
focuses the bulk of his exegetical treatment on the Decalogue, the Book of
the Covenant, the Holiness Code, and Deuteronomy’s exposition of the Law.
According to him, these passages show that holiness “is the central organizing
feature of Old Testament ethics.”9 Holiness is the universal ethical principle
underlying lawgiving and covenant making, and it is central to all other ethical
reflections in the OT. While later studies are less interested in locating universal
principles applicable to every age, many still assume a priority of the pentateuchal
and prophetic literature for OT ethics. John Rogerson, writing nearly twenty years
after Kaiser, helpfully points out the universalizing and reactionary tendency in
Kaiser that Rogerson ascribes to “conservative” approaches to OT ethics; yet,
even in his preference for focusing on example rather than preceptÂ€in Christian-
6
Christopher J. H. Wright, Walking in the Ways of the Lord: The Ethical Authority of the Old Testament
(Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1995), pp. 91–4.
7
I am not employing the Tanakh’s framework of Law, Prophets and Writings here in order to make
a canonical statement, but rather easily to designate portions of the OT that receive more or less
treatment in theological-ethical considerations.
8
Roland E. Murphy, O. Carm., The Tree of Life: An Exploration of Biblical Wisdom Literature, 3rd edn
(Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2002), p. 112.
9
Walter C. Kaiser, Jr., Toward Old Testament Ethics (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House,
1983), p. 139.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 5
ethical reflection on the OT, he is nonetheless focused on the same themes of

commandment and covenant (which he refers to as “imperatives of redemption”
and “structures of grace”).10
In Living as the People of God, Wright extends a little further beyond Kaiser in
his focus, suggesting the triangular relationship between God, Israel, and the land
as a framework for OT ethics, rather than the universal principle of “holiness.”11
Within this triangular framework, God represents “the theological angle,” Israel
represents “the social angle,” and the land represents “the economic angle.”12 In
Wright’s schema, the story of Israel and God’s dealings with her is paradigmatic
for the understanding of God’s relationship with other nations and the rest of
creation.13 This emphasis on Israel’s narrative, along with the “economic angle,”
enables Wright to move beyond the legal writings in the Pentateuch to the
Deuteronomistic history (and other portions of the OT) for ethical consideration,
a move that reflects the increased interest in literary approaches to the OT in
the early 1980s.14 However, though he is able to incorporate a broader scope for
insight, Wright still subordinates the ethics of other sections of the OT to the
patterns established in the pentateuchal and prophetic portions, just as biblical
theologians oftentimes have had a tendency to subordinate the theological
particularity of some portions of the OT to grander theological themes.15
According to Wright, the triangular framework is “covenantal, canonical and
comprehensive.”16 This concise summary of the advantages of his schema also
betrays the triangular framework’s twofold pitfall: It leaves less “covenantal”
portions of the OT on the edges of ethical consideration; and it grants these
portions primarily illustrative, rather than substantial, value in relation to
covenantal sections. Regarding the former pitfall, the most concerted effort
Wright exerts with respect to wisdom literature (particularly, Proverbs and
Job) lies in his final chapter, “The way of the individual,” which he admits falls
10
John Rogerson, “The Old Testament and Christian Ethics,” in Robin Gill (ed.), The Cambridge
Companion to Christian Ethics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), pp. 29–41. See also
Wright’s summary and critique of Kaiser in Walking in the Ways of the Lord, pp. 91–4.
11
Christopher J. H. Wright, Living as the People of God: The Relevance of Old Testament ethics (Leicester:
Inter-Varsity Press, 1983), p. 19. See also his updated edition, Old Testament Ethics for the People of
God (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004), which revises Living as the People of God and
also integrates Walking in the Ways of the Lord into the work.
12
Wright, Living as the People of God.
13
Wright, Living as the People of God, pp. 40–5.
14
For an exemplary treatment of biblical narrative from a literary perspective, see the pioneering
work by Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative (New York: Basic Books, 1981).
15
For one critique of the biblical-theological approach to both theology proper and theological ethics,
see Brian Brock, Singing the Ethos of God: On the Place of Christian Ethics in Scripture (Grand
Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2007), pp. 52–70.
16
Wright, Living as the People of God, p. 63.
www.Ebook777.com
6 Introduction
outside of the basic triangular framework, though it is not unrelated to the social
angle that the topic “Israel” implies.17 Wright’s sparse comments on Ecclesiastes
exemplify the second pitfall of his schema. The book receives even fewer pages
of consideration in Wright’s study than do Proverbs and Job. When Wright does
comment on it, he does so mainly in regard to the effects of the fall on human
work. Though he hints at the paradoxical nature of Qoheleth’s reflections on work,
he emphasizes that “there is no more perceptive exposition of the outworking
of God’s curse upon the earth and the lot of fallen man upon it than these
observations of Ecclesiastes.”18 While it is certainly insightful to read Qoheleth’s
reflections within the logic of creation and fall,19 the general subordination of
biblical wisdom to the theme of covenant in Wright’s study ultimately results
in his granting Ecclesiastes a primarily illustrative significance, rather than its
meriting a more substantial treatment. His framework leaves wisdom literature
in general lying on the periphery of his proposal for OT ethics.
While the 1983 studies of Kaiser and Wright push wisdom literature to the
edges of ethical consideration, the studies of the last twenty years have ascribed
more ethical value to biblical wisdom, though they still do little constructive
work with Ecclesiastes. Such is the case with Eckart Otto’s 1994 publication,
Theologische Ethik des Alten Testaments,20 which John Barton considers the most
significant work on OT ethics (in biblical studies) since the Second World War,
and which Barton (writing in 2003) predicts will be the new standard text.21
Barton summarizes Otto’s methodology and the motivation behind it:
In a brief programmatic statement of his working assumptions (p. 10), Otto

discusses the difficulty of separating out Old Testament ethics as a field of enquiry
from the larger contexts of the history of Israelite religion and the theology of
the Old Testament. To prevent its simply collapsing into one or another of these,
he proposes that it is essential to concentrate only on the explicit norms attested
in the Old Testament. This means that the book limits itself to a consideration
of legal and Wisdom sections of the text. Prophecy is almost wholly omitted,
and the narrative books are not discussed at all (the index of biblical references
reveals only nine references to the histories).22
17
18
19
Indeed, in Chapter 2, I will suggest the significance of Bonaventure’s reading of Ecclesiastes within
the logic of creation and fall.
20
Eckart Otto, Theologische Ethik des Alten Testaments (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1994).
21
John Barton, Understanding Old Testament Ethics: Approaches and Explorations (Louisville:
Westminster John Knox Press, 2003), pp. 162–3.
22
Barton, Understanding Old Testament Ethics, p. 163.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 7
Although Otto significantly brings wisdom into ethical focus, as both Barton and
Gordon Wenham complain,23 he mostly ignores narrative and prophetic texts,
thus committing the same problem of exclusion existent in earlier treatments of
OT ethics, only renegotiating the principal loci of generic investigation. Yet, even
with a strong emphasis on wisdom literature (especially Proverbs), Ecclesiastes
receives only three pages of treatment in Otto’s work.24 Waldemar Janzen, whose
Old Testament Ethics: A Paradigmatic Approach shares the same publication
year as Otto’s Theologische Ethik des Altens Testaments, contradicts Otto by
arguing for the primacy of narrative over legal material for the formulation of
ethics in the OT. He argues that “story is the literary genre that, next to actual
cultic practice, was most important in the transmission of theological-ethical
instruction in ancient Israel itself.”25 While Janzen focuses on the wisdom
“paradigm” in biblical narrative, in his work, as in that of Otto, Ecclesiastes only
receives minimal attention.
In the early twenty-first century general studies of OT ethics, Ecclesiastes
has hardly fared better than in studies from the 1980s and 1990s. The book is
not a factor anywhere in Barton’s Understanding Old Testament Ethics. In Cyril
Rodd’s Glimpses of a Strange Land, as in Wright’s 1983 study, Ecclesiastes merits
a few pages of illustrative significance for broad themes such as “The Poor” and
“Animals.”26 Such is also the case in the recent collection of essays Character
Ethics and the Old Testament.27 In a work that he was unable to finish revising
before his death, R. Norman Whybray considers Ecclesiastes according to the
parameters he earlier establishes for “the good life” in the OT.28 While he devotes
more substantial energy to Ecclesiastes than earlier studies, and though he is no
stranger to Qoheleth’s thought world,29 the massive scope of his ethical study
(he devotes chapters to nearly every book in the OT) as well as his topical limits
prevent a sustained look at the ethics of Ecclesiastes.
23
Barton, Understanding Old Testament Ethics, p. 162; Gordon J. Wenham, Psalms as Torah: Reading
Biblical Song Ethically (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012), p. 5.
24
Otto, Theologische Ethik des Alten Testaments, pp. 172–4.
25
Waldemar Janzen, Old Testament Ethics: A Paradigmatic Approach (Louisville: Westminster John
Knox Press, 1994), p. 2.
26
Cyril S. Rodd, Glimpses of a Strange Land: Studies in Old Testament Ethics (Edinburgh: T&T Clark,
2001). See pp. 164–5, 226–7.
27
R. Carroll, M. Daniel and Jacqueline E. Lapsley (eds), Character Ethics and the Old Testament:
Moral Dimensions of Scripture (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2007). See especially
Daniel L. Smith-Christopher’s essay, “The Quiet Words of the Wise: Biblical Developments toward
Nonviolence as a Diaspora Ethic,” in which Smith-Christopher reads Ecclesiastes as subversive
wisdom vis-à-vis the Gentile state, pp. 139–41.
28
R. Norman Whybray, The Good Life in the Old Testament (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2002).
29
See, for instance, R. Norman Whybray, Ecclesiastes, Old Testament Guides (Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press, 1989).
www.Ebook777.com
8 Introduction
This brief survey of studies from the last thirty years exposes the need for more
particular points of entry into OT ethics. At best, the general studies subordinate
the ethical vision of some portions of the OT to overarching canonical themes,
reducing them to mere illustrations of previously established paradigms. At
worst, these studies simply suggest the sociological background that informs
a biblical writer’s ethos or survey linguistic content, stopping short of actual
interpretations that would pose challenges to theological ethics. More specific
inquiries would allow the sharp edges of particular books to remain present,
rather than allowing the ethicist to smooth the edges over for the purposes of
building up a comprehensive ethical vision for the entire OT. Recent trends do
hold out the promise for more sustained attention being given to oft-ignored
biblical loci of ethical deliberation.
While the general studies surveyed above have tended either to ignore
certain portions of the OT or to ascribe minimal value to them, some recent
studies have indeed sought more particular points of entry, a move that
has allowed for more serious engagement with neglected sections. Gordon
Wenham takes a narrative approach to OT ethics in his Story as Torah:
Reading Old Testament Narrative Ethically30 but turns to the poetry of the
Psalms for ethical deliberation in Psalms as Torah: Reading Biblical Song
Ethically, attempting to fill what he sees as a critical gap in ethical readings of
the Psalms. Mary Mills treads a similar path to Wenham’s Story as Torah in her
Biblical Morality: Moral perspectives in Old Testament narratives.31 Yet, while
these works provide a welcome corrective to OT ethics by focusing attention
on more specific portions of Scripture, there is still a void in biblical studies
in sustained ethical treatment of Ecclesiastes. The same problem exists in
theological ethics.
Theological ethics
There is no shortage of material on the relationship between Scripture and
ethics in the field of theological ethics. The current popularity of theological
interpretation of Scripture, which has resulted in an abundance of handbooks
30
Gordon J. Wenham, Story as Torah: Reading Old Testament Narrative Ethically (Grand Rapids: Baker
Academic, 2000).
31
Mary E. Mills, Biblical Morality: Moral perspectives in Old Testament Narratives (Aldershot,
Hampshire: Ashgate Publishing, 2001).
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 9
for theological exegesis32 as well as theological commentary series,33 has

further expanded the discussion of the relationship between the OT and
theological ethics.34 However, oftentimes these discussions have contained
more prolegomena, such as discourses on hermeneutical method, than actual
theological-ethical exegesis of Scripture.35 Further, when ethicists actually do
engage Scripture, the chosen passages are often those that seem most obviously
ethical to modern readers, which means that particularly challenging books are
ignored. One may still apply the lament of Birch and Rasmussen regarding the
whole of Scripture particularly to Ecclesiastes:
In spite of general agreement that the Bible is an important resource for the
church in ethical issues, the fact is that in practice its role is often an insignificant
one. Christian ethicists often acknowledge the Bible in chapters on biblical
foundations, but its influence is meager within the pages of discussion that
follow. Biblical scholars concerned with textual, historical, and literary issues
often betray little interest in how biblical materials might be claimed as a
resource in the lives of communities which still view those texts as Scripture. It
seems ironic that in a time when critical scholarship has clarified so much in our
32
There is even a dictionary devoted to theological interpretation of Scripture. See Kevin Vanhoozer
(ed.), Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House
Company, 2005).
33
I will mention here only a few series that offer theological-exegetical treatments of Scripture.
InterVarsity Press’s Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture series has made a wealth of
patristic exegesis available to students seeking early examples of Christian exegesis, which do
not operate outside of a theological mode. InterVarsity Press is also introducing a Reformation
Commentary on Scripture series. A Medieval Christian Commentary on Scripture series would
complete this attempt at covering pre- and early modern Christian treatments of Scripture,
highlighting the desire in each age to combine exegetical and theological insight for the sake of the
Christian community. The Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible series has sought insight
primarily from theologians and theological ethicists from various ecclesial traditions, in order to
recover the more holistic approaches of precritical interpreters of Scripture. Westminster John Knox
Press’s Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible series promises to follow a similar course
(though currently, far fewer volumes are available than those from the Brazos series). William B.
Eerdmans Publishing Company’s Two Horizons Old Testament Commentary series attempts to
offer commentaries containing the exegetical precision demanded of critical commentaries joined
by explicitly theological insights.
34
See, for instance, Daniel J. Treier’s consideration of the virtues and vices in relation to Proverbs in
his Proverbs & Ecclesiastes, Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible (Grand Rapids: Brazos
Press, 2011). OT scholar John Barton has also sought to apply the insights of virtue theory to OT
ethics. See Barton, Understanding Old Testament Ethics, pp. 65–74.
35
Brian Brock, in Singing the Ethos of God, comments, “The contemporary academic Bible-and-ethics
discussion remains largely determined by the question of how Scripture might be understood
as a moral guide, preparing for exegesis rather than engaging in it. In so doing, such treatments
rarely glimpse the possibility that exegesis might be a form of praise. My suggestion, learned from
Augustine and Luther, is that exegesis should find its proper form only as praise of a God who is
present with creatures” (p. xv).
www.Ebook777.com
10 Introduction
understanding of the Scriptures that the Bible actually seems less available as a
resource for the Christian moral life than in previous generations.36
Birch and Rasmussen suggest that one reason for the neglect of particular
parts of Scripture in ethical deliberation is the failure on the part of readers
to account for the complexity and variety of biblical literature. While law
codes and explicit moral injunctions receive much consideration in ethical
treatments of Scripture, other forms of Scripture, such as “narrative accounts,
historical events, wisdom sayings, parables, eschatological material, theological
reflection, and liturgical material” receive far less emphasis.37 Though, as I have
intimated above, some of these genres (particularly narrative) have received
more emphasis since Birch and Rasmussen’s publication of Bible and Ethics
in the Christian Life, general ethical considerations of the OT from the field
of theological ethics fail to offer substantial treatments of sections and genres
of the OT that do not easily fall under a basic covenantal framework or the
category of narrative.
1983 was an important year for OT ethics not only in the discipline of biblical
studies, but also in that of theological ethics. Thomas Ogletree devotes a chapter
to OT ethics in The Use of the Bible in Christian Ethics: A Constructive Essay.38 In
this chapter, he betrays the same basic tendency as Kaiser and Wright to privilege
pentateuchal and prophetic themes at the expense of themes from other biblical
genres. He bases the chapter on the themes of commandment and covenant,
“characteriz[ing] the basic patterns of moral understanding which appear in
the Pentateuch and the writings of the eight- and seventh-century prophets.”39
Though he attempts to respond substantively to Birch and Rasmussen’s lament,
he bypasses genres not easily amenable to the basic covenantal outlook he
detects. Another work from 1983, an influential treatise on theological ethics
and not explicitly a book on Scripture and ethics, is also worthy of mention in
this regard. In The Peaceable Kingdom, Stanley Hauerwas insightfully articulates
the formational significance of scriptural stories for the character of Christian
communities.40 Though the focus on narrative has the potential to open up
36
Bruce C. Birch and Larry L. Rasmussen, Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life: Revised & Expanded
Edition (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press, 1989), p. 159. Ironically, Birch and Rasmussen are
mostly guilty of Brock’s charge in the note above this one.
37
Birch and Rasmussen, Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life, p. 161.
38
Thomas W. Ogletree, The Use of the Bible in Christian Ethics: A Constructive Essay (Philadelphia:
Fortress Press, 1983).
39
Ogletree, The Use of the Bible in Christian Ethics, p. 47.
40
Stanley Hauerwas, The Peaceable Kingdom: A Primer in Christian Ethics (Notre Dame: University of
Notre Dame Press, 1983), pp. 72–95.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 11
scriptural passages previously less considered in theological-ethical deliberation,41

Hauerwas avoids other scriptural genres. As with Ogletree, certain parts of the
canon are pushed to the periphery. The “narrative turn,” for all its benefits for
theological ethics, has led to the exclusion of those portions of Scripture not
typically designated as narrative.42 As in biblical studies, in theological ethics,
there is a need for more specific engagement with sections ignored in general
inquiries into OT ethics. Ecclesiastes is one book (among several) that merits
more concentrated consideration.43 Before moving into the particular ethical
topic I am going to engage from within the thought world of Ecclesiastes, I shall
suggest the reasons I believe Ecclesiastes in particular is largely ignored. It is my
sense that addressing the theological reasons for neglect, especially, will expose
the critical points to keep in focus for the remainder of this project.
Reasons for neglect

There is a twofold reason for the overall neglect of Ecclesiastes in OT ethics in
the fields of both biblical studies and theological ethics. First, the book’s formal
complexity eludes attempts at complete comprehension, rendering generic
statements about Qoheleth’s ethics difficult to justify. Second, and following from
the first reason, it is difficult to decipher Qoheleth’s theological tone as well as his
relationship vis-à-vis the broader wisdom tradition. To say anything definitive
about Qoheleth’s theology or ethics is to assume a certain grasp on the formal
and canonical problems related to Ecclesiastes.
Formal reasons
Regarding the first reason, though Chapter 1 will include a fuller discussion on
issues pertaining to genre, style, composition, and structure, it is worth mentioning
a couple of examples here that both illustrate the problems that Qoheleth’s
formal complexity poses and exemplify how theological-ethical judgments
41
Indeed, Hauerwas has influenced the work of one of the biblical scholars to whom I have referred
above, namely, Waldemar Janzen.
42
Ironically, though it has been by and large ignored by theological ethicists drawing their ethical
visions from the logic of biblical narrative, Ecclesiastes itself would prove a fruitful resource for
narrative ethics. In 1977, Michael V. Fox convincingly argued for the narrative framework and
character of Ecclesiastes in “Frame-Narrative and Composition in the Book of Qohelet,” Hebrew
Union College Annual 48 (1977), pp. 83–106. I will say more about this article in Chapter 1.
43
As I have indicated above, the Psalms have in recent years garnered the kind of ethical attention that
I seek to apply to Ecclesiastes. See Brock, Singing the Ethos of God. See also, Jason Byassee, Praise
Seeking Understanding: Reading the Psalms with Augustine (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans
Publishing Company, 2007).
www.Ebook777.com
12 Introduction
are intimately tied to formal ones. While some scholars read Ecclesiastes as a
basically coherent (though complicated) narrative, others detect a multitude of
sources from a variety of literary genres (including proverbs, example stories,
autobiography, etc.); and there is a myriad of variations within each of these
basic accounts. One variation on the former is to read Ecclesiastes in the
manner of a Greek diatribe,44 thus hearing multiple voices being represented by
the author in the book. If Qoheleth does assume this form, the difficulty with
developing a theological-ethical account of work from within his thought world
lies in discerning whether particular positive statements are quotations from the
mouth of a foolish interlocutor or are actually indicative and ethically positive
claims the author is making. Yet, even if one affirms the latter of these options,
the epilogue adds another level of complexity: Is the epilogist warning the reader
against Qoheleth’s claims or genuinely praising Qoheleth?45
It will be evident in my treatment of Bonaventure and Luther that answers
to these questions both arise from and contribute to the theology one locates
in the book as a whole. For instance, Bonaventure suggests that the so-called
carpe diem passages in Ecclesiastes originate in the mouth of the fool,46 thus
anticipating the reading of Ecclesiastes as a diatribe. Theologically, this
interpretive move enables Bonaventure to promote the monastic life from
within Ecclesiastes. Luther, on the other hand, reads these passages positively,
and for him, they are normative for Christian economic-political ethics.47
Contra Bonaventure, Luther’s positive reading of these passages lends support
for his polemic against monasticism. These basically polar interpretations show
just how tied theological-ethical judgments are to formal ones. Thus, attempts
at simple summaries of Qoheleth’s moral imagination, which do not account for
this formal complexity, assume a too easily identifiable logic that Ecclesiastes
itself defies. Yet, this interpretive distinction between Bonaventure and Luther
44
See R. Braun, Kohelet und die frühhellenistische Popularphilosophie BZAW 130 (Berlin: de Gruyter,
1973), p. 165; and Norbert Lohfink, Qoheleth: A Continental Commentary, trans. Sean McEvenue
(Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press, 2003), p. 8, in which Lohfink argues for a combination of
diatribe and palistrophe.
45
Compare the treatments of the epilogue by Michael V. Fox and Tremper Longman, III, both of
whom are working under the same basic assumption regarding Qoheleth’s composition that Fox
himself proposes in “Frame-Narrative.” While Fox has a more positive reading of the epilogue,
Longman hears in the epilogue a certain hesitation with regard to Qoheleth’s words. See Michael
V. Fox, A Time to Tear Down and a Time to Build Up: A Rereading of Ecclesiastes (Eugene: Wipf
and Stock Publishers, 1999), p. 350; and Tremper Longman III, The Book of Ecclesiastes, The New
International Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1998), pp. 276–7.
46
WSB VII:232–5.
47
LW 15:46.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 13
also arises from differing perspectives on the place of biblical wisdom in the
Christian life (and the place of Ecclesiastes within the wisdom corpus), a topic
that is not unrelated to the following suggestions, drawn from a theological
perspective, for why Ecclesiastes has been by and large avoided in theological-
ethical deliberation.
Theological reasons
Along with the formal reasons for the overall neglect of Ecclesiastes in accounts
of OT ethics (in both biblical studies and theological ethics), there are more
substantial and explicitly theological reasons (particularly in the registers ofÂ€the
doctrine of creation and eschatology), which are tied to perspectives on the place
of Ecclesiastes in relation to the rest of the wisdom corpus. Therefore, it will be
necessary first to survey broader developments in theological interest in wisdom
literature before narrowing the focus to Ecclesiastes.
Wisdom literature
Walter Brueggemann, in his article entitled “The Loss and Recovery of Creation
in Old Testament Theology,”48 has narrated the contextual and substantial factors
relating to the fall and subsequent rise of interest in OT creation theology,
which has been paralleled by a renewed interest in OT wisdom literature.
Brueggemann begins by remarking on the considerable influence of Karl Barth
on the movements within mid-twentieth-century OT theology in the context of
the Church struggle in the Third Reich. In likely the most significant instance
of Barth’s influence, OT scholar Gerhard von Rad applies Barth’s opposition
between faith and the “natural” religion of National Socialism (which enlists
the doctrine of creation to promulgate its conception of societal order)49 to OT
scholarship in his depiction of the opposition between the faith of Israel and
Canaanite religion (construed as natural religion), a move that results in von
Rad’s pushing the doctrine of creation to the periphery of the OT.50 Von Rad’s
basic sensitivities are echoed in the writings of American scholar G. Ernest
48
Walter Brueggemann, “The Loss and Recovery of Creation in Old Testament Theology,” Theology
Today 53.2 (1996), pp. 177–90.
49
For an illuminating study on Barth’s use and eventual disavowal of the concept of “orders of creation”
and on the points of continuity and discontinuity in Barth’s early and later ethics in relation to this
concept, see Paul T. Nimmo, “The orders of creation in the theological ethics of Karl Barth,” SJT 60.1
(2007), pp. 24–35.
50
Brueggemann, “Loss and Recovery,” pp. 177–8. See von Rad’s essays “The Theological Problem of
the Old Testament Doctrine of Creation” and “The Form-Critical Problem of the Hexateuch” in
Gerhard von Rad, The Problem of the Hexateuch and Other Essays (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966).
www.Ebook777.com
14 Introduction
Wright.51 Brueggemann points out that while the pitting of Israel’s faith against
Canaanite religion carries with it the intention of “resist[ing] the reduction of
the divine to the natural,” it also “seems to yield a form of faith that is removed
from human birth, suffering, and dying—bodily and communal processes in
which the mystery of human life is lodged.”52 In other words, while von Rad
and Wright, following in Barth’s footsteps, avoid the grave error of the National
Socialists, their constructive work has the pitfall of eclipsing biblical reflections
on God’s involvement in quotidian existence. Subsequent developments in OT
theology, including von Rad’s own work, confront this misstep.
The works of two OT scholars, Claus Westermann and Frank Moore Cross,
problematize the “faith-versus-religion” model of von Rad, yet do so in a way
that does not reject von Rad’s theological objective.53 In his work,54 Westermann
challenges the either/or paradigm of von Rad and calls into question the
simple demonization of Canaanite “fertility religion” by noting that Israel’s
God too blesses the land in ways not totally dissimilar to those works ascribed
to Baal.55 Moreover, what is especially important for the present discussion is
that Westermann’s work shows “a readiness to take seriously all of the texts of
the Old Testament, including those that do not fit the regnant construct,” and
“a willingness to be genuinely dialectical about deliverance and blessing,”56 Even
if, according to both von Rad and Westermann, creation does lie “at the edge
of the Old Testament,” it is “integral and decisive for Israel’s faith.”57 To quote
Westermann himself, “The acting of God in creation and his action in history
stand in relation to one another in the Old Testament; the one is not without
the other.â•¯... Creation and history arise out of the same origin and move toward
the same goal.”58 Therefore, nonhistorical genres of the OT that are heavy with
creation theology merit more attention than von Rad gives in the two volumes
of his seminal work Old Testament Theology.59 Yet, as will be evident below,
51
Brueggemann, “Loss and Recovery,” pp. 178–9. See, for instance, G. Ernest Wright, The Challenge of
Israel’s Faith (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1944).
52
Brueggemann, “Loss and Recovery,” p. 179.
53
Brueggemann, “Loss and Recovery,” pp. 179–82.
54
See especially his essay, “Creation and History in the Old Testament,” in Vilmos Vajta (ed.), The
Gospel and Human Destiny (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1971), pp. 11–38; and Claus Westermann,
Blessing in the Bible and in the Life of the Church (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1978).
55
Frank Moore Cross’s main contribution in America in this regard is his challenge to Wright’s sharp
distinction between Canaanite myth and Hebrew epic in his Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic:
Essays in the History of the Religion of Israel (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973).
56
57
58
Westermann, “Creation and History,” pp. 17, 32; quoted in Brueggemann, “Loss and Recovery,” p. 180.
59
Gerhard von Rad, Old Testament Theology, 2 vols., trans. D. M. G. Stalker (New York: Harper & Row
Publishers, vol. 1, 1962; vol. 2, 1965).
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 15
von Rad himself displays a certain teachability, taking his critics seriously and
renegotiating his perspective on creation theology in the OT, especially in his
last major work, Wisdom in Israel.60
Von Rad’s Wisdom in Israel is both evidence of a change of posture toward OT
creation theology and a reflection of an increasing interest in wisdom literature
within biblical studies as a whole. The convergence of these two movements
has rendered OT wisdom literature a prime place from which to develop an
OT doctrine of creation. Indeed, Walther Zimmerli succinctly says, “Wisdom
thinks resolutely within the framework of a theology of creation.”61 While
Brueggemann draws attention primarily to the work of Hans Heinrich Schmid62
(and von Rad) in connection to the rise of interest in wisdom, it is necessary also
to point to the influential work of Klaus Koch, the principal proponent of the
deed-consequence framework through which the reflections on the relationship
between the concept of “order” and human action in OT wisdom can be
analyzed.63 In Koch, one detects a renewed interest in order, but an interest that
is not tied to a particular political ideology. According to him, biblical wisdom
is primarily focused on the detection of a certain order in creation as well as
responses to the disruption of this order. In Koch’s framework, there is woven
into the fabric of creation a mechanical relationship between human deeds and
their consequences. God does not so much intervene directly in the lives of the
wise and foolish but rather performs a “midwifery service” (Hebbamenedienst),64
60
Gerhard von Rad, Wisdom in Israel, trans. James D. Martin (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1972).
Brueggemann says regarding this work and the person of von Rad, “It is a measure of the greatness
of von Rad that he himself provided a study that moves well beyond his earlier work and, in fact,
functions as a third volume of his theology of the Old Testament, though, of course, it is not identified
as such” (“Loss and Recovery,” p. 183). James Crenshaw, too, praises von Rad for his willingness
to refine his thoughts: “Von Rad’s major study of wisdom in Israel stands as a monument to his
extraordinary powers of interpretation. It also demonstrates his willingness to adopt a different
approach when the literature demands it.” See James Crenshaw, Gerhard von Rad, Makers of the
Modern Theological Mind, ed. Bob E. Patterson (Waco: Word Books, 1978), pp. 97–8.
61
Walther Zimmerli, “The Place and the Limit of The Wisdom in The Framework of the Old Testament
Theology,” SJT 17.2 (1964), p. 148.
62
Particularly, Hans Heinrich Schmid, Wesen und Geschichte der Weisheit: Eine Untersuchung zur
altorientalischen und israelitischen Weisheitsliteratur (Berlin: A. Töpelmann, 1966); idem, Gerechtigkeit
als Weltordnung: Hintergrund und Geschichte des alttestamentlichen Gerechtigkeitsbegriffes (Tübingen:
J.C.B. Mohr [Paul Siebeck], 1968), and an article translated into English as idem, “Creation,
Righteousness, and Salvation: ‘Creation Theology’ as the Broad Horizon of Biblical Theology,” in
Bernard W. Anderson (ed.), Creation in the Old Testament (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984),
pp. 102–17.
63
See especially Klaus Koch, “Gibt es ein Vergeltungsdogma im Alten Testament?,” Die Zeitschrift für
Theologie und Kirche 52 (1955), pp. 1–42. For an abridged translation of this article, see Klaus Koch,
“Is There a Doctrine of Retribution in the Old Testament?,” in James Crenshaw (ed.), trans. Thomas
H. Trapp, Theodicy in the Old Testament (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1983), pp. 57–87.
64
Koch, “Gibt es ein Vergeltungsdogma im Alten Testament?,” p. 5. The translation of Hebbamenedienst
as “midwifery service” is from Peter Hatton, “A Cautionary Tale: The Acts-Consequence ‘Construct’,”
JSOT 35.3 (2011), p. 376.
www.Ebook777.com
16 Introduction
seeing that the deed-consequence law functions properly. Murphy suggests that
“moderns might call this ‘poetic justice.’”65 While Koch’s observations concerning
deed and consequence parallel some statements in biblical wisdom regarding
retribution, the detection of an order of retribution divorced from direct divine
involvement seems foreign to the Israelite imagination: “There is no zone of
‘order’ that separated the Israelite from the Lord.”66 However, Koch’s theory was
to gain a following.
The work of Schmid furthers Koch’s findings by putting Israel’s wisdom
tradition into conversation with Egyptian wisdom, in particular, drawing parallels
between the Egyptian concept of ma’at and Hebrew ‫( צדקה‬righteousness) within
the deed-consequence understanding of reality. In Schmid’s work, “the notion
of [‫ ]צדקה‬is treated as a matter of order, of the right ordering of the world, which
intends shalom and eventuates in well-being when honored and in harm when
not honored.”67 Thus, righteousness is not merely a covenantal theme but rather
is rooted in creation. Schmid’s work betrays a reversal of Barth and (earlier) von
Rad’s biblical-theological paradigm: now creation, not salvation history, would
be seen to form the horizon of biblical theology.68 Under this new rubric for
biblical theology, wisdom would be seen as the international phenomenon that
Israel appropriates in order to decipher creation’s order. However, while Koch and
Schmid help to recover creation for OT theology, drawing attention to wisdom
especially to do so, they seem to portray Israel’s God deistically in the process. The
God of the strict deed-consequence model is like the divine clockmaker, setting
the world in motion and establishing its order, and then simply ensuring that
the gears keep turning. On the other hand, von Rad’s treatment of wisdom offers
a balance between the detection of order and God’s continuing involvement,
between faith in God’s involvement and faith in “the way the world works.” For
now, however, it is in order to consider where Ecclesiastes fits within the deed-
consequence framework of Koch and Schmid, and to consider a corrective to
this model.
Scholars advocating for the deed-consequence framework pay particularly
close attention to the book of Proverbs, with treatments of the other wisdom
books focusing on those books’ relation to the basic framework articulated in
Proverbs. If Proverbs illustrates the mechanical relationship between deeds and
their consequences, then books like Job and Ecclesiastes tell stories about wrinkles
65
Murphy, Tree of Life, p. 117.
66
Murphy, Tree of Life, p. 117.
67
68
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 17
in this basic framework. In other words, Job and Ecclesiastes represent a crisis
in biblical wisdom.69 If Ecclesiastes is primarily a reactionary tale that trumps
the ethical vision of earlier sages, then it can hardly offer much in the way of a
constructive and positive ethical vision. Its summons to enjoy labor is more a
sigh of resignation than (as it is for Luther) a kerygmatic call. However, the deed-
consequence model has faced challenges relatively recently. Craig Bartholomew
has pointed out that “literary and canonical readings of the Wisdom books are
casting new light on the doctrine of retribution in them and on their relationships
to each other.”70 Concerning the topic of retribution in Proverbs, Raymond van
Leeuwen has applied a literary-canonical approach, concluding that though
there are simple statements regarding deed and consequence in Proverbs, paying
attention to the canonical shape of the book as a whole shows that the final
concern in Proverbs is long-term character formation toward final blessing.71
Van Leeuwen’s understanding is less mechanical, in that it allows for exceptions
to the deed-consequence rule even within Proverbs and focuses on the final
direction toward which one is moving in ethical formation.72
Ecclesiastes
If van Leeuwen’s proposal regarding Proverbs is correct, then Ecclesiastes
(along with Job) is not so much a radical break with received wisdom as it is
a special inquiry into those exceptional moments when there is not a simple
correspondence between righteous deeds and righteous rewards (see, for
instance, Eccl. 8:14). Again, the literary-canonical approach is useful. As I have
intimated above and will explicate in Chapter 1, Ecclesiastes tells a story. Just
as one may not draw definitive conclusions about Proverbs as a whole from
isolated proverbial statements, so too one must account for narrative progress
in Ecclesiastes, in which, according to Bartholomew, there is an epistemological
transformation. On Bartholomew’s reading, what initially drives Qoheleth to
his ‫ הבל‬conclusions is an empirical epistemology that is not governed at first
by the “fear of the LORD” but rather is autonomously motivated. Yet, by the
end of his journey, Qoheleth admonishes the would-be sage to remember the
69
Craig Bartholomew, “A God for Life, and Not Just for Christmas! The Revelation of God in the
Old Testament Wisdom Literature,” in Paul Helm and Carl R. Trueman (eds), The Trustworthiness
of God: Perspectives on the Nature of Scripture (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 2002), p. 48.
70
Bartholomew, The Trustworthiness of God, p. 48.
71
Raymond van Leeuwen, “Wealth and Poverty: System and Contradiction in Proverbs,” Hebrew
Studies 33 (1992), pp. 25–36.
72
Bartholomew, “A God for Life,” pp. 49–50.
www.Ebook777.com
18 Introduction
Creator in the days of youth (Eccl. 12:1), and the epilogue exhorts one to fear
God and keep God’s commandments (Eccl. 12:14). Whereas Proverbs begins
with the “fear of the LORD,” it takes Qoheleth a lifetime of inquiry to arrive
at the same epistemological starting point. According to Bartholomew, there is
thus theological harmony between Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, particularly with
respect to the doctrine of creation.73
Bartholomew’s proposal that Ecclesiastes fits well within the theological
framework of the book of Proverbs bears ethical significance. In a chapter in
which Bartholomew puts the work of theological ethicist Oliver O’Donovan74
into conversation with biblical wisdom,75 Bartholomew suggests that, even
though its eschatology is not developed, in its detection of an order woven into
creation’s fabric, biblical wisdom anticipates O’Donovan’s notion of resurrection
being a reaffirmation of creation, with morality being a participation in the
creation order which the resurrection reaffirms.76 According to Bartholomew,
“Ecclesiastes is about knowing that order, and particularly about wrong ways to
try and get to know it.”77 Thus, Bartholomew appreciates O’Donovan’s placing
Ecclesiastes within an epistemological register.78 For O’Donovan, the ethical
import of Ecclesiastes lies in its placing an epistemological limit on humanity.79
There is only so far that empiricism may take one before the seeker after
knowledge turns to despair. Thus, Qoheleth’s is a story of realizing that one has
taken a wrongheaded approach to epistemology in order to arrive at the Creator-
remembering, God-fearing starting place of Proverbs, just in time to instruct
younger sages.
While Bartholomew and O’Donovan are helpful in noting the moral significance
that Qoheleth grants to the search for knowledge, it is necessary to move beyond
O’Donovan’s mere notating of the central role of the epistemological question for
73
Bartholomew, “A God for Life,” pp. 51–4.
74
The particular works of O’Donovan with which Bartholomew interacts are Oliver O’Donovan,
Resurrection and Moral Order: An Outline for Evangelical Ethics, 2nd edn (Leicester: Apollos
[Inter-Varsity Press], 1994); and idem, The Desire of the Nations: Rediscovering the Roots of Political
Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).
75
Bartholomew says, “In this chapter my main aim is to point out the ethical contribution of Wisdom
literature and to suggest that in all sorts of ways O’Donovan has a relatively unexplored ally in Old
Testament wisdom.” See Craig Bartholomew, “A Time for War, and a Time for Peace: Old Testament
Wisdom, Creation and O’Donovan’s Theological Ethics,” in Craig Bartholomew, Jonathan Chaplin,
Robert Song and Al Wolters (eds), A Royal Priesthood?: The Use of the Bible Ethically and Politically:
A Dialogue with Oliver O’Donovan (Carlisle, Cumbria: Paternoster Press, 2002), p. 91.
76
Bartholomew, “A Time for War, and a Time for Peace,” pp. 91–6; cf. O’Donovan, Resurrection and
Moral Order, p. 76.
77
Bartholomew, “A Time for War, and a Time for Peace,” p. 94.
78
Bartholomew, “A Time for War, and a Time for Peace,” p. 103.
79
O’Donovan, Resurrection and Moral Order, pp. 79–80.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 19
interpreting Ecclesiastes in order to arrive at more indicative ethical claims. I want

to suggest that one way to enhance their ethical treatment of Ecclesiastes is to
supplement their focus on the doctrine of creation with a more robust eschatological
understanding of Ecclesiastes. This move will require a renegotiation of some basic
assumptions about the topic of time in the book, which entails moving beyond the
conundrum of the relationship between wisdom and history.
O’Donovan and Bartholomew do grant eschatological significance to the
reflections on human deeds in biblical wisdom (see, for instance, Eccl. 12:14). Yet,
because of a basic assumption that there is less of a connection between God’s
“mighty deeds” and quotidian existence in biblical wisdom, there is not much of
a sense in the work of either author that God is doing genuinely new things in the
midst of the sages and their audiences. There may be a faint gesture toward the
eschaton, but there is not much said of God’s presence beyond God’s continuing
involvement in maintaining creation’s order. In other words, though they do
move beyond Koch and Schmid, they do not move far beyond simply ascribing
a more positive relationship between Ecclesiastes and Proverbs, and granting
epistemological significance to Ecclesiastes. Their emphasis on creation must be
joined by a complementary and theoretically elaborated eschatological emphasis.
Such a corrective will involve a different interpretation of Eccl. 3 in particular.
The basic notion of time in Ecclesiastes as presented in the work of O’Donovan
and Bartholomew renders it difficult to posit a positive ethical vision from
Eccl. 3. O’Donovan says, “Koheleth has no perception of a revealed meaning
in history; it is simply a series of contradictions and reversals, as the famous
passage on ‘time’ makes clear (3:1ff.).” The upshot of this perspective, according
to O’Donovan, is that “man’s wisdom does not afford him a total purchase on
the cosmos and its history; he can reach out towards apprehension only from
within.”80 On O’Donovan’s reading, this passage teaches epistemological humility
by shrouding God’s works in mystery. Its wisdom lies in its recognition of life’s
contradictions and its putting a halt on surety with regard to cosmological
and historical knowledge. Bartholomew similarly suggests with regard to this
passage that “epistemology is at stake once again.”81 According to Bartholomew,
who draws heavily on Paul Ricoeur,82 what Qoheleth lacks is access to the
metanarrative that would give meaning to the order he is trying to decipher.
80
O’Donovan, Resurrection and Moral Order, p. 80.
81
Craig Bartholomew, Ecclesiastes, Baker Commentary on the Old Testament Wisdom and Psalms
(Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009), p. 170.
82
See Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 3 vols., trans. Kathleen McLaughlin and David Pellauer
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984–88).
www.Ebook777.com
20 Introduction
Qoheleth, being the epistemological automaton he is, “ignores the linear view of
history that the OT opens up.”83 Because of this, Bartholomew suggests a more
canonical approach to time in the OT, in which “narrative holds the key.”84 He
quotes Robert Herrera, who says that “the doctrine of creation entailing linear
time opened up a vast horizon of novel events that took history beyond the
limits of the ancient chroniclers. Even Herodotus ... was imprisoned in a circle.”85
The problem with Qoheleth, on Bartholomew’s reading, is that he has put a stop
on the experience of novelty and is searching for an epistemological way out
of the cycle of monotony. Unfortunately, Qoheleth does not find the exit until
nearly the end of his journey.
William Brown basically echoes the sentiments of O’Donovan and
Bartholomew, while also exemplifying a crucial error in the reading of Eccl. 3:
Qoheleth is no idealist, optimistically calling forth a time of peace and celebration

that can erase the less desirable dimensions of human existence. Rather, the
sage calmly observes that for every course of action in one direction, there will
occur in due time an equal and opposite reaction. If the cosmos operates like
clockwork, impersonal and repetitive, then chronos is its pendulum, held aloft
by God.86
In his interpretation of Eccl. 3, Brown gives the sense of an unceasing

chronological progression with no seeming telos (indeed, he labels the section
“Chronology without History”)87 and no opportunity to experience anything new.
His error lies principally in carrying chronos (which the LXX uses to translate
‫ זמן‬in Eccl. 3:1) through the entire poem, when in fact, in the LXX, it is kairos
that translates the Hebrew Leitwort ‫עת‬. While chronos is not an unimportant
temporal concept into which to inquire with respect to Ecclesiastes, Eccl. 3 is
not the primary place in which one should make such an inquiry. O’Donovan,
Bartholomew, and Brown’s interpretive misstep lies in assuming a kind of
dialectic without historical progress in Ecclesiastes. Such a framework precludes
any consideration of God’s revelatory involvement in the contradictory realities
of Eccl. 3. If there is nothing new under the sun (Eccl. 1:9), then there is no reason
to expect God to do anything new in the mundane realities in which Qoheleth
83
Bartholomew, Ecclesiastes, p. 170.
84
85
Robert A. Herrera, Reason for Our Rhymes: An Inquiry into the Philosophy of History (Grand Rapids:
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2001), p. 13; quoted in Bartholomew, Ecclesiastes,
p. 171.
86
Brown, Ecclesiastes, p. 41.
87
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 21
finds himself working. However, there are two uses of ׁ‫( חדש‬new) in Ecclesiastes,
one in a statement introduced by a particle of negation (‫אין‬, in Eccl. 1:9), and the
other in a statement introduced by a particle of existence (ׁ‫יש‬, in Eccl. 1:10). On
my reading, Qoheleth admits the impossibility of humans doing anything new
“under the sun” (Eccl. 1:9), while simultaneously gesturing toward the genuinely
new in Eccl. 1:10. The rest of the book narrates a search for novelty, and, as I will
show in Chapters 3 and 4, Eccl. 3 is where Qoheleth indicates the experience of
novelty. It will be evident that an eschatological reading of Eccl. 3 offers a more
substantial ethical vision than that characterized simply by epistemological
humility.
In making a case for the necessity of reading Ecclesiastes within the doctrinal
foci of both creation and eschatology, I begin to open up a core move in this
book. The interpretations of Eccl. 3 that I have mentioned above do not grant
the poem any eschatological significance. Though Bartholomew comes close to
an eschatological reading in noting that Qoheleth sets the “stage for shalom,”88
Bartholomew’s continual emphasis on Qoheleth’s epistemological conundrum
makes the declaration of a “time for peace” little more than a gesture in his
reading. In Chapter 1, I suggest that the LXX’s translation of Eccl. 3 provides
further insight than O’Donovan, Bartholomew, and Brown allow. It is also
eschatologically significant. In Chapter 3, I will show how Luther’s interpretation
of Eccl. 3 is in line with the LXX and leads him to an articulation of his Stündelein
concept. In many ways, this book will culminate in that discussion, in that it
is in Luther’s eschatological reading of Ecclesiastes that I place special ethical
significance. Luther completes Bonaventure’s contemplative reading by moving
eschatological fulfillment to the present. While Bonaventure incorporates
Ecclesiastes into a broader eschatological-contemplative framework for biblical
wisdom, one that culminates in the beatific union expressed in Song of Songs,
Luther does not demand advancement to Song of Songs for the obtainment of
beatitude, but rather suggests that beatitude may even be experienced in the
everyday labor he finds described in Ecclesiastes.
In this section, I have broadly surveyed the state of research into OT ethics
in the fields of both biblical studies and theological ethics, showing that
thereÂ€ isÂ€ aÂ€ considerable lack in extended ethical treatments of Ecclesiastes. I
haveÂ€ also suggested, why Ecclesiastes has received little sustained attention,
evenÂ€ given the rise of interest in wisdom literature. Finally, I have proposed
thatÂ€ aÂ€ more eschatological reading of Ecclesiastes will help to trigger more
88
www.Ebook777.com
22 Introduction
ethicalÂ€insight from its pages, pointing toward the ways in which I will enlist
Luther especially to do so. While Bonaventure improves upon the epistemological
readings of O’Donovan and Bartholomew, Luther paves the way for new
ethical insights. One ethical topic that this turn will enhance is the theology of
work. Now, I move to consider the relevance of Ecclesiastes for contemporary
theologies of work.
Ecclesiastes and contemporary theologies of work
I have suggested above that a more concerted theological-ethical treatment of

Ecclesiastes will fill a gap in OT ethics. In this section, I will propose that one
discipline that will benefit from this move is the theology of work. A substantial
treatment of Ecclesiastes and its relation to the ethics of work will have a twofold
benefit for the theology of work. First, it will address a problem similar to that
which I have shown to be present in general in OT ethics, in which Ecclesiastes
serves a primarily illustrative function. Second, it will enhance the relationship
between the ethics of work and three doctrinal foci: protology, eschatology, and
christology. I now move to a brief consideration of the place of Ecclesiastes in
contemporary theologies of work.
As is the case in general studies of OT ethics, in contemporary theologies
of work Ecclesiastes possesses a primarily illustrative significance rather than
garnering more substantial treatment; that is, if it is considered at all. One
theology of work regarded as a standard in the field is emblematic of a general
tendency largely to ignore difficult books of the Bible, even when those books
relate directly to the chosen topic of inquiry. In his Work in the Spirit, Miroslav
Volf poses three problems involved in attempts at developing theologies of
work from summaries of biblical material. First, though the New Testament89
is “the key source for developing a Christian theology of work,” unfortunately, it
only occasionally addresses the phenomenon. The OT is more promising, but,
according to Volf, it is not useful for a particularly Christian theology of work
as it stands.90 Second, there is a deep historical divide between contemporary
work situations and the socioeconomic contexts represented in the Bible.91
Third, even when studies of biblical materials are presently applicable, “it is still
89
Henceforth, I will refer to the New Testament with the abbreviation “NT.”
90
Miroslav Volf, Work in the Spirit: Toward a Theology of Work (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 1991), p. 77.
91
Volf, Work in the Spirit, p. 77.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 23
not immediately obvious what significance should be ascribed to each statement

in relation to the others and hence, also, precisely how they should inform
Christian thinking and behavior. This information is provided by the theological
framework in which we place these statements.”92 Volf thus favors a deductive
rather than an inductive approach to incorporating biblical statements on work
into a theology of work.93
In Volf ’s justification for bypassing substantial engagement of Scripture in
favor of developing a theology of work from within systematic-theological loci
(particularly pneumatology),94 there inhere some problematic presuppositions
about the relation between the Bible and theology (and theological ethics). First,
underlying the notion that summarizing the content of the biblical witness would
be an appropriate modus operandi for speaking of the Bible and its relation to
work is an assumption that Scripture may be reducible to a unified logic that
one may then utilize in one’s own constructive work. Such an assumption fails
to allow the sharp edges of particular books of the Bible to confront one’s own
theological program. The second problem exacerbates the first in excusing one
from serious engagement with the bulk of biblical material on work: VolfÂ€betrays
a neo-Marcionite tendency in privileging the NT and assuming that one is
unable to read OT reflections on work christianly.95 To be fair, Volf does say, “To
integrate [OT reflections on work] into a Christian theology, we have to interpret
the Old Testament statements on human work in the light of the revelation of
God in Christ.”96 However, his general occlusion of substantial engagement
with the OTÂ€ witness renders this qualifying statement an excuse. The two
primary interpreters I am considering in this book would find this assumption
inconceivable, even with as contentious a book as Ecclesiastes.97
92
93
Volf, Work in the Spirit, pp. 78–9.
94
See Volf, Work in the Spirit, pp. 115–17. Darrell Cosden, who generally improves upon Volf ’s thesis,
nonetheless takes a similar course to Volf, only instead placing work within the doctrinal register of
eschatology rather than pneumatology. See Darrell Cosden, A Theology of Work: Work and the New
Creation (Carlisle, Cumbria: Paternoster Press, 2004).
95
This critique of Volf is in line with Brock’s critique of the accounts of the Bible-and-ethics
relationship in Frank Matera, Richard Hays, and John Howard Yoder, in Singing the Ethos of God.
Brock says, “We also get the distinct impression that these analyses disproportionately favor the
New Testament, with the implication that Christians, in their actual use of the Bible, should look
for moral guidance to the New Testament, which, in Marcionite fashion, they treat de facto as more
important and accessible to Christian ethical inquiry,” p. 50.
96
97
Volf does refer to Ecclesiastes twice in his book, but they are no more than passing references: in
the first place, he quotes part of Eccl. 4:4 in order to illustrate the moral aspect in the motivation
for work, which garners God’s judgment (Work in the Spirit, pp. 120–1); and in the second place, he
refers to Eccl. 6:19 (in another partial reference) in relation to a brief discussion of “job satisfaction”
(Work in the Spirit, p. 159).
www.Ebook777.com
24 Introduction
Finally, even given all the obvious difficulties of reading ancient texts
from within modern contexts, the inability of a Christian interpreter to read
Scripture in one’s own context and still hear the Word of God is more an
indictment of the reader than an indication of the practical uselessness of an
ancient text. To read the Bible as Christian Scripture rather than as simply an
ancient text is to listen together with the saints for God’s address in the present.
As will be evident in my treatment of Bonaventure and Luther, readers of past
generations, though likewise removed from the historical context of Scripture,
have shown an ability to read Scripture in exegetically nuanced ways, yet still
to hear a “fitting word” for their own time. Indeed, as Ellen Davis and Richard
Hays point out in regard to “the church’s great interpreters of Scripture,” “for
them, the interpretation of the Bible [is] a seamlessly integrated theological
activity that [speaks] directly to the needs of the church.”98 Somehow, Volf
finds ways to read Marx as relevant for a contemporary theology of work,
but excuses himself from having a direct and sustained confrontation with
Scripture’s explicit reflections on work in the formation of his own theology
of work.
If Volf ’s approach leads to a drastic minimization of the relevance of
Ecclesiastes (and other OT books) for the theology of work, then the “liturgical
reasoning” in Esther D. Reed’s Work, for God’s Sake leads to a complete passing
over of Qoheleth’s reflections on work.99 Though the Holy Scripture is anÂ€integral
part of the basic Christian liturgical format that Reed follows,100 the Revised
Common Lectionary provides little from Ecclesiastes on which to reflect with
regard to work. Though several traditions annually reflect on Qoheleth’s “catalog
of times” on New Year’s Day, the Sunday lectionary itself contains only one
reference to Ecclesiastes, one that offers little in the way of exposing Qoheleth’s
positive claims about work. In Year C, Proper 13, there is an option (as the first
reading in Track 2) to read Eccl. 1:2, 12-14; 2:18-23, which in this instance serves
to illustrate the parable of the rich fool, which is encountered in theÂ€day’s gospel
lesson (Lk. 12:13-31).101 If one depends primarily on the Sunday lectionary for
exposure to Qoheleth’s work ethic, then one will only come into contact with
98
Ellen F. Davis and Richard B. Hays (eds), The Art of Reading Scripture (Grand Rapids: William B.
Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2003), p. xv.
99
See Esther D. Reed, Work, for God’s Sake: Christian Ethics in the Workplace (London: Darton,
Longman and Todd Ltd., 2010).
100
See Reed, Work, for God’s Sake, pp. 37–57.
101
See Church of England, Revised Common Lectionary in NRSV: Sundays and Festivals: Principal
Service Lectionary of the Church of England, Pew Edition (London: Mowbray, 1998), pp. 671–5.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 25
Qoheleth’s self-indictment and not his statements on the value of work.102

Therefore, though Reed otherwise refers to the Torah and the Prophets, the
liturgical reasoning that guides her approach renders Ecclesiastes irrelevant for
her theological-ethical reflections on work.
While Volf ’s brief depiction of the problems of developing a theology of work
from summaries of biblical teaching betrays an alarming tendency largely to
ignore the OT in general (and thus Ecclesiastes in particular), and while Reed’s
liturgical reasoning finds no place for Ecclesiastes in her theological-ethical
account of work, there are considerations of Ecclesiastes in some contemporary
theologies of work. However, the treatments of Ecclesiastes are hardly sustained;
and often, the book is used simply to illustrate a particular theme in one’s
configuration of a theology of work. For instance, in his reader on work, Working:
Its Meaning and Its Limits, Gilbert Meilaender includes Eccl. 3:1-9 as a passage
that partly illustrates the “The Limits of Work,” under the subheading “Rhythms
of Life.”103 David Jensen helpfully captures the tension in Qoheleth’s perspective
on work, yet, like Whybray, he is limited by the broader scope of his project. Thus,
he is only able to spend two pages on the book.104 Though both Meilaender and
Jensen improve upon the neo-Marcionism of Volf and the liturgical reasoning of
Reed by turning to Ecclesiastes for different yet fruitful ends, there is still a gap in
substantial treatments of its perspective on work for theological ethics. I aim to
help in filling this gap not only by simply taking a sustained look at Ecclesiastes,
but also by proposing that the perspective of Ecclesiastes may sharpen some of
the doctrinal themes that dominate discussions on work in theological ethics.
These themes are protology, eschatology, and christology. I will show how
reading Ecclesiastes through the lenses of Bonaventure and Luther will give rise
to reflections on work within these doctrinal foci. I now move to give reasons for
my selection of Bonaventure and Luther in particular as helpful interlocutors.
102
Thus, the Revised Common Lectionary mirrors Christopher Wright’s move, in which Ecclesiastes
illustrates the effect of the Fall on work (Living as the People of God, p. 72). In like fashion, in his
more popular-level book on work, Darrell Cosden quotes Eccl. 2:17-19, 22-23 in the epigraph to
his chapter entitled “Why Can’t I Do God’s Work Too?” Tellingly, he does not quote the chorus
immediately following Eccl. 2:22-23. Further, it is interesting to note that Cosden quotes Rev. 21:5 in
the epigraph to the following chapter, entitled “What on Earth Will Your Work Be Doing in Heaven?”
See Darrell Cosden, The Heavenly Good of Earthly Work (Milton Keynes: Paternoster, and Peabody,
MA: Hendrickson, 2006), pp. 13, 31. In the final chapter of this book, I will show that Ecclesiastes
and Revelation do not depict opposing perspectives on work, but rather share an emphasis on the
newness God brings.
103
Gilbert C. Meilaender (ed.), Working: Its Meaning and Its Limits (Notre Dame: University of Notre
Dame Press, 2000), pp. xii, 129.
104
David H. Jensen, Responsive Labor: A Theology of Work (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press,
2006), pp. 26–7.
www.Ebook777.com
26 Introduction
Why St Bonaventure and Martin Luther?
In this section, I will give an account for my selection of Bonaventure and Luther
at the outset, on both historical-critical and historical-theological grounds. First,
however, it will be helpful to consider Qoheleth’s words on both novelty and
nostalgia in order to gain a perspective that is instructive for one encountering
precritical commentaries after the critical moment.
Qoheleth on novelty and nostalgia

Ecclesiastes both denies novelty (at least with respect to human works) and warns
against nostalgia. This perspective from which to view the present in relation to
the past and the future, especially considered theologically, is an important one.
In its declaration that there is nothing new “under the sun” (Eccl. 1:9) and its
warning concerning the multiplication of books (Eccl. 12:12), Ecclesiastes would
seem to indict the modern academic obsession with novelty, which carries with
it the underlying assumption that chronological progress necessarily implies
interpretive progress. Qoheleth’s irony would not be dissimilar to that of Paul
J. Griffiths in his own assessment of the modern academy: “Where would the
academy be without its groundbreakingly transgressive works, hailed with the
talisman-like mantra of all university press jacket copy, ‘the new contribution
of this work is ...’?”105 Indeed, Bonaventure reads Ecclesiastes at least in part
as a declaration and reprimand of curiosity,106 that vice which circumvents
contemplative rest in its constant craving for something new.107 In his exegesis of
both Eccl. 1:9 and Eccl. 12:12, Bonaventure seems to apply these implicit warnings
against curiosity to the struggles concerning certain appropriations of Aristotle
at the University of Paris by employing Acts 17, in which the “Athenians” serve
as curiosi par excellence, to explain Ecclesiastes.108 Luther, too, warns against
curiosity, drawing a sharp distinction between human works “under the sun,”
which bring about nothing new, and divine works “above the sun,” the only
genuine source of novelty.109 If Luther is correct, then whatever truly innovative
insight is uncovered in a university library, including insights into the nature of
105
Paul J. Griffiths, Intellectual Appetite: A Theological Grammar (Washington, DC: The Catholic
University of America Press, 2009), p. 209.
106
WSB VII:118.
107
Paul J. Griffiths, “The Vice of Curiosity,” Pro Ecclesia XV.1 (2006), p. 53.
108
WSB VII:112, 425.
109
LW 15:20–1.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 27
Ecclesiastes, must be a gift from God bestowed in God’s good timing. As will
be evident in my treatment of time in Chapter 3, for Luther, this reality is true
whether the human recipient acknowledges God’s involvement or not.110
While the theological judgments of Bonaventure and Luther on novelty
challenge assumptions about academic progress, it is important also not to
complain, “Why were the former days better than these?” (Eccl. 7:10). There
is no returning to medieval Paris or early modern Wittenberg, so it is foolish
to wish to do so. Nostalgic speech is foolish speech because it ultimately denies
God’s continuing involvement in the world. The basic point of the passage in
which Qoheleth inserts this warning against nostalgia is twofold: God is at
work in the world, and yet the work of God is beyond human comprehension
(Eccl. 7:13-14; cf. 11:5). Resting in this knowledge rather than trying to grasp
the ungraspable leaves open the possibility of surprise, which will oftentimes
bring about the recognition of God’s involvement in some event after the fact.
For example, though at the time of his brothers’ betrayal, Joseph did not realize
it, God intended to work the betrayal for the good of Jacob and his descendants
(Gen. 50:19-21). In a similar vein, if God spoke through the mouth of Balaam’s
ass (Num. 22:28), then God may also speak through the most self-aggrandizing
of scholars.111 Therefore, it is wholly appropriate to recognize, appreciate, and
appropriate the critical insights of those scholars who have advanced the field of
research into Ecclesiastes.
How is the perspective of Qoheleth on novelty and nostalgia, then, instructive
for my reading of Bonaventure and Luther in light of the genuine insights of more
contemporary studies on Ecclesiastes? In Chapter 3, I will characterize Luther’s
ethos with respect to Ecclesiastes along the lines of a media via between works-
righteousness and antinomianism (in the ecclesia), between avarice and sloth (in
the oeconomia), and between ambition and anarchy (in the politia). Here, I want
to suggest a media via between obsessing over novelty and being nostalgic. On
the one hand, there really is “nothing new” in thoughts on Ecclesiastes, only more
critical and less overtly theological reiterations of old tensions and arguments.
On the other hand, even between Bonaventure and Luther, one detects
advancements in the study of the Hebrew language that sharpen the exegesis of
Ecclesiastes.112 Though Luther acknowledges that humans are dependent upon
God for that which is genuinely new, he nonetheless avails himself of the new
110
LW 15:49–50.
111
See WSB VII:86–7.
112
www.Ebook777.com
28 Introduction
linguistic work of Reuchlin and Erasmus in order to advance his understanding

of Scripture.113 Yet, it is precisely in his theological judgments about progress that
he is instructive regarding novelty and nostalgia. The theological point is that the
God who gives insight even to atheistic biblical commentators is the same God
who moves among Joseph and his brothers, speaks through Balaam’s ass, teaches
a sage in Hellenistic Jerusalem, grants understanding to a ScholasticÂ€theologian
in medieval Paris, and inspires a preacher-lecturer in early modern Wittenberg.
There is no adding to or taking from the work of this God (Eccl. 3:14-15), who
renders beautiful each new gift of life in every age (Eccl. 3:2, 11). Insofar as
commentators offer timely remarks on the work of the ancient God who yet
does new things, it is possible to translate their remarks into other ages in fresh
ways. What is refreshing, though, about Bonaventure and Luther is that both of
them are explicit in their theological judgments as well as being unhesitant in
reading the book ethically for their own ages. Yet, they nonetheless anticipate
the modern tensions, to which I move now to consider briefly.
Historical-critical reasons
Some modern commentators cannot resist the temptation ironically to ask
in their introductions to Ecclesiastes why there is yet another book about the
book that says, disparagingly, that there is no end to the making of books.114
More modest interpreters may remark in answer to this ironic question that
Ecclesiastes is something of an inexhaustible source for reflection in every
age.115 Bolder commentators propose “rereadings” of Ecclesiastes.116 In this book,
I am working under the assumption that the basic interpretive strands that are
present in current critical research on Ecclesiastes reiterate precritical moves,
even given that there are almost as many variations on these strands as there
are commentaries on the book. I have already indicated these tensions in the
discussion on the formal complexity of Ecclesiastes above. Regarding formal
complexity, I indicated that the difficulty lies in determining whether certain
113
Heiko A. Oberman, Luther: Man Between God and the Devil, trans. Eileen Walliser-Schwarzbart
(New York: Doubleday, 1992), pp. 123, 171.
114
See, for instance, Brown, Ecclesiastes, p. vii; and Treier, Proverbs & Ecclesiastes, p. xix.
115
For instance, Brown says, “Most appropriate, perhaps, is a dialogical model of commentary reflection
that encourages forthright, rather than covert, negotiation between the world of the ancient text and
that of the commentator in the shared quest to understand human existence and divine providence,
the sage’s expressed aims.... Ecclesiastes, in short, may very well pave the way for a truly postmodern
commentary, one that eschews any effort to wrest authoritative coherence from its self-consuming
content” (Ecclesiastes, p. viii).
116
See, for instance, Fox, A Time to Tear Down; and Tamez, When the Horizons Close.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 29
forms in Ecclesiastes are commendatory or condemnatory, wisdom sayings or

ironic gestures. Yet, I also indicated the relationship between formal judgments
and theological ones, showing the tensions between Bonaventure and Luther to
be illustrative of the point. While Bonaventure and Luther show that the tension
indicates a basic problem with how to handle God’s good creation, in critical
treatments, there is a question as to whether Qoheleth essentially is a pessimist,117
a preacher of joy,118 or some combination of both.119 The overall judgments one
makes about Ecclesiastes reflect the overall theological outlook of the reader. OT
scholar James Crenshaw admits: “For many years I have been fascinated with
Qohelet, perhaps because he makes my own skepticism appear solidly biblical.”120
Ecclesiastes, then, defies hermeneutical neutrality. The basic interpretive threads
in critical research—whether advocating an essentially positive or negative
outlook or some reasonable balance between the two—reflect the basic threads
that have weaved throughout the reception history of Ecclesiastes. In my
estimation, however, the theological motivations of Bonaventure and Luther,
which lead to conflicting interpretations, are more significant for contemporary
theological ethics because both readers are unable to divorce exegesis from
ethics. It is necessary, then, to introduce the theological-ethical motivation for
choosing these particular interpreters.
Historical-theological reasons
Insofar as Bonaventure and Luther take their place within the communio
sanctorum, the temporal gap between each theologian, and that between both
figures and the contemporary Church, should not be an obstacle for Christian
ethical interpretation of Ecclesiastes. Yet, the question regarding why I have
chosen these particular members of the communion of saints rather than
others is nonetheless worthy of consideration here. There are two primary
theological motivations for my selection of these two particular figures. First,
117
See, for instance, William H. U. Anderson, Qoheleth and Its Pessimistic Theology: Hermeneutical
Struggles in Wisdom Literature, Mellen Biblical Press Series 54 (Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen
Press, 1997).
118
See, for instance, R. Norman Whybray, “Qoheleth, Preacher of Joy,” JSOT 23 (1982), pp. 87–98.
119
Brown draws an appropriate analogy from the field of music to indicate the problem with the
polarizing tendencies in Ecclesiastes scholarship regarding Qoheleth’s disposition: “Arguing over
whether Ecclesiastes is either optimistic or pessimistic is sort of like trying to determine whether
Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring is happy or sad. Such profound works cannot be shackled to simple
categories” (Ecclesiastes, p. 10).
120
James Crenshaw, Ecclesiastes: A Commentary, Old Testament Library (Philadelphia: The Westminster
Press, 1987), p. 53.
www.Ebook777.com
30 Introduction
both assume pivotal places in the reception history of Ecclesiastes among

Christian interpreters. Second, these places, which are polarities on the surface
at least, are representative of significantly divergent theological imaginations. In
other words, Luther’s general motivation for eschewing Bonaventure’s mystical
theology is particularly applied in his exegesis of Ecclesiastes. Yet, I aim to show in
the course of this book that a synthesis of both interpretations is possible for the
consideration of the ethics of work one may locate in Ecclesiastes. In sum, I have
chosen to read Ecclesiastes with St Bonaventure because he both exemplifies a
nuanced contemptus mundi approach to Ecclesiastes and is the author of the most
significant medieval commentary on the book.121 I have chosen Luther not only
because in his reading of Ecclesiastes he pushes one fully to embrace economic-
political existence, but also because, in so doing, he is largely responsible for
reorienting the way people read the book.122 Thus, there is in the commentaries
of Bonaventure and Luther both fruitful unity and divergence, both of which
are relevant for theology today. Some treatments of the reception history among
Christian readers of Ecclesiastes recognize the significance of both Bonaventure
and Luther along the lines established above but tend to polarize their readings
within the register of the doctrine of creation: Luther recovers the doctrine of
creation, while the contemptus mundi tradition eschews it. This overly simplistic
reading of the distinction between Bonaventure and Luther is worth confronting
here.
Contemptus mundi and the enjoyment of creatures

Eric Christianson suggests that Bonaventure offers the most nuanced version of
the contemptus mundi reading of Ecclesiastes.123 Bonaventure clearly says that
“the purpose of [Ecclesiastes] is contempt of the world (contemptus mundi).”124
I will show in my treatment of Bonaventure that his take on contemptus mundi
is rooted in his metaphysics of emanation, exemplarity, and consummation.
creation, for Bonaventure, has iconic significance, inviting contemplation of
the triune God through the vestiges of the Trinity that God has made. True
contempt of the world is not a hatred for creation in itself, as such hatred
would defy creation’s iconic significance. Rather, true and pious contempt for
the world occurs when one loves the Maker of creation in such a way, that, by
121
122
123
Eric S. Christianson, Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2007), p. 103.
124
WSB VII:77; QuarEd VI:6.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 31
comparison, one’s love for creation looks like hatred.125 The perceptual problem
in Ecclesiastes lies ultimately in failing to detect the proper significance of the
creaturely “words” that speak of God.126 The vice of curiosity takes hold and
corrupts both the pursuit of knowledge and the cultivation of skill.127 This is
the sin that Bonaventure’s Solomon declares to have committed and for which
he repents. In engaging in this act of penance, Solomon is preparing himself
for the beatific union that his Song describes. Therefore, Ecclesiastes is the
purgative step in the contemplative journey one traces through biblical wisdom.
In its depiction of creation’s iconic significance and of curiosity’s corrupting
influence, Ecclesiastes invites one to recognize one’s own perceptual sins and
to reorient one’s self contemplatively. While Bonaventure improves upon the
epistemological readings of Bartholomew and O’Donovan by articulating just
how vicious the wrongheaded pursuit of wisdom can become, he is hesitant to
affirm the appropriate handling of creation. In other words, though he offers a
contemplative account that seeks the restoration of the sense of sight, he is less
inclined to offer a similar account with respect to the sense of touch.128 Here is
the main point of departure for Luther.
Luther, unlike Bonaventure, is unhesitant to activate all his senses. It is
reasonable to assume that Bonaventure is at least partially in view when Luther
refers to the interpretation of the “sophists” in his own lectures on Ecclesiastes,129
with which he breaks. Some scholars narrate Luther’s break with the preceding
interpretive tradition along the lines of a recovery of the doctrine of creation.
For instance, Bartholomew suggests that Luther and the other Reformation-era
interpreters bring to Ecclesiastes a “strong theological recovery of the doctrine
of creation,”130 which challenges the contemptus mundi tradition of Ecclesiastes
interpretation that precedes him, and would forever change the way the Church
reads the book. While Luther certainly does reorient the interpretation of
Ecclesiastes, I contend that he does not “reinvent the wheel” by restoring the
doctrine of creation to the reading of Ecclesiastes. One of the contributions of
this book is to show how accounts suggesting that Luther heroically recovers
125
WSB VII:77–9.
126
WSB VII:115.
127
WSB VII:118.
128
Suzannah Biernoff notes how sight, in the medieval imagination, is both a tool for knowledge
acquisition and a locus of carnal desire. See Suzannah Biernoff, Sight and Embodiment in the Middle
Ages: Ocular Desires (New York: Palgrave, 2002), p. 17.
129
See, for instance, LW 15:20–1.
130
Bartholomew, Ecclesiastes, p. 33. Corresponding to this recovery, according to Bartholomew, is a
“stress on the vocation of all believers in all spheres of life.” While I do not think that Luther recovers
the doctrine of creation, I do agree with Bartholomew’s point about vocation.
www.Ebook777.com
32 Introduction
creation theology for Ecclesiastes interpretation arise from a failure to detect

the finer nuances in earlier contemptus mundi readings of Ecclesiastes.
Though Bartholomew mentions Bonaventure’s wedding ring analogy,131 which
I will examine in more detail in Chapter 2, Bartholomew does not consider
what this analogy does for Bonaventure’s doctrine of creation. I suggest that the
most significant point of departure in Luther’s reading of Ecclesiastes is not in
his positive valuation of creation as such, but rather in his positive valuation of
economic-political existence, rooted in his doctrine of vocation. Put in classical
terms, Luther refuses to subordinate the active life to the contemplative life but
rather interprets the two lives “in parallel.” While there are significant points of
similarity in the overall theological projects of Bonaventure and Luther, it is the
points of departure between the two that rise to the surface in a comparison of
their commentaries on Ecclesiastes. In order to be ready to detect when these
theological differences arise, it will be helpful now to show broadly and briefly
where Bonaventure and Luther meet and where they depart.
Points of theological convergence and divergence

In the epigraph to his chapter entitled “Luther and the Via Moderna: The
Philosophical Backdrop of the Reformation Breakthrough,” Heiko Oberman
inserts the following quotation from Luther’s Table Talk: “Bonaventura inter
scholasticos doctores optimus est (Bonaventure is the best of the Scholastic
doctors).”132 Though, as I will point out below, Luther’s appraisal of Bonaventure
does not imply that Luther is without serious reservations regarding the Seraphic
Doctor, it is worth noting in brief those features of Bonaventure’s thought that
Luther does find praiseworthy. Here, I shall focus mainly on the Augustinian
resonance between the two theologians, their similar postures toward
Aristotelianism, and their preference for thinking of God in personal rather
than ontological categories. Beginning with the Augustinian resonance, it will be
evident in Chapters 2 and 3 that both Bonaventure and Luther depend heavily on
Augustine in particular aspects of their exegesis. For instance, Bonaventure draws
on Augustine’s treatment of curiosity, though he appropriates it significantly for
his own time. Luther, as I shall show in Chapter 3, reads Ecclesiastes through
Augustine’s Confessions, as well as employing Augustine’s distinction between
131
132
WAT 1:330 (no. 683), quoted in Heiko Oberman, The Two Reformations: The Journey from the Last
Days to the New World, ed. Donald Weinstein (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), p. 21. See
also Heiko Oberman, “Luther and the Via Moderna: The Philosophical Backdrop of the Reformation
Breakthrough,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 54 (2003), p. 641.
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 33
usus and fruitio in De Doctrina Christiana, yet, like Bonaventure, appropriating

the Augustinian theme significantly for his own purposes. Bonaventure and
Luther not only appropriate Augustine’s work in their commentaries on
Ecclesiastes, but also share a more basic Augustinian sensitivity. Put simply, both
Bonaventure and Luther affirm the inability of the natural person to escape the
condition of being unable not to sin, as well as the complementary affirmation
of the necessity of God’s grace and acceptance before being able not to sin. In
fact, George Tavard has suggested that the justification theories of Bonaventure
and Luther are compatible, in that both speak to the total need for grace and
remission before having any ability to be contrite or to will not to sin.133
Not only do both Bonaventure and Luther place limits on the abilities of the
human will in matters of justification, but they also delimit reason. Nowhere is
the delimitation of reason in both figures more evident than in their estimations
of Aristotle and Aristotelianism. It is important, however, to declare at the
outset that it is a mistake to assume that either of them desire to reject Aristotle
wholesale. Both recognize Aristotle’s abilities as a natural philosopher. In fact, both
Bonaventure and Luther read Ecclesiastes in part as a vindication of the study
of physics.134 Aristotle also broadly instructs both Bonaventure and Luther in
providing them a framework for narrating causality.135 The Aristotelian problem,
then, occurs when one moves from empirical investigation to metaphysical
speculation. Unlike Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure ends his academic
relationship with Aristotle at natural investigations, not believing that Aristotle
was competent enough to be a proper metaphysician.136 Though Bonaventure
does substitute Neoplatonic metaphysics for Aristotelian metaphysics (a move, as
I shall show below, that gives Luther reason for pause), he does anticipate Luther
by placing a primary emphasis on divine revelation, paying special attention to
the theology of the Word.137 This point brings the current discussion to the final
point of resonance for consideration here.
Bonaventure’s emphasis on the Word moves him to focus his attention on
the personal God of the covenant rather than God simply as “Being.” This
move, according to Oberman, is significant for Luther.138 Bonaventure eschews
133
George H. Tavard, From Bonaventure to the Reformers (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press,
2005), pp. 64–9, 79–81.
134
See, for instance, WSB VII:100 and LW 15:9.
135
See, for instance, WSB VII:75–6; and Luther’s treatment of Ps. 127 in WA 40/3: 202–69.
136
Charles Carpenter, Theology as the Road to Holiness in St. Bonaventure (New York: Paulist Press,
1999), p. 62.
137
Ilia Delio, O. S. F., Simply Bonaventure: An Introduction to His Life, Thought, and Writings (Hyde Park,
NY: New City Press, 2001), p. 47.
138
Oberman, The Two Reformations, pp. 26–7, 36–7, 40–1.
www.Ebook777.com
34 Introduction
Thomas’s Aristotelian tendencies to delve into ontology in his articulation of

theology proper. Instead, he focuses on what has been revealed about God.
Luther would add the phrase, “in Christ,” to the phrase, “what has been revealed,”
yet he is nonetheless indebted to Bonaventure (whose emphasis on revelation is
mediated to Luther through the nominalists, particularly Duns Scotus) in his
preference for revelation over speculation.139 Though Luther is critical of Francis
and Franciscans for a myriad of reasons,140 in terms of thinking of a God who
is not merely “pure Being,” but a God who is for us, Luther finds a likeminded
partner in Bonaventure. However, though Bonaventure shares similar sensibilities
with Luther, particularly in being an Augustinian who is reserved with respect
to Aristotelianism but sure of the significance of revelation for theology, there
is one aspect of Bonaventure’s Augustinianism that Luther finds particularly
frustrating, namely, his Neoplatonic mysticism.
While Luther prefers Bonaventure to the other Scholastic theologians, he is
not without his reservations. It is worth quoting from another section of Luther’s
Table Talk at length, because the aspects of Bonaventure’s theology that frustrate
Luther most are precisely those that inform Bonaventure’s contemplative
approach to Ecclesiastes, from which Luther departs:
The speculative learning of the theologians is altogether worthless. I have

read Bonaventure on this, and he almost drove me mad because I desired to
experience the union of God with my soul (about which he babbles) through a
union of intellect and will. Such theologians are nothing but fanatics. This is the
true speculative theology (and it’s practical too): Believe in Christ and do what
you ought. Likewise, the mystical theology of Dionysius is nothing but trumpery,
and Plato prattles that everything is non-being and everything is being, and he
leaves it at that. This is what mystical theology declares: Abandon your intellect
and senses and rise up above being and non-being.141
Though Bonaventure is not as speculative a theologian as Thomas, he is speculative

enough to incite Luther to insult him. In particular, Bonaventure operates within
a Neoplatonic, Pseudo-Dionysian metaphysic,142 joined with a monastic ideal,
which simultaneously values creation and problematizes humanity’s handling of
139
Oberman, The Two Reformations, pp. 26, 30.
140
See Tavard, From Bonaventure to Luther, pp. 78–9.
141
LW 54:112. For more insight into Luther’s problem with mysticism, see Oberman’s article “Simul
Gemitus et Raptus: Luther and Mysticism,” in Heiko Oberman (ed.), The Dawn of the Reformation:
Essays in Late Medieval and Early Reformation Thought (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1992), pp. 126–54.
142
Indeed, “Blessed Dionysius” makes an appearance on the first page of Bonaventure’s introduction to
his Ecclesiastes commentary, particularly in a reference from De divinis nominibus (WSB VII:65).
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 35
it. Though Bonaventure’s mystical theology reaches its zenith in the Itinerarium
Mentis in Deum,143 to which Luther alludes in the quotation above, I will suggest
that the mystical vision that Bonaventure articulates in the Itinerarium is in germ
in the Commentary on Ecclesiastes. Within this mystical vision, Ecclesiastes is
only able to prepare one for the eschatological union with God. Luther, however,
expects to meet Christ precisely in the activities Ecclesiastes describes.
In this work, I want to suggest that, in spite of these contradictions, the proposals
of Bonaventure and Luther for Ecclesiastes are not completely incompatible.
I admit here a preference for Luther’s reading of Ecclesiastes, which I intend to
justify in due course. Yet, the relation of Luther’s commentary to Bonaventure’s is
not only corrective, but also complementary. Read in concert with one another,
the interpretations of Bonaventure and Luther, I think, are significant for how
one might think of the cultivation of knowledge and skill for work on the one
hand, and of the eschatological significance of work on the other. Below, I offer a
roadmap for how I intend to arrive at this final suggestion.
Locating an ethic of work in Ecclesiastes:

The direction of this book
Thus far, in this introduction, I have made a case for a sustained theological-
ethical look at Ecclesiastes, showing the discipline of the theology of work to be
one area that would benefit from more attention being paid to Ecclesiastes. I have
also suggested that the commentaries of St Bonaventure and Martin Luther on
Ecclesiastes will assist in locating a theological-ethical vision of work in the book.
I now conclude the introduction by showing how I intend to fulfill that which I
have promised to do above, by summarizing the content of this book’s chapters.
In Chapter 1, I draw attention to six topics in Ecclesiastes that are pertinent for
a theological-ethical exploration of the book. These topics are: the relationship
between Qoheleth and the figure of Solomon; the Leitwort ‫( הבל‬traditionally
rendered in English as “vanity”); perception and epistemology; cult, economy,
and politics; time; and the so-called carpe diem passages in Ecclesiastes. At the
conclusion of Chapter 1, I propose that St Bonaventure and Martin Luther,
whose commentaries on Ecclesiastes I consider in Chapters 2 and 3, provide
critical insights into these themes.
143
See WSB II.
www.Ebook777.com
36 Introduction
The chapters on Bonaventure and Luther form the nucleus of this book. In
Chapter 2, I enlist Bonaventure for assistance in answering questions regarding
the significance of the figure of Solomon for understanding the persona
Qoheleth, the meaning of ‫הבל‬, and the ethical import of the themes of perception
and epistemology in Ecclesiastes. I show how Bonaventure’s detection of the
multivalency of the term ‫( הבל‬translated as “vanitas” in the Vulgate), an insight
he learns from Hugh of St Victor, stems from his nuanced version of contemptus
mundi, which is rooted in his metaphysics of emanation, exemplarity, and
consummation. Bonaventure’s interpretation of vanitas allows him to locate
in Ecclesiastes both a positive valuation of creation, particularly its iconic and
contemplative significance, and a negative valuation of humanity’s perception of
creation. I will propose that the Seraphic Doctor places the theme of perception
within a moral register by narrating a perceptual fall from contemplation to
curiosity, the principal vice of which the author is repenting in Ecclesiastes.
The character of Solomon in Ecclesiastes, then, is significant for Bonaventure, as
he is for patristic readers of Ecclesiastes, in that he models the purgative step in
the contemplative journey. Bonaventure’s Solomon is not the praiseworthy king
of the first chapters of 2 Chronicles, but the fallen king who has pursued foreign
gods and used his power for his own personal gain. Though Ecclesiastes contains
an implicit invitation to contemplate creation’s iconic significance, its primary
place in the contemplative journey is as a model for repentance.
In Chapter 3, it will be evident that the figure of Solomon has a different
kind of significance for Luther than it does for Bonaventure. Rather than serving
as a model for penance, Luther’s Solomon preaches to the oeconomia and the
politia as the singularly wise head of household and political administrator par
excellence. I will show how reading Ecclesiastes through both the Confessions of
St Augustine and Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount enables Luther to interpret the
book as Solomon’s gospel for everyday life. Luther’s doctrine of the drei Stände
provides another interpretive tool, helping Luther to make sense of the density
of economic and political language and its relation to the minimal use of cultic
language in the book. Informing Luther’s account of economic and political
life is an eschatological vision of quotidian existence, exemplified in his use of
the hora (Stündelein) concept to explain Eccl. 3 (along with his deployment of
Augustine’s usus/fruitio distinction). For Luther, when God’s hora interrupts and
fills the activity of labor, one already experiences the joys of Paradise. In other
words, one need not escape “secular” existence and flee to the monastery in order
to begin one’s ascent to God. In fact, one need not make an ascent at all. God
www.Ebook777.com
Introduction 37
comes to meet the laborer with some new and unexpected work in God’s own
time. Nowhere is the admonition to joy more explicit than in the so-called carpe
diem passages, the final topic of consideration in Chapter 3. Luther appropriates
Augustine’s usus/fruitio distinction significantly in order to explicate Solomon’s
chorus. I will show that in this specific appropriation of Augustine, Luther elides
any temporal gap between use and enjoyment, moving eschatological enjoyment
into what Dietrich Bonhoeffer calls the “middle.”144
In the fourth and final chapter, I will draw together the readings of Bonaventure
and Luther for the sake of proposing an ethic of work within Qoheleth’s thought
world. First, I will offer a christological reading of Eccl. 1:4-11 that I believe will
link Bonaventure’s overall interpretation to Luther’s. In sum, I will suggest that
Christ is the eternal Word who invites a contemplation in work that operates
side by side with work’s activity. I will show that Luther’s reading of Ecclesiastes
complements the invitation to the contemplation of the Word by encouraging
the discovery of the Word’s continuing work in quotidian existence. This
reading provides a corrective on eschatological perspectives on work by drawing
attention to the genuinely new work that God does in present, everyday life,
enhancing human existence in the “middle.” I will offer an interpretation of Eccl.
3:1-15 that capitalizes on this insight. This eschatological interpretation will
further impress the inherent value of work in that it does not imply a temporal
“layover”Â€before work reaches its eschatological fulfillment. Finally, I will propose
that Ecclesiastes improves upon theologies of work operating under the rubrics
of protology, eschatology, and christology (either as isolated topics or in various
combinations) by itself simultaneously working protology and eschatology
through christology.
144
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, “Creation and Fall: A Theological Exposition of Genesis 1-3,” in Martin Rüter,
Ilse Tödt, and John W. de Gruchy (eds), trans. Douglas Stephen Bax, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works 3
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997), p. 28.
www.Ebook777.com
38
www.Ebook777.com
Qoheleth’s Perplexing Story: Six Topics

for Theological-Ethical Engagement
The difficulties which the book Qoheleth has occasioned the interpreter have
a history extending back centuries. It is a book which has proved particularly
problematic for interpreters, so that views of its intended meaning are polar-
ized. This situation is due, in part, no doubt, to the subjectivity and limitations
of individual scholars, but the fact that this is a problem of such long standing
points accusingly at the book itself. The book is difficult to comprehend.1
A cursory reading of critical commentaries’ introductions to Ecclesiastes verifies

the validity of Ogden’s suggestion that Ecclesiastes is “difficult to comprehend.”
The very polarization of critical commentators’ opinions on a range of issues,
from historical background to literary integrity, is evidence not only of the
difficulties that Qoheleth poses, but also of the influence of the interpreters’
subjectivity on hermeneutical deliberation. Even the most even-handed of
commentators feel obliged to admit that this book, perhaps more than any
other in the Bible, evinces divergent interpretations that reflect the theological
presuppositions of its readers. Thus, while Ecclesiastes receives little attention
in discussions of Scripture and theological ethics, it compels biblical scholars
and theologians alike to “do theology” when it is encountered. In this chapter,
I seek to gather insights from critical research into Ecclesiastes, while also
suggesting how the bulk of critical research in biblical studies and Christian
ethics falls short in answering the theological conundrums Qoheleth sets out for
readers. I will do so first by summarizing how I understand the book to unfold,
including an outline which highlights the pertinent topics for theological-ethical
deliberation. Then, I will move to an exploration of the topics, in particular the
1
Graham S. Ogden, “Qoheleth,” Readings: A New Biblical Commentary, 2nd edn (Sheffield: Sheffield
Phoenix Press, 2007), p. 11.
www.Ebook777.com
40 Singing at the Winepress
significance of the figure of Solomon for interpreting Ecclesiastes; the meaning

of the Leitwort ‫ ;הבל‬perception and epistemology; cult, economy, and politics;
time; and the so-called carpe diem refrain. In the course of my exploration of
these topics, customary issues pertaining to authorship, historical background,
and genre will be briefly considered. In the conclusion to this chapter, I will ask
whether reading the commentaries of St Bonaventure and Martin Luther with
a perspective like that which Paul Ricoeur calls a “second naïveté”2 will help in
addressing the theological problems that Ecclesiastes raises. I move now briefly
to consider the topics of composition and structure.
Composition and structure
It is the medium of narrative that conveys the movement from contradiction

to clarity in Ecclesiastes with a powerful force. Reading Ecclesiastes narratively
helps one to make sense of the combination of various generic and stylistic
features in the book. Ecclesiastes is not an arbitrary assortment, but rather a
narrative that tells the story of a man called Qoheleth. In 1977, Michael V. Fox
broke new ground for Ecclesiastes studies by “[taking] some first steps in the
investigation of the literary characteristics of Qohelet as narrative” in his article
“Frame-Narrative and Composition in the Book of Qohelet.”3 This is not to say
that previous studies did not remark on narrative elements in the book, but Fox’s
approach was novel for modern biblical studies in his argument that “the Book
of Qohelet is to be taken as a whole, as a single, well-integrated composition, the
product not of editorship but of authorship, which uses interplay of voice as a
deliberate literary device for rhetorical and artistic purposes.”4 Whose voices are
at play in this interplay? Fox suggests that the implied author, the voice behind
the voices,5 has built “successive levels, each with a perspective that encompasses
the next.” At the first level is the “frame-narrator,” who tells the story of (Level 2A)
“Qohelet-the-reporter, the narrating ‘I’, who speaks from the vantage point of
2
Paul Ricoeur, The Symbolism of Evil, trans. Emerson Buchanan (Boston: Beacon Press, 1967),
p. 351.
3
Fox, “Frame-Narrative and Composition in the Book of Qohelet,” p. 83. Bartholomew says, “In terms
of stimulating research into Ecclesiastes as a literary whole, Fox’s work has been by far the most
significant in recent decades” (Ecclesiastes, p. 40). In this book, I assume the basic literary framework
that Fox proposes.
4
Fox, “Frame-Narrative” For a full-scale study following the course Fox sets in this article, see Eric
S. Christianson, A Time to Tell: Narrative Strategies in Ecclesiastes, JSOT Supplement 280 (Sheffield:
Sheffield Academic Press, 1998).
5
Fox, “Frame-Narrative,” p. 105.
www.Ebook777.com
Qoheleth’s Perplexing Story: Six Topics for Theological-Ethical Engagement 41
old age and looks back on ... [(Level 2B)] Qohelet-the-seeker, the experiencing
‘I’, the younger Qohelet who made the fruitless investigation introduced in
1:12f.”6 Fox’s position hinges on distinguishing between the frame-narrator and
Qoheleth. Further, he distinguishes between the old, narrating Qoheleth and
the young, experiencing Qoheleth. What, then, is a frame-narrator, what is the
frame-narrator’s role in the book of Ecclesiastes, and where does one hear the
voice of the frame-narrator?
The frame-narrator is an anonymous figure who offers a “third-person
retrospective frame-narrative encompassing a first-person narrative or
monologue.”7 It is a person whose voice remains in the background, as a
transmitter of the protagonist’s words, not the creator of them. Rather, the
frame-narrator is “a relatively passive agent between [the words’] creator ... and
the reader.”8 This figure attests to the reality of the protagonist, even if the
protagonist does not actually exist. In other words, the role of the frame-narrator
is to suspend disbelief in the reality of the character.9 The character in question
here is Qoheleth. Qoheleth is a persona the implied author has created, and the
implied author has had the frame-narrator introduce this persona to the reader.
The superscription of Ecclesiastes (Eccl. 1:1) identifies Qoheleth as the “son of
David, king in Jerusalem”; and in Eccl. 1:12–2:26, the reader finds Qoheleth
sharing his own experiences. Though both internal and external evidence
precludes Solomonic authorship,10 the acknowledgment of this evidence does
not make the figure of Solomon unimportant for the book. Rather, Ecclesiastes
contains a Solomonic fiction, instructing readers from the perspective of “an
old king facing his own mortality.”11 That the persona Qoheleth tells his story
in Solomonic guise further suspends disbelief in his reality. The frame-narrator
situates Qoheleth’s story in such a way as to aid this disguise.
Where, then, does the reader hear the voice of Qoheleth, and where does the
reader hear the voice of the frame-narrator? The frame-narrator is responsible
6
7
Fox, “Frame-Narrative.” It is important to note the parallels that Fox detects between the frame-
narrative in Ecclesiastes and other ancient Near Eastern texts, especially Egyptian texts, which come
from the “homeland of narrative technique,” p. 92. Egyptian texts with frame-narratives include The
Instruction of Kagemeni, The Complaint of Ipuwer, and Onchsheshonqy, pp. 92–3. Biblical parallels
include Deuteronomy and Tobit, pp. 93–4. Fox also points to an intriguing modern analogy, namely,
Uncle Remus, pp. 94–6. These parallels show frame-narrative as both an ancient and modern literary
technique.
8
9
10
See Bartholomew, Ecclesiastes, pp. 46–54.
11
Leo G. Perdue, The Sword and the Stylus: An Introduction to Wisdom in the Age of Empires (Grand
Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2008), p. 208.
www.Ebook777.com
for introducing the “words of Qoheleth” in the superscription (Eccl. 1:1),12

three quotations of Qoheleth at decisive points in the narrative (Eccl. 1:2; 7:27;
12:8),13 and the epilogue (Eccl. 12:9-14).14 While the frame-narrator introduces
Qoheleth’s words in the superscription (Eccl. 1:1), this figure does not speak about
those words until the epilogue.15 Thus, the frame-narrator not only suspends
disbelief in the persona Qoheleth, but also suspends judgment on this persona’s
words until the epilogue. In between these outer frames (Eccl. 1:1; 12:9-14),
the voice of the frame-narrator interrupts the flow in order to quote Qoheleth.
The quotations in Eccl. 1:2 and Eccl. 12:8 form an inclusio stating the book’s
theme, the superlative phrase “merest breath” (‫)הבל הבלים‬. Ecclesiastes 1:2 reads,
“â•›‘Merest breath,’ says Qoheleth, ‘Merest breath. All is mere breath.’â•›”16 Ecclesiastes
12:8 echoes this quotation, eliding the repetition of the superlative phrase and
attaching a definite article to Qoheleth’s name (‫)הקהלת‬. Between these parts of the
inclusio, the voice of the frame-narrator breaks in only once, in Eccl. 7:27: “â•›‘See
this I have found,’ says Qoheleth, ‘(adding) one to one to find a solution.’â•›” That
the frame-narrator sees it fit to interrupt Qoheleth’s narrative at this juncture
implies that this verse is a climactic moment. The interruption causes the reader
to pause, to make sure to listen; and it reminds the reader who is speaking.
The frame-narrator introduces Qoheleth’s words to the reader in the
superscription without making an initial judgment about them and invites the
reader to wrestle with Qoheleth’s words throughout the course of the narrative. In
the epilogue (Eccl. 12:9-14), the frame-narrator, as epilogist, assumes a didactic
tone:
The speaker marks off the points to be learned: “Now furthermore ... And
furthermore ... Finally ...” He praises the ancient wise-man Qohelet, generalizes
about the words of the wise, cautions the boy about excessive writing and
speaking, and sums up with an exhortation to fear God and obey him since his
judgment is certain. He addresses these words to [‫]בני‬, “my son,” in the customary
12
In “Frame-Narrative,” Fox does not include the superscription within the frame-narrator’s work (see
p. 91, where he suggests that Eccl. 1:2–12:14 is by the same hand, not including Eccl. 1:1), though in
A Time to Tear Down, he does (pp. 159–60; see also Christianson, Time to Tell, pp. 73–7).
13
14
Fox, “Frame-Narrative.” One should note that while in “Frame-Narrative,” Fox includes Eccl. 12:14 in
the frame-narrator’s epilogue, in A Time to Tear Down, he identifies Eccl. 12:13-14 as a “postscript”
that “probably belongs to a later scribe,” though it supplements Qoheleth’s perspective rather than
contradicting it, pp. 358–9. I prefer Fox’s perspective in “Frame-Narrative” (see also Bartholomew,
Ecclesiastes, p. 84).
15
Fox, “Frame-Narrative.”
16
In translating ‫ הבל‬as “mere breath” I am drawing on Alter, in Robert Alter, The Wisdom Books: Job,
Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes: A Translation with Commentary (New York: W. W. Norton & Company,
2010), p. 346.
www.Ebook777.com
wisdom fashion, thus creating an epic situation that must have been immediately
recognizable to the early readers of Qohelet: the father-son instruction situation
of didactic wisdom literature. The epilogist thus implicitly identifies himself as a
wise-man, a wisdom teacher. This identification is important in establishing his
own reliability and showing the attitude the reader is to take toward him, the way
in which he is to hear his words.17
In the epilogue, the frame-narrator continues suspending the reader’s disbelief

in the persona Qoheleth, describing him as a “master collector”18 of ‫משׁלים‬
(“proverbs”) who taught the people (‫ )העם‬knowledge, sought pleasing words,
and wrote words of truth plainly (Eccl. 12:9-10). It is important to note here
that Fox does not suggest that the epilogist uses this moment of judgment
to warn the student of the dangers of Qoheleth’s words but rather to praise
Qoheleth.
Tremper Longman, though reading Ecclesiastes within Fox’s narrative
framework, suggests that the frame-narrator’s evaluation of Qoheleth is more
reserved. The frame-narrator is like a recommending professor who praises the
industriousness of a student whose grades are nonetheless mediocre, lacking the
merit for acceptance into an elite graduate program.19 Though Longman follows
Fox in hearing the voice of the frame-narrator in the epilogue, in the ideological
distance he places between the persona Qoheleth and the frame-narrator, he is
not unlike interpreters who assume that the epilogue is an editorial edition that
aligns the book with orthodoxy.20 Also, though he “corrects” early interpretations
that assume that in the epilogue, Solomon is engaging in an act of repentance and
providing an interpretive key for the rest of the book,21 Longman’s interpretation
has the same theological bent. The words of Qoheleth, though the product of a
diligent search for wisdom, are suspect. In the case of both Fox and Longman,
as well as precritical interpretations, reading the book as a unified whole forces
the reader to wrestle with the theological message of the epilogue, regardless of
the outcome.
17
Fox, “Frame-Narrative,” pp. 99–100.
18
Fox, A Time to Tear Down, pp. 353–4.
19
Longman, The Book of Ecclesiastes, p. 277.
20
Perdue’s comment on the epilogue summarizes this position well: “Finally, one hears a second
voice in the book, especially in the epilogue (12:9-14) and 11:9b. This suggests a piety issuing from
traditional wisdom that taught obedience to the Torah, the ‘fear of God’ ..., moral obedience, and
retribution. Qoheleth’s skepticism and excessive reading and writing that are wearisome toil become
the basis for the editors’ countermeasures and warnings issued to the students who read Qoheleth.
Instead, they should study the Torah and the sayings of the sages, while being aware of divine
judgment” (The Sword and the Stylus, p. 246).
21
Longman, The Book of Ecclesiastes, p. 276.
www.Ebook777.com
Now that I have made the case for the narrative unity of Ecclesiastes,
I move to consider the structure of the book, incorporating various forms
into the narrative framework. I have shown that the frame-narrator presents
a prologue in Eccl. 1:1 and an epilogue in Eccl. 12:9-14. The quotations of
Qoheleth’s theme “merest breath” take place in Eccl. 1:2 and Eccl. 12:8, forming
an inclusio. Ecclesiastes 1:3 sets the tone for the book with a rhetorical question
that the reader is to contemplate in the course of the narrative. This question
introduces the opening poem in Eccl. 1:4-11. Fox suggests that though there
are shorter, proverbial sentences in Qoheleth’s narrative, three longer passages
in particular have the features of ‫( משׁלים‬proverbial sections). These passages
are Eccl. 1:3-11; 3:1-15; and 11:7–12:7.22 These ‫ משׁלים‬help guide the narrative.
Roland Murphy suggests that describing the book of Ecclesiastes generically as
a mashal is inadequate because the designation is “far too elusive in meaning to
be helpful.”23 Yet, whether or not the entire book shows the formal characteristics
of a particular genre called “mashal,” the particular passages in question (Eccl.
1:3-11; 3:1-15; 11:7–12:7) do instruct the reader through the medium of poetry,
as well as occupying pivotal places in the narrative.
The poem and commentary of Eccl. 3:1-15 immediately follow Qoheleth’s
“royal testament” (Eccl. 1:12–2:26).24 The final verses of the royal testament
mark a transition in Qoheleth’s perception of reality, from hating life and labor
(Eccl. 2:17-18) to resolving to delight in labor (Eccl. 2:24-26). The poem on time
immediately follows this resolve. Though the recognition in the first so-called
carpe diem passage does not prevent Qoheleth from continuing to reflect on
oppressive economic and political situations, it does represent a turning point, of
which he will remind the reader six more times in the course of the narrative.
The other two uses of ‫ משׁלים‬form “bookends” around Qoheleth’s narrative.
If the frame-narrator sets the story within the “merest breath” theme with the
inclusio of Eccl. 1:2 and Eccl. 12:8, then these two ‫ משׁלים‬in Eccl. 1:3-11 and
Eccl. 11:7–12:7 form Qoheleth’s own inclusio.25 Both Fox and Perdue note
similarities between these two passages. Fox presents several thematic parallels
that function as antitheses between Eccl. 1:4-11 and Eccl. 12:1-7: the opening
22
Fox, A Time to Tear Down, p. 354. Fox suggests that Eccl. 11:7–12:8 is a ‫משׁל‬, but I prefer to terminate
the ‫ משׁל‬at Eccl. 12:7, thus keeping the inclusio piece in Eccl. 12:8 separate from the poem as the work
of the frame-narrator quoting Qoheleth’s thematic phrase.
23
Roland Murphy, O. Carm., Wisdom Literature: Job, Proverbs, Ruth, Canticles, Ecclesiastes, and Esther,
The Forms of Old Testament Literature, XIII (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1981), p. 129.
24
For a description of the form “royal testament,” see von Rad, Wisdom Literature, p. 226.
25
Perdue, The Sword and the Stylus, p. 208.
www.Ebook777.com
poem portrays unending cycles while the closing poem describes the undoing
of an individual life. In Eccl. 1:5, the sun rises after setting, while in Eccl. 12:2a,
a person’s light is extinguished forever. Ecclesiastes 1:11 describes the failure
of memory, while Eccl. 12:1 urges the reader to remember the Creator. Finally,
in Eccl. 1 the natural elements move around and around, while in Eccl. 12, the
mourners go around, though their movement is unidirectional in that they are
making their way to their eternal home.26
Complementing Fox’s thematic parallels are Perdue’s structural ones. Both
Eccl. 1:4-11 and 11:7–12:7 are two-stanza poems. These two-stanza poems have
reverse orders: in the first poem, the first stanza (Eccl. 1:4-7) is about cosmology,
while the second (Eccl. 1:8-11) is about anthropology; in the second poem, the
first stanza (Eccl. 11:7-10) is anthropological, while the second (Eccl. 12:1-7) is
about cosmology and death.27 Having shown these parallels, Perdue summarizes
the effect of the inverted orders of the poems and their respective placement
within the book of Ecclesiastes:
The two poems on cosmology and anthropology/anthropology and cosmology

(plus death; 1:4-11 and 11:7–12:8) and the repetition of the major metaphor
(“breath of breath,” says Qoheleth, “all is breath”) at the opening and conclusion of
the testament proper (1:2; 12:8) present the telling inclusio for the testament.28
If one theologically interprets Perdue’s basic judgment about the placement of these
poems and the inclusio within the structure of the book, then one may detect in the
structure of Ecclesiastes a consideration of human activity “under the sun” within
the framework of creation and eschaton. I am admittedly reading the cosmological
activity in Eccl. 1:5-7 positively, following Norman Whybray.29 I am also following
C. L. Seow’s appeal to eschatological imagery in Eccl. 12:1-8.30 I suggest that the
figures I will encounter in the two chapters following the present one assist in
considering Ecclesiastes within the doctrinal foci of protology and eschatology,
Bonaventure in his reading of vanitas, and Luther in his treatment of time.
Within the inclusio and the outer ‫משׁלים‬, where may one detect other “peaks”
in Qoheleth’s narrative? Perdue notes how within the outer ‫משׁלים‬, the “peaks” lie
at the so-called carpe diem passages:
26
Fox, A Time to Tear Down, p. 320.
27
Perdue, The Sword and the Stylus, p. 207. Note that Perdue, like Fox, marks the limits of the second
stanza of the second poem as Eccl. 12:1-8, while I mark the limits as Eccl. 12:1-7.
28
29
R. N. Whybray, “Ecclesiastes 1.5-7 and the Wonders of Nature,” JSOT 41 (1988), pp. 105–12.
30
C. L. Seow, “Qohelet’s Eschatological Poem,” Journal of Biblical Literature 118.2 (1999), pp. 209–34.
www.Ebook777.com
Discovering the “good” in human life, the quest that drives Qoheleth’s empirical
examination, has two aspects, reflected in the two parts of the literary structure:
“doing” and “knowing.” These are based on the pivotal expressions: “breath (and
the desire for life’s breath)” in the first part and “cannot find out (who can find
out)” and “do not know (no knowledge)” in the second. Recurring throughout
the testament is the repetition of “carpe diem” that reflects the seven major
units of the book (see 2:24-26; 3:12-13, 22; 5:17-19; 8:14-15; 9:7-10; 11:7-10).
These repetitions point to the thematic organizing principle of the volume that
contains the teacher’s conclusion to each of the states of his quest: joy that is
quickly fleeting is the good in human life. An interlude (6:1-9) divides the two
major parts and describes the misery of a life devoid of joy that ultimately ends
in death and eternal darkness.31
In recognizing the division of the book’s two halves at Eccl. 6:9, the “pivotal
expressions” in the two halves, and the strategic placement of the so-called carpe
diem passages, Perdue follows the significant contribution of Addison Wright
in his 1968 article, “The Riddle of the Sphinx: The Structure of the Book of
Qoheleth,” in which Wright applies elements of New Criticism, from literary
theory, to the text of Ecclesiastes.32 While locating these structural markers is
helpful for making sense of the book’s composition, what is missing in Perdue’s
account is the theological character of the so-called carpe diem passages, which
I will begin to probe later in this chapter.
In examining the structure of Ecclesiastes thus far, I have located the book’s
prologue (Eccl. 1:1) and epilogue (Eccl. 12:9-14), three ‫( משׁלים‬Eccl. 1:3-11; 3:1-15;
11:7–12:7), and an interlude (Eccl. 6:1-9). I have also noted Perdue’s suggestion
of seven major units punctuated by the so-called carpe diem passages. It remains
to account for the passages that the recurring chorus punctuates, taking into
account some form-critical considerations. There is a royal testament in Eccl.
1:12–2:26, punctuated by a so-called carpe diem passage. Ecclesiastes 3:16-22
is a section on judgment and human nature, also punctuated by a carpe diem
passage (though in my outline, I consider it along with the section that follows).33
Though Perdue suggests that Eccl. 4:1–5:19 [20, Engl.] is one section, I divide it
in order to account for the sudden use of imperatives beginning in Eccl. 4:17
[5:1, Engl.], drawing on Brown. Thus, Eccl. 4:1-6 narrates the problem with
both power and isolation, while Eccl. 4:17–5:19 [5:1-20, Engl.] portrays “the
31
32
Addison Wright, “The Riddle of the Sphinx: The Structure of the Book of Qoheleth,” Catholic Biblical
Quarterly 30 (1968), pp. 313–14.
33
www.Ebook777.com
[s]implicity of [r]everence.”34 The writer punctuates this section with another

carpe diem passage. After the interlude “on joy and its absence” in Eccl. 6:1-9,
Qoheleth begins to use the key refrains, “Cannot find out/who can find out?”
in Eccl. 7-8, and “Do not know/no knowledge” in Eccl. 9-11.35 Thus, Eccl. 6:10–
8:17 deals with the search to “find out” wisdom and God’s action in the world,
punctuated by a carpe diem passage in Eccl. 8:14-15; and Eccl. 9:1–11:6 deals
with the inability to comprehend God’s action in the world, and the implications
of this ignorance for life and wisdom. The carpe diem passage in Eccl. 9:7-10
concludes this section. The ‫ משׁל‬in Eccl. 11:7–12:7 is interesting in that it begins
with a carpe diem passage (Eccl. 11:7-10) rather than having one as a conclusion.
Bartholomew suggests that this inversion is significant in that it notes a final turn
in Qoheleth’s narrative. Whereas in previous passages, Qoheleth offers a carpe
diem claim but follows it with another observation that seems to contradict the
conclusion, in Eccl. 11:7-10 he states it at the outset, noting to the reader that he
is on the final leg of his journey.36 By now, it should be clear how in Qoheleth’s
narrative, the ‫ משׁלים‬and the so-called carpe diem passages, as well as key words
such as ‫“( הבל‬mere breath”), ‫“( מצא‬to find out”), and ‫“( ידע‬to know”), help to
govern the story’s flow.
The following outline summarizes my description of the book’s flow. In it,
I draw on Fox, Perdue, Brown, and Bartholomew. I agree with Brown that “only
the most general of outlines can be proposed, one that is more topically than
formally governed.”37 Thus, while taking into account the formal and stylistic
features in the text, as well as the book’s frame, I do not attempt to offer a
completely formal outline, as the character of the book as narrative makes doing
so with perfect precision impossible. Below is my outline of Ecclesiastes:
I. Frame narration (1:1-2)

A. Prologue introducing Qoheleth’s words (1:1)
B. Inclusio: Quotation of book’s theme: Merest breath (1:2)
II. Qoheleth’s narrative (1:3–12:7)
A. Programmatic question concerning the profitability of humanity’s
labor (1:3)
B. Mashal: Poem on cosmology and humanity’s failed attempt to find
novelty (1:4-11)
34
35
Perdue, The Sword and the Stylus, pp. 207–8.
36
37
www.Ebook777.com
C. Qoheleth’s royal testament, which introduces his perceptual struggle

(1:12–2:26)
D. Mashal: Poem on time, with theological commentary (3:1-15)
E. Qoheleth’s observations concerning oppression, judgment, human
nature, the problem of power, and the problem of isolation (3:16–4:16)
F. Qoheleth’s switch to direct address: The simplicity of reverence
(4:17–5:19 [5:1-20, Engl.])
G. Interlude on joy and its absence (6:1-9)
H. Humanity’s search to find out wisdom and God’s action in the world
(6:10–8:17)
I. Humanity’s inability to know God’s action in the world and this
inability’s implications for wisdom (9:1–11:6)
J. Mashal: Poem on joy and the memory of the creator in life, in light of
death’s reality and the coming end of the cosmos (11:7–12:7)
III. Frame narration (12:8-14)
A. Inclusio: Quotation of the book’s theme: Merest breath (12:8)
B. Epilogue concluding Qoheleth’s words and instructing the reader in
how to judge them (12:9-14)
The outline above highlights several topics that merit further theological-ethical
treatment for the ultimate aim of locating an ethic of work in Ecclesiastes.
First, the character regarding whom the frame-narrator suspends the reader’s
disbelief (Qoheleth), who has experience as both a ruler and an observer of
rulers and who is both a poet and a storyteller, deserves consideration beyond
the simple questions of actual identity. Second, I have shown that the inclusio
states the book’s theme as “merest breath,” but I have not fully explored the
theological significance of ‫הבל‬. Third, the book’s opening poem, the royal
testament, and the section on the search to find out wisdom and God’s
action in the world speak to the centrality of perception and epistemology in
Ecclesiastes. Fourth, the programmatic question and Qoheleth’s observations
about society convey the importance of economics and politics in Ecclesiastes.
Yet, the “Simplicity of Reverence” section shows that Qoheleth does not totally
dismiss cultic considerations in his observations about life “under the sun.”
Fifth, the second ‫ משׁל‬in the text draws attention to the topic of time. Finally,
there are the “peaks” in the narrative that punctuate the major sections of
Ecclesiastes, the so-called carpe diem passages. I will explore these six topics in
turn, posing theological-ethical questions about them for further exploration
in the following chapters.
www.Ebook777.com
Qoheleth and the figure of Solomon
Premodern treatments of Ecclesiastes, in both Jewish and Christian interpretive

traditions, assume Solomonic authorship.38 That the author describes Qoheleth as
the “son of David, king in Jerusalem” (Eccl. 1:1), that Qoheleth introduces himself
as “king over Israel in Jerusalem” in Eccl. 1:12, and that his activities in Eccl. 1–2
especially resemble those of Solomon in 1 Kgs 4–11, shows the reasonableness
of early interpreters’ association of the book’s author with Solomon. However,
most modern scholars flatly deny Solomonic authorship. In the section on
composition, I have already hinted that I follow contemporary scholarship in this
regard.39 Yet, in this section, I also ask whether there is a remainder of Solomonic
significance that is worth considering for the aims of this book. Therefore, in this
section,Â€I will inquire further into Qoheleth’s “Solomonic guise.”40
There are two primary interpretive options for the term “Qoheleth”: ‫ קהלת‬is
either a pseudonym (or nickname)41 that contains a Solomonic connection and
serves a literary function, or the name is an extension of one’s office.42 There are,
of course, variations within these options and room for some combination of
the two. Here, I am most interested in the Solomonic connection. While the
designation “son of David” (Eccl. 1:1) surely calls Solomon to mind, particularly
compelling to me is the Solomonic significance of the name ‫ קהלת‬itself. Therefore,
in this section, I will first explore the relation between the verb ‫ קהל‬and Solomon’s
activities in Kings and Chronicles, and I will ask whether this relation has any
bearing on how one reads Ecclesiastes. In other words, how do Qoheleth’s
reflections in Ecclesiastes reflect Solomon’s activities in Kings and Chronicles?
Then, I will prepare the reader for the following two chapters by suggesting how the
answer to this question affects the theological significance granted to the persona
Qoheleth, as well as the overall theological message identified in the book. Does
the name Qoheleth allude to Solomon’s monarchic excess or to his gathering of
the people for the building of the Temple? Is Qoheleth practicing penance or
preaching a sermon? If the latter, what is the character of his sermon?
38
Christianson, Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries, p. 23.
39
Regarding provenance, I follow Bartholomew (Ecclesiastes, p. 112); Fox (A Time to Tear Down,
pp. 6–7); and Perdue (The Sword and the Stylus, pp. 247–52), all of whom date Ecclesiastes to the
Hellenistic period (particularly, mid- to late third century BCE), making strong connections between
Greek philosophy and Qoheleth’s style, along with the linguistic evidence typically given in support
of a late date of composition for Ecclesiastes.
40
41
Brown, Ecclesiastes, pp. 46–8; Lohfink, Qoheleth, p. 10.
42
Roland Murphy, O. Carm., Ecclesiastes, Word Biblical Commentary, 23A (Dallas: Word Books,
1992), p. xx.
www.Ebook777.com
The LXX captures the communal nuance of the verb ‫ קהל‬by translating the
substantive participle ‫ קהלת‬with ἘkklhsiastὴV, which calls to mind the image of
a “gathered assembly.” The English-speaking inheritors of Jerome’s transliteration
of the LXX’s rendering hear ecclesial overtones in the title of Qoheleth’s book.
However, when they read through Qoheleth’s narrative, there is little in the way
of cultic language (outside of Eccl. 5, Engl.) that would seem to merit reading the
book in an ecclesial register. Why, then, does the author employ the term ‫קהלת‬
to refer to an individual as seemingly isolated as the book’s central character?
Is there any reason to interpret the term in a communal or ecclesial register in
Ecclesiastes? If so, what is the theological significance of interpreting the term in
this fashion? To answer these questions, it is worth considering other instances
of the verb ‫ קהל‬in the Hebrew Bible, especially focusing on Kings and Chronicles,
given their Solomonic connection.
Scholars often allude to the books of Kings43 and Chronicles44 when exploring
the significance of the figure of Solomon for Ecclesiastes. Therefore, here
I will look briefly at Kings and Chronicles, starting with the latter. In order to
understand the broader context in which Solomon assembles God’s people in
Kings and Chronicles, it is necessary first to mention the assembling activities of
Solomon’s father, David. In 1 Chronicles, one finds David assembling all Israel at
Jerusalem, to which he commands the people to take the Ark of the Covenant,
where he offers sacrifices and leads the people in prayer. In the final chapters
of the book, David assembles all the officials of Israel and of Israel’s tribes, and
in their presence instructs Solomon to build the Temple (1 Chron. 28:1). In
1 Chron. 29, David says “to the whole assembly” (‫ )לכל־הקהל‬that God has chosen
Solomon alone for this task, but that Solomon is young and inexperienced, while
the work is great. David also blesses the LORD before the eyes of the whole
assembly (‫ )כל־הקהל‬and enjoins the entire assembly to bless the LORD with him
(1 Chron. 29:10, 20).
After the assembly anoints Solomon as king at the conclusion of 1 Chronicles,
in 2 Chronicles one finds Solomon continuing the work of his father, leading
“the whole assembly of his people” (‫ )כל־הקהל עמו‬to the high place at Gibeon,
where the Tent of Meeting is (2 Chron. 1:3). It is “the people” (‫ )העם‬that the
frame-narrator declares are the recipients of Qoheleth’s teaching in Eccl. 12:9.
While there is at least a linguistic connection here, as will be apparent, the
43
See, for instance, Bartholomew, Ecclesiastes, pp. 103–4; and Lohfink, Qoheleth, p. 35.
44
See, for instance, Abraham S. Kamenetzky, “Der Rätselname Koheleth,” Zeitshcrift für alttestamentliche
Wissenschaft 34 (1914), pp. 225–8.
www.Ebook777.com
purposes of leading the people (‫ )העם‬in each book are distinct from one another.
To continue with the account of Solomon’s activities in 2 Chronicles, Solomon
and the assembly inquire at the Tent of Meeting, and in this context, Solomon
asks God for wisdom. In 2 Chron. 1:11-12, God promises to grant SolomonÂ€both
wisdom and “riches.” It is interesting that in 2 Chronicles, God promises Solomon
‫( עשׂר ונכסים וכבוד‬riches, possessions, and honor), which Qoheleth describes in
identical form45 as gifts from God in Eccl. 6:2.46 It is possible that Qoheleth’s
comment that God does not permit the recipients of these gifts to enjoy them is
an allusion to Solomon’s own downfall, an allusion that warns the reader of the
relative worth of these gifts and the limitations of the wisdom that these gifts
accompany.47 Prior to his forfeiture of wisdom, however, Solomon continues in
2 Chronicles to gather the community together for the task of completing the
Temple construction, assembling the elders to bring the Ark of the Covenant
up to the Temple (2 Chron. 5:3). Then, Solomon blesses “the whole assembly
of Israel” (‫ )כל־הקהל ישׂראל‬while they stand at the Temple for its dedication
(2 Chron. 6:3). Like his father, Solomon finally leads the assembly in prayer to
the LORD.
It is in the context of building a house for God (‫בית האלהים‬, see Eccl. 4:17
[5:1, Engl.]), that Solomon asks the LORD for wisdom. He does not ask for a
generic sort of wisdom, but rather wisdom to employ in the service of God and
the community. Yet, this wisdom nonetheless involves the “earthly” aspects of
Temple construction, such as gathering materials and craftspeople for the task.
1 Kings 7 is almost entirely devoted to the work of Hiram, an artisan who is
renowned for his knowledge and skill in the casting of bronze materials. The
lines between the secular and the sacred are blurred in the account of the Temple
construction.48 King Solomon employs his political wisdom for the building of an
ecclesial structure, in which the priests may practice their vocation. His political
position enables him to acquire materials from foreign lands for the construction
45
There is, however, a conjunction ‫ו‬attached to ‫ עשׂר‬in 2 Chron. 1:12.
46
Bartholomew also makes this connection (Ecclesiastes, p. 234).
47
Given my suggestion that the composition of Ecclesiastes lies in the mid- to late third century BCE,
and that Chronicles is likely a Persian-period text, it is reasonable to assume some dependence
of Ecclesiastes on Chronicles. For the dating of Chronicles, see Peter R. Ackroyd, “Chronicles,” in
Michael D. Coogan and Bruce M. Metzger (eds), The Oxford Companion to the Bible (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1993), p. 115. Ackroyd notes that “there is no clear evidence of the change to Greek
rule. A fourth century BCE date is reasonable, but remains a balanced guess.”
48
Raymond van Leeuwen stresses that wisdom in Israel does not function in terms of a dichotomy
of the secular and the sacred. See Raymond C. van Leeuwen, “Proverbs,” in Leander Keck (ed.),
The New Interpreter’s Bible 5 (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1997), p. 34. In making this observation,
I am anticipating the discussion of the interplay between cultic, economic, and political language in
Ecclesiastes below.
www.Ebook777.com
of his people’s place of worship (see, for instance, 1 Kgs 5:6). Solomon is also
dependent on the wisdom of artisans who are more adept at working with these
materials than he. The artisans employ their domestic wisdom for the building
of the Temple. Thus, there is a picture of a community of domestic and political
administrators employing their wisdom together for the construction of the
ecclesial edifice.
While it could seem that there is complete harmony between Solomon and
his subjects in this joint endeavor of the Temple construction, there are hints
of economic-political oppression. For instance, Solomon conscripts forced
labor to carry out his plans (see, for instance, 1 Kgs 5:13; 9:15-22; cf. 2 Chron.
8:7-10). Not only does he conscript labor, but he also uses his political position
to pursue foreign wives. He even builds high places for the gods of these wives
(1 Kgs 11:1-8). Though there are moments when he imitates the best days of
his father’s reign, Solomon also imitates David’s misdeeds. Yet, unlike David,
Solomon does not show signs of repentance (at least not in Kings or Chronicles).
Eventually, Solomon’s errors precipitate a fall from grace, and God promises
to tear Solomon’s kingdom from Solomon and give it to Solomon’s servant
(1 Kgs 11:9-13). The narratives of both Kings and Chronicles quickly deflate
Solomon’s greatness, leaving the reader questioning what sort of estimation she
or he ought to make of the character of Solomon. Yet, the Solomonic tradition is
not without remainder, as there is an entire corpus in the OT ascribed to him, of
which Ecclesiastes is a part. It remains, then, to ask how Ecclesiastes in particular
relates to these narratives.
In this brief survey of Solomon’s activities in Kings and Chronicles, a tension
between the wisdom and folly of Solomon is evident. On his best days, he
employs his political wisdom to build a house for God. On his worst days, he
conscripts slave labor for the Temple construction, and even constructs other
places of worship for foreign gods, being led astray by foreign wives. If at least
the royal testament in Ecclesiastes (Eccl. 1:12–2:26) is a “Solomonic fiction,”
then it is necessary to ask which Solomon is in mind. Is it the supremely wise
Solomon, the downfallen Solomon, or some combination of the two? Answering
this question is important for determining the theological-ethical message in the
book because the answer helps in grasping the book’s overall tone. Consequently,
the discernment of a particular tone will determine what kind of speech-acts
take place in particular parts of Ecclesiastes. Is Solomon repenting of his foolish
misdeeds or praising quotidian existence? Not only does the determination of
the significance of Solomon’s character help to detect the tone of Ecclesiastes, but
also the interpretation of the Leitwort ‫הבל‬, the next topic for consideration.
www.Ebook777.com
Vanitas
In my discussion regarding composition, I argued that, structurally, the superlative

phrase ‫ הבל הבלים‬functions as an inclusio (see Eccl. 1:2; 12:8), providing an envelope
around Qoheleth’s monologue. Out of eighty-one occurrences of ‫ הבל‬in the OT,
Ecclesiastes claims thirty-eight.49 Given its structural function and its volume of
occurrences, how one understands ‫ הבל‬will have significance for how one reads
the entire book of Ecclesiastes.50 Therefore, in this section, I will explore the
meaning of this Leitwort and ask about its theological significance. In particular,
I will survey translations of the term, inquire into the relationship between its
metaphorical and abstract nuances, pose the problem of applying single abstract
nuances throughout the entire book, and suggest why it is preferable to employ a
term that allows for multiple abstract nuances, depending on the context. Then,
I will suggest that how one interprets ‫ הבל‬will have a bearing on the theology of
creation one locates in the book.
Determination of the meaning of ‫ הבל‬and its implications has dominated the
exegesis of Ecclesiastes for centuries. As far as Christian interpretation goes,
Jerome’s translation of ‫ הבל‬as vanitas, following both the LXX’s rendering of
the term as mataiόthV and Origen’s general interpretation of Ecclesiastes,51 has
been largely responsible for debates over the term’s precise abstract meaning
and the identity of its referents. Because in the next chapter I will focus more
intently on the contemptus mundi tradition of Ecclesiastes interpretation, which
has been mediated largely through Origen and Jerome, here, I will simply survey
translations that, in one way or another, reflect Jerome’s translational sensibilities.
Both the LB (with its translation of ‫ הבל‬as eitel) and the KJV (with its translation
of ‫ הבל‬as “vanity”) basically follow Jerome. Of modern translations, the NRSV
and the NASB are among those that continue the course of the LB and the KJV.
In his Anchor Bible commentary, Seow opts to use “vanity” as his translation of
‫“ הבל‬for want of an adequate alternative.”52 Because both Bonaventure and Luther
49
Douglas B. Miller, Symbol and Rhetoric in Ecclesiastes: The Place of Hebel in Qohelet’s Work (Atlanta:
The Society of Biblical Literature, 2002), p. 57. Miller says that the term occurs thirty-five times in the
OT outside of Ecclesiastes, but then mentions in a footnote that this number excludes eight instances
in Gen. 4, when ‫ הבל‬serves as the proper name for the character, Abel. However, with Jacques Ellul,
I believe that the eight occurrences in Gen. 4 are significant for a study of the meaning of ‫הבל‬,
including the study of the term in Ecclesiastes. See Jacques Ellul, Reason for Being: A Meditation on
Ecclesiastes, trans. Joyce Main Hanks (Grand Rapids: Williams B. Eerdmans Publishing Company,
1990), pp. 58–60. Therefore, I include these occurrences in my total count.
50
Miller, Symbol and Rhetoric in Ecclesiastes, p. 2.
51
Christianson, Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries, pp. 100–1.
52
C. L. Seow, Ecclesiastes: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, The Anchor Bible,
vol. 18C (New York: Doubleday, 1997), p. 102.
www.Ebook777.com
assume Jerome’s translation (though, as will be evident, they appropriate it in

different ways), I will follow Seow by simply retaining the translation “vanity” in
Chapters 2 and 3, though keeping in mind the insights from this discussion.
Though Jerome’s vanitas has remained a standard basis for English translations
of ‫הבל‬, some translations, while retaining an abstract nuance for the term, have
interpreted the term even more severely. For instance, the NIV and the NLT render
the term as “meaningless,” while the CEB employs “pointless.” Among Jewish
translations, the NJPSV translates ‫ הבל‬as “futile.” Longman is in accord with the
NIV and the NLT, suggesting in regard to Eccl. 1:2 that “the book of Ecclesiastes
leaves no doubt about Qohelet’s ultimate conclusion—everything is completely
meaningless.”53 Reading Qoheleth in line with French existentialism, Fox renders
‫ הבל‬as “absurd.”54 In his recent commentary, Peter Enns treads in Fox’s footsteps.55
The severest English translation of ‫ הבל‬is “shit,”56 a translation that leaves little to
be imagined with regard to the overall tone the translator detects in the book.
While these abstract translations of ‫ הבל‬carry negative connotations, some recent
proposals, though still abstract, allow more room for interpretation. For instance,
Bartholomew, who reads Ecclesiastes as something of an epistemological
journey, suggests using the term “enigmatic,”57 while Treier, trying to reconcile
contemptus mundi readings of Ecclesiastes with the Lutheran reading, suggests
“ungraspable.”58 Though the proposals of Bartholomew and Treier allow more
room for positive takes on Qoheleth’s ‫ הבל‬judgments in certain contexts, they
still elide the metaphorical picture that the term calls to mind. Therefore, it is
necessary to inquire further into the metaphorical meaning of ‫הבל‬.
Robert Alter has helpfully captured the problem present in the above platter
of offerings for the translation of ‫הבל‬: “The problem is that all of these English
equivalents are more or less right, and abstractions being what they are, each one
has the effect of excluding the others and thus limiting the scope of the Hebrew
metaphor.”59 The particular nuance an interpreter chooses when rendering ‫הבל‬
in abstract terms depends on how one reads the entire book—whether one
53
Longman, The Book of Ecclesiastes, p. 61. Longman goes on to suggest (on the same page) that the
traditional English rendering of Qoheleth’s superlative phrase (vanity of vanities) “is problematical
because the English term ‘vanity’ is primarily used in reference to self-pride.”
54
55
Peter Enns, Ecclesiastes, The Two Horizons Old Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: William B.
Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2011), p. 31.
56
See Frank Crüsemann, “The Unchangeable World: The ‘Crisis of Wisdom’ in Koheleth,” in Willy
Schottroff and Wolfgang Stegemann (eds), God of the Lowly: Socio-Historical Interpretations of the
Bible (New York: Orbis Books, 1979), p. 57; and Tamez, When the Horizons Close, pp. 3, 155–6.
57
Bartholomew, Ecclesiastes, pp. 93–4.
58
Treier, Proverbs & Ecclesiastes, p. 125.
59
Alter, The Wisdom Books, p. 340.
www.Ebook777.com
understands Qoheleth to be a pessimist or a “preacher of joy.”60 The problem

with translating the term in abstract uniformity throughout the course of the
book is that it typically only allows for one primary vista of interpretation. For
this reason, Alter prefers to render ‫ הבל‬according to the “concrete metaphor” it
calls to mind, namely, “mere breath.” According to him, “the writer uses concrete
metaphors to indicate general concepts, constantly exploiting the emotional
impact of the concrete image and its potential to suggest several related ideas.”61
The “concrete metaphor,” then, has both an affective and a symbolic significance.
Douglas Miller has proposed that ‫ הבל‬in Ecclesiastes is a “â•›‘symbol’, an image
which holds together a set of meanings, or ‘referents’, that can neither be
exhausted nor adequately expressed by any single meaning.”62 This “symbol” is
“versatile ... suggest[ing] certain distinctive nuances according to the particular
context in which the term is found.”63 Alter’s translation of ‫ הבל‬as “mere breath”
enables one to make room for Miller’s proposal, whereby one allows “breath”
to have different abstract connotations depending on the context. Thus, in one
context, ‫ הבל‬may certainly refer to a “shitty” situation (for instance, that which
Qoheleth describes in Eccl. 2:17); in another, it may indicate the inability to
precisely comprehend the work of God (see, for instance, Eccl. 8:10).
This brief survey of the meaning and translational options of the Leitwort
‫ הבל‬has highlighted the significance of the interpretation of the term for the
tone one detects in the book. The translation “mere breath,” as I have suggested,
allows for connotative multivalency. In other words, Qoheleth may bespeak both
pessimism and enjoyment, depending on the context and the referents of ‫הבל‬.
This move is theologically significant because of its implications for the doctrine
of creation one locates in the text. If ‫ הבל‬may refer to everything (‫)הכל‬, and it is
a necessarily negative term, then what kind of judgment is Qoheleth casting
on creation (Eccl. 1:2; 12:8)? Yet, if ‫ הבל‬does not necessarily imply a negative
judgment, it may not be denigrating all of creation but simply referring to its
contingency. In other words, if creation is “mere breath,” it could easily return to
the nothingness whence it came, save for the governing and preserving work of
Qoheleth’s mysterious God. How, then, does Qoheleth use this multivalent term,
and what does this usage imply about his understanding of reality? Intimately
tied to these questions is the topic of perception and epistemology in Ecclesiastes,
to which I now move.
60
See Christianson, Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries, p. 99.
61
62
Miller, Symbol and Rhetoric, p. 15.
63
www.Ebook777.com
Perception and epistemology
In the introduction, I engaged the work of both Craig Bartholomew and

Oliver O’Donovan, each of whom ascribe special significance to Qoheleth’s
epistemology. Likewise, Fox asserts: “The problem of epistemology is one of the
main concerns of [Qoheleth’s] book—in a sense, the central one.”64 Regardless of
how much or what type of an empiricist one believes Qoheleth to be, or whether
one finds Qoheleth’s empiricism praiseworthy or blameworthy, it is the high
density of perceptual and reflective language in Ecclesiastes that has ignited
particular interest in Qoheleth’s methodology and epistemology. Therefore,
I will begin this section with a brief survey of Qoheleth’s heavy use of perceptual
language, especially in the royal testament, in order to provide an exegetical
basis for considering Qoheleth’s epistemology. Then, I will suggest that, though
O’Donovan and Bartholomew move in the direction of theological-ethical
reflection on Qoheleth’s search for knowledge, there is little deliberation beyond
the question of Qoheleth’s epistemological starting place and the suggestion that,
if he had just begun where Proverbs does, he could have avoided his errors and
frustration.
My outline of Ecclesiastes indicates that the search for knowledge, along
with the expression of humanity’s inability to “find out” God’s works “under
the sun,” is crucial to Qoheleth’s story. In the first half of the book, Qoheleth
narrates his own observations about various deeds under the sun, while in
the second half, he stresses the incomprehensibility of God’s own deeds in the
world. Punctuating both halves of the book at crucial places is the so-called
carpe diem chorus, which I shall consider in greater detail below. In this
section, I will focus especially on Qoheleth’s use of perceptual language in the
royal testament, as his account of his own search for wisdom and knowledge,
as well as his eventual resolve, has a particular bearing on what one may call his
“perceptual ethics.”
While ‫ הבל‬may well signify the primary Leitwort of Ecclesiastes, perception is
the theme that both encapsulates other Leitwörter and determines the direction
for interpreting the “mere breath” metaphor. In other words, how Qoheleth
perceives reality determines how he applies ‫ הבל‬within a given context. One
may discern a general pattern to Qoheleth’s perceptual process by looking at his
deployment of several lexemes, especially in Eccl. 1:12–2:26. First, ‫“( ראה‬seeing”)
is the verb that signifies the physiological act of observation, though it can also
64
www.Ebook777.com
signify the entire perceptual process (as when one understands a concept and
verbally responds “I see.”). In Ecclesiastes, the verb refers to “the perception of
data,”65 careful and critical contemplation,66 and the “inference of conclusions of
the basis of [the] data.”67 There are no fewer than forty-three occurrences of ‫ראה‬
in Ecclesiastes, making it a more frequent lexeme than ‫הבל‬.68
The Qal perfect, first common singular form of the verb (‫ )ראיתי‬often begins
the narration of a new experience for Qoheleth, and it is repeated to serve as a
signal to the reader that Qoheleth is narrating a different experience than that
signified by the previous usage (see, for instance, Eccl. 3:10, 16). At other times,
Qoheleth more explicitly makes the reader aware that he is narrating a new
experience by using concrete images of “facing” (‫פנה‬, see Eccl. 2:12) or “turning”
(‫שׁוב‬, see Eccl. 4:1, 7) combined with ‫ ראה‬in the Qal infinitive construct form
(‫לראות‬, see Eccl. 2:12) or in the Qal imperfect, first singular form (‫ואראה‬, see
Eccl. 4:1, 7). The usage of ‫ פנה‬and ‫שׁוב‬, like the usage of ‫הבל‬, describes Qoheleth’s
process in concrete-metaphorical terms. While Qoheleth’s quest could be
interpreted as merely involving the mind, these verbs provide the process with
an active, physical quality, making the turn from one part of the narration to
another visually explicit. As Alter says, “[Qoheleth] turns around, turns back,
like a man in a restless pursuit of some maddeningly elusive quarry, trying to
find true wisdom.”69 As will be evident in Chapters 2 and 3, the restlessness Alter
recognizes is significant. Qoheleth moves from one place to the next, with an
insatiable need to observe everything his eyes may behold. The sense of sight
provides the initial way of engaging reality. Once engaged, Qoheleth begins to
process that which he sees.
Having observed reality with his eyes, Qoheleth begins to process his
observations, both rationally and emotionally, in his ‫“( לב‬heart”). Enns lists a
total of thirty-four occurrences of this term in the book of Ecclesiastes.70 The
‫ לב‬is the instrument by which Qoheleth seeks and judges his experiences. It is
“the decision-making organ in ancient Near Eastern anthropology”;71 and “[i]n
biblical physiology, the heart is the organ of understanding, though sometimes
65
66
Fox, A Time to Tear Down, p. 183. Here, Fox is translating the usage of “(prüfendes) betrachten,” by
Diethelm Michel in Diethelm Michel, “Untersuchungen zur Eigenart des Buches Qohelet,” BZAW
183 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1989), pp. 25–30.
67
68
Enns lists all the occurrences of this root (Ecclesiastes, p. 26).
69
70
Enns, Ecclesiastes, p. 26.
71
Seow, Ecclesiastes, p. 120.
www.Ebook777.com
it is also associated with feeling.”72 That the ‫ לב‬is the location of understanding,
decision-making, and feeling means that it involves the “whole person.”73
Qoheleth’s investigation is neither casual nor purely mental,74 but demands the
entirety of his being. Qoheleth “mentions his heart twelve times in 1:12–2:26.... He
speaks of it so frequently ... because he is reflecting on the process of perception
and discovery, and the heart has a central role in this process.”75 The central
role of the heart is evident from the beginning of Qoheleth’s investigation (see
Eccl. 1:13). It both directs Qoheleth to pursue wisdom and processes that which
Qoheleth sees. Qoheleth’s usage of both the verbal and nominal forms of ‫ידע‬
(knowing) indicates the product of the heart’s activities. There are no fewer than
thirty occurrences of this root in Qoheleth’s story.76 I will reserve more substantial
discussion on knowledge according to Qoheleth for the end of this section.
The perceptual process culminates finally in speech. Qoheleth uses two
lexemes for speech in order to report his findings: ‫ אמר‬and ‫דבר‬. In some instances,
it seems that Qoheleth employs these terms interchangeably (compare, for
instance, the usage of ‫ דבר‬with ‫ לב‬in Eccl. 1:16; 2:15 with the similar usage of
‫ אמר‬in Eccl. 3:17-18). However, it seems that ‫ דבר‬carries a deeper theological
significance than ‫ אמר‬throughout Ecclesiastes. Interestingly, though ‫ דבר‬occurs
no fewer than thirty times in Ecclesiastes, it does not make Enns’s list of lexemes
that are significant for Qoheleth’s theology.77 Here, I shall only mention a couple
of instances. The plural construct nominal form, ‫דברי‬, is the very first word in the
book, introducing Qoheleth’s “words” (Eccl. 1:1). Further, the epilogist employs
the term when laying down the “final word” (‫סוף דבר‬, see. Eccl. 12:13) of the book
(the double imperative to fear God and keep God’s commandments), which is
spoken after “all has been heard.” Thus,‫ דבר‬is present in both the prologue and
the epilogue and throughout the book. I suggest that it is a more theologically
significant term than Enns allows, and in the final chapter, I will expand on this
suggestion.
Though Qoheleth does not formulaically follow the pattern I have depicted
above—observe, process, come to know, respond—in the course of his
reflections, the persistent use of these terms in the senses I have described is
72
Alter, The Wisdom Books, p. 347. See also Gordis, who refers to the ‫ לב‬as the “seat of understanding.”
He mentions also that the term is a synonym for “understanding” in Prov. 15:32; 19:8; Eccl. 10:3,
in Robert Gordis, Koheleth—The Man and His World, Texts and Studies of the Jewish Theological
Seminary of America, vol. XIX (New York: Bloch Publishing Company, 1955), p. 199.
73
74
75
76
Enns, Ecclesiastes, p. 26.
77
Enns, Ecclesiastes, pp. 25–6.
www.Ebook777.com
evidence of a concerted effort on Qoheleth’s part to “observe and report,” to

see, interpret, and respond. The perceptual problem for Qoheleth is twofold: he
desires to exceed his epistemological limits, and God is the one who ensures the
enforcement of these limits. Fox suggests that it is not simply the recognition
of epistemological limits that is Qoheleth’s innovation, but that it is his modus
operandi for obtaining knowledge in the first place.78 That, in Qoheleth’s wisdom
methodology, knowledge is a product of autonomous reason’s processing of what
one has observed rather than something learned from a sapiential tradition,
is significant when thinking of Qoheleth’s place in biblical wisdom. Fox well
summarizes the distinction: “In brief, if one could ask a more conventional sage,
‘How do you know this?’ I believe he would answer: ‘Because I learned it.’ To
this question Qohelet would reply: ‘Because I saw it.’ The shift is profound.”79
As I indicated in the introduction, there are different ways of interpreting
Qoheleth’s relationship to traditional wisdom. While some suggest that there is a
radical break from or at least a deep crisis within biblical wisdom, others, taking
into account the possibility of narrative development, see Qoheleth eventually
landing at the starting place of Proverbs, namely, the fear of God.
Ecclesiastes, on Bartholomew’s reading especially, narrates something of an
epistemological conversion. At first, Qoheleth searches for the kind of creation
order that Proverbs articulates, but in all the wrong ways. He pursues knowledge
autonomously rather than starting with the “fear of the LORD.” However,
the injunction to the would-be sage to remember the Creator in the days of
youth (Eccl. 12:1), as well as the frame-narrator’s imperative to fear God and
keep God’s commandments (Eccl. 12:14), gives the impression that Qoheleth
has finally arrived by the end of his journey at the same epistemological
starting place of Proverbs. While O’Donovan and Bartholomew both attempt
to interpret Qoheleth’s perceptual process in terms significant for Christian
ethical reflection, it seems that their primary motivation is to make a case for
the overall theological-epistemological harmony of Ecclesiastes and Proverbs,
leaving little room for more substantial engagement beyond the question of the
“starting place.” In other words, they are more interested in the question of how
Qoheleth knows what he knows than they are in the question of how Qoheleth’s
way of perceiving reality affects both his mind and his body, as well as the lives
of those around him. Therefore, it is worth asking whether there is something
particularly vicious about Qoheleth’s pursuit of knowledge that precipitates ill
78
79
Fox, A Time to Tear Down, p. 85
www.Ebook777.com
effects for himself and others. If so, is there a proposal in Ecclesiastes for an
alternative way to see reality?
Cult, economy, and politics
Just as Qoheleth’s empiricism is evidence of Greek influence, so too do his

comments regarding economics and politics reflect a Hellenistic provenance. The
composition of Ecclesiastes took place in a period in which Judah experienced
intense socioeconomic change, with effects lingering from the Persian empire and
the influence of Ptolemaic economic policies. Brown notes that “Beginning in the
Persian period (539–337 B.C.), certain socioeconomic developments occurred
that dramatically and indelibly changed the social landscape of Palestine.”80 From
the fifth century, preexilic Judah’s “largely subsistence agrarian economy ... became
increasingly commercialized.” People dealt for the first time with “standardized
monetary currency,” created to “facilitate commerce from Egypt to Persia.” Persian
hegemony also implemented “an efficient and aggressive system of taxation,” and
“Consequently, a new market-driven economy of global proportions emerged,
complete with many entrepreneurial opportunities.”81 Greek dominance only
intensified the situation for Judah. Judeans became immersed in Hellenistic
administration and commerce, struggling with a tension between partial
autonomy in governance with opportunities for economic prosperity and facing
pressure to increase the production of goods. The Ptolemies increased agricultural
output through the promotion of contour farming and irrigation. However, the
“economic boom” that ensued throughout the land through increased production
“hardly benefited the broad masses of the population.” Ptolemaic economic
policies cultivated a context where some could thrive but others could easily be
exploited. Qoheleth’s critical treatment of oppression and striving for gain, as well
as his sharp criticism of power, seem to have these economic realities in view (see,
for instance, Eccl. 4:1; 5:7-8; 6:2; and 8:9).82 Thus, the book was composed during
a period still experiencing the impact of intense socioeconomic change, including
commercialization, the standardization of currency, taxation, globalization, and
a market-based economy. The message of the book reflects both this background
and the intellectual background I have considered above.
80
Brown, Ecclesiastes, pp. 8–9.
81
Brown, Ecclesiastes, p. 9. See also Seow, Ecclesiastes, pp. 21–3.
82
Krüger, Qoheleth, pp. 20–1.
www.Ebook777.com
While commentators have sought to decipher Qoheleth’s precise posture

vis-à-vis those in power, they have by and large not considered what kind of
ethical claims Qoheleth makes about life within such political contexts. Such is
also the case with economics. Commentators spend considerable time looking
at the socioeconomic context that prompts Qoheleth’s reflections on labor, the
land, and money, but have not sought to consider whether in his use of economic
language Qoheleth is making indicative claims about ethics even as he reflects
on economic existence. Finally, interpreters draw attention to the sparseness
of “religious” language, yet they do not seek to relate what religious language is
present to these broader realities. Therefore, I wish to consider especially what the
interrelationships are between cult, economy, and politics, as well as what sort of
ethical vision for economic-political existence in particular Qoheleth is offering.
Time
In the introduction, I suggested that one contribution of this book will be to

draw attention to the eschatological significance of Ecclesiastes. While I have
hinted above at the eschatological significance of Qoheleth’s closing poem, I wish
to inquire further into the significance of another mashal, the famous “catalog
of times,” particularly in terms of eschatology. Is it significant that the LXX
renders the Leitwort ‫ עת‬with kairὸV? In his study of ‫עת‬, John Wilch denies any
kairological significance in this poem,83 yet I aim to reconsider his conclusion,
asking whether there is there any relationship between the LXX translation and
the apocalyptic imagination of the NT. Further, how does the perspective on
time in Eccl. 3 relate to the seeming circularity of time in Eccl. 1:4-11 and the
linear dimension to Qoheleth’s narration? Finally, does Qoheleth’s theology of
time have any bearing on everyday ethics?
Carpe diem
Related closely to the theology of time in Ecclesiastes is the recurring chorus

that stresses the enjoyment of present quotidian life. The so-called carpe diem
83
John R. Wilch, Time and Event: An Exegetical Study of the Use of ‛ēth in the Old Testament in
Comparison to Other Temporal Expressions in Clarification of the Concept of Time (Leiden: E.J. Brill,
1969), pp. 121–2.
www.Ebook777.com
passages are structurally significant in Ecclesiastes. Yet, the semantic significance

of this chorus is a debated topic in both critical and precritical treatments of
Ecclesiastes. Therefore, here I will inquire into the function of this oft-repeated
refrain by examining the refrain’s contents and the intensification it undergoes in
its repetition throughout the book. Then, I will encounter interpretative options
and ask about the theological-ethical significance of these options.
In the section on structure and composition above, I quoted Perdue at length,
who notes that the carpe diem passages punctuate seven major sections of
Ecclesiastes, serving as structural guides for the book. Because they carry such
structural weight, the semantic function with which one credits these passages
will have a crucial bearing on how one will read the book as a whole. Therefore,
it is necessary to explore the contents of the chorus and its meaning. The first
occurrence of the so-called carpe diem chorus is Eccl. 2:24-26, which is the
conclusion to Qoheleth’s royal testament. In Eccl. 2:24-26, Qoheleth makes an
explicit turn that expresses a new understanding of reality. He begins by declaring,
“There is nothing better with the human than that he eat and drink and cause
his soul to see good in his labor” (Eccl. 2:24a). Qoheleth’s focus on what happens
to his self-produced inheritance at the time of his death is what provokes him
to hatred toward his labor in Eccl. 2:18. In the carpe diem passage, however,
Qoheleth is not seeking delight in what he amasses from his labor (‫מכל־עמלו‬,
see Eccl. 2:10), but rather is eating, drinking, and causing his soul to see good
in the labor (‫ )בעמלו‬itself.84 Moreover, Qoheleth acknowledges that this labor
itself is not an inheritance his own hands (‫ )ידי‬produce (Eccl. 2:11) but is from
the hand of God (‫מיד אלהים‬, see Eccl. 2:24). Earlier, Qoheleth seemed concerned
with what and who would come after him at his death. Yet what undergirds his
shift in Eccl. 2:24-26 is an implicit shift from an orientation toward the outcome
of achievements in the future to a focus on the present. He carries this emphasis
on the present with him in the repetition of the chorus.
Elsa Tamez says that the carpe diem message is the “unifying theme of the
discourse,” with “[e]ach repetition of the refrain includ[ing] different details; the
last one giv[ing] its most complete form.”85 The refrain not only receives different
details with each repetition, but also increases in intensification, such that in
the final two occurrences (Eccl. 9:7-10; 11:7-10), Qoheleth directly addresses
the reader with imperatives to enjoy life. The repetition of the refrain, then, not
only helps to structure the book, but also has a crescendo effect. What is left to
84
Brown also notices this distinction (Ecclesiastes, p. 38).
85
Tamez, When the Horizons Close, p. 25; cf. Perdue, The Sword and the Stylus, p. 208.
www.Ebook777.com
consider is, given this crescendo effect, what is the message Qoheleth is driving
through the usage of this refrain?
The two basic lines of interpretation of this passage, as with much of Ecclesiastes,
are the pessimistic reading and the positive reading. Along the pessimistic line,
Crenshaw emphasizes in his exegesis of Eccl. 2:24-26 that Qoheleth is not
making an indicative claim about what is good, but rather, given life’s futility,
there is nothing better than to enjoy food and drink while one is able.86 In his
theological commentary, commenting on the same passage, Treier shifts the
emphasis from “nothing better” to “from the hand of God,”87 interpreting the call
to enjoyment more positively. Is Qoheleth, then, abandoning himself to enjoying
the few pleasures in an otherwise futile existence or coming to recognize God’s
involvement in creaturely sustenance?
As I conveyed in the introduction, and as will be evident in the following
chapters, these basic lines of interpretation of Qoheleth’s chorus have been
operative for centuries. That the “abandonment to joy” option has been assumed
and then placed into the mouth of the fool illustrates that readers have long
wrestled with this chorus, unsure as they have been as to whether it advocates
hedonism or simple pleasure. What kind of speech-act is it then, and if read
positively, what does it say about God’s involvement in everyday existence?
Further, if this recurring passage is indeed a chorus, might there be any
significance in the Church learning to sing it?
Conclusion
In this chapter, I have proposed six topics arising from a close reading of
Ecclesiastes, which are pertinent to a theological-ethical exploration of work
within the thought world presented by Ecclesiastes. The six topics I have
encountered are: the significance of Solomon for Ecclesiastes; the meaning of
‫ ;הבל‬perception and epistemology; cult, economy, and politics; time; and the
significance of the so-called carpe diem passages. I have suggested that, while
critical engagement with Ecclesiastes helpfully brings these topics to the fore, it
must not stop at the mere level of detection (of, for instance, a certain kind of
epistemology), but must also ask what kind of problems the work of detection
poses for theology.
86
Crenshaw, Ecclesiastes, p. 89. See also Krüger, Qoheleth, pp. 71–2.
87
Treier, Proverbs & Ecclesiastes, p. 147.
www.Ebook777.com
I have stated that Ecclesiastes forces the “theological hand” of its interpreters,
but also that earlier readers are quicker to reveal their hand than critical
commentators. Such is the case with St Bonaventure and Martin Luther. Therefore,
in the next two chapters, I will encounter their commentaries on Ecclesiastes
so that they might assist my theological-ethical exploration of the six topics
I have raised here. I will look at both figures’ understanding of the Solomonic
significance of Ecclesiastes to see how their interpretations of his character
affect the overall tone of their exegesis. Bonaventure will assist me in uncovering
the multiple valences of ‫הבל‬, as well as the ethical significance of the pursuit
of knowledge. Luther, on the other hand, will help me further in clarifying the
relationship between cult, economy, and politics, as well as in sharpening my
understanding of the time concepts in Ecclesiastes and the significance of the
so-called carpe diem passages. I now move to Chapter 2, where I will engage the
exegesis of St Bonaventure.
www.Ebook777.com
Solomon’s Manual for Penitents:

St Bonaventure on Ecclesiastes
‘A divine word is every creature because each creature speaks of God. This
word the eye sees.’1
In the previous chapter, I formulated questions that theologians might pose

after serious engagement with salient themes from the book of Ecclesiastes
and its historical-critical commentators. I then suggested that two particular
figures from historical theology, St Bonaventure and Martin Luther, would assist
one’s encounter with these theological questions. In this chapter, I consider
Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiates in order to further probe questions
concerning two important themes: vanitas and perception. Concerning the
former, I will show how Bonaventure’s nuanced version of contemptus mundi
informs his appropriation of Hugh of St Victor’s notion of a triplex vanitas2 in
Ecclesiastes. I will argue that Bonaventure derives his version of contemptus
mundi from his metaphysics of emanation, exemplarity, and consummation. This
metaphysical vision enables him to read vanitas initially as referring to creation’s
mutability, which does not imply inherent sinfulness but rather creation’s
contingency upon the Creator. Yet, vanitas for Bonaventure is a multivalent
term, signifying different realities in different contexts. This multivalency allows
Bonaventure an interpretive flexibility that negotiates the tension between a
positive valuation of creation and a negative valuation of humanity’s dealings
with it. I will argue that by his use of the triplex vanitas concept, Bonaventure
conceives of the structure of Ecclesiastes according to the pattern of creation
and fall in Gen. 1–3, with Solomon showing vanitas to depict, in descending
1
St Bonaventure, Commentary on Ecclesiastes, ed. and trans. Robert J. Karris, O.F.M., and Campion
Murray, O.F.M., Works of St Bonaventure VII (St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute
Publications, 2005), p. 115.
2
QuarEd VI:5.
www.Ebook777.com
order, created mutability, the vanity of sin, and the vanity of guilt. I will focus
especially upon Bonaventure’s depiction of the vanitas mutabilitatis, as his
depiction speaks to that from which Solomon has fallen, as well as conveying
how it is a perceptual rupture that precipitates Solomon’s fall. After introducing
this perceptual rupture, I will proceed to the next section, which describes the
vice that moves Solomon from contemplation to sin and guilt.
In the section on perception, I will argue that Bonaventure improves upon
contemporary commentaries’ epistemological concerns by placing the theme of
perception within a more explicitly moral register, being faithful to the patristic
reading of the book as a penitential narrative of Solomon.3 Bonaventure interprets
the book’s perceptual language in moral terms by characterizing Solomon’s
intellectual pursuits as inhabiting the vice of curiositas, which resists contemplation
and instead expropriates the knowledge of objects from the knowledge of God.
Bonaventure illustrates from Solomon’s royal testament the character and
ramifications of curiositas in both the liberal and the mechanical arts. Thus,
there is a duplex curiositas that Solomon admits and for which he repents. In
relating Solomon’s story to curiositas, Bonaventure is drawing on an Augustinian
tradition. Therefore, I will consider the contours of Augustine’s articulation of the
vice of curiositas before looking particularly at his depiction of the Manichees in
the Confessions. I will suggest that Bonaventure’s portrayal of Solomon’s curiositas,
particularly in Eccl. 1:12–2:26, reflects the broad features in Augustine’s teaching.
Also, whereas Augustine depicts the Manichees as supreme curiosi, Bonaventure
himself counters contemporary culprits, namely, the “Athenians.”
In warning against the curiositas with which the discovery of new
philosophical sources tempts a young scholar, Bonaventure implicitly invites
the student to assume the contemplative posture from which he has shown
Solomon to have fallen. Thus, in the conclusion of this chapter, I will suggest
ways in which Bonaventure’s exposition may be instructive as I move in the
direction of locating an ethic of work in the thought world presented by
Ecclesiastes. At the same time, I will ask some critical questions that anticipate
my treatment of Luther in the following chapter. Before moving to consider the
two primary themes of this chapter, vanitas and curiositas, I will explore the
place of Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes within his broader work
and his historical setting, the place of his commentary within the interpretive
tradition that precedes him, and the significance of the character of Solomon for
his interpretation of Ecclesiastes.
3
WSB VII:86.
www.Ebook777.com
Solomon’s Manual for Penitents: St Bonaventure on Ecclesiastes 67
The context of Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes
An “Academic Commentary”
Dominic Monti says with respect to Bonaventure’s commentaries on Ecclesiastes
and John that,
viewing the Biblical text chiefly as providing the source of received ecclesiastical
doctrine, Bonaventure discerns in it the elements of theological systematization,
furnishing the solution to current dogmatic or ethical issues. These expositions
of Scripture, then, are primarily works of academic theology, and this basic fact
does much to explain both the achievements and the limitations of Bonaventure’s
exegesis in them.4
Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes, composed between 1253 and 1257,

reflects this dogmatic and academic posture in both its polemical undertones
and its style. Christopher Cullen suggests, in fact, that “[Bonaventure’s]
commentary on Ecclesiastes presents some of his most central and profound
ideas.”5 The commentary belongs to the period of Bonaventure’s Scholastic
work at the University of Paris, which precedes his tenure as Minister General
of the Franciscan Order, during which he composed his most famous works,
including his lives of St Francis and mystical works such as the Itinerarium. In
the final years of his life, Bonaventure handled the challenge of Averroism and
the conflict between the seculars and the mendicants, mostly through lectures
(collationes).6 The issues from his final years, however, had also affected his
Scholastic career.7 As will be evident in this chapter’s section on curiositas, the
struggle to discern how properly to appropriate Aristotle (and the sciences in
general) in Christian theology comes to the forefront in Bonaventure’s treatment
of Ecclesiastes. Bonaventure also speaks to the controversy between the seculars
4
Dominic V. Monti, “Bonaventure’s Interpretation of Scripture in his Exegetical Works,” PhD diss.,
University of Chicago, 1979, microfilm, p. 79; see also pp. 143–4.
5
Cullen continues: “The world is a sign from God: ‘Every creature is the divine word, because it
speaks of God.’ To love the world above God is to confuse the sign for its giver. Charity or true
love involves recognizing the sign as a sign, and thereby turning one’s love to the sign giver.” See
Christopher M. Cullen, Bonaventure, Great Medieval Thinkers (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2006), p. 19. The themes that Cullen introduces are major themes of this chapter.
6
Scholars recognize the Collationes in Hexaëmeron, though incomplete due to his premature death
during the Second Council of Lyon (1274), to be Bonaventure’s most mature work, offering the
clearest synthesis of his theological vision. See J. Guy Bougerol, O.F.M., Introduction to the Works of
Bonaventure, trans. José de Vinck (Paterson, NJ: St. Anthony Guild Press, 1964), p. 131.
7
For a fuller chronology of Bonaventure’s life, see Thomas Reist, O.F.M. Conv., Saint Bonaventure as
a Biblical Commentator: A Translation and Analysis of His Commentary on Luke, XVIII, 34-XIX, 42
(New York: University Press of America, 1985), pp. 1–13; and Bougerol, Introduction, pp. 171–7.
www.Ebook777.com
and the mendicants at the University of Paris when he vindicates monastic life
in his commentary.8 Though his commentary does not carry the same polemical
flair that Luther’s will, it nonetheless reflects the struggles that he and his more
famous contemporary, Thomas Aquinas, faced at Paris.
Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes also reflects its provenance in its
depth and style. By the time of its composition, Bonaventure had completed his
first cycle of biblical training as a baccalaureus biblicus, in which he would offer
literal readings of the Old and New Testaments cursorie under the supervision
of a master. J. Guy Bougerol suggests that during this period, Bonaventure
attended to this reading with such rigor that his mind would function much
like a biblical concordance in his later writings, with one word calling to mind
several biblical passages at once. The Scripture indices in his works are proof
of this rigorous engagement with the biblical text.9 Bonaventure had also
lectured for two years on Lombard’s Sentences as a baccalaurius sententiarius.
The Commentary on Ecclesiastes finds its place in Bonaventure’s second biblical
cycle, following his work in Lombard’s Sentences. This is the period “during
which the teaching of a master was received in the form of a more profound
exegesis of one of the Sacred Books.”10 As a master, Bonaventure was qualified
to read the Bible cursorie with younger students, now having the authority to
supervise students himself.
There are three salient features of the Commentary on Ecclesiastes that reflect
its Scholastic classroom setting. First is Bonaventure’s interpretation of Scripture
with Scripture, which comprises roughly half of his interpretive moves.11 One
is able to witness Bonaventure’s concordance-like knowledge of Scripture at
work in the commentary. Another striking feature of Bonaventure’s work on
Ecclesiastes is the heavy emphasis he places on the literal sense.12 Therefore, the
relatively sparse moves to the spiritual sense are significant in that they indicate
those places where the literal sense is either problematic in terms of relating to
the mysteries of redemption and principles of morality, or significant in drawing
one toward a deeper meaning.13
The Seraphic Doctor’s use of the quaestio is the third salient feature that
reflects the commentary’s Scholastic provenance. Monti suggests that the use
8
See, for instance, WSB VII:200–1.
9
Bougerol, Introduction, p. 87.
10
Bougerol, Introduction, p. 87.
11
WSB VII:9.
12
Monti, “Bonaventure’s Interpretation of Scripture,” pp. 93–101.
13
For Bonaventure’s three rules of interpretation, which includes a description of the interplay
between the literal and the spiritual sense, see WSB IX:20–1.
www.Ebook777.com
of the quaestio is “[t]he most striking and original feature of Bonaventure’s

commentary.â•¯... Here is where Bonaventure’s concept of Ecclesiastes truly comes
to the fore.”14 The quaestio is a Scholastic method that Bonaventure uses in this
commentary and his Commentary on the Gospel of John (though not in his
Commentary on the Gospel of Luke) to supplement his interpretation of Scripture
with Scripture. Bonaventure’s use of this method makes up around a third of
his exegesis of Ecclesiastes (there are thirty-four quaestiones throughout the
commentary), and one may compare the method to an excursus that a modern
commentator may employ to treat difficult issues of interpretation or particularly
important concepts.15 The quaestio was an important tool for Scholastic education.
One would hear a lecture in the morning and a disputation on a critical point
from the lecture in the afternoon. The master would pose the question, and a
bachelor (a senior student) would respond to objections that other students
posed. The master would conclude the quaestio by summarizing “the state of the
question.”16 The quaestiones in Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes cover
a range of issues from natural science to hermeneutical method, and they “show
Bonaventure at his creative best.”17 Given the myriad interpretative problems
Ecclesiastes poses for the attentive reader, the quaestio method, along with the
interpretation of Scripture with Scripture, suits the nature of the book. The use
of the quaestio enables the Seraphic Doctor to encounter the doctrinal problems
Ecclesiastes poses: “The book—in its literal sense—is presenting doctrine to the
contemporary reader. Hence the text poses questions that must be resolved by
the theologian. The move from expositio to quaestio is required by this quest for
understanding.”18 It will be evident, however, that while the move to quaestio
helps Bonaventure explain difficulties in Ecclesiastes, at times it also enables him
to resolve those difficulties according to the monastic ideal. Such is the case with
the so-called carpe diem passages.
The Seraphic Doctor’s use of the hermeneutical tools described above renders
compelling arguments concerning the message of Ecclesiastes. Apparently, his
contemporaries agreed, seeing that his commentary became “a standard aid to
study for masters who lectured on Ecclesiastes,” and was welcomed “as a new
14
Monti, “Bonaventure’s Interpretation of Scripture,” p. 101.
15
See WSB VII:11–12; cf. Fox, A Time to Tear Down, pp. 194–206 for a stellar example of an excursus in
a contemporary commentary (this particular excursus deals with the topic of time in Ecclesiastes).
16
WSB VII:12, quoting J. A. Weisheipl, “Scholastic Method,” in New Catholic Encyclopedia, 2nd edn,
Vol. 12 (Detroit: Thomson Gale, 2003), p. 747.
17
WSB VII:13.
18
Monti, “Bonaventure’s Interpretation of Scripture,” p. 102.
www.Ebook777.com
contribution to the study of ‘Solomon.’â•›”19 Before exploring features of this “new

contribution,” it will be necessary briefly to examine the interpretive tradition
that precedes Bonaventure, especially in its call to contemptus mundi.
Bonaventure’s place within the interpretative tradition

Bonaventure’s exegesis of Ecclesiastes assumes a pivotal place in the book’s
reception history within Christian theology, in that he offers novel approaches
to the text while simultaneously dwelling in the mainstream tradition of
interpretation. It will be evident in the next chapter how Luther’s rejection of the
monastic ideal enables the Reformer to make a clear break with the tradition,
reading Solomon’s recurring chorus (the first of which is Eccl. 2:24-26) as a call
to enjoy God’s gifts in one’s economic and political vocations. Contrariwise, as
a Franciscan who has found it necessary to defend the cause of the mendicant
orders, Bonaventure cannot read the so-called carpe diem passages as gospel
in the way Luther does. Yet, he nonetheless prepares the way for Luther in his
positive valuation of the gift of creation. In this section, I aim to introduce the
mainstream Christian interpretation of Ecclesiastes that precedes Bonaventure
and to hint at the ways in which Bonaventure both appropriates this tradition
and departs from it, with the rest of the chapter expanding on these features.
The mainstream Christian tradition of Ecclesiastes interpretation that
precedes Bonaventure, which he both appropriates and modifies, is the
contemptus mundi tradition. This tradition finds its roots in Jerome’s translation
of and commentary on Ecclesiastes, particularly his exposition of the significance
of a central term.20 To recall the previous chapter’s discussion, Jerome translates
the Leitwort ‫ הבל‬with the Latin vanitas. While, at a literal level, the Hebrew term
connotes the concrete metaphor “mere breath,”21 Jerome follows the example
of the LXX (which translates ‫ הבל‬with mataióthV) in rendering a translation
that involves more abstract conclusions, likely entailing negative connotations.
If vanitas does entail a negative judgment, and if all is vanitas (Eccl. 1:2; 12:8),
then what kind of judgment is Solomon casting on creation? Several early
Christian interpreters suggest that Solomon is calling the reader to despise
the vain world. In Origen’s well-known schema for reading the traditionally
19
Beryl Smalley, Medieval Exegesis of Wisdom Literature: Essays by Beryl Smalley, ed. Roland E.
Murphy (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1986), pp. 39–40.
20
21
www.Ebook777.com
Solomonic wisdom corpus, Ecclesiastes serves the purpose of teaching one to

renounce the world and to long for things eternal.22 John of Damascus, in his
Barlaam and Joseph, appropriates this suggestion severely: “[it is the] world we
have been taught to love not at all but rather to hate it with all our heart.”23
While readings like Damascene’s give Luther reason to draw a caricature of
this interpretative tradition,24 some who propose versions of contemptus mundi
offer more complex renditions than Luther allows.25 Christianson suggests that
Bonaventure’s contribution is the most nuanced of all,26 and Beryl Smalley
has provided several reasons why Bonaventure’s particular modification of
contemptus mundi is so compelling.
Smalley notes that Bonaventure’s exegesis of Ecclesiastes “had a tremendous
vogue” in the classroom and in successive treatments of the book.27 The reasons she
provides for the enthusiastic response include Bonaventure’s judicious satisfaction
of piety in the commentary’s prologue (itself unmistakably Bonaventurian in its
character)28 and two ways in which he provided “a fresh religious colour to the
traditional story of Ecclesiastes’ purpose in writing his book.”29 First, he seems
to be the first interpreter to have detected and resolved a contradiction between
Origen’s schema and the contemptus mundi tradition. Origen’s schema has the
student ascend from Proverbs to Ecclesiastes to Song of Songs as three stages
of the spiritual life. These stages correspond to the three schools of philosophy.
Proverbs teaches ethical living, while the climax of the ascent, Song of Songs,
teaches logic, which in the imagination of medieval interpreters is equated
with theology, “the science of divine contemplation.” Between ethics and logic
22
Origen, The Song of Songs: Commentary and Homilies, Ancient Christian Writers, 26, trans. R. P.
Lawson (New York: The Newman Press, 1957), p. 44.
23
J. Robert Wright (ed.), Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Ancient Christian Commentary on
Scripture: Old Testament, IX (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2005), p. 203.
24
LW 15:4–5. It will be evident in the next chapter, however that Luther himself offers a revision of
contemptus mundi.
25
Interestingly, Jerome’s contemporary in the East, John Chrysostom (in his Homilies on Ephesians 12)
sounds like Luther when he emphasizes that it is not the works of God in creation that are vain but
the deeds that humans perform to magnify their own greatness. Chrysostom does, however, suggest
that “all things in the present life” are vain; this contradicts Luther’s continual emphasis upon life
in the present, which will be a topic of consideration in the next chapter. The distinction between
Chrysostom and Damascene is evidence that well before Bonaventure, there are multiple accounts
of contemptus mundi, as well as multiple interpretations of vanitas. See J. R. Wright, Proverbs,
Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, pp. 191–5.
26
27
Smalley, Medieval Exegesis of Wisdom Literature, p. 39.
28
Smalley, Medieval Exegesis of Wisdom Literature, pp. 40, 43. Smalley says, “[Bonaventure’s] prologue
to Ecclesiastes expresses his personality and says something positive. One could distinguish it as his,
and only his, in an age when prologues were as interchangeable and as frequently borrowed as pens
or bicycles are among students today” (p. 43).
29
www.Ebook777.com
is physics, which in Origen’s account is the topic of Ecclesiastes. Herein lies the
contradiction. How can Ecclesiastes teach one simultaneously to flee the world
and to study rigorously its physical features?30
In responding to this contradiction, Bonaventure offers a version of contemptus
mundi that both vindicates the study of physics and continues the contemplative
concern. In doing so, Bonaventure joins knowledge, which is the contemplation
of God “in God’s works,” and wisdom, which is the contemplation of God “as
God.”31 According to Smalley, “Ecclesiastes [gives] him an opportunity to enlarge
on his favourite theme: wisdom as a means to sanctification.”32 Yet, as will be
evident by the end of this chapter, because he still interprets Ecclesiastes as the
purgative step on the contemplative ladder, he is only able in the end to imply
the wisdom that is the contemplation of God as God.33 I will show, on the other
hand, that Luther, in advocating a sapientia negativa through a literal reading of
Ecclesiastes, actually allows for a direct experience of the divine in the secular
vocations that Solomon celebrates, not obliging one to make the ascent to Song
of Songs to experience the climax of wisdom.
The second way in which Bonaventure provides a fresh yet pious approach to
Ecclesiastes is by taking note of Solomon’s singularem modum in Ecclesiastes34 and
arranging his exposition accordingly. He follows Gregory the Great in reading
the book as a dialogical work.35 Because Ecclesiastes presents itself in the mode
of a disputation, Bonaventure finds the practice of using quaestiones helpful for
30
Smalley, Medieval Exegesis of Wisdom Literature, pp. 40–3.
31
WSB VII:333.
32
33
In stressing the importance of this framework for Bonaventure, I am registering a disagreement with
Endel Kallas, who suggests that “Unlike Hugh of St Victor, Bonaventure places no great importance
upon the relative significance of the three texts that comprise the Solomon corpus. Instead, it is
maintained by Bonaventure in his exposition of verse 1:1 that Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and the Song
of Songs are simply designed for three types of devout individuals: the novice, the proficient and
the advanced. Beyond this, no attempt is made by Bonaventure to fashion the respective texts
into an hierarchical scheme, or to grade their importance in accordance with the ‘meditative’ or
‘contemplative’ stages of mystical life.” See Endel Kallas, “Ecclesiastes: Traditium et Fides Evangelica.
The Ecclesiastes Commentaries of Martin Luther, Philip Melanchthon, and Johannes Brenz
Considered within the History of Interpretation,” PhD diss., Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley,
1979, p. 156. I suggest, on the other hand, that Bonaventure clearly keeps Origen’s scheme in view.
Bonaventure says, “So [Solomon] wrote three books, namely, Proverbs in which he teaches a son
how to live wisely in this world; Ecclesiastes, in which he teaches contempt for present realities; and
The Song of Songs, in which he teaches the love of what is heavenly, especially, of the Bridegroom
himself ” (WSB VII:74–5). Insofar as he maintains the contemptus mundi line of reasoning, however
nuanced it is, Bonaventure is working within the classical framework.
34
QuarEd VI:49.
35
Smalley, Medieval Exegesis of Wisdom Literature, p. 43. See Gregory the Great, The Dialogues of
Saint Gregory the Great, ed. Edmund G. Gardner (Merchantville, NJ: Evolution Publishing, 2010),
pp. 180–4 (Bk. IV, Ch. 4).
www.Ebook777.com
his exposition. Commentators after Bonaventure “took [his] quaestiones as their

starting point and sometimes copied, sometimes modified them. The tradition
had been established that the method in expounding Ecclesiastes was to proceed
by quaestiones. Bonaventure had set a fashion which was accepted as suitable and
convenient.”36 As will be evident in the next chapter, Luther sets himself apart
from those who follow Bonaventure’s lead by rejecting the dialogical reading.
While I have already touched on Bonaventure’s use of the quaestio method, I will
describe his take on the dialogical reading of Ecclesiastes in more detail when
elaborating on the book’s “formal cause” in the section below on the character of
Solomon. First, however, it is necessary to summarize his take on the book as a
whole by introducing his proposal for the “fourfold cause” of Ecclesiastes.
When one encounters Bonaventure’s treatment of Ecclesiastes, one senses a
tension between desiring to uphold contemptus mundi on the one hand, and on
the other hand desiring to maintain the metaphysical vision and corresponding
theology of creation that permeate the rest of his works. In the introduction to
the commentary, after describing the path to blessedness that it is the sage’s duty
to teach and the role of Ecclesiastes in wisdom education (following Origen), the
Seraphic Doctor employs an Aristotelian framework in articulating the “fourfold
cause” of the book. In naming the final cause, he plainly states that the “aim of the
book is the contempt of present realities,” clearly following the tradition, but, as I
shall show, nuancing it in significant ways. The material cause is present realities
“in so far as they are vanities.” The formal cause is the weighing by a preacher of
the opinions of both the wise and the foolish in order to convey to listeners the
one truth. Finally, the efficient cause is the experience of Solomon himself, who
took part in the vanities he describes.37 This list of causes ought to beg several
questions from those listening: What is the meaning of contemptus mundi, given
the goodness of creation? How can vanitas, which implies nothingness, be a
matter of study? Why would a sage consider the teaching of fools? How is a
carnal man like Solomon able to possess the ethos of the sage par excellence?
These questions summarize the content of Quaestio 1.38 I will consider each part
of this quaestio in this chapter, as together they introduce the key features of
Bonaventure’s exegesis of Ecclesiastes. I begin by encountering the questions
concerning the formal and efficient causes as I explore the significance of
Solomon’s character for Bonaventure.
36
37
WSB VII:75–6.
38
WSB VII:77–7.
www.Ebook777.com
The character of Solomon
In the first chapter, I noted that most contemporary scholarship on Ecclesiastes

rejects Solomonic authorship. While some maintain that the character of
Solomon is still important for interpreting the book, others grant Solomon
less significance. Questions (and proposals) abound concerning the identity of
Qoheleth, his office, his attitude toward Greek philosophy, and whether he is
like a hero with tragic flaws or an exemplar of realistic wisdom. While I assume
that Solomon is not the actual author of Ecclesiastes, I also affirm that one ought
not to dismiss altogether the significance of his character for the book. Both
of the commentators whose work forms the basis of this book’s core, precisely
becauseÂ€ of their assumption of Solomonic authorship, provide substantial
theological answers to the critical questions concerning Qoheleth’s identity and
role in the community of faith. Therefore, in both of the central chapters, I will
look at the significance of Solomon’s character for each author’s exegesis. While
Luther pairsÂ€ Solomon with Jesus, as both present positive ethical proposals
for the kingdoms of the left and right hands (with Solomon preaching to the
left-hand kingdom and Jesus preaching to the right-hand kingdom), Bonaventure
pairs Solomon with Adam,39 reading Ecclesiastes in a penitential mode. Yet,
Solomon is able to retain the ethos and pedagogical approach necessary for a
teacher of wisdom. An examination of Bonaventure’s unpacking of the formal and
efficient causes of Ecclesiastes in Quaestio 1 will help to clarify the significance of
Bonaventure’s interpretation of Solomon’s character.
Solomon’s experience: The efficient cause of Ecclesiastes

Simply put, the efficient cause of Ecclesiastes is Solomon himself. Bonaventure
defends this point on the basis of the practice of penance, the distinction between
office and person, and the divine inspiration of the Church’s scriptural canon.
Bonaventure employs these arguments in his response to the three rebuttals in
the sed contra concerning the efficient cause. First, Bonaventure’s interlocutor
suggests that because Solomon was carnal and sinful, when he “preaches
spirituality (praedicat spiritualitatem)” it will be cause more for scandal than
for edification.40 Bonaventure replies that according to Jerome, who himself is
39
Bonaventure employs Gen. 3:19 five times throughout the course of his exegesis of Ecclesiastes to
convey the effects of Adam’s guilt upon his descendants, in both their labor and their death (WSB
VII:99, 150, 248, 327, 411).
40
WSB VII:85; QuarEd VI:8.
www.Ebook777.com
drawing from the Jewish interpretive tradition, Solomon wrote Ecclesiastes while
doing penance.41 There is evidence of this act in the text itself. Solomon sets the
penitential tone in the book’s heading, where he says “The words of Ecclesiastes,
son of David, king of Jerusalem.”42 Whereas in Proverbs, Solomon presents his
own name and indicates the total scope of his reign by referring to himself as
“king of Israel,” in Ecclesiastes he limits the scope by only referring to Jerusalem.
This narrowing, according to Bonaventure, is an act of humiliation, in which
Solomon weakens the declaration of his power.43 Solomon’s self-introduction
in Eccl. 1:12-13a (“I, Ecclesiastes, was king in Jerusalem. And I proposed in my
mind to seek and search out wisely concerning all things that are done under
the sun.”)44 summarizes his humiliating downfall by showing how, though he
had possessed the suitability to study divine works in nature, he succumbed to
philosophical curiosity.45 Like the Athenians, Solomon attempted to exceed his
intellectual limitations, turning a laudable exercise (studying natural realities)
into a vice.46
In narrating his own fall, Solomon models the practice of penance to the
reader. Song of Songs, then, is the eucharistic feast that follows the sacrament
of penance in Ecclesiastes.47 It is helpful to keep in mind the relative temporal
proximity of the Commentary on Ecclesiastes to the Fourth Lateran Council
of 1215, which officially obliged Christians to confess their sins annually, to
practice the penance assigned to them, and then to receive the sacrament of the
Eucharist. While its theological comments concerning confession, penance, and
the Eucharist are not especially novel, Lateran IV “was the first general council
to say it officially, to the extent of making the sacrament of penance binding on
41
WSB VII:86.
42
WSB VII:28.
43
WSB VII:92.
44
WSB VII:29.
45
WSB VII:119.
46
Interestingly, Luther makes a similar point regarding Aristotle and Plato (see LW 15:103).
47
Indeed, in a Lenten sermon on Jn 6:2 [“A great crowd followed him because they saw the signs he
worked upon those who were sick,” (WSB XII:28)], Bonaventure shows himself to read Song of
Songs eucharistically. He says that “[the display of divine goodness] caused the sign of charity and
benevolence in the charitable exhibition of one’s own flesh against the infirmity of rancor and envy.
Whence The Song of Songs 8:6 says: Put me as a seal upon your heart and as a seal upon your arm,
for as strong as death is love, as enduring as the grave is longing. Even if the Son of God caused a great
sign of charity and benevolence in the incarnation, by giving himself as a brother of the human race
by assuming human nature, and in the passion by giving himself as the price of our redemption
by bearing the punishment; nevertheless, the greater sign of love was when he gave over his own
body to humanity as refreshing food. For in the other two ways there is a certain separation and
division between the one who gives and what is given, but in this way there is a wondrous and
boundless union between the one who feeds and the food as one is transformed into the other”
(WSB XII:235–6).
www.Ebook777.com
all Christians, linking it with the Eucharist and, above all, requiring that it be
a regular observance albeit at comparatively long intervals.”48 In implying the
logic of penance and Eucharist in the successive reading of Ecclesiastes and Song
of Songs, Bonaventure offers a pastoral interpretation of Ecclesiastes, one that
invites his students to the same practice and instructs them in how to guide their
future parishioners. Yet, Bonaventure adds that even if one is an unrepentant
sinner who does not model the practice of penance, the Holy Spirit may speak
through that evil person. Balaam is an exemplary case of the phenomenon of
divine speech being mediated through evil persons. Thus, even if Solomon were
unrepentant, God could speak through him in the way God spoke through
Balaam in spite of the latter’s wickedness.49
I will show more fully in the next chapter how Luther departs from
Bonaventure, yet here it is worth clarifying an important distinction to keep in
mind as this chapter continues. In placing the successive reading of Ecclesiastes
and Song of Songs within the logic of penance and Eucharist, Bonaventure
is relating Ecclesiastes to one’s conscience before God. Luther, on the other
hand, suggests that Ecclesiastes does not instruct the conscience but the hand,
calling one further into one’s economic and political vocations.50 Rather than
reading Ecclesiastes as a preparation for the Eucharist, Luther reads the book
as a sacramentalizing of secular vocations. Thus, though both Bonaventure and
Luther affirm the same efficient cause (Solomon), they differ significantly in the
purpose (final cause) of Solomon’s autobiography.
The second objection concerning the efficient cause of Ecclesiastes that
Bonaventure’s interlocutor raises stems from a reading of Ps. 49:16 (“But to the
sinner God has said: Why do you declare my justices?”).51 If Solomon indeed
exhibits carnality, then he only increases the offensiveness of his misdeeds by
declaring God’s righteousness.52 Bonaventure responds by making a distinction
resembling that which Luther later makes between person and office.53 He reminds
the listener of the special gift of wisdom that God bequeathed to Solomon so
that Solomon could teach the people through both the spoken and written word.
Such teaching is indicative of Solomon’s monarchic vocation. Thus, insofar as
Solomon taught according to the gift of wisdom and with the authority of a king,
48
Carola Small, “The Fourth Lateran Council of 1215: A Turning Point in the History of Medieval
Europe,” Religious Studies and Theology 11.2–3 (1991), p. 71.
49
WSB VII:86–7.
50
LW 15:70, 133.
51
WSB VII:85.
52
WSB VII:85–6.
53
See LW 21:83.
www.Ebook777.com
he did not sin in his teaching. Rather, he sinned “by not acting rightly.”54 In other
words, in fulfilling the duties of his office, Solomon did not sin, though he did sin
in his personal misdeeds.
The final objection in this part of Quaestio 1 involves a question of the
auctoritas of the scriptural author and the implications of the author’s credibility
for the trustworthiness of Scripture. How is it possible for a scriptural book to
hold authority over its reader if the (human) author fails to live according to
the ethos that a biblical writer ought to possess?55 Bonaventure resorts in his
response to a doctrine of Scripture that affirms its divine inspiration:
Just as we believe the Prophets, who spoke not from themselves, but from the
Holy Spirit, so we also believe that all the books of Scripture were written at the
prompting of the Holy Spirit. Wherefore, the goodness of an author does not
inspire greater or less trust. The trust depends on the Spirit speaking through
the author.56
Because of divine inspiration, the Church is able to unhesitatingly accept and

trust the words of Scripture, even if the author of a given book is untrustworthy.57
According to Bonaventure, Solomon possesses the necessary ethos to be the author
of Ecclesiastes, in that he models the practice of penance for the reader. Yet, even
if this were not the case, the one who stands under Scripture’s authority is still
bound to the words of this book, because the Holy Spirit speaks even through
unholy prophets like Balaam. However, if Bonaventure is correct in interpreting
Solomon as an exemplary penitent, then what mode of argumentation does
Solomon employ in his articulation of the penitential way? The following
discussion on the formal cause of Ecclesiastes will answer this question.
Solomon’s “Dialogues”: The formal cause of Ecclesiastes

As I mentioned earlier in this chapter, Bonaventure follows Gregory the Great
in his detection of a dialogical method in Solomon’s compositional strategy. In
this move, he also anticipates critical scholars who suggest that the Hellenistic
diatribe is “the proper form of the book.”58 As one who has exhibited the heights
of wisdom and the depths of folly in his own life, Solomon is flexible enough
54
WSB VII:87.
55
WSB VII:86.
56
WSB VII:87.
57
WSB VII:87.
58
Murphy, Ecclesiastes, p. xxxi.
www.Ebook777.com
to speak as both sage and fool in Ecclesiastes. However, Quaestio 1, part III
expresses hesitations in accepting Solomon’s approach to penitential wisdom,
to each of which Bonaventure responds with a lesson in hermeneutics. In the
first part of the sed contra, the interlocutor quotes Sir. 20:22 (“A parable coming
out of a fool’s mouth will be rejected.”), suggesting that because one must submit
to the counsel of Scripture, the opinions therein cannot be those of the fool,
whose counsels must be rejected. Bonaventure responds to this objection with
an appeal to rhetoric. One would quote the words of a fool either to approve
or to rebuke those words. If one speaks in the fool’s name for the latter reason,
the most effective way to discredit the fool’s opinion is to present that opinion
convincingly before showing its flaws.59 Though Bonaventure does not use the
phrase reductio ad absurdum to describe this method of argumentation, he is
nonetheless drawing on this ancient rhetorical practice. Detecting the use of this
rhetorical device enables one to differentiate between what is prescriptive and what
is descriptive in the text of Scripture. However, Ecclesiastes poses difficulties for
the one discerning those places where Solomon practices reductio ad absurdum.
The second objection in the sed contra addresses just this problem.
The second objection is significant not only in that it begs a hermeneutical
question, but also in that it addresses the problem of the canonicity of Ecclesiastes.
The objector suggests that it is unclear in Ecclesiastes where Solomon is quoting
the fool and where he is speaking as the sage par excellence. Therefore, Ecclesiastes
may have the drastic effect of leading one into error. If, for instance, the so-called
carpe diem chorus is in fact not calling one to the enjoyment of wine and bread
but is a quotation of something like the “song of fools” condemned in Eccl. 7:5,
what does one make of the sincere reader who interprets the chorus otherwise
and fills her or his glass accordingly? If Ecclesiastes leads one into error, then it
should be removed from the canon.60 Bonaventure responds to this objection
by appealing to the book’s epilogue as both the hermeneutical key to the book
and the resolution to the question of canonicity, reflecting the classical reading
of Solomon’s final verses.61 According to Bonaventure, “[Ecclesiastes] cannot be
understood without paying attention to all of it.”62 If one is patient and reads to
the end, one will notice a solution to the problem of detecting wise and foolish
59
WSB VII:84.
60
WSB VII:84.
61
In his survey of modern interpretations of Ecclesiastes, Bartholomew asserts, “The prime legacy
of source criticism in the interpretation of Ecclesiastes is [the] tendency to read the book without
the epilogue. By comparison, in almost all precritical interpretation of Ecclesiastes the epilogue
provides the interpretive key” (Ecclesiastes, p. 37).
62
WSB VII:85.
www.Ebook777.com
sayings: “Let us all hear together the conclusion of the discourse. Fear God and
keep his commandments. This is the whole person. And all things that have
been done, God will bring into judgment for every error, whether it is good
or evil” (Eccl. 12:13-14).63 Here in the epilogue, “Ecclesiastes condemns every
opinion of the foolish, the carnal, and the worldly. So in this last statement he
is speaking in his own name [in other words, not in the name of the fool], but
what he rejects is spoken in the name of others.”64 The injunction to fear God and
keep God’s commandments assists one in acknowledging that those injunctions
earlier in the book that seem to contradict the commandments are in fact not to
be heeded, but are quotations of fools.
Bonaventure appeals to this hermeneutical rule for Ecclesiastes in his response
to questions concerning the chorus in Eccl. 5:17.65 I will show in Chapter 3 how,
in this move, Bonaventure’s dialogical reading significantly sets itself apart from
the way in which Luther reads the chorus. Thus, though Bonaventure perceptively
finds a resolution for objections to the dialogical reading, as well as offering
insightful hermeneutical proposals, he is not without significant detractors.
Bonaventure’s articulation and defense of the formal and efficient causes of
Ecclesiastes stress the significance of Solomon’s confession of his fall from grace.
Once a promising and sagacious ruler, given wisdom by God, he departed from
the fount of wisdom and became a fool. Yet, the impartation of divine wisdom
was not without remainder. Solomon was wise enough to recognize his misdeeds
and to confess them. Ecclesiastes is his act of penance. In this penitential
book, Solomon not only models confession for the reader but also warns the
student not to succumb to the same error that brought about his fall, namely,
curiosity.66 Curiosity is the vice that caused Solomon to descend from the joy
of contemplation to a life of sin and guilt. Confessing this error is necessary for
retracing his steps back to Jacob’s ladder, by which he may once again make his
contemplative ascent. Song of Songs illustrates the experience at the top of the
ladder. Yet, one may not climb the ladder without first confessing one’s folly, just
as one may not approach the eucharistic table without first practicing penance.
In reading Ecclesiastes as a penitential guidebook, Bonaventure not only narrates
Solomon’s fall, but also gives indication of that from which Solomon has fallen,
however brief the indication is. Bonaventure’s interpretation of vanitas shows
that for him, even Ecclesiastes may provide insights into the contemplative life,
63
WSB VII:44.
64
WSB VII:85.
65
WSB VII:232–3.
66
WSB VII:425–6.
www.Ebook777.com
though it is incomplete without Song of Songs. Therefore, before examining

the cause of Solomon’s downfall, it is necessary to look at the contemplative
implications of Bonaventure’s reading of Ecclesiastes through his interpretation
of vanitas.
Vanitas: From contemplative contempt to contemptuous guilt
In the last chapter, I suggested that the way in which one reads the Leitwort ‫הבל‬
will affect the creation theology one locates in the book. I noted that abstract
interpretations of the term have a tendency either to render a negative judgment
on creation or to attempt a narrow philosophical application to the term that
is somehow applicable to each use in Ecclesiastes. I conveyed a preference for
Alter’s translation of ‫ הבל‬as “mere breath,” which allows for multiple abstract
connotations, depending on context. In this section, I will show that Bonaventure,
albeit without referring to the “concrete metaphor,” also allows for multiple
nuances of vanitas. Bonaventure’s reading is theologically substantial in that his
interpretation, informed by his metaphysics, enables him to locate a positive
doctrine of creation in the book of Ecclesiastes, a move that is counterintuitive
to entirely pessimistic readings of Ecclesiastes. I will show that in his detection
of multiple nuances of vanitas in Ecclesiastes (particularly in his appropriation
of Hugh of St Victor’s triplex vanitas concept), and in his subsequent use of these
distinctive nuances to discern the structure of the book’s “treatise,” Bonaventure
finds in Ecclesiastes a narrative that mirrors that of creation and fall in Gen. 1–3.
I will focus especially on the vanitas mutabilitatis. In showing this “fall narrative,”
I will prepare the reader for the discussion on curiositas, which I will argue is
the vice that precipitates Solomon’s fall. First, however, it will be necessary to
examine Bonaventure’s take on contemptus mundi, which funds his reading of
vanitas in terms of mutability and not necessarily sin.
Bonaventure’s nuanced version of contemptus mundi

In the section above on Bonaventure’s relation to the Christian interpretaÂ�
tive tradition that precedes him, I have already hinted at how crucial the
interpretation of vanitas is for the contemptus mundi reading of Ecclesiastes.
Though Bonaventure is faithful to the tradition in reading vanitas within the
contemptus mundi framework, he still offers a pivotal take on the tradition.Â€His
www.Ebook777.com
version of contemptus mundi resonates with a contemplative reading of the

book, reflects his metaphysics, and offers a positive valuation of creation that
draws one back toward the Creator whom the creation signifies. Bonaventure’s
contemptus mundi, then, prepares one to read vanitas itself in a more nuanced
fashion, as will be evident in the treatment of vanitas below.
Not only does Bonaventure affirm a penitential provenance of Ecclesiastes, but
he also shows himself to be indebted to the contemplative reading of Ecclesiastes,
which for him both illustrates the life from which Solomon has fallen and
anticipates the life that awaits one who repents of curiosity and its associated
vices, journeying back to God initially through the proper contemplation of
physical reality. Physics for Bonaventure is useful insofar as it assists one in the
contemplative trek. Bonaventure resembles Evagrius of Pontus, who proposes
that the author of Ecclesiastes may be “one who, having purified the soul by
moral contemplation, leads his or her soul to the contemplation of the physical
[world].”67 If curiosity brought Solomon from the heights of contemplation
down to moral depravity, his “moral contemplation” enables him to repent of
his curiosity and to return to the proper contemplation of things in the physical
world. This proper contemplation is illustrated in Bonaventure’s interpretation of
Eccl. 1:3-11, on which I will focus my discussion of the vanitas mutabilitatis. In
order to more fully grasp the significance of the physical world for Bonaventure’s
contemplative vision, it is helpful to have an understanding of his metaphysics,
which follows the pattern of emanation, exemplarity, and consummation. It is
Bonaventure’s metaphysics, paired with a high esteem for the contemplative life,
that undergirds his version of contemptus mundi.68
Bonaventure’s metaphysics: Emanation, exemplarity,

and consummation
In his Collations on the Hexaëmeron, Bonaventure explicitly states, “Such is
the metaphysical Center that leads us back, and this is the sum total of our
metaphysics: concerned with emanation, exemplarity, and consummation, that
is, illumination through spiritual radiations and return to the Supreme Being. In
this you will be a true metaphysician.”69 One may call this metaphysical vision
67
J. R. Wright, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, p. 193.
68
Kallas has explored the metaphysical significance of Bonaventure’s reading of vanitas (see, for
instance, “Ecclesiastes: Traditium et Fides Evangelica,” pp. 106–7), but has not sought to relate
Bonaventure’s reading of Ecclesiastes to his overall metaphysical vision.
69
QuarEd V, p. 332. This English translation is from Cullen, Bonaventure, p. 60.
www.Ebook777.com
“theological metaphysics,”70 or a “metaphysics of Christ the center,”71 because

Bonaventure roots it in his trinitarian theology; and in turn, his theological
metaphysics undergirds his creation theology.72 Therefore, this discussion
on Bonaventure’s metaphysics shall begin with his trinitarian theology. I will
discuss the implications of his metaphysics for his creation theology with explicit
reference to his Commentary on Ecclesiastes as I examine his answer to objections
regarding the contemptus mundi interpretation of Ecclesiastes.
If metaphysics involves emanation, exemplarity, and consummation, it is
because the Trinity, the ground of all beings according to their ideal, eternal causes
(the knowledge of which is what metaphysics involves), first entails these features
in its “actiones ad intra.”73 Bonaventure’s doctrine of the Trinity at the outset
betrays more Cappadocian than Augustinian influence, placing more emphasis
on divine persons than divine substances. This Cappadocian influence is mediated
through John of Damascus’s doctrine of perichoresis (though Bonaventure uses the
Latin term circumcessio to describe the “communion of love” within the Trinity).74
Having established the significance of the interrelations of the divine Persons,
Bonaventure then follows the sixth-century Neoplatonist, Pseudo-Dionysius (and
Hugh of St Victor’s appropriation of Pseudo-Dionysius’s work), in his treatment
of the Son’s relation to the Father; and he follows Richard of St Victor most closely
in his treatment of the Spirit’s relation to both the Son and the Father.75
Following Pseudo-Dionysius and Lk. 18:19 (“Why do you call me good? No
one is good but God alone”; cf. Mk. 10:18), Bonaventure sees the Father as the
unbegotten, self-diffusive, and self-communicating Good76 who generates the
70
Delio stresses the importance of the theological basis of Bonaventure’s metaphysics: “Bonaventure’s
most outstanding achievement, which has been virtually overlooked, is his development of a
theological metaphysics.” See Ilia Delio, O.S.F., “Bonaventure’s Metaphysics of the Good,” Theological
Studies 60.2 (1999), p. 229.
71
Ilia Delio, O.S.F., “From Metaphysics to Kataphysics: Bonaventure’s ‘Good’ Creation,” SJT 64.2 (2011),
p. 173.
72
See Delio, “Bonaventure’s Metaphysics of the Good,” p. 231; and idem, “From Metaphysics to
Kataphysics,” pp. 172–4.
73
Kenan B. Osborne says, “A complete understanding of Bonaventure’s theology of Trinity needs to
show how he unites the Trinity’s actiones ad intra with its actiones ad extra.” See Kenan B. Osborne,
“The Trinity in Bonaventure,” in Peter C. Phan, (ed.). The Cambridge Companion to the Trinity
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011). While this section is not a full discussion on
Bonaventure’s trinitarian theology, it does aim at least to introduce the relationship between God’s
internal and external actions through a discussion of Bonaventure’s metaphysics.
74
Delio, Simply Bonaventure, pp. 40–1. See also similar points from Zachary Hayes’s introduction to
Bonaventure’s trinitarian theology in WSB III:41–3.
75
Delio, Simply Bonaventure, pp. 41–3.
76
In the first words of his introduction to Ecclesiastes, Bonaventure pairs Pseudo-Dionysius’s notion
of the Good with the beatitude in Ps. 39:5: “Blessed is the man, whose trust is in the name of the Lord
and has no regard for vanities and lying follies. For, as Blessed Dionysius says: Good is above all else
desirable” [WSB VII:65; cf. Pseudo-Dionysius, De divinis nominibus, ch. 4, translated in Pseudo-
Dionysius, The Works of Dionysius the Aeropagite, pt. I, trans. John Parker (London: James Parker
and Co., 1897), pp. 32–72].
www.Ebook777.com
Son out of the fecundity of his nature and his fontal fullness.77 The generation
of the Son is one of two emanations in the Trinity.78 As Son, the second Person
of the Trinity is the personal likeness of the fecund Father and the perfect
image of the Father, his expressed likeness, or form. Yet, the Son, as the perfect
product of the Father’s self-communication, is also the expressive likeness of the
Father, the Word. As the eternal Word, the eternally begotten Son is the internal
expression of God, and this by way of exemplarity.79
Exemplarity “lies at the heart of Bonaventure’s entire system.”80 It is a theme
in Plato’s theory of ideas and was controversial in medieval metaphysics
because of the increasing availability and acceptance of the works of Aristotle,
who denies Plato’s theory of exemplarity.81 Because of this denial, Bonaventure
believes Aristotle not to be a true metaphysician, but rather only competent
to be a natural philosopher (in this role, however, Aristotle is important for
Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes).82 On the other hand, for Augustine,
whom Bonaventure follows, there indeed are exemplary ideas. Yet, Augustine
appropriates Plato christianly by suggesting that these exemplary ideas exist not
in the Nous, but in the eternal Word.83 Bonaventure contradicts Aristotle because
the former understands this Word to be the exemplar of creation. Creation is the
external expression of what is eternally and internally expressed already in the
Trinity by the exemplarity of the Word.84 Following Plato and the Neoplatonists,
Bonaventure says that exemplarity involves the themes of idea, word, art,
and reason;85 and following Pseudo-Dionysius, he christianizes the notion of
exemplarity on the basis of Scripture.86 The Word, as God’s self-communication,
receives the fullness of the Father’s expression (which flows from the Father’s
self-diffusive goodness) and in turn expresses all the self-knowledge of the
Father. This is how the Word is the internal expression of God, the exemplar
who expresses God’s reason.87
77
WSB III:33; 43–8.
78
WSB III:37; 41–3.
79
It is important to note the distinction between “expressed” and “expressive” in describing how the
Son/Word is the full expression of God. See Delio, Simply Bonaventure, pp. 45–7; and WSB III:
43–8, 52.
80
Carpenter, Theology as the Road to Holiness, p. 61; cf. Bougerol, Introduction, p. 9; Etienne Gilson, The
Philosophy of St. Bonaventure, trans. Dom Illtyd Trethowan and F. J. Sheed (London: Sheed & Ward,
1939), pp. 140–1; and Zachary B. Hayes, The Hidden Center: Spirituality and Speculative Christology
in St. Bonaventure (St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 1992), pp. 13–14.
81
Gilson, The Philosophy of St. Bonaventure, pp. 139–42.
82
Carpenter, Theology as the Road to Holiness, p. 62.
83
84
85
See, for instance, WSB IX:50.
86
87
WSB III:51–3.
www.Ebook777.com
While Pseudo-Dionysius provides Bonaventure with a metaphysical

framework for grasping “the first emanation within God” this Dionysian model
“is not sufficient for trinitarian theology since it specifies neither the mode nor
the number of divine emanations.”88 Therefore, “[t]o fill up the incompleteness
of the Dionysian model, Bonaventure reaches to Richard’s reflections on love.”89
Richard of St Victor joins the NT concept of the Good to another NT concept,
namely, love. Goodness implies love, according to Richard. Yet, there can be no
charity without a plurality of Persons.90 The Son is both receptive and responsive
to the Father’s love, and this forms the ontological basis of all relations, as well
as the basis for the metaphysical structure of emanation and consummation.91
The love between the Father and the Son cannot be kept to themselves. Their
mutual love issues forth in condilectio, the joint love of the Father and the Son for
a third Person.92 Condilectio is the basis for the second emanation in the Trinity,
namely, the spiration of the Spirit by the fecund will of the Father and the Son,
which issues forth perfectly in love.93 The Spirit is the bond, or the free gift of the
Father and Son’s love. Thus, in the Trinity, there is a Person who only produces
(the unbegotten Father), One who both is produced and produces (the eternally
begotten Son who is receptive and responsive to the Father’s love), and One who
is produced but does not produce (the spirated Spirit who is the Bond of the
Father and the Son).94 The Word is at the center of Bonaventure’s trinitarian
theology as the generated and spirating exemplar who is God’s internal self-
expression.95 As I have already intimated, the exemplary Word is also at the
center of Bonaventure’s metaphysical vision.
Just as Bonaventure’s trinitarian theology begins with the emanation
that is the generation of the Son from the unbegotten Father, so too does his
metaphysics begin with emanation. All created reality emanates from the triune
God as the objectification of God’s self-knowledge in the Word and the external
self-expression of God through the Word.96 “The Word who is the centre of the
divine life is also the exemplar of creation; and creation itself may be seen as an
external word in which the one inner Word is objectified through the indwelling
88
WSB III:33.
89
WSB III:33.
90
WSB III:16. See also Richard of St Victor, De Trinitate 3.2, in PL 196, pp. 926–7.
91
WSB III:49.
92
WSB III:17. See also Richard of St Victor, De Trinitate 3.14, in PL 196, pp. 924–7.
93
WSB III:54–62.
94
Delio, Simply Bonaventure, p. 87.
95
96
WSB III:47–8, 51.
www.Ebook777.com
Spirit.”97 Yet, if creation is the external expression of the singular Word, how then
does one answer the question of the one and the many? In other words, how
does one reconcile the notion of a singular expression of a singular Word with
the multiplicity of objects in creation? Ilia Delio addresses this predicament in
her discussion of Bonaventure’s doctrine of the Trinity:
When we say that the Word is the inner self-expression of God, we immediately
imagine a singular word. But the key is in the term “self-expression.” If the Word
is the self-expression of God [the Father], the Word is singular but the “content”
of the Word is, in a sense, infinitely multiple because the “content” expressed in
the Word is all the divine ideas. Everything that has existed since the beginning
of time, everything that exists, and everything that will exist in the future,
is grounded in the one Word of God. Thus, the created order is the external
[or limited] expression of the inner Word. All of creation, with its manifold
variations, expresses the one Word of God.98
Thus, even in all its variety, creation is an icon, symbolic of the triune God.
Within this icon, though, there is a hierarchy, ascending from vestige to image to
similitude. Every creature is a vestige, containing traces of the trinitarian imprint.
Humans bear more of the Trinity’s imprint as image-bearers of God, because they
are rational beings who reflect the rationality of the divine Word. They reflect
the Trinity in their faculties of memory, intelligence, and will, corresponding to
the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, respectively. Similitude is the highest tier of
the created hierarchy in that it represents beatific union with God.99
The image of God is important for Bonaventure’s metaphysics of emanation,
exemplarity, and consummation because of its relation to the Trinity, to the
vestiges of the Trinity in creation, and to similitude. As image of the triune God,
humanity has a mediatory function within creation, to bring the rest of creation
to union with God and thus to attain the blessedness of similitude. Because
it is both corporeal and spiritual, humanity has the original capacity to lead
nonspiritual creatures back to God in consummation.100
Unfortunately, the fall renders humans incapable of this mediatory function,
in part because they are unable properly to interpret reality and therefore to know
how to handle it.101 As will be evident below, curiositas is the vice that precipitates
97
Delio, “From Metaphysics to Kataphysics,” p. 169.
98
99
Delio, Simply Bonaventure, pp. 61–2, 71; cf. WSB IX:96–8
100
101
www.Ebook777.com
such misinterpretation. Though creation is a book full of words speaking of the

Word, this book has become illegible to human perception. Humans need the
very Word to make the words legible again. At this point, exemplarity comes
back into focus. Humans need illumination from the eternal Word in order to
perceive the book of creation in its iconic significance. Yet, they also need the
eternal Word to become incarnate perfectly to embody the mediating role of
humanity. The incarnate Word, Jesus the Christ, reveals to all creation its goal
of uniting with God. At the same time, he reveals this goal to humanity, making
the book of creation legible once again. The culmination of the incarnate Word’s
fulfillment of creation’s goal is the crucifixion, where he spills forth the fullness
of his love for all creation and dies, not only for the sins of humans, but also
for the restoration of the cosmos that originally reflected the order and beauty of
the triune God. Thus, Bonaventure’s is a cosmic christology.102 Christ is not only
the exemplar of the Trinity but also of all creation. In becoming incarnate and in
being crucified, he is the mediator not only for humans, but for all creation. As
mediator, he also leads creation back to its end in God, which Bonaventure calls
reduction, or consummation.
Reduction, or consummation, is both a metaphysical and a cognitive term.
Metaphysically speaking, it signifies the return of all things to their one,
originating Principle: God. Cognitively, it signifies the perceptual recognition
and retracing of the vestigial nature of all creation, which emanates from the
one Principle.103 Ecclesiastes significantly speaks to the rupture in this cognition
through the vice of curiositas. Yet, it also invites one to repent of curiositas and
be restored to the vita contemplativa. Bonaventure’s version of contemptus mundi
elucidates the motivation behind the invitation.
Creation as a wedding ring: Defending the final cause of Ecclesiastes

Bonaventure resolves the question of the meaning of contemptus mundi by use of
an important simile in response to questions regarding the final cause in Quaestio
1, part I. On the way to this simile, he first supports the claim that the final
cause of Ecclesiastes is contemptus mundi with two verses from the NT. James
4:4 asserts that friendship with the world is enmity toward God, while 1 Jn 2:5
exhorts the reader not to love the world or the things in it. Yet, the quaestio’s sed
contra also employs biblical material. Bonaventure probably alludes to Sir. 9:24
when he says that praising a work means praising the worker, while despising
102
Delio, Simply Bonaventure, pp. 62, 84–95.
103
WSB I:1.
www.Ebook777.com
a work likewise reflects back on the worker. Also, Prov. 16:4 says that the Lord
made all things for the Lord’s self. This verse suggests that “all things are directed
toward God”; and whatever is directed toward its goal, who is God, one ought
not to despise but rather love.104
Though Bonaventure does not explicitly employ the language of emanation,
exemplarity, and consummation here, the sed contra reflects his metaphysical
vision. To condemn the world without qualification would seem objectionable
first because the world emanates from the triune God as the objectification of
God’s self-knowledge, the exemplar of which is the eternal Word. The beautifully
ordered cosmos bears the trinitarian imprint, specifically in vestige, image, and
similitude. At the same time, the Lord has appointed this cosmos for God’s
self. In Bonaventure’s metaphysics, consummation refers to this direction of all
things toward God. Therefore, to despise the work of creation is to despise the
Creator from whom the creation emanates and to deny the mediatory function
of humanity to aid creation toward its consummation in God, which is creation’s
final goal (though creation in turn aids humanity toward its own consummation
in God).105 If the sed contra is accurate, how then does Bonaventure reconcile the
truth of creation’s goodness with contemptus mundi and the scriptural evidence
for it (Jms 4:4; 1 Jn 2:5)?
In his reply, the Seraphic Doctor does not directly counter the sed contra,
precisely because the verses he quotes reflect his own metaphysical vision.
Therefore, consistent with his style, he clarifies “contempt” as having a twofold
meaning, which the twofold meaning of love first implies. Before this clarification,
however, he borrows a simile from Augustine and Hugh of St Victor106 in order
to resolve the contradiction between contemptus mundi and its objections.
Bonaventure says that the world is like a wedding ring, which the Bridegroom
(God) gives to the soul itself. Now, the bride can respond to this gift with a
twofold love. She can love the ring in an adulterous way by loving it more than
the ring’s Giver. In this adulterous love, the ring becomes its own end, an idol.
Yet, the bride can love the ring in a chaste way, as a memento of her husband. She
loves the ring on account of its Giver, not as an end in itself. Thus, she orders her
affection for the ring to her affection for its Giver.107 To put this twofold love for
104
WSB VII:77.
105
Delio, Simply Bonaventure, pp. 59, 68.
106
WSB VII:77. In fn. 33, pp. 77–8 the editors comment that while the Quarrachi editors offer substantial
quotations from Hugh of St Victor’s Soliloquium de Arrha animae and Augustine’s Sermon 85,
neither quotation actually mentions the image of the wedding ring, though both refer to adultery.
107
WSB VII:77–8.
www.Ebook777.com
the ring in the context of Bonaventure’s metaphysics, if the ring is the world and
the bride the soul, chaste love for the world is only possible upon recognition of
the world as a gift emanating from, reflecting back upon, and finally ordered to
the world’s Giver, the triune God. To love the world in its symbolic significance
is to love the one of whom the world is an icon. To love the world in itself,
on the other hand, is adulterous and flows from a consideration of the world
that expropriates it from its Giver. Curiosity is the vice that corresponds to this
expropriation;108 and it shall enter this chapter more explicitly later.
Using Aristotle’s method of implication, Bonaventure suggests that this
twofold love implies its opposite, a twofold contempt. Ingratitude characterizes
the first kind of contempt, which, in Bonaventure’s analogy, is to consider the
ring poor and ugly. Like adulterous love, this contempt involves a failure to
recognize the ring’s features as reflecting the Giver. Yet, whereas in adulterous
love, the bride considers the beauty of the ring apart from the Bridegroom, in
unthankful contempt the bride now fails to notice the beauty of the ring at all,
again considering it apart from the Bridegroom. There is, however, a proper
contempt for the ring. This contempt regards the ring as almost nothing
compared to the love of the Bridegroom, and in turn, this contempt gives glory
to the ring’s Giver.109 While chaste love for the ring regards it as a memento of
the husband, proper contempt for the ring allows the ring as memento to turn
one’s thoughts to the Giver in such a way that the affection for the Giver eclipses
the (rightly ordered) affection for the ring. In comparison to the love for the
Giver that the love for the ring evokes, the love for the ring is almost nothing. Yet,
this near-nothingness of the bride’s affection for the ring also shows the ring’s
contingency as gift from the Giver.
The connection between the wedding ring analogy and Bonaventure’s
metaphysics with regard to the meaning of “contempt” makes Bonaventure’s
resolution clearest. Merely to condemn the world as an end in itself is once again to
expropriate the knowledge of it from the knowledge of its Creator. Like curiosity,
this simple contempt fails to contemplate the world’s iconic significance, only
this time despising it rather than loving it adulterously. Both cases, curiosity and
contempt, come from a perceptual rupture that traces its roots to the fall.110 On
108
Griffiths, “The Vice of Curiosity,” p. 54.
109
WSB VII:78–9.
110
See WSB VII:98, where the Seraphic Doctor says, “But the eye of contemplation [part of the ‘triple
eye,’ the first two being ‘the eye of the flesh’ and ‘the eye of reason’] does not function perfectly except
through glory, which human beings have lost through sin, although they may recover this through
grace and faith and the understanding of the Scriptures.”
www.Ebook777.com
the other hand, proper contempt of the world is exemplified when one considers
the world in the first step in the contemplative ascent to the Creator. As one rises
toward similitude, one’s affection is drawn toward the Creator in such a way as to
eclipse affection for the world. In Bonaventure’s account, humans love creation
most when their love for it looks like hatred in comparison to their love for the
Creator.
To summarize Bonaventure’s resolution to this first part of Quaestio 1 in
terms of his metaphysics, chaste love for the world means recognizing its
emanation from God, while proper contempt of the world means recognizing
its consummate end in God, an end that should likewise bring the image-
bearer who delights in the Creator of the cosmos to beatific similitude.111 If this
modified version of contemptus mundi is the final cause of Ecclesiastes, then it
will behoove the reader repeatedly to ask not only how this penitential book
guides one negatively to contemptus mundi, but also how the book encourages
the necessary positive aspect of contemptus mundi: simply love for the Creator.
This version of contemptus mundi informs Bonaventure’s interpretation of
vanitas. I move now to consider Bonaventure’s defense of the material cause of
Ecclesiastes (vanitas), which will provide a framework for better understanding
the vanitas mutabilitatis.
Triplex vanitas: Defending the material cause of Ecclesiastes

In Quaestio 1, part II, Bonaventure’s interlocutor asks whether the material cause
of Ecclesiastes can really be vanitas, interrogating Bonaventure with a multifaceted
sed contra. The first objection is that there can be no knowledge of vanity because
knowledge is about goodness and truth, while vanity drives them out.112 The
second objection is that there would not be vanity in things because God made
them and saw their goodness (see Gen. 1:31). Third, the supposed interlocutor
suggests that what is vain does not tend toward a purpose, while creatures tend
toward the highest good. Finally, knowledge that one bases on vanity is itself
vain. In his reply, Bonaventure grants that vanity is truth’s opposite, but answers
his objectors by showing that like truth, vanity too has multiple meanings.113
Bonaventure begins his resolution to the first objection by contrasting the
meanings of truth with the meanings of vanity. First, truth refers to being while
111
WSB IX:98.
112
Recall Bonaventure’s pairing of Ps. 39:5 with Pseudo-Dionysius’s concept of the Good. The “blessed
man” has no regard for “vanities,” but, by implication, does have regard for the Good (WSB VII:65).
113
WSB VII:79–80.
www.Ebook777.com
vanity refers to nonbeing. Second, truth relates a thing to its purpose, while
vanity is “the lack of being ordered to a purpose.”114 Third, one may use “truth” to
refer to what is unchangeable, while vanity can have the nuance “mutability.”115
According to Bonaventure, Ecclesiastes does not deal with vanitas as nonbeing
because one cannot have knowledge of nonbeing. However, though one may not
consider vanity in itself, one may know it “by reason of the truth.” Ecclesiastes
does treat vanity as referring to that which is not ordered to its purpose; this is
the vanity of sin or guilt. Yet, the vanity of sin is a deviation from what comprises
the third meaning of vanitas: mutability, which does not necessarily imply
sinfulness.116
This recognition of the triplex vanitas117 enables Bonaventure to answer to
the next three objections: that there is no vanity in created things because God
made them good, that there is no vanity in created things because they do tend
toward a purpose, and that there can be no knowledge of created things if that
knowledge is based on what is vain. Bonaventure answers these objections by
showing that creatures are considered vain not because they lack goodness or
purpose, but because they are mutable. Therefore, there can be true knowledge
regarding creatures. Ecclesiastes does not deal with vanity in itself, because one
cannot create a discourse about nonbeing, of which there is no knowledge.118 Yet,
Bonaventure understands Ecclesiastes to unfold from the vanity of mutability to
the vanity of sin and guilt. The vanity of mutability is the topic of Eccl. 1:3–3:15;
the vanity of sin is the topic in Eccl. 3:16–7:23; and Bonaventure locates the
vanity of guilt in Eccl. 7:24–12:7.119
In using the triplex vanitas as the tool for organizing Solomon’s “treatise,”
Bonaventure shows himself to be reading Ecclesiastes as something of a “fall
narrative.” As I have shown above, in Bonaventure’s reading of Ecclesiastes,
Solomon is a king who has fallen from possessing the godly wisdom he shares in
Proverbs to testing a self-referential wisdom that seeks knowledge as its own end,
a knowledge that Solomon uses to cater to his selfish desires. Though Ecclesiastes
does not articulate a version of creatio ex nihilo, because it deals with “things as
they are desired by humans,”120 it nonetheless follows a similar trajectory as the
114
WSB VII:81.
115
WSB VII:81–2.
116
WSB VII:82–3.
117
QuarEd VI:5; WSB VII:74. In detecting a triplex vanitas in Ecclesiastes, Bonaventure is appropriating
Hugh of St Victor. See Hugh of St Victor, In Salomonis Ecclesiasten Homiliae XIX, Homily 1, in PL
175:119A.
118
WSB VII:83–4.
119
WSB VII:96.
120
WSB VII:80–1.
www.Ebook777.com
story of creation and fall in Gen. 1–3. For the purposes of this thesis, the most
significant themes related to the triplex vanitas framework are the contemplative
implications of the vanitas mutabilitatis and the vice that precipitates the vanity of
sin and guilt, namely, curiositas, the next major theme of this chapter. Therefore,
in what follows, I will pay special attention to the vanitas mutabilitatis.
Vanitas mutabilitatis
Reading vanitas as a multivalent term allows Bonaventure both to read
Ecclesiastes according to the metaphysical vision that informs his take on
contemptus mundi and to account for the sins of Solomon, for which Solomon
is repenting in Ecclesiastes. Regarding the former aspect, whether knowingly or
not, in his description of the first nuance of vanitas, Bonaventure picks up on the
concrete-metaphorical sense of ‫“( הבל‬mere breath”), relating vanitas to mutability
(vanitas mutabilitatis),121 which implies contingency. Metaphysically speaking,
vanitas “accounts for the instability of things. Every creature bears the mark of its
original movement from non-being to being.”122 Theologically speaking, to say
that “everything” (‫ )הכל‬is “mere breath” is to imply that all creation is radically
dependent upon its Creator for its continued existence.123 Yet, Bonaventure also
recognizes the profound effects of the fall on humanity’s ability to recognize this
contingency of creation on the Creator, for which he accounts in his depiction of
the other two nuances of vanitas, namely, the vanitas iniquitatis and the vanitas
poenalitatis.124 I move now to look intently at Bonaventure’s depiction of the
vanitas mutabilitatis.
Bonaventure begins his exegesis of Solomon’s “treatise” with a vision of
mutable creation whose movements carry symbolic significance, inviting
human participants to contemplation of creation’s immutable Maker. The
vanity of mutability is the theme of Eccl. 1:3–3:15.125 This first major division of
Solomon’s “treatise” has two primary parts. The first part (Eccl. 1:3–2:26) deals
with mutability from the point of view of change itself. The second (Eccl. 3:1-15)
deals with mutability from the point of view of a designated time for everything.
Considering that time will be a major theme of the next chapter of this book, I will
121
QuarEd VI:11.
122
Cullen, Bonaventure, p. 107.
123
For a contemporary reading of ‫ הבל‬in terms of contingency, see John E. McKenna, “The Concept of
Hebel in the Book of Ecclesiastes,” SJT 45.1 (1992), pp. 19–28, in which McKenna relates ‫ הבל‬to T. F.
Torrance’s teaching on contingency and Karl Barth’s doctrine of the nothingness of creation.
124
QuarEd VI:11.
125
WSB VII:96.
www.Ebook777.com
focus primarily on the first part. Within this first part, there are two subunits. The
first (Eccl. 1:3-11) shows mutability in the being of creatures, while the second
subunit exposes the rupture in humanity’s dealings with mutable creatures by
describing the ramifications of Solomon’s curiosity.126 I will deal with the second
subunit more concretely in this chapter’s section on curiosity, though the theme
will be significant in the following discussion of Eccl. 1:3-11.
As I mentioned in the previous chapter, Eccl. 1:3-11 is both an introduction
to the book and a kind of “mini-Ecclesiastes” in that it “powerfully evokes the
issues that Qohelet will struggle with as he seeks to explore the meaning of labor
and life itself.”127 Ecclesiastes 1:3 introduces what the author intends to show in
the course of proving the material cause (the vanity of present things), namely,
that no amount of labor can liberate one from the condition of being subject to
change.128 Thus, like critical scholars, Bonaventure reads Eccl. 1:3 as a rhetorical
question implying a negative answer. Yet, what is interesting about his take on
Eccl. 1:3 is that the problem for humanity is not the world, but how humans deal
with the mutable world that God has given to them.
Bonaventure begins his exegesis of Eccl. 1:4-11 by proving the changeableness
of creatures in their existence as creatures. Creatures exist in three ways. First,
they exist “in the Word by reason of exemplarity,” a way of existing that does
not end or change, meaning that there can be no vanity in it.129 To recall the
earlier discussion of Bonaventure’s metaphysics, this mode of existence is that
which exists in the eternal Word, the internal self-expression of the triune God
who expresses the ideals of the Father. This Word is the eternal exemplar of all
created things. Because the subject matter of Ecclesiastes is vanity, which involves
changeability, Bonaventure does not explicitly read the poem as containing an
invitation to contemplate this kind of existence.
Creatures also possess changeability as participants in the material
world, where their motion makes them subject to the vanitas mutabilitatis.130
Bonaventure treats this second type of existence in his exegesis of Eccl. 1:4-7.
Three types of creatures show themselves to be mutable in this passage, namely,
rational, heavenly, and elemental.131 Ecclesiastes 1:4a (“One generation passes
away, and another generation comes.”) refers to the material mutability of rational
126
WSB VII:97–8.
127
128
WSB VII:98.
129
WSB VII:97.
130
WSB VII:97.
131
WSB VII:98.
www.Ebook777.com
creatures.132 By reading the going and coming of the generations as referring to

the mutability of rational creatures, Bonaventure is in part proving his answer
to the question in Eccl. 1:3. The inability of humans to liberate themselves from
being subject to change is evident in the perpetual flux of human generations.
Bonaventure supports his interpretation with Sir. 14:19 and Jms 4:15, both of
which speak to the transience of human existence. Yet, something does remain
of fading generations of people. Displaying the influence of both Genesis and
hylomorphism,133 Bonaventure says that when humans’ bodies decay, they
do not return to nothingness, but rather become part of the earth. Hence the
earth “stands forever, as the matter into which we break down.” Psalm 103:5
and Prov. 8:29, which speak to the surety of the earthly foundations God has
established, support this reading of the latter half of Eccl. 1:4.134
Though Bonaventure reads this passage as part of the larger section on the
vanity of mutability, which is “natural and appropriate,”135 he seems to anticipate
the vanity of guilt in describing the movement of rational creatures, just as he
will anticipate the vanity of sin in Eccl. 1:8-11. Thus, one might read this poem
as introducing the totality of the triplex vanitas. The anticipation of the vanity of
guilt is evident in a common use of Gen. 3:19, a postlapsarian verse in which God
declares to Adam that he is dust and shall return to dust at death, to explicate
both Eccl. 1:4 and 12:7.136 Ecclesiastes 12:7 most explicitly refers to the death
that results from the guilt of sin, in language reminiscent of Gen. 3:19: “and the
dust return into its earth, from whence it was, and the spirit return to God who
gave it.”137 In spite of the ways in which the heavenly and elemental movements
of Eccl. 1:5-7 speak as words from God, Eccl. 1:4 already gestures toward the
death that results from humans misreading the words and failing to recognize
their proper place in the cosmos. Again, the problem in the opening poem is not
creaturely movement in itself, but humanity’s interpretation of it.
The latter half of Eccl. 1:4 (“But the earth stands forever.”) should provoke
questions for those who both affirm the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo and anticipate
the passing away of heaven and earth in the last days. In Quaestio 3, part II, an
interlocutor asks how the earth stands forever (in Hebrew, ‫ )לעולם‬if it will pass
away and there will be a new earth (see Matt. 24:35; Rev. 21:1). Bonaventure
132
WSB VII:98–9.
133
For a brief summary of the influence of hylomorphism on Bonaventure, see Delio, Simply
Bonaventure, pp. 57–8.
134
WSB VII:99.
135
WSB VII:74, quoting Hugh of St Victor.
136
WSB VII:99, 411.
137
WSB VII:44.
www.Ebook777.com
answers by suggesting that the earth stands in two ways: with regard to substance
and with regard to appearance. In terms of the former, the earth will indeed
stand forever, but in terms of the latter it will pass away (see 1 Cor. 7:31).138 If
this first reply solves the problem with the language of the earth’s standing, there
is still a question concerning the meaning of “eternity.” Given the popularity of
the Aristotelian doctrine of the eternality of the world, Bonaventure is keen also
to distinguish between different nuances of “eternity.” When the term refers to
something with no beginning or end, it can only apply to God. Yet, it can also
refer to a body of which the substance never ends; and this is the meaning in
Eccl. 1:4.139 Thus, rational creatures subject to mutability will remain part of the
earth even after death as they return to dust. While this depiction of rational
creatures anticipates the final verse of the book’s “treatise” (Eccl. 12:7), what
immediately follows is a reflection on other mutable creatures who more readily
move according to the vanitas mutabilitatis, while also awaiting the eternal and
incarnate Word who will lead them to glory.140
According to the Seraphic Doctor, Eccl. 1:5-6a (“The sun rises and goes down,
and returns to its place, and there rising again makes its round by the south
and turns again to the north.”)141 refers to heavenly creatures subject to change,
specifically the sun. Eccl. 1:5-6a shows that the sun never rests. Once it rises, it
already begins to move toward its setting, hence the phrase “returns to its place.”
Yet, once it sets, the sun continues southward (then northward) round again, not
remaining at any central place.142 In his exegesis of this section, and in his use
of Aristotle in answering its associated quaestiones,143 Bonaventure shows this
section to be an invitation to natural philosophy.144 He quotes Hugh of St Victor,
who reads this section as referring to both daily and annual movements of the
sun.145 For those who pay careful attention to the sun’s constant movement, they
can recognize both daily patterns and equinoxes. In either case, the sun, “by its
nature,” is never still. It is constantly in motion because of its creatureliness, and
it only stops by a miracle, as in Josh. 10:12.146
138
WSB VII:106.
139
WSB VII:106–7.
140
Bonaventure makes a connection between the vanity of mutability and that which Paul ascribes to
creation in Rom. 8:20 (WSB VII:94). This sentence alludes to the hope of creation in Rom. 8.
141
WSB VII:28.
142
WSB VII:99.
143
WSB VII:107–9.
144
In this chapter’s section on curiositas, I will look at the corruption of natural philosophy that arises
from curiosity.
145
WSB VII:99–100.
146
WSB VII:100.
www.Ebook777.com
The movements of the elements of air and water also invite scientific
observation. Among other interpretations, Eccl. 1:6b could refer either to the
movement that air makes, or, following Aristotle, the movement of vapor in the air
that in turn moves the air. Yet, as Ps. 134:7 intimates in declaring that God brings
forth winds out of God’s stores, God hides from human perception the precise
cause of the vapor’s returning in its circuits to the earth.147 Like the sun, water
does not have a fixed place. All water moves toward the sea; yet its movement
does not stop at the sea, because the sea is not full. The reason the sea is not
full is because “in a hidden way,” rivers flow back out to the place from which
they came, only to “return openly.” Their movement, like the wind, is circuitous.
The water’s movement appears before its viewer’s eyes as something worthy of
admiration (videtur mirabile).148 This aesthetic judgment of Bonaventure shows
that he does not interpret this circuitous movement as an exercise in monotony
but rather as a cause for wonder.
One image that Bonaventure uses elsewhere to describe creation is that of
the book. Prior to the fall, when the image of God in rational creatures became
blemished, this book was legible to humans, “suffic[ing] to enable [them] to
perceive the light of divine Wisdom.”149 The “book of creation”150 is made up of a
multitude of words that trace their origin to and comprise an expression of the
one divine Word.151 In Quaestio 4, part II (on Eccl. 1:8b), when distinguishing
between human and divine words, Bonaventure says, “A divine word is every
creature because each creature speaks of God. This word the eye sees.”152 He
describes how these words speak of God in his spiritual interpretation of
Eccl. 1:5-7. The spiritual interpretation presents these creatures in their vestigial
significance. “The sun is Christ.”153 The “Spirit surveying” is not only the wind
but also the Holy Spirit, who examines everything by causing humans to search
everything, even the deep things of God.154 The waters represent both the fontal
fullness of God and the corresponding response of humans.155 Bonaventure’s
interpretation, flowing from his version of contemptus mundi, informs and is
informed by his theology of creation. Such an interpretation, however brief,
147
WSB VII:100–1.
148
WSB VII:101–2; QuarEd VI:13.
149
WSB IX:97.
150
WSB IX:97.
151
152
WSB VII:115.
153
WSB VII:102.
154
WSB VII:103–4.
155
WSB VII:104–5.
www.Ebook777.com
illustrates the power of creaturely vestiges to draw one into the contemplation that
Bonaventure will eventually describe in the first two steps of the Itinerarium.156
However, his exegesis of Eccl. 1:8-11 hints at the perceptual rupture that renders
creation’s vestigial significance incomprehensible.
Creatures not only exist as entities in themselves, but also as abstractions in the
human mind, where they are once again subject to the vanitas mutabilitatis; and
Bonaventure treats this third type of existence in his exegesis of Eccl. 1:8-11. If
Eccl. 1:4 gestures toward the vanity of guilt, then Eccl. 1:8-11 gestures toward the
vanity of sin by declaring the vice of curiosity to be the reason for dissatisfaction
in Eccl. 1:8. Since the curiosity in Eccl. 1:8 is the vice that resists the contemplation
that Eccl. 1:5-7 invites, it is worth paying particular attention to curiosity’s role
in this final section of Qoheleth’s opening poem, in anticipation of the expanded
treatment of curiosity below. In his exegesis of Eccl. 1:8b-10, Bonaventure says
that the ear is not filled with hearing because it “itches to hear novelties and
curiosities.”157 Not only does he pair curiositas with the notion of novelty, but he
also says that the reason for unfilled ears (and unsatisfied eyes) is that neither
eyes nor ears perceive that which is truly satisfying. The person in question is
not blind or deaf in a physiological sense. Rather, the eye and ear are unsatisfied
with what they sense within the motions “under the sun.” Bonaventure says that
“we cannot be refreshed in these matters because the eye and ear want to learn
new things. But nothing stays new, and therefore, the ear and eye do not find
satisfaction in anything.”158 Once the curiosus has acquired knowledge of an
object, the object loses its novelty because the curiosus has quickly moved his
glance from the newly old object to another one, in a vicious cycle.
In Quaestio 4, part III, Bonaventure’s interlocutor asks what Solomon means
by saying that there is “nothing new under the sun.” The sed contra quotes
Jer. 31:22, where the writer says that the Lord will do a new thing upon the
earth, and Rev. 21:1, where John reports seeing a new heaven and a new earth.
Also, it seems erroneous to suggest that things move in such a circular way as to
156
In the Itinerarium, Bonaventure recounts his vision of the six-winged seraph at Mount La Verna, the
same place where St Francis previously received the stigmata. Each of the seraph’s wings represents a
stage on the path to illumination. These six stages “begin with creatures and lead to God, to whom no
one has access properly except through the Crucified” (WSB II:37, 39). If one divides the six wings
into pairs, one notices that the ascent of the soul to God begins at the level of vestiges, where the
soul contemplates God in the universe and sensible world; then the ascent continues at the level of
image, where one contemplates God through one’s natural powers of reason, which are eventually
reformed by grace; and finally one ascends to similitude by contemplating God in God’s unity and
trinity (WSB II:47).
157
WSB VII:111.
158
WSB VII:112.
www.Ebook777.com
end up the same as they were. Bonaventure answers that “[w]hat concerns the
working, conservation, repair, and glorification of the world is above nature and
so is not under the sun or under time. These are above time with the exception
of propagation, and so he is speaking only of this.”159 If the adjective “new” refers
to what has not been before, then it is impossible for propagation to produce
anything new, as it “always produces similar from similar.”160 In other words,
only God, who is distinct from creation and “above the sun,” is able to produce
something genuinely new. Curiosity is the vice that expects to find this kind
of newness in the works “under the sun” rather than in the works of God.
The next chapter of this thesis will show that Luther shares this basic stance,
distinguishing between works “under the sun” and those that come from “above
the sun.”161 Luther likewise relates this point to the theology of time, relating
curiosity (as well as works-righteousness, avarice, and ambition) to what he
calls the concupiscentia futurorum.162 The main difference between Luther and
Bonaventure concerning this point, as I will propose in the next chapter, lies in
Luther’s detection of an eschatological imagination akin to Rev. 21:1 (mentioned
above) in Ecclesiastes, especially in his treatment of the “catalog of times” and
the so-called carpe diem passages. In Bonaventure’s interpretation, one may
only imply such an eschatology through an allegorical interpretation or by
progressing to Song of Songs. Luther, on the other hand, interprets the literal
sense of Ecclesiastes eschatologically.
Ecclesiastes 1:8-11 shows that though the words in the book of creation speak
of God, the eyes that see them are not satisfied, constrained as they are by curiosity.
Until the incarnation, humanity gropes in darkness to find the reason for things,
because humans are bent downward (homo recurvatus) in self-referential pursuits
of knowledge.163 Bonaventure relates Eccl. 7:30 to the cause of concupiscence,
which, along with death, is characteristic of the vanity of guilt that stems from the
159
WSB VII:117.
160
WSB VII:117.
161
See LW 15:20–1. Interestingly, Luther accuses the “sophists” (medieval interpreters) of “perpetrat[ing]
enormous kinds of nonsense” by trying to harmonize passages such as Is. 65:17, Rev. 21:5, and Num.
16:30 with Eccl. 1:9. According to Luther, “this happened because of an ignorance of Solomon’s way
of speaking, because they did not pay attention to what he means when he says under the sun. For if
you take this to refer to the things and works of God themselves, it is not true; for God is constantly
doing new things. But it is we who do nothing new, because the same old Adam is present in all of
us” (LW 15:21). While Bonaventure does seem to distinguish between the works of humans and the
works of God, Luther’s problem seems to be that the “sophist” reading does not make room for any
experience of novelty this side of the beatific union, because it lacks an eschatology that is significant
for the present.
162
WA 20:59.
163
www.Ebook777.com
vanity of sin. Though God made humans upright, one consequence of original
sin is that they now look downward and constantly entangle themselves in an
infinite number of questions, none of which find satisfactory answers.164 Their
curious disposition distorts the image of God in them and makes them unable
to infer the immutable Word from the mutable words of creation; and thus they
are not content to contemplate the Word through the words. The incarnate Word
is the only one who will make the book of creation legible, so that fallen humans
might again interpret its revelatory function.165 Humans also need the revelation
of Scripture to enable them to interpret creation in such a way.166 If all Scripture
proclaims the eternal and incarnate Word,167 might there be a ray of hope for the
reformation of the divine image in humanity and the promise of similitude even
within this diagnosis of humanity’s sin and guilt in Eccl. 1:8-11? I will return to
this question in the final chapter of this book.
The heavenly and elemental creatures in Eccl. 1:5-7 move as they were
created to move, resembling the heavens and the elements in Gen. 1. As
vestiges of the Trinity, they invite humans to contemplate the Creator through
them. However, Eccl. 1:8-11 anticipates the fall of Solomon, which mirrors
the fall of Adam and Eve, who succumbed to the vice of curiosity rather than
considering the iconic significance of the heavens and the elements. They
converted the forbidden fruit from a vestige to something like a transformative
drug, offering the possibility of becoming sicut Deus. Rather than signifying
their creaturely limits, the forbidden fruit came to represent the expansion
of knowledge beyond human limitations, the sort against which Ecclesiastes
warns. Ecclesiastes 1:8-11 introduces the perceptual struggle that Solomon will
describe with respect to his own intellectual journey. The fact that this diagnosis
follows the meditation on cosmological movement in Eccl. 1:5-7 seems to leave
little room for hope, since “[c]uriosity precludes contemplation.”168 The vanity
of mutability soon gives way to the vanity of sin, which produces the vanity
of guilt, mirroring Adam and Eve’s fall in Gen. 3. The vice that precipitates
Solomon’s fall is curiositas.
164
WSB VII:287.
165
In Chapter 4, I will invert Bonaventure’s contemplative modus operandi: rather than beginning a
contemplative ascent to Christ through contemplating the Word through the “words” in the “book
of creation” I will propose that Christ the Word descends to humanity, giving “eyes to see” the “words”
through the Word.
166
WSB IX:98.
167
WSB I:45, 47.
168
Griffiths, “Vice of Curiosity,” pp. 50–1.
www.Ebook777.com
Curiositas: The corruption of the liberal and mechanical arts
In the first chapter, I suggested that Qoheleth’s royal testament (Eccl. 1:12–2:26)
is the most important section of Ecclesiastes for the consideration of Qoheleth’s
perceptual process and epistemology. I drew particular attention to those lexemes
that Qoheleth employs to refer to his way of processing and responding to reality
(‫ראה‬, ‫לב‬, ‫ידע‬, ‫)דבר‬. I also suggested that though some (particularly O’Donovan
and Bartholomew) have made a start at inquiring into the ethical significance
of Qoheleth’s epistemology, they hardly move beyond the question of how
Qoheleth knows what he knows. I suggest that Bonaventure improves upon
these attempts at a kind of “ethics of perception” by reading the royal testament
within the register of the vice of curiositas. Bonaventure is not merely interested
in Solomon’s approach to wisdom vis-à-vis Proverbs, but is also interested in the
intended scope of Solomon’s pursuit of knowledge (and its moral implications), as
well as the personal and communal ramifications of the pursuit. In exploring this
significance, Bonaventure divides Solomon’s search broadly into inquiries into
the liberal arts and the mechanical arts. Yet, not only does Bonaventure consider
the ramifications of Solomon’s curiosity for Solomon’s own journey, but he also
takes the opportunity to offer an implicit warning to his students in Paris not to
become curiosi, especially with respect to the works of Aristotle. In this section,
I will show how Bonaventure’s exposure of the fruits of curiosity in Solomon’s
search for knowledge and wealth are instructive for his vision of the liberal and
mechanical arts. Then, I will suggest that this account, joined by the opening
poem and the epilogue of Ecclesiastes, serves for Bonaventure as an indictment
of Aristotelianism that goes unchecked, as well as an implicit warning to his
own students in Paris. Before moving into the discussion of Solomon’s curiosity,
however, I will introduce the Augustinian concept of curiosity that informs
Bonaventure’s reading, enlisting the work of Paul J. Griffiths for assistance.
Curiositas according to Augustine

In his exegesis of Eccl. 1:13, Bonaventure defines curiositas as “a willful
prostitution of the human mind, embracing any truth it chances on and being
adulterous with it, because the first truth is the soul’s only spouse.”169 Here,
Bonaventure is drawing from a tradition that reaches through Hugh of St Cher
169
WSB VII:121.
www.Ebook777.com
and Hugh of St Victor170 back to St Augustine. Because European thought on

curiositas from the fifth to the fifteenth century is by and large Augustinian,171
including the perspectives of Hugh of St Victor and St Bonaventure, it will be
helpful here to examine Augustine’s understanding of curiositas. After providing
a general overview of Augustine’s conception of curiositas, I will look briefly
at his relation of curiositas to the works of the Manichees in the Confessions,
because it anticipates Bonaventure’s relation of the vice to the “Athenians.”
Perhaps what is initially surprising to modern ears about Augustine’s
understanding of curiositas is that, for him, curiositas is a vice, not a virtue.172
The notion of curiosity’s viciousness is counterintuitive to members of research
guilds whose aim is “to seek out and investigate by wisdom all that is done
under the heavens” (Eccl. 1:13). Yet, Griffiths has recently challenged curiosity’s
current reputation as a virtue by engaging Augustine’s treatment of curiositas.173
He notes that almost all premodern Christian thinkers considered curiositas
to be a vice. How, then, does Augustine and those who follow him characterize
the vice?
Combining perspectives from Augustine’s De Trinitate and the Confessions,
Griffiths suggests that “Curiosity for Augustine is appetite for nothing other
than the ownership of new knowledge,” with the appetite being “a kind of
concupiscentia,” which for Augustine indicates “a disordered desire that
guarantees its own disappointment.”174 Augustine distinguishes between the
curious person (curiosus) and the studious person (studiosus).175 Though both
the curiosus and the studiosus have a kind of love for the objects of their study
(amor sciendi), the curiosus is a fornicator, perverting study and investigation.176
While the desire of the studiosus is open, ordering the scientia of things to the
relation of those things to God, the curiosus has a closed desire, a libido for
the scientia of the incognita alone.177 The resulting disposition of the curiosus
is one of “infinite dissatisfaction,”178 which manifests itself in various ways, as
I shall enumerate below, after highlighting Augustine’s biblical backing for his
treatment of curiositas.
170
WSB VII:121, see fn. 94.
171
Griffiths, “Vice of Curiosity,” p. 49.
172
173
See Griffiths, “Vice of Curiosity”; idem, Intellectual Appetite; and idem, The Vice of Curiosity: An
Essay on Intellectual Appetite (Winnipeg: Canadian Mennonite University Press, 2006).
174
175
De Trin. 10.1.2–3.
176
Griffiths, “Vice of Curiosity,” p. 50; cf. DDC 2.23.35; De Trin. 10.1.2–3.
177
Griffiths, “Vice of Curiosity”; cf. De Trin. 10.1.2–3.
178
Griffiths, “Vice of Curiosity.”
www.Ebook777.com
Griffiths notes that a verse Augustine uses continually in relation to curiositas

is 1 Jn 2:16,179 which, according to Bonaventure in his Breviloquium, names the
threefold root from which evil springs: “the desire of the flesh, the desire of the
eye (concupiscentiae oculorum), and the pride of life.”180 The second element
from 1 Jn 2:16, the concupiscentia oculorum, is that which Augustine relates to
curiositas.181 He identifies this concept of the concupiscentia oculorum with the
second temptation in the temptation narrative in Matt. 4:1-11,182 where the devil
places Jesus on the pinnacle of the Temple and asks Jesus to throw himself down,
quoting Ps. 91:11-12, which says that God’s angels will not allow harm to befall
“whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High” (Ps. 91:1). Jesus resists the
temptation, declaring to the devil with a quotation from Deut. 6:16 that one
is not to tempt the Lord.183 For Augustine, this temptation is “paradigmatic
of temptations to curiosity because it offers to the tempted satisfaction of the
experimental appetite.â•¯... Here too, then, the libido sciendi is linked with the
libido experiendi: the indulgence of the latter is precisely the indulgence of
curiosity.”184 A crucial conclusion of this depiction of Augustine is that one may
characterize curiosity’s linking of the libido sciendi with the libido experiendi as
the concupiscentia oculorum. “Seeing” (videre), for Augustine, not only signifies
the physical sense, but also the linguistic lexeme that represents the consolidation
of the perceptual process, from experience to knowledge. While sight is only one
of five senses, Augustine suggests that
we also use [the word “seeing” (videre)] for the other senses as well, when we
exercise them in the search for knowledge ... Thus ... the whole round of sensory
experience is called [concupiscentia oculorum] because the function of seeing, in
which the eyes have the principal role, is applied by analogy to the other senses
when they are seeking after any kind of knowledge.185
The term “seeing” has an ability descriptively to link the quest for knowledge
and sensory experience, whether one pursues knowledge and experience out of
desire for God or out of curiosity.
179
180
WSB IX:206; QuarEd V:263.
181
Conf. 10.35.54.
182
Correspondingly, he relates the “desire of the flesh” with the first temptation, and the “pride of life”
with the third temptation.
183
See “Of True Religion (De Vera Religione),” 38.71, in Augustine: Earlier Writings, ed. J. H. S. Burleigh,
The Library of Christian Classics: Ichthus Edition (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1953),
p. 261.
184
185
Conf. 10.35.54.
www.Ebook777.com
With the high volume of ocular language in Ecclesiastes, as well as the

language of knowledge and experience, one can understand how it would seem
obvious for an Augustinian such as Hugh of St Victor, whom Bonaventure
follows, to invoke the language of curiositas in describing the royal testament
in Eccl. 1:12–2:26. As I have intimated, there is more to Solomon’s intellectual
journey than physiological “seeing.” Solomon’s “seeing” has particular effects
on his entire person. Placing his sight within the register of curiositas helps in
exploring these effects. What, then, are the characteristic features of this vice?
Below, I will introduce three characteristic features of curiositas, which will
figure into the more detailed look at Solomon’s curiosity.
Griffiths argues that for Augustine, there are three primary outcroppings
of curiositas: the insatiable desire for novelty, the tendency toward loquacity,
and the quest for total, privatized ownership of knowledge.186 In the desire for
novelty, the concupiscentia oculorum directs its gaze to possess what no one else
has seen and to know what no one else has known. The gazer becomes obsessed
with the search for the incognita. Yet, this appetite is finally unsatisfying, because
once a thing is known, it is no longer new. Consequently, the gaze upon a given
object becomes a glance, for one has not the time to ponder the object if the only
object worth knowing is a totally new one. Curiosity’s glance at an object-turned-
spectacle “precludes contemplation.”187 It cannot be a vestigium aeternitatis, but
rather is an idol. The spectacle is an idol because one has observed it purely as a
thing in itself and not an icon of God created ex nihilo. The idol, then, ultimately
proves to be a “no-thing” when the observer strips it bare of its contingency
on the Creator. Thus the quest for novelty becomes wearying and perpetually
frustrating, because as soon as one possesses knowledge of something new
(however fleeting), it is already known, useless to the insatiable appetite of the
concupiscentia oculorum, resulting in an endless and futile search.188
Novel objects not only give themselves to the curiosi only to become “no-things,”
but they also cause the mouths of the curiosi to tend toward loquacitas. Each
new object lends itself to words of description. Yet, if curiosity’s gaze becomes a
glance and an object becomes a “no-thing,” the words of the curiosi are “chatty,”
superficial, and wearying, due to the sheer number that the curiosi expend vainly
to describe new thing after new thing. The curious person desires for others to
know her or him as one who knows.189 Augustine illustrates this phenomenon
186
187
188
189
www.Ebook777.com
by describing the works of the Manichees, who filled books, but whose words
were empty, just like the objects of their gaze, namely, their idols.190 Pascal aptly
illustrates the relation between curiositas and loquacitas by equating curiosity
to the vanity (in the sense of “pride”) of a seaside traveler who only travels in
order to chat about it to others: “Curiosity is only vanity. More often than not, we
only want to know something in order to speak about it. Otherwise, we would
not travel on the sea—in order never to say something about it—for the sole
pleasure of seeing without the hope of ever communicating it.”191 The loquacious
only see in order to speak incessantly about what they have seen, not in order to
contemplate that which is seen, much less the Creator.
The final and most important manifestation of curiositas for Augustine
is the attempt of the curiosus to become a proprietor over knowledge. This
point regarding proprietas is central for Augustine because of his “ontology of
participation, according to which all particulars (trees, rocks, people, numbers,
propositions) are what they are in virtue of their participation in the excess of
God’s being.”192 The attempt to take ownership, and thus privatize, knowledge
of a thing by expropriating such knowledge from a thing’s participation in God
“results always in misprision.”193 This attempt is at the same time an attempt at a
kind of reversal of creation. If creation is ex nihilo, because it is totally contingent
on the Creator for its existence, then divorcing knowledge of a creature from
its contingency on the Creator is a kind of attempt at a return of the creature’s
existence ad nihilo. This movement ad nihilo not only affects the status of
the object, but also the human subject. This effect on the subject is relevant
for thinking about curiosity’s relation to ethics, and it is the springboard for
Griffiths’s contemporary argument against curiositas.
Griffiths links the notion of privacy to ownership and control, or dominance.194
While private ownership on the surface connotes personal gain, for Augustine
(and Griffiths), it connotes a loss, because the movement of a thing from esse
commune to esse proprie is a movement from what something is more fully to
what it is less completely.195 This ontological diminution involves the correlation
of ownership and the thirst for power. Griffiths suggests that all current debates
surrounding the notion of personal privacy “are about the limits of controlled
190
See the fuller discussion on Augustine and the Manichees below.
191
Blaise Pascal, Les Pensées de Pascal, ed. Francis Kaplan (Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1982), p. 204.
Translation mine.
192
193
Griffiths, “Vice of Curiosity,” p. 55
194
195
www.Ebook777.com
access.”196 On the one hand, liberal societies venerate ideally public objects; but
on the other hand, they protect ideally private objects with all the rigor they can
muster.197 Both the question about the limits of controlled access and the protection
of ideally private objects point to the power of the owner. “Sequestration requires
power, or at least the illusion of power.”198 The thirst for and rise to power, however
real or illusory, transforms the one expropriating, diminishing her or him just as
she or he diminishes the object by the act of sequestration.199 The diminution of
the owner is ontological as well. The privatizing of something that does not give
itself to privatization reduces an owner from being a participant in creaturely
existence to a pseudocreator, an architect of simulacra that grant the illusion of
ownership of creatures. The pseudoworlds that the pseudocreator constructs are
simulacra because the objects they contain are victims of ontological diminution.
Thus, there is total ontological diminution in the quest for owning power over
creatures, reducing both knower and knowable.
Griffiths says that all things one is able to know are either eternal or temporal.200
An eternal knowable, such as a mathematical or logical truth, participates in the
being of God because it has neither beginning nor end in time, and does not
have temporal properties except those that temporal things give it.201 “Eternal
objects cannot be created, for temporality is intrinsic to the idea of creation.”202
Consequently, a failure to recognize an eternal knowable’s participation in God’s
being by trying to sequester knowledge of it for one’s self is “to fail to know
the kind or quiddity of the thing apprehended.”203 Temporal objects, such as
“paintings, plants, genes, galaxies, social structures, and so on,”204 are contingent
on the Creator for their existence. Thus, to sequester knowledge of temporal
things is “to deny performatively the relation of [such things] ... to the creator of
everything.”205 The knower denies something essential about the object, but also
“the mode of [the thing’s] apprehension by the curious makes of it something
it is not and cannot be: an object exhaustively knowable by the curious.”206 The
curious person’s attempt to sequester knowledge of both eternal and temporal
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
www.Ebook777.com
knowables is to reduce the knowables to simulacra and the curiosus to a self-

deluded pseudocreator who forfeits participation in the fullness of creaturely
life. For Augustine, the Manichees are supreme culprits in this phenomenon.
Therefore, it is worth looking briefly at his depiction of the Manichees, who will
be shown to anticipate the “Athenians” against whom Bonaventure warns his
students.
In the second book of the Confessions, Augustine describes the way in which
vices masquerade as virtues. He begins with pride: though it “imitates what is
lofty,” it fails to recognize that God alone is “most high above all things.”207 In
other words, appearances are deceiving. A vice seems like one thing, but behind
its appearance is another thing altogether. Such is also the case with curiositas,
which “appears to be a zeal for knowledge,” but in fact it is rooted in an attempt
to displace God as supreme Knower.208 Likewise, “[a]varice wishes to have large
possessions,” but only God possesses everything.209 Throughout the Confessions,
Augustine narrates his search for knowledge among those who are known as
people who know. He becomes restless (inquietus)210 in the course of his journey
because the zealous and lofty thinkers are unmasked, exposed as those who in
fact are not zealous for true knowledge but rather desire self-exaltation. One such
curiosus in Augustine’s tale is “a Manichee bishop named Faustus, a great trapÂ€of
the devil (1 Tim. 3:7) by which many were captured as a result of his smooth
talk.”211 In recalling his experience with Faustus, who serves as an emblem of the
Manichees, Augustine portrays the severe ramifications of curiositas for curiosi
themselves as well as for their auditors.
Regarding the effect of curiositas on the curiosi themselves, Augustine
shows, simply speaking, that the Manichees are delusional. Even as they pursue
knowledge through rigorous training in the liberal arts,212 they extinguish the
very light of knowledge because they do not “in a religious spirit investigate the
source of the intelligence with which they research into these matters.”213 Instead,
they reach for things well beyond their grasp, exploring natural phenomena
207
Conf. 2.6.13.
208
Conf. 2.6.13.
209
Conf. 2.6.13.
210
See Conf. 5.2.2. In the following chapter, the dialectic of rest and restlessness from the Confessions will
be a prominent theme. Thus, as intimated in the introduction, the work of Augustine is a common
thread linking the Seraphic Doctor and the Wittenberg Reformer. Yet, it will be evident that Luther
appropriates this dialectic in a significant way, departing from Bonaventure precisely in where he
pinpoints the temporal-spatial location of quietus.
211
Conf. 5.3.3.
212
Conf. 5.3.3.
213
Conf. 5.3.4.
www.Ebook777.com
as ends in themselves, “simply desir[ing] knowledge for its own sake.”214 They
count innumerable stars, employing geometric and other skills, but not to their
proper end.215 Augustine grants the veracity of many of their observations, but,
importantly, recognizes that ever-expanding and ever-precisive knowledge of
the universe does not guarantee for the proud a knowledge of the truth:
About the creation they say many things that are true; but the truth, the artificer
of creation, they do not seek in a devout spirit and so they fail to find him. Or if
they do find him, although knowing God they do not honour him as God or give
thanks. They become lost in their own ideas and claim to be wise, attributing to
themselves things which belong to [God].216
In their very attempt to displace God by trying to know what only God can know,
the Manichees actually lose themselves, forfeiting dependence upon God, the
sign of their creaturely status. Thus, though they learn to predict eclipses, they
eclipse the light of God from reaching them, and in so doing “do not perceive
their own eclipse.”217 In becoming “lost in their own ideas,” the Manichees lose
themselves as well. However, being lost in this manner does not prevent the
Manichees from trying to reach others with their knowledge, that they may be
known as those who know.
Seemingly indefatigable in their chatter, the Manichees amaze their auditors
by expounding on their knowledge of nature, with the auditors hanging on every
word.218 For Augustine, to get lost in the teachings of the Manichees is to depart
from “the Way.”219 The only avenue by which one may reach rest in God is God’s
Word, “through whom [God] made the things that [the Manichees] count and
also those who do the counting, and the senses thanks to which they observe
what they count, and the mind they employ to calculate.”220 Thus, the revelation
of Christ leads knowledge back to its font, crushing pride and the hubris of the
curious while at the same time making them happy regarding the givenness of
creation.221
In this section, I have provided an overview of Augustine’s understanding of
curiositas as a vice, drawing on the work of Paul Griffiths. There are primarily
214
Conf. 10.35.55.
215
Conf. 5.3.3.
216
Conf. 5.3.5.
217
Conf. 5.3.4.
218
Conf. 5.3.4.
219
Conf. 5.3.5.
220
Conf. 5.3.5.
221
Conf. 5.4.7.
www.Ebook777.com
three features of curiositas in Augustine: the obsession with novelty, the tendency
to be loquacious, and the desire for private ownership of knowledge. I have
shown that, for Augustine, the principal curiosi are the Manichees, with whom
he has had firsthand experience. In the next section, I will draw connections
between what has been said about curiositas and Bonaventure’s explication of
the character of Solomon’s curiositas, particularly applied in the liberal and
mechanical arts. Then, I will show how Bonaventure’s relation of the “Athenians”
to the vice parallels Augustine’s depiction of the Manichees. This move, as will be
evident, has a potent rhetorical force given Bonaventure’s context.
Solomon’s duplex curiositas

After the opening passage of his “treatise” (Eccl. 1:4-11), Solomon begins to
narrate details of his own life, first introducing himself as having been “king
in Jerusalem” (Eccl. 1:12). According to Bonaventure, Solomon moves from
describing the vanity of changeability in created realities to declaring and
reprimanding his own curiosity (in Eccl. 1:12–2:26). The fallen king applied his
curiositas in two realms of inquiry, namely, the liberal arts and the mechanical
arts.222 Whether engaging in philosophical reasoning or cultivating skills for
wealth production, Solomon subjected objects of knowledge to his self-referential
reasoning, seeking full propriety over whatever new information would expand
the scope of his power. In this section, I will look at Solomon’s duplex curiositas,
considering the ramifications of his vicious activity first for the liberal arts and
then for the mechanical arts. It will be evident that no matter what the endeavor,
curiosity corrupts the contemplation of creatures and, in so doing, converts
creatures from icons to idols.
Bonaventure indicates that within the liberal arts, Solomon exercised his
curiositas with respect to both natural philosophy and moral philosophy.223 In
each case, Solomon betrayed a tendency not to depend upon the Word of God
but on his own understanding, becoming like Faustus in seeking to displace God
as the knower of all things “under the sun,” and like Elihu in claiming sovereignty
over ethical deliberation. Therefore, in this section, I will look at Solomon’s self-
referential reasoning in both natural and moral philosophy, paying particular
attention to how he resembles Augustine’s Manichean foe and the pretentious
young ethicist in Job.
222
WSB VII:118.
223
WSB VII:118.
www.Ebook777.com
If Eccl. 1:4-7 invites the appropriate study224 of nature, in that it evokes

the recognition of nature’s proper end in God, then Eccl. 1:12-15 depicts the
corruption of natural philosophy through the vice of curiositas. This brief section
unfolds at first by tying power and entitlement to an unconstrained search for
knowledge. Then, it indicates that the excessive intellectual appetite of the
curious king comes under divine judgment. Finally, it speaks to a “Manichean”
delusion on the part of this curious king, who does not even realize that he is
afflicted by his own misguided investigations.
According to Bonaventure, in Eccl. 1:12 (“I, Ecclesiastes, was king in
Jerusalem”),225 Solomon “looks at the suitability of the one studying” divine works
in creation.226 Yet, Solomon indicates a presumption on his part: he was qualified
not only because of his world-famous wisdom, but also because of his power (as
king) and the peace in which he dwelled (as ruler over the city which bears a name
that means “vision of peace”).227 Dwelling in peace and having seemingly infinite
resources and time meant that Solomon was able to investigate without restraint.
If, as Griffiths has shown, curiositas involves a desire for private ownership over
a wealth of knowledge in order to possess power, then in Solomon’s case, this
concupiscence was amplified by Solomon’s ability to acquire whatever he desired
by any means possible.228 Though Bonaventure does not explicitly indicate whether
Solomon is speaking with a certain amount of irony in Eccl. 1:12, the Seraphic
Doctor’s comments elsewhere on Solomon’s style,229 as well as his immediate move
to depicting the curiosity of the king, support the conclusion that Bonaventure
is portraying Solomon as a “son of entitlement.” It is not enough for this heir of
David to possess a kingdom when, like the fruit in the garden, percepts hold forth
the empty promise of propriety over godlike knowledge.
224
Here, I am using the term “study” to refer to the intellectual activity of the studiosus, as opposed to
that of the curiosus.
225
WSB VII:29.
226
WSB VII:119.
227
WSB VII:119.
228
Brock relates curiositas to the desire of the technological age: “Technology is sin when it becomes
a way of life expressing a quest for power and self-aggrandizement. It is sin as life formed by the
fetters of self-interest, without wonder at the goodness of existing creation, without concern for
the neighbor. Here desire (concupiscence) reigns, greedily making an empire of our wills. The
rapacious expansion of such concupiscence illumines the dynamics of empire building, and vice
versa. For both, the constant temptation to evil lurks in limitless and undisciplined desire. Only
as the one God vanquishes science and technology as salvific deities can the truth about created
things be known.” See Brian Brock, Christian Ethics in a Technological Age (Grand Rapids: William
B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2010), p. 207. King Solomon the curiosus anticipates the desire of
the technological age precisely in putting every intellectual resource at his disposal to the use of such
empire building.
229
See, for instance, WSB VII:233, where Bonaventure says that Solomon “uses two styles of speaking,
for he says some things plainly, others ironically.”
www.Ebook777.com
Solomon admits the hubris of his curiosity when he declares that he “proposed
in [his] mind to seek and search out wisely concerning all things that are done
under the sun” (Eccl. 1:13a).230 The adjective “all” is all-important. It indicates
the boundless character of Solomon’s pursuit. In Manichean fashion, Solomon
latched on to any and every novel bit of information available, not content to
contemplate creation when there was so much knowledge to acquire. Like Faustus
in Augustine’s Confessions, Solomon became known as “one who knows,” even
piquing the curiosity of the Queen of Sheba (1 Kgs 10:1-13; 2 Chron. 9:1-12).231
Yet, in like fashion to Faustus, Solomon did not carry out his pursuit of knowledge
“in a religious spirit,”232 but instead lived in monarchic excess, attempting to
extend beyond his creaturely limits.233 He became known as “one who knows,”
but in so doing, forgot that he was also one known in the first place by God.234
Yet, this forgetfulness would come at a price: Solomon would find this endeavor
tiresome and unsatisfying because it fell under God’s judgment.
According to Bonaventure, Eccl. 1:13b (“This worst occupation God has
given to men and women to be exercised therein”)235 indicates the “severity of
divine judgment.”236 What is the character of this occupation that God has given
to humanity? In answer to this question, Bonaventure quotes Hugh of St Victor:
“An occupation is a distraction of the mind that turns away, distracts, and traps a
soul from being able to think of what concerns salvation.”237 This “distraction of
the mind” causes one’s “rational ability” to “run riot in the knowledge of earthly
matters.”238 If contemplation invites rest in allowing creaturely vestiges to draw
one to God, then curiosity causes the opposite. The insatiable desire to know,
to grasp ever-new objects of knowledge, never ceases to move. This occupation
is the worst of all occupations in that it is intimately linked with the “sin of the
first parent.”239 Adam’s curiosity directed him to seek after knowledge of what
he had not been given to know, discontented as he was with the Word of God.
The first sin brought with it concupiscence, a condition that causes humans “by
their own freedom,” to be caught up “in an infinite number of questions, because
230
WSB VII:29.
231
Bonaventure refers to the Queen of Sheba twice in his section on Solomon’s curiosity (see WSB
VII:133, 136).
232
Conf. 5.3.4.
233
WSB VII:119–20.
234
WSB VII:120–1.
235
WSB VII:29.
236
WSB VII:120.
237
WSB VII:120–1.
238
WSB VII:120.
239
WSB VII:120.
www.Ebook777.com
by abandoning the one human beings have become prone to many and indeed
to an infinite number of things. For in these their concupiscence is not finished
or satisfied.”240 The distractedness that causes discontent in the search of the
curiosus, then, is a symptom of the vanitas poenalitatis. In desiring to become
like God by attempting to cover the whole sweep of divine knowledge, Solomon
inhabited a condition inherited from Adam. As with Adam, Solomon’s curiosity
caused him to fall from the contemplation of those things that reminded him
of the contingency of creatures upon the Creator (vanitas mutabilitatis) to the
concupiscence that caused his intellectual appetite to run rampant with no hope
of rest. Unfortunately for Solomon, like Faustus, he was deluded enough not
to realize this source of his restlessness, instead “crossing over” to other lines of
inquiry in search of satisfaction.241 Thus, he moved from natural philosophy to
ethics.
Bonaventure suggests that when Solomon says that he “[gave his] heart
to know prudence and learning and errors and folly” (Eccl. 1:17a),242 he is
indicating a transition from natural philosophy to moral philosophy. If Solomon
suffered perpetual movement without progress in the study of “everything
under the sun,” then perhaps he would be satisfied by learning every good and
evil deed imaginable.243 Further, as one with expert knowledge in morality, he
could also find ways to justify all manner of action. Bonaventure reads Eccl.
1:16–2:3 as a passage which exposes the pride of the ethicist. Significantly, he
conceptually relates the sins of Solomon to the sins of Elihu in the acquisition
of moral knowledge, and delimits the study of morality by drawing attention to
the command of God.
If Solomon prefigured Faustus in his study of natural philosophy, then in his
study of moral philosophy, he resembled Elihu. It is in connection to Eccl. 1:18
(“Because in much wisdom there is much indignation. The person who adds
knowledge also adds sorrow”)244 that Bonaventure calls to mind the figure of
Elihu, who in Job 32–37 “was moved to indignation because he regarded himself
as wise.”245 In the book of Job, Elihu arrives on the scene, rebukes both Job and
his friends, and then, like the loquacious, pours forth a flood of words declaring
one axiom after another. Ironically, he himself rebukes Job for engaging in empty
240
WSB VII:287.
241
WSB VII:124.
242
WSB VII:29.
243
Indeed, Bonaventure notes that “just as avarice and the desire to possess increase with riches, so too
does the desire to learn increase for the curious person” (WSB VII:130).
244
WSB VII:29.
245
WSB VII:126.
www.Ebook777.com
speech,246 though it is his own words that are met with no response, meriting
neither rebuke nor praise in the end (see Job 42:7-9). No matter the number
of ethical principles or theological truths declared, his words fall on deaf ears.
The reason Elihu’s words seem to vanish into thin air is because they arise from
pride. One may become indignant simply because one’s pride makes her or him
impatient in moral matters.247 Solomon, like Elihu, embodies the pride of the
ethicist, as curiosus seeking to learn every axiom possible, and then, unsolicited,
seeking to impose the knowledge of good and evil upon others. Through a
quotation of Hugh of St Victor, Bonaventure conveys the intimate relationship
between curiositas and pride, even in learning ethics: “Curiosity impels him to
study. Pride impels him to show off. And so it is fitting that labor should weigh
down on the one puffed up, and being occupied should put to flight the one
who was curious.”248 As with the attempt to master the knowledge of natural
philosophy, the curiosity of the ethicist comes at a price, namely, the “vexation
of spirit.” Responding to such vexation, Bonaventure places limits upon moral
reasoning.
Bonaventure notes that it is useful to possess knowledge of “prudence and
learning,” as well as their opposites (“errors and folly”), “provided they are
studied in the right way.”249 For Bonaventure pride has no place in the study of
morality. Yet he also recognizes that, as with the knowledge of natural things, the
knowledge of good and evil may become a means to godlike power. Indeed, the
connection of curiosity and pride to the study of morality further impresses the
allusion to Adam, as it was precisely Adam’s reaching out for the knowledge
of good and evil—which offered the opportunity to become sicut Deus—that
precipitated his fall. In his exegesis of Eccl. 2:12b and in its associated quaestio,
Bonaventure outlines an ethical vision strikingly similar to the twentieth-century
ethics of Barth and Bonhoeffer. In Bonaventure’s Bible, Ecclesiastes 2:12b says,
“What are human beings, said I, that they can follow the King, their maker?”250
Bonaventure interprets “the King” (in Hebrew, ‫ )המלך‬theologically, suggesting
that it refers to “God the creator.”251 Interpreting Scripture with Scripture, he
then quotes Isa. 64:8, following the quotation with a definitive comment: “â•›‘And
now, O Lord, you are our father and we are clay. And you are our maker, and
246
Interestingly, the word used for “empty” here is ‫הבל‬, clearly connected in this case to loquacity.
247
WSB VII:126.
248
WSB VII:126.
249
WSB VII:125.
250
WSB VII:30.
251
WSB VII:143.
www.Ebook777.com
we are all the work of your hands.’ So no one can follow God.”252 It is supremely
significant that Bonaventure relates Eccl. 2:12b particularly to the study of ethics,
as is especially evident in Quaestio 8.
In the first part of Quaestio 8, Bonaventure’s interlocutor inquires into the
meaning of the question “What are human beings that they can follow God?,” quoting
both Sir. 23:38 (“It is a great glory to follow the Lord”) and Job 23:11 (“My foot has
followed God’s steps”) in the sed contra.253 In a response that both echoes Augustine
and anticipates Barth254 and Bonhoeffer,255 Bonaventure says, “To follow by being
like God is not given to any creature. Because Satan wanted this, he fell. But one
can follow by subjection and obedience. This is a possibility for human beings ... not
for all, but for those to whom it is given by grace from God and whom God draws.
And therefore, no one by themselves can follow God without God’s help.”256 In
rebuking his curiosity with regard to the study of moral philosophy, Solomon finally
acknowledged his creaturely limits. The king in Jerusalem realized that it was not
for him to know what the heavenly King knows. Rather he was dependent upon
the heavenly King’s grace and command for the knowledge necessary to do good
deeds. While it might be useful to know “prudence and learning,” it is more useful
simply “[t]o keep the commandments of God.”257 Such a mode of moral reasoning
and existence means eschewing “ethical loquacity” and instead “drawing near to
listen” for God’s voice (see Eccl. 5:1 [4:17, Heb.]). The imperative of Bonaventure
here for contemporary theological ethics is difficult to miss. In an age when there
is “no end to the making of books” (Eccl. 12:12) that seek to offer “the definitive
word” on any given ethical topic, Bonaventure declares that God’s grace and
command are sufficient, and that obsessing over every possible detail only leads
to further questioning and finally vexation. Neither dwelling in potentialities nor
becoming indignant when among those who are less knowledgeable in moral
matters will bring one closer to God. In fact, such a mode of moral reasoning in
the end bespeaks a lack of dependence upon God.
Thus far, I have shown how Bonaventure relates Solomon’s curiositas both
to natural philosophy and to ethics. Solomon mirrors both Faustus and Elihu,
252
WSB VII:143.
253
WSB VII:146.
254
See in particular Barth’s articulation of “The Command of God the Creator” in Karl Barth, Church
Dogmatics, III.4, eds G. W. Bromiley and T. F. Torrance, trans. A. T. Mackay, T. H. L. Parker, Harold
Knight, Henry A. Kennedy and John Marks (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1961).
255
See, for instance, Bonhoeffer’s essay, “The ‘Ethical’ and the ‘Christian’ as a Topic,” in Dietrich
Bonhoeffer, Ethics, eds Ilse Tödt, Heinz Eduard Tödt, Ernst Feil, and Clifford Green, trans. Reinhard
Krauss, Charles West, and Douglas Scott, in Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works 6 (Minneapolis: Fortress
Press, 2005), pp. 363–87.
256
WSB VII:146.
257
WSB VII:129.
www.Ebook777.com
seeking knowledge of physics and morality in order to enhance his power. He

also resembles Adam, who was the first to fall because of curiositas, desiring to
be like God in obtaining all the forbidden fruit had to offer. While as a lecturer
in a university, Bonaventure is especially keen to explore the ramifications of
curiositas for the liberal arts,258 he does not ignore the way in which curiositas is
put to work in the cultivation of mechanical skill for gaining wealth. Therefore,
I will close this section by looking briefly at the Seraphic Doctor’s depiction of
curiosity in the mechanical arts.
Not only did Solomon follow Adam in desiring to know good and evil, but he
also attempted to recreate his own personal Eden, cultivating mechanical skill
in order to do so. Conveying the Greek and Scholastic belief that the pursuit of
wisdom is a spiritual matter while the cultivation of mechanical skill is a bodily
matter, Bonaventure detects a movement from curiositas in the liberal arts to
curiositas in the mechanical arts in Eccl. 2:4-8. While I will confront Bonaventure’s
dichotomizing tendency in Chapter 4, here I will focus primarily on what is to be
gleaned from Bonaventure’s insights. Reading Ecclesiastes in a penitential register,
Bonaventure notes that Solomon’s acquisition of lasting possessions, servants,
animals, and minerals “was a work of curiosity and blameworthy,” referring to
1 Kgs 9:10, where Solomon is said to have built a house not only for the Lord,
but also for himself.259 The four categories of acquisition—lasting possessions,
servants, animals, and minerals—“cover almost all worldly delights.”260 Thus,
Solomon joined a logic of consumption to the acquisitive logic he applied in the
liberal arts: “It is clear that he owned much, because he consumed much.”261 He
did not cultivate skill for service, but rather for dominance and delight. Thus, for
Solomon, both head and hand were governed by curiositas, which led him not
to embody his wisdom for the sake of his citizens, but rather to utilize his wit for
the purposes of self-gain. Having shown the comprehensive scope of Solomon’s
curiositas, I now move to close this chapter with a reflection on the rhetorical
force of Bonaventure’s exposition of Ecclesiastes for his own students.
The curiosity of the “Athenians”

If for Augustine the Manichees are the principal curiosi, then the paradigmatic
example of the obsession for learning new things for Bonaventure comes from the
258
I shall return to this point in the final section of this chapter.
259
WSB VII:132.
260
WSB VII:131.
261
WSB VII:133.
www.Ebook777.com
example of the Athenians in Acts 17:21, who “employed themselves in nothing

else but either telling or hearing some new thing.”262 The Athenians are depicted
in Acts as both loquacious and restless in their pursuit after new percepts. Yet
their intellectual appetites are never satisfied, precisely because of their desire
for novelty and ownership over knowledge. Bonaventure refers to this verse
from Acts three times in the course of his Commentary on Ecclesiastes, and two
of these instances take place in especially significant places. The first instance
occurs as Bonaventure relates the diagnosis of humanity’s perceptual problem to
the search for novelty in his exegesis of Solomon’s opening passage (Eccl. 1:3-11),
which I have examined in detail already. The second instance occurs in his
exegesis of the warning in the book’s epilogue (Eccl. 12:12). Read together, these
passages for Bonaventure send a clear message: curiositas is at the heart of the
failure properly to perceive the world and is to be avoided at all costs, as it is not
only an act of adultery with knowledge obtained but it is also harmful to the
eager student. Here, I shall look at the relation between Bonaventure’s detection
of curiositas in Solomon’s opening poem and Bonaventure’s interpretation of the
epilogue as a warning against curiositas. I will then suggest that the combined
rhetorical effect of Bonaventure’s reading the Athenians of Acts into the opening
and closing passages of Ecclesiastes, along with his treatment of curiositas in
Solomon’s royal testament, is to sound his own warning with respect to the
reception of Aristotle at the University of Paris.
There is a connection between the dissatisfaction in humanity’s quest for
novelty under the sun in Eccl. 1:8-11 and the epilogue’s warning. According
to Bonaventure, the warning given to “my son” in the epilogue is a warning
against curiositas. To the line, “More than these, my son, require not” (Eccl.
12:12), Bonaventure adds “so that you always want to hear new things. For it is
enough to know what is necessary.”263 Bonaventure employs Sir. 3:22 to interpret
this line in Eccl. 12:12: “Think always on the things that God has commanded
you, and in many of God’s works be not curious.”264 What God commands and
reveals is sufficient for the studiosus, but the curiosus, like the Solomonic ethicist,
dangerously attempts to plumb the depths of the unknown works of God. Thus
the work of the curiosus is both “unending and laborious.”265 There is no end to
the making of books “because the curious never have enough, but want to hear
262
WSB VII:112.
263
WSB VII:425.
264
WSB VII:425.
265
WSB VII:425.
www.Ebook777.com
more, never wanting to hear what is old, but always what is new.”266 The Athenians
in Acts 17 serve as the prime example of this obsession with novelty.267 Because
things “under the sun” are unsatisfying for the concupiscentia oculorum268 of the
curiosi, curiosity’s quest is not only unending, but also laborious: “And much
study is an affliction of the flesh” (Eccl. 12:12).269 It is important to emphasize
how the quest of the curiosus not only wearies the mind, but also the flesh. The
one who obsesses over incognita will lose sleep, only to discover that she or he
still has made no progress in the search to master all kinds of knowledge. In the
next chapter, it will be evident that curiosity’s sister vice, avarice, has the same
effect on a person.
Aside from Acts 17:21, another passage that Bonaventure uses to interpret
both the epilogue and the opening poem is Eccl. 8:16b-17a: “For there are
some who day and night take no sleep with their eyes. And I understand that
a human being can find no reason for all those works of God that have been
done under the sun.”270 In his exegesis of the epilogue, Bonaventure uses these
verses to illustrate the weariness that the study of the curiosus produces. In his
treatment of the opening poem, he uses Eccl. 8:17 to interpret Eccl. 1:8a.271 The
same Hebrew verbal root (‫ )יגע‬occurs in both Eccl. 1:8 and Eccl. 12:12 to depict
the weariness that human attempts to perceive reality with copious verbal and
written expressions involves. Loquacity wearies both the chatterer and the one
who is subject to chattering, whether the chatter is present in speaking or the
composing of countless books. The first instance of this verb occurs in a diagnosis
of humanity’s perceptual struggle, while the second takes place in the context of
a warning. I propose that, in reading the epilogue’s warning as a warning against
specifically “Athenian-style” curiositas, Bonaventure is directing the warning
toward his own students, himself assuming the posture of a teacher of wisdom.
Both in the introduction to this book and throughout this chapter, I have
expressed ways in which the Seraphic Doctor conveys his reticence regarding
Aristotelianism, even as I have also shown him to be dependent upon the
Philosopher in describing the natural occurrences within the cosmos. For
instance, in Quaestio 3, when clarifying the meaning of Eccl. 1:4 (“One
266
WSB VII:425.
267
WSB VII:425.
268
269
WSB VII:426.
270
WSB VII:39–40. Luther likewise relates Eccl. 8:16-17 to curiosity (LW 15:143).
271
One could render Eccl. 1:8a in English literally as, “All the words (‫ )הדברים‬are wearisome.” The
explicit use of verbal language in Eccl. 1:8a is significant for discussing the presence of loquacity in
the opening poem.
www.Ebook777.com
generation passes away, and another generation comes, but the earth stands
forever”),272 Bonaventure takes the opportunity to explain the various meanings
of “eternity,” based on revelation. Though he does not explicitly refer to Aristotle
in this instance, in working his way through five scriptural meanings of “eternity,”
Bonaventure is no doubt subtly confronting the Aristotelian notion of the
eternality of the world.273 Though the lectures of the final decade of his life are
especially known for their attacks on Averroistic Aristotelianism,274 Bonaventure
is nonetheless implicitly warning his students here against the increasingly
popular high-medieval school.275
Further, the reiteration of his own metaphysics of emanation, exemplarity, and
consummation in his nuanced version of contemptus mundi is likewise a subtle
reminder that Aristotle, though an able natural philosopher, is not competent
to be a proper metaphysician, precisely because he denies exemplarity, the
centerpiece of Bonaventure’s metaphysical vision.276 Though it is beyond the
scope of this chapter to delve into the complex intellectual relationship between
Bonaventure and his more famous Dominican colleague (Thomas Aquinas),
I do suggest that, given the intellectual currents at the University of Paris,
Bonaventure is warning his students that even if one appropriates Aristotle
christianly, as Thomas is famous for doing, there are limits to such appropriations.
For the Seraphic Doctor, to teach on Scripture is simultaneously to expound on
Christian doctrine, and his lectures on Ecclesiastes provide ample opportunity
to explicate a metaphysical vision with Christ the exemplary Word at the center.
Moving from the talk of “Being” to placing the eternal, incarnate, and personal
Word at the center of metaphysical deliberation implies a stronger emphasis on
revelation. Yet, one must be careful not to read too much into Bonaventure’s
“anti-Aristotelianism.”277
According to Bonaventure, insofar as the Philosopher speaks truth about
created realities, one may indeed appropriate his findings for theology. In the
Breviloquium, Bonaventure says, “Theology, therefore, subjects philosophical
knowledge to itself, borrowing from the nature of things what it needs in order
to construct a mirror for the representation of divine realities.”278 Such is the
272
WSB VII:28 (italics mine).
273
See WSB VII:106–7.
274
275
Cullen notes, “It is commonly held that there were four high-medieval schools: Franciscan
Augustinianism (divided into three currents), Christian Aristotelianism (Thomism), Averroistic
Aristotelianism, and scientifico-physical Augustinianism” (Bonaventure, p. 11).
276
277
278
WSB IX:12.
www.Ebook777.com
case in Bonaventure’s exegesis of Eccl. 1:6b (“The spirit goes forward surveying
all places round about and returns to its circuits”),279 in which he draws on
Aristotle’s scientific observations of vapor and air in order to explain what sort
of movement is taking place in Solomon’s opening passage.280 For Bonaventure,
the whole of Scripture, whether one applies the literal or spiritual meaning of its
various parts, “deals with the whole universe.”281 He says, “In a sense, [Scripture]
takes the form of an intelligible cross on which the entire world machine can be
described and in some way seen in the light of the mind.”282 If Scripture deals
with the “whole universe,” then those who make true observations about the
universe may assist one in the reading of Scripture. Yet one must be sure to
subordinate the observations of scientists to the service of understanding God’s
plan of salvation for all of creation, which the saints and doctors of the Church
have passed down through the ages.283 Seeming to anticipate Barth’s articulation
of the relationship between creation and covenant, Bonaventure declares,
“Scripture does not speak of the work of creation except with reference to the
work of redemption.”284 Lest his students forget that Christian doctrine details the
direction of all things toward God, Bonaventure ensures that the genuine insight
of Aristotle, among others, remains a handmaiden to theology rather than a
self-referential end. If, as in Origen’s schema for biblical wisdom, Ecclesiastes
parallels the study of physics, then one must know how appropriately to pursue
physics. In warning his students not to become Athenian curiosi, Bonaventure
ensures that physics (as well as ethics and the mechanical arts) is brought to its
proper end in God.
Bonaventure’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes, then, serves as a primer for
his students on how to handle the sciences in general, and Aristotelianism
in particular, with respect to the doctrines of Scripture. The Seraphic Doctor
himself places limits on the seemingly unfettered study and appropriation of
the Philosopher at the University of Paris, both warning his students against
becoming “Athenian” curiosi and simultaneously illustrating how to employ
Aristotelian philosophy in the exposition of Scripture, which itself subordinates
the divine works in nature to the divine work of redemption. However, it is
precisely on this latter point that one may push the Seraphic Doctor.
279
WSB VII:28.
280
WSB VII:100.
281
WSB IX:22.
282
WSB IX:22.
283
WSB IX:22.
284
WSB IX:75; cf. Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics III.1, eds G. W. Bromiley and T. F. Torrance, trans. J. W.
Edwards, O. Bussey and H. Knight (London: T&T Clark, 1958), pp. 42–329.
www.Ebook777.com
As I have shown, Bonaventure desires to subject philosophy to theology.

According to his discussion in the Breviloquium of the “ordered levels of
hierarchies”285 in Scripture, philosophy may assist one in contemplating reality
at the level of material existence or abstraction, but only theology (or Scripture)
may bring one to contemplation of the Word. As I have shown, in his Commentary
on Ecclesiastes, Bonaventure admits that Ecclesiastes describes existence at the
levels of materiality and abstraction, but, because its material cause is vanitas
(which is the opposite of truth), it does not describe existence in the Word.286 By
implication, then, it would seem that, minus spiritual interpretation, Ecclesiastes
would be only as useful as philosophy in the contemplation of created reality
and would thus necessitate reading further to Song of Songs to contemplate
existence in the Word. There is an implied invitation to contemplate the Creator,
but Bonaventure’s overall framework circumvents the possibility of experiencing
union with Christ in Ecclesiastes. He therefore anticipates the noneschatological
readings of Ecclesiastes I depicted in the introduction and Chapter 1, which fail
to find anything redemptive in the literal sense of the book. I will elaborate on
this critique in the following two chapters. Therefore, as I move in the direction
of extending this critique, it is necessary to summarize what has been gained and
to make some anticipatory comments.
Conclusion
In reading Ecclesiastes as a penitential manual, Bonaventure is most insightful

in his detection of the cause and ramifications of the perceptual rupture
introduced in Eccl. 1:8, and expanded in Solomon’s royal testament, as
curiositas. He recognizes that vanitas is a multivalent term, transformed in the
course of Solomon’s narrative from indicating the changeableness of creatures to
evidencing human sinfulness and concupiscence. As curiosi, the descendants of
Adam convert creatures from icons to idols. The implied solution to curiositas
for Bonaventure lies not in condemning creatures per se, but in repenting of
curiosity and reconsidering the iconic significance of creatures as words that
speak of the Word. Proper contemptus mundi, then, means loving the Creator
of whom creaturely gifts speak in such a way that love for the gifts is as nothing
compared to the love for the Giver. Thus, Bonaventure’s version of contemptus
285
WSB IX:5.
286
WSB VII:97–8.
www.Ebook777.com
mundi promotes the vita contemplativa as an alternative to curiosity. However,

for Bonaventure, Ecclesiastes is only the purgative step on the contemplative
journey. While Ecclesiastes aids the restoration of sight and perception through
the purgation of curiositas, the direct contemplation of the Word may only be
implied through the spiritual interpretation of certain passages.287 Because the
material content of Ecclesiastes is vanitas, which is opposed to truth, the Word,
who is truth, is not directly encountered in the literal exposition of the book.
Direct encounter with the Word must be delayed in Bonaventure’s contemplative
ascent until one arrives at Song of Songs. In Chapter 4, however, I shall offer a
christological reading of the opening poem of Ecclesiastes, suggesting that one
need not move to Song of Songs to complete the contemplative ascent. Indeed,
one need not make an ascent at all, because Christ first descends to humanity,
opening eyes to perceive fellow creatures in their primal significance. First,
however, I will look at Luther’s take on Ecclesiastes, after briefly introducing the
points of connection and departure here.
I have hinted above that Luther distinguishes himself most vividly from
the interpretive tradition that precedes him in his exegesis of the so-called
carpe diem passages, and in the theology of time he locates in the text, which
funds Solomon’s recurring chorus. As will be evident below, Luther reads this
chorus as gospel. While Bonaventure’s solution to curiosity lies in the proper
contemplation of creatures, Luther’s solution to the vices depicted in Ecclesiastes
lies in the usus of creatures. For Luther, it is precisely in economic-political
vocations, in using the “masks of God,” that one experiences Christ making
all things new. Bonaventure’s account, though aimed at restoring the sense of
sight, finally does not offer a positive account for laborers “on the ground.” I will
suggest that, with his radical turn, Luther joins to Bonaventure’s restoration of
sight a compelling account of the activities of the hand. Luther’s “eschatology
of the present,” then, both complements and corrects Bonaventure’s penitential
reading of Ecclesiastes. It complements Bonaventure’s reading in its recognition
of the vanity of human sinfulness being rooted in the misuse of creatures that
speak of God. Yet he offers a corrective to Bonaventure in his high valuation of
secular vocations, rooted in a “this-worldly” reading of Ecclesiastes, a reading
that does not necessitate reading on to Song of Songs to experience the newness
of Christ’s work. I shall continue this comparison in the next chapter, to which
I now move.
287
www.Ebook777.com
120
www.Ebook777.com
Solomon’s Sermon for the Oeconomia and

the Politia: Martin Luther on Ecclesiastes
“In this way he has joy in his toil here, and here in the midst of evils he enters
into Paradise.”1
In the last chapter, I turned to St Bonaventure to assist in answering questions

concerning the relationship between the doctrine of creation and the interpretation
of vanitas, as well as the ethical significance of the theme of perception.
Addressing the first concern involved an examination of Bonaventure’s version
of contemptus mundi and the “fall narrative” that governs his understanding of
the structure and argument of Ecclesiastes. To place perception within a moral
register, I showed how Bonaventure employs the Augustinian notion of curiositas
as a vice in order to describe Solomon’s fall from contemplation to idolatry, from
the vanity of mutability to the vanity of sin and guilt. I concluded the chapter
by suggesting that Bonaventure’s penitential reading of Ecclesiastes, though
incomplete, is a fitting first step in allowing Ecclesiastes to shape contemporary
ethics. It is ethically fitting because it calls modern curiosi toward repentance for
the incessant thirst for novelty and self-importance, promoting instead a Word-
centered posture that in turn respects the “words” of creation.
In this chapter, I turn to Luther for assistance in taking another step toward
an ethics of work, particularly as he addresses certain features of Ecclesiastes
that I brought to the fore in Chapter 1. First, I asked how one might move
from the linguistic and ideological considerations of cultic, economic, and
political terminology in Ecclesiastes toward a theological account of these
themes. Second, I asked whether there is a uniform understanding of time in
Ecclesiastes and, if not, how the different perspectives interrelate. Further to this
1
Martin Luther, “Notes on Ecclesiastes,” ed. and trans. Jaroslav Pelikan, Luther’s Works 15 (Saint
Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1972), p. 93.
www.Ebook777.com
concern, I asked if there is an eschatological perspective that ultimately informs

Qoheleth’s theology of time. Finally, I asked whether the so-called carpe diem
passages that structure the book of Ecclesiastes present a message of hopeless
abandon or hopeful joy, and how the answer to this question affects one’s reading
of the book’s message as a whole. The following thesis for the present chapter
outlines how I understand Luther to aid in answering these questions, how the
answers interrelate, and what kind of hermeneutical framework governs Luther’s
teaching on Ecclesiastes.
After locating Luther’s Ecclesiastes lectures in their historical context and
briefly comparing Luther’s treatment of Ecclesiastes with Bonaventure’s in
order to illustrate the crucial points of resonance and dissonance, I will show
that, in addition to the accounts of Solomon’s life in Kings and Chronicles,
the autobiography of St Augustine is important for Luther’s interpretation of
Ecclesiastes. I will argue that Luther shows himself to be Augustine’s disciple
by allowing the Confessions to provide a hermeneutical matrix through which
he interprets Ecclesiastes. Solomon’s Confessions, however, narrate a journey not
primarily of spiritual conversion, but of the experience of restlessness and rest
in the practices of everyday life. Solomon not only prefigures Augustine, but
also Christ, particularly in the Sermon on the Mount. Yet, while Christ’s sermon
proclaims the “righteousness of faith,” Solomon’s “public sermon” proclaims
economic-political righteousness, thus playing a complementary role in the
prefiguration. I will show that in publishing both his “Notes on Ecclesiastes” and
his commentary on the Sermon on the Mount in the same year (1532), Luther
is offering a scriptural sermon for the kingdom of the left hand, and another
for the kingdom of the right hand. In order to grasp the fullness of Luther’s
ethical vision, one must hear his exposition of both sermons. Thus, the figures of
both Augustine and Christ help Luther interpret the significance of Solomon’s
character for Ecclesiastes, but primarily in the register of “temporal” restlessness
and righteousness rather than “spiritual” righteousness.
While the temporal/spiritual distinction has led previous readers of Luther’s
lectures on Ecclesiastes to interpret the commentary primarily within a two
kingdoms framework, I propose reading it within a different primary framework
(albeit allowing the two kingdoms a role in interpretation). In this chapter, I suggest
that Luther improves upon historical-critical considerations of cultic, economic,
and political dimensions of Ecclesiastes by interpreting these dimensions with
reference to his doctrine of the three estates (drei Stände), which grants these
dimensions theological-ethical significance. As the doctrine of the estates and
www.Ebook777.com
Solomon’s Sermon for the Oeconomia and the Politia 123
the interpretation of Ecclesiastes mutually inform one another, Luther locates a

sapientia negativa in Ecclesiastes, with an ethic guided by what he calls the via
regia. I will expand on the theme of the via regia (which Luther also calls the
media via) by suggesting the direction it takes in each of the three estates.
As one learns to follow negative wisdom’s “royal road,” one relies upon a
crucial aspect of the second major theme of this chapter, namely, time. While
critical scholarship often majors on temporal themes such as eternal recurrence
and monotony, with eschatology possibly coming into view in the book’s final
poem, Luther makes eschatology central to the book’s theology of time with his
teaching on the hora (Stündelein) throughout the lectures (particularly, though,
in ch. 3), which makes way for the experience of novelty in the course of one’s
journey along the “middle way.” Luther’s emphasis on the book’s eschatological
dimension finally re-orients one’s reading of the so-called carpe diem passages
away from the polarizing choice between reckless hedonism and hopeful joy,
and toward a reading that promotes a posture of receipt of God’s gifts in the
oeconomia and the politia, in the midst of hindrances to economic and political
flourishing. For Luther, the most fitting way to receive such gifts is to make use
(usus) of them in the present for the enjoyment (fruitio) of God. Therefore,
I will argue finally that Luther employs another Augustinian trope to explicate
Ecclesiastes, namely, the usus/fruitio distinction made in Augustine’s De Doctrina
Christiana. In the concluding section of this chapter, I will draw the implications
of Luther’s Ecclesiastes lectures for the ethics of work that I will develop in the
next chapter. For now, I move to consider the place of Luther’s commentary in
his work and context.
The context of Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes”
It is helpful for our understanding of Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes” to note

how the provenance of the work informs Luther’s style, his economic and
political insights, and his choice of interlocutors. As with Bonaventure’s
commentary, Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes” traces its origin to the classroom.
Although the notes were not published until 1532, Luther began lecturing on
Ecclesiastes to his students at the University of Wittenberg on 30 July 1526; and
the last confirmed lecture took place on 7 November.2 His concern for correcting
2
LW 15:ix.
www.Ebook777.com
previous interpretations of Ecclesiastes and his didactic tone befit the location of
his lectures. Throughout the course of his lectures, he assumes a basic knowledge
of the traditional interpretation of Ecclesiastes that he confronts, as well as
knowledge of Scripture in general, the theological tradition (as will be seen in
his persistent use of two Augustinian tropes), biblical and antique history, and
Greco-Roman philosophy. Actors from these stages all function to illustrate the
truthfulness of Solomon’s observations. Yet not only do these figures from the
studies of the arts and theology inform Luther’s exegesis, but also recent events
in his own domestic and political context.
Recent events in Luther’s household bolster his affirmation of participation in
mundane realities throughout his commentary. His statement in the introductory
lecture that “[a] woman is a good thing”3 has special significance considering that
he had been married just over a year before the inauguration of the Ecclesiastes
lectures. Also, his first son was born just a month before he initiated his series
on Ecclesiastes.4 In his exegesis of Eccl. 3:2a (“A time to be born, and a time to
die.”), Luther seems to have this event fresh in his memory: “An infant is in the
hand of God and is not born until its hour of birth comes. Women labor and
are concerned about the birth of an infant, and they predict its time, but there is
nothing certain about it.”5 Luther’s fresh experiences of marriage and fatherhood
make the traditional contemptus mundi interpretation of Ecclesiastes for him a
far stretch of the imagination. Luther has seen the birth of his first child occur in
God’s hora6 and has received this child as a gift from God. How could one forfeit
the receipt of such a good gift by fleeing domestic life? No less problematic,
though, are the political implications of contemptus mundi readings.
Not only is Luther’s commentary informed by his domestic life, but also by the
political milieux in which he finds himself. The lectures occur in the aftermath
of the Peasants’ Rebellion, which is a topic that comes explicitly into view in the
commentary. In his comment on Eccl. 5:13-14 (“There is a grievous evil which
I have seen under the sun: riches were kept by their owner to his hurt, and those
riches were lost in a great calamity; and he is father of a son, but the son has
nothing in his hand.”),7 Luther mentions that the avarice of political and ecclesial
officials is what provoked the peasants to anger. However, he does not excuse the
3
LW 15:8.
4
Oberman, Luther: Man Between God and the Devil, p. 359.
5
LW 15:50–1.
6
As I noted in the introduction to this chapter, the concept of the hora will be an important theme
below.
7
LW 15:89.
www.Ebook777.com
peasants’ actions. Instead, he suggests that they incurred political punishment

and divine judgment through their attempts to mete out judgment upon their
rulers, rather than trusting in God’s judgment.8 Even in passages where Luther
does not explicitly name the peasants, they remain in view. For instance, Luther
demands that attempts to avenge sin should only occur if God’s Word commands
it,9 and proposes that it is God who rebukes the government, not those who are
obliged to respect the authorities.10 As will be evident in this chapter’s section
on politics, though Luther is harsh on the peasants, he is no less harsh on their
rulers, instead ascribing vanity to all those who desire to take matters into their
own hands. Now that I have briefly shown how both the economic and political
context of Luther’s own life inform his exegesis of Ecclesiastes, it remains to
consider the polemical context.
While Luther reads Ecclesiastes as an affirmation of economic and political
engagement, his interlocutors are those who challenge such an affirmation by
misinterpreting one’s role in relation to everyday administration. Here, I shall
merely introduce these interlocutors, as they will be important figures in the
following sections. Luther targets medieval interpreters when he accuses the
“philosophers,” or “sophists,” of misinterpreting Solomon’s posture toward
the natural world (and natural philosophy).11 Below, I will compare Luther’s
interpretation of Ecclesiastes to that of one such reader, whose commentary
I have examined at length in the previous chapter, namely, St Bonaventure. Such
a comparison will be fruitful for pinpointing just where Luther’s interpretation
of Ecclesiastes departs from previous readings, as well as highlighting points
of continuity that are not immediately evident. Luther also directs his polemic
against the monastic orders, within which he has had firsthand experience.12 In
this chapter’s section on Luther’s doctrine of the three estates, I will show how
the monastic ideal serves as a foil for Luther’s account of faithful participation in
economic-political life. In the same section, I will show how two more groups,
the “papists” and the “sectarians,” function in Luther’s interpretation as examples
8
LW 15:124–5, 137–8.
9
LW 15:26–7.
10
LW 15:169–70.
11
See, for instance, LW 15:3, 18. William J. Wright, in the context of his discussion of Luther’s treatment
of Ecclesiastes, notes that when Luther employs the term “sophist” in his polemics, he is usually
referring to Scholastic theologians, and that this is the case in Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes.”
See William J. Wright, Martin Luther’s Understanding of God’s Two Kingdoms: A Response to the
Challenge of Skepticism, Texts & Studies in Reformation and Post-Reformation Thought (Grand
Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010), p. 151.
12
See LW 15:83, where Luther says, “I myself have seen and experienced in the monastery that many
incompetent people there were promoted to the position of directing affairs or of holding office, a
situation that cannot be corrected.”
www.Ebook777.com
of ecclesial unfaithfulness, at opposite extremes. I will argue further that for

Luther, these two extremes are not only disastrous for life in the ecclesia, but
they also produce complementary extremes within economic and political life.
Finally, Robert Rosin has suggested that one of Luther’s most famous opponents,
Erasmus, is in the background of Luther’s lectures.13 In this chapter’s section on
time, I will consider Rosin’s proposal. Now, however, I turn to a comparison of
the approaches to Ecclesiastes of St Bonaventure and Martin Luther.
From Bonaventure to Luther
In order to situate Luther’s work on Ecclesiastes within the tradition of Christian

interpretation of the book, and in the context of this thesis, I will point out important
similarities and differences between his interpretation and that of Bonaventure.
Considering the differences between the two theologians in metaphysical
orientation, as well as the significant temporal gap between the two (during which
the influential nominalist movement arose), it may seem surprising that there
would be substantial similarities between the two. However, also considering
that both figures convey an intense desire to ensure that readers do not take the
contemptus mundi reading too far, there are important parallels. Not only do the
commentaries of both Bonaventure and Luther originate in the classroom, but
also both works convey a desire to instruct one in how to read Solomon14 and
to correct misinterpretations of Ecclesiastes, which arise from the difficulty in
handling the book.15 Both acknowledge in Solomon a singularem modum that calls
for clarification.16 There are both significant similarities and important differences
in the two authors’ clarifications of this “singular method.” Perhaps the clearest way
to elucidate both is by examining Luther’s remarks in his introduction through the
lens of the “fourfold cause” with which Bonaventure characterizes the book.17
13
Robert Rosin, Reformers, the Preacher, and Skepticism: Luther, Brenz, Melanchthon, and Ecclesiastes,
Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Europäische Geschichte Mainz 171 (Mainz: Philipp von Zabern,
1997), pp. 79–150.
14
See WSB VII:74–5, where Bonaventure reiterates Origen’s schema for reading the traditionally
Solomonic corpus; and LW 15:6, where Luther commends “this Solomon of mine,” having shown
how others have misread Solomon.
15
Bonaventure’s use of the quaestio, while befitting the commentary’s provenance, also serves as a
suitable way of handling difficulties in the text. Karris notes that “Bonaventure has adapted the
Scholastic method to address various thorny issues of interpretation” (WSB VII:12). Luther states at
the outset of his introductory Ecclesiastes lecture that the book is one of the “more difficult books
in all of Scripture, one which no one has ever completely mastered” (LW 15:7).
16
QuarEd VI:49; WA 20:15.
17
WSB VII:75–6.
www.Ebook777.com
The final cause of Ecclesiastes

The clarification of the book’s “final cause” by each interpreter evinces a certain
version of Augustinianism and centers on the issue of contemptus mundi.
Whereas Bonaventure maintains that the book’s final cause is contemptus
mundi,18 and nuanced as his take on the tradition is, Luther attacks the tradition,
suggesting that it encourages readers to forsake the present gifts God gives within
the estates,19 opting instead to flee the world and not make use (usus) of what
God has given.20 Rather than encouraging flight, then, Solomon admonishes the
reader to be content in the present without anxiety with regard to the future.21
Luther does, however, offer a proposal for proper contemptus mundi, namely
to live in media res without being carried away by one’s affections for things.22
Paraphrasing and commenting on the admonition to the “young man” to rejoice
in his youth in the face of the world’s evils (Eccl. 11:9), Luther says,
“Live in such a way that you are a despiser of the world and that you conquer
its malice.” Here you see what he calls “the contempt of the world” (contemnere
mundum)—not that we human beings should run away but that we should carry
on within the world, in the midst of dangers, yet in such a way that we preserve a
quiet and peaceful heart (cor quietum ac pacatum) in any and every diversity.23
True “despisers of the world” are those who find rest in the midst of the problems
the world imposes upon them. Solomon’s father, David, is a prime example of
such “restful contempt” because, as he dealt with his exile, he used whatever was
available to him and accepted any of the setbacks that hindered his monarchic
duties.24 Thus, what Solomon condemns is not creatures or the use (usus) of them,
but rather the “depraved affection and desire” that forces discontent with what God
has given and inflames a yearning for the accumulation of wealth and fame.25
Luther and Bonaventure both offer correctives for contemptus mundi, and both
employ Augustinian tropes to do so, but for different ends. Bonaventure offers
18
WSB VII:77.
19
LW 15:4.
20
LW 15:8–9. Luther employs the term usus to signify humanity’s dealings with the good gifts of God
in creation. See, for instance, WA 20:10, where Luther says, “Cuncta enim, quae fecit Deus, sunt bona
valde et in usum hominum facta.” Below, I will relate this employment of usus to Augustine’s in the
first book of De Doctrina Christiana.
21
LW 15:7.
22
LW 15:9.
23
LW 15:176; WA 20:190. The notion of the “quiet heart” (cor quietus) will be important later in this
chapter.
24
LW 15:31.
25
LW 15:8; WA 20:11.
www.Ebook777.com
a finally contemplative reading through the use of the wedding ring analogy
he claims to have received from Augustine and Hugh of St Victor.26 Luther, on
the other hand, employs Augustine’s distinction between usus and fruitio for
a reading that affirms active participation in material creaturely existence.27
If Bonaventure focuses on the ring’s quality as a memento that draws one to
contemplate the ring’s Giver,28 then Luther emphasizes the actual wearing of the
ring as the faithful way to receive the Giver’s gift.29 I will expand on Luther’s
emphasis on the active usage of God’s gifts later in this chapter. Now, however, it
is appropriate to focus on the material cause he locates in the book.
The material cause of Ecclesiastes

Both Bonaventure and Luther use the term “materia” to introduce what
they perceive to be the subject matter, or material cause, of Ecclesiastes.30 For
Bonaventure, the book’s subject is vanitas, a term he nuances with his employment
of Hugh of St Victor’s triplex vanitas, discussed in Chapter 2.31 For Luther, the
phrase “under the sun” in Eccl. 1:3 provides a clue that the subject matter is the
human race and its works.32 Rather than articulating something of a fall narrative
in a nuanced exposition of the meaning of vanitas, Luther simply acknowledges
the works of humans as they are. Humans are driven by foolish affections, which
simultaneously produce boredom and a lack of peace. The purpose to which the
book’s material content directs the reader, then, is present contentment in the
Word and work of God, bequeathed to humans from “above the sun” in the gifts
of God (dona Dei).33 Interestingly, both Bonaventure and Luther vindicate the
classical study of physics from being contemptible.34 Luther suggests that such
study is not only useful but is also a source of pleasure, as well as the inspiration
26
WSB VII:77–8.
27
Though Luther does not explicitly declare that he is employing this distinction, I am suggesting
that his continual employment of usus and fruitio (which I shall explicate below) conveys his
dependence on the Augustinian distinction.
28
WSB VII:78.
29
Luther does not mention the wedding ring analogy. I am merely retaining this analogy to show how
Luther differs from Bonaventure.
30
QuarEd VI:6; WA 20:12.
31
WSB VII:75, 94; QuarEd VI:6, 10.
32
LW 15:14–15.
33
LW 15:10; WA 20:12.
34
Thus, Pelikan is mistaken to imply in a reference that Bonaventure exemplifies Luther’s statement
that “The sophists corrupted this text [(Eccl. 1:8)] because they thought that here the study of the
philosophers was being reproached, the investigation of the nature of things and their causes, as
though this were something evil and beyond explanation” (LW 15:18).
www.Ebook777.com
of a range of biblical metaphors together serving as a “great light.”35 While both

Bonaventure and Luther promote the study of physics,36 the distinction between
the two again is that between usus and contemplatio, a distinction also apparent in
the implications of each commentator’s articulation of the book’s formal cause.
The formal cause of Ecclesiastes

In their introductions to Ecclesiastes, both Bonaventure and Luther describe the
author’s form of argumentation, and one senses that, for each author, detecting a
particular form enables the reader to handle difficulties in the text in particular
ways. Bonaventure, alluding to Eccl. 12:9, suggests that Solomon weighs the
opinions of both the wise and the foolish, as a preacher would, for the purpose of
elucidating the one truth for the audience.37 Luther also understands Solomon to
be preaching,38 but in a different way. According to Luther, in Ecclesiastes, Solomon
practices induction from his particular experiences and those of others, arriving at
the universal declaration that “all is vanity.”39 Thus, whereas Bonaventure assumes a
dialogical model, Luther assumes a monological one, even given that his Solomon
brings several perspectives into focus. In fact, Luther attacks the dialogical model.
For instance, in his exegesis of Eccl. 6:3 (“If a man begets a hundred children, and
lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but he does not enjoy life’s
good things, and also has no burial, I say that an untimely birth is better off than
he.”), Luther says, “Nor is Solomon speaking in the manner of foolish men or
dressing up in the mask of a foolish man, as some interpreters say, but he is here
describing the life of foolish men in their external behavior.”40 Interestingly, in
his own comment on this verse, Bonaventure names the interpretation of which
Luther is speaking as an option, suggesting that putting the words of Eccl. 6:3 in
the mouth of “a carnal person” would easilyÂ€resolve the interpretative difficulty
that the verse poses. However, he also shows how to resolve the difficulty if the
35
LW 15:9.
36
Throughout his commentary, Bonaventure appeals to Aristotle in order to make scientific
observations. See for instance Bonaventure’s exegesis of Eccl. 1:6b, where he appeals to Aristotle’s
theory that vapor moves air to describe the wind’s movement (WSB VII:100). Luther lists astronomy
and philosophy in his appeal to the study of the “nature of things” (LW 15:9).
37
WSB VII:76.
38
LW 15:12. See the following discussion of the efficient cause of Ecclesiastes.
39
LW 15:7–8.
40
LW 15:95. The term “external” is indicative of Luther’s reading Ecclesiastes as a book that deals with
the “kingdom of the left hand.” Luther’s teaching on the two kingdoms will feature in the discussion
on the significance of the character of Solomon below. For another instance of Luther attacking the
dialogical model, see LW 15:62-63.
www.Ebook777.com
author “is speaking the truth.”41 Bonaventure’s comment here is illustrative of his
framework for the book’s formal cause.
The distinction between Bonaventure’s dialogical model and Luther’s model of
induction is important because it has implications for how each reader interprets
the so-called carpe diem passages in Ecclesiastes, interpretations that are
drastically different from one another. It is the formal cause to which Bonaventure
appeals when he proposes that perhaps the carpe diem passages originate
from the mouth of the fool.42 Luther, on the other hand, reads these passages
as expressing positively the point of the entire book.43 Whereas Bonaventure
readily acknowledges the contemplation-inspiring iconic significance of creation
but shows in his dialogical interpretation that he is hesitant to affirm precisely
how one enjoys the Creator in media res, Luther, without hesitation, affirms the
usefulness of material pleasures for the enjoyment of God. In both cases, though,
the perceived efficient cause that has brought about Solomon’s insights involves
the character of Solomon himself, albeit with significantly different emphases.
The efficient cause of Ecclesiastes

While both Bonaventure and Luther would trace the efficient cause of Ecclesiastes
to the experience and character of Solomon, they do so for different reasons.
For Bonaventure, what establishes Solomon’s ethos is his experience as a sinner
who is recounting his misdeeds in a penitential mode.44 This aspect of Solomon’s
experience calls to mind Solomonic narratives such as 1 Kgs 11:1-14, where
Solomon provokes God’s anger by marrying foreign women and worshiping
their gods. In such passages, Solomon lives in monarchic excess, employing
his resources for the purposes of depraved pleasure and self-advancement.
Choosing a different location of emphasis from Bonaventure, Luther, while not
totally denying to Ecclesiastes this penitential aspect (as I will show below in
relation to Augustine’s Confessions), places emphasis on Solomon’s authority
as a wise king, more closely resembling the Chronicler’s Solomon in 2 Chron.
1-7.45 This Solomon has thought deeply about the objects and consequences of
human affections and shares his thoughts in a speech during or after a dinner
with his officials. His speech is courtly in tone, and the pages of his books contain
41
WSB VII:244.
42
WSB VII:232–5.
43
LW 15:46.
44
WSB VII:86–7.
45
See my suggestion of the importance of 1–2 Chronicles for understanding the name ‫ קהלת‬in
Chapter 1.
www.Ebook777.com
a Hebrew idiom more complex than that of his father, David, and the simple
language of Moses.46 Solomon’s Hebrew, then, poses another major difficulty to
interpretation of Ecclesiastes, the first major difficulty being the detection of the
book’s aim.47
Rather than being convoluted for the sake of convolution, Solomon’s
courtly language befits his monarchic office. This observation is important for
two reasons. First, Luther confronts philosophical readings of Ecclesiastes by
pointing out that Solomon is a king, not a teacher. The teaching office belongs to
priests and Levites. Solomon, on the other hand, directs a courtly speech to those
involved in the economic and political estates.48 Second, although his speech
assumes a kerygmatic tone and has the quality of a public sermonÂ€ (publica
concio),49 Solomon is not a preacher per se.50 Luther ensures that in hearing his
reference to the book as a “sermon,” his auditors will not assume that Solomon
is primarily preaching to the ecclesia (though, as I will show in the section on
the three estates, the ecclesia is nonetheless significant), as Christ does in the
Sermon on the Mount, for instance.51 It befits the office of a preacher per se to
preach to the ecclesia. On the other hand, it befits the office of a king and head of
household to preach to domestic and political administrators. Solomon shares
the good news of God’s involvement in the economic and political estates. The
evangelical character of his speech inspires members of the ecclesia to collect
his words and disseminate them.52 Now that I have compared Bonaventure and
Luther with reference to the fourfold cause of Ecclesiastes it is in order to suggest
in the conclusion to this section how differing perspectives on metaphysics and
the canonical function of Ecclesiastes undergird these differences. In doing so,
I will set the stage for the treatment of Luther’s exegesis in the rest of the chapter.
Therefore, I will withhold details concerning points on which I will expand in
the remainder of the chapter.
I have suggested that Luther’s most significant departure from the interpretive
tradition is exemplified in his exposition of the so-called carpe diem passages, on
46
LW 15:12–13.
47
LW 15:7.
48
LW 15:12.
49
WA 20:15.
50
In his Latin translation of Eccl. 1:1, Luther transforms Jerome’s Vulgate translation “Verba Ecclesiastae
filii David” to “Concio filii David,” preferring to apply the term “Ecclesiastes,” transliterated from the
LXX’s rendering of ‫קהלת‬, to the name of the book itself, rather than the proper office of the speaker
(WA 20:14).
51
Below, I will explicate the relationship between Solomon’s “public sermon” and the Sermon on the
Mount.
52
WA 20:15.
www.Ebook777.com
which I will offer specific treatment below. It is a different metaphysical posture,

along with a different perspective on the canonical function of Ecclesiastes, that
prompts this move. While both Bonaventure and Luther note the revelatory
function of creation, both interpreting creation as a book that speaks of God, it
is how each one reads the book of creation itself that most sharply distinguishes
them (and their readings of Ecclesiastes) from each other. I suggested in the
previous chapter that the mystical progression Bonaventure describes in the
Itinerarium is already in germ in his commentary on Ecclesiastes. However, for
Bonaventure, following Origen, contemplation of God’s self does not reach its
climax in Ecclesiastes. Rather, Ecclesiastes teaches contemptus mundi, which
prepares the way for the union with God described in Solomon’s Song. In other
words, Ecclesiastes is only one step in the anagogical reading of the traditionally
Solomonic corpus. Though Bonaventure’s specific take on contemptus mundi
offers a positive valuation of the revelatory function of creation, his reading of
Ecclesiastes in the end can only imply union with Christ.
Luther, on the other hand, bypasses the metaphysics of emanation, exemplarity,
and consummation, understanding the knowledge of God to be consummated
in the usus of the creatures through which God speaks to the human. Thus,
he locates consummated rest not in inactivity, but precisely in its opposite:
making use of the masks of God in order to enjoy the God hidden behind them.
Significantly, this rest for Luther is articulated in Ecclesiastes. In other words,
for Luther, one does not have to continue reading to the Song of Songs to find
rest in God or to experience Christ making all things new. If read properly, not
as part of a mystical manual or as a book applied to the conscience, but rather
as Solomon’s economic-political sermon, one hears in Ecclesiastes a call to find
one’s rest in God even in secular vocations. St Francis and his disciples (including
Bonaventure) rightly recognize the revelatory significance of creation, but they
allow Neoplatonic metaphysics ultimately to lure them to the monastery to
work. Luther’s polemic against monasticism in his Ecclesiastes lectures is meant
to draw people back into the world, in media res. Luther’s Solomon finds rest
in the unhesitant use of creatures in the economic and political estates for the
enjoyment of God. Disordered affection for such creatures and failure to make
proper use of them is what causes restlessness in economic and political life.
In employing a dialectic of rest and restlessness to articulate Solomon’s message,
Luther shows that his Solomon not only resembles the Chronicler’s, but also
resembles Luther’s spiritual ancestor, St Augustine, whose Confessions serves as
one of Luther’s hermeneutical guides for making sense of Ecclesiastes. Thus, there
are two Augustinian tropes that Luther employs to explicate Ecclesiastes:Â€ the
www.Ebook777.com
rest/restlessness dialectic, and the usus/fruitio distinction. These two tropes will
provide “bookends” for the remainder of the chapter, beginning with Augustine’s
dialectic of rest and restlessness.
The character of Solomon
Not only do the historical narratives of the OT inform Luther’s perspective on

the efficient cause of Ecclesiastes, but two other figures also assist Luther in
plumbing the nature and significance of Solomon’s account. In the preceding
section, I showed that the positive narrative of 2 Chron. 1-7 enables Luther
to establish Solomon’s experience as the efficient cause of Ecclesiastes. In this
section, I will explore how Augustine’s Confessions and the Sermon on the Mount
form the hermeneutical matrices through which Luther reads Ecclesiastes, and
suggest what they do for the message he locates in the book. I propose that
Augustine helps Luther understand both the autobiographical dimension of
the book and the nature of Solomon’s experience as inhabiting the dialectic of
rest and restlessness. I will also argue that Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount assists
Luther in discerning the scope of Solomon’s “public sermon” as dealing with the
kingdom of the left hand.
Ecclesiastes as Solomon’s Confessions

Luther finds both formal and substantial parallels in Augustine’s Confessions that
help to elucidate the message of Ecclesiastes. He makes an explicit connection
between the two books toward the end of his introduction to Ecclesiastes, where
he offers a version of Augustine’s famous line in Conf. 1.1.1, inverted in order
to explicate Solomon’s message in Ecclesiastes: “Thou hast commanded, Lord,
that a man who is not content with what he has receive a restless heart as a
punishment.”53 Though in this paraphrase, Luther uses the phrase irrequietum
animum54 rather than Augustine’s inquietum est cor nostrum,55 in other places,
he uses the word cor in connection with restlessness. For instance, when he
interprets Solomon’s leading question in 1:3 regarding the gain in humanity’s
53
LW 15:11.
54
WA 20:13.
55
Augustine says, “tu excitas ut laudare te delectet, quia fecisti nos ad te et inquietum est cor nostrum
donec requiescat in te” (Conf. 1.1.1).
www.Ebook777.com
labor, he reads the question rhetorically, saying that humans find nothing but
vanity in their labor because “their heart is not at rest (cor non est quietum),”56
in this instance more closely resembling Augustine’s phrase. Solomon fills out
this reason for vanity poetically and universally in what immediately follows the
question, and narratively and particularly in the recounting of his deeds and those
of others after the poem. Luther’s paraphrase of Augustine proves at the outset
that he reads the book as Solomon’s Confessions. Yet, as will become evident in
the consideration of the formal and substantial parallels between Augustine and
Solomon, what gives Luther’s use of Augustine a striking spin is how he applies
Augustine’s rest/restlessness dialectic specifically to domestic and political life.
In other words, rest and restlessness apply not only to one’s conscience before
God or to one’s intellectual journey, but also to one’s participation in everyday
activities.
The formal parallel between Augustine’s Confessions and Solomon’s lies
in the autobiographical nature of both books. In the Confessions, Augustine
unpacks the rest/restlessness dialectic with respect to his own life by narrating
his search for truth and pleasure. In similar fashion to Augustine, Solomon first
presents himself as a particular restless wanderer whose vision and action are
directed by depraved affections, not by contentment with the present gifts of
God. Solomon’s experience of restlessness manifests itself in both domestic and
political activities. Regarding the former, in Eccl. 2:4-11, Solomon presents a
catalog of his own works to exemplify the actions of a household administrator
who has ruled according to his own counsel.57 Regarding the latter, as much as
Solomon has sought to employ wisdom in the governance of his people, he has
still trusted too much in his own counsel and found such counsel vain. Though
he will recount several other examples of such restlessness,58 it is significant
that he first shows himself to be the “chief of restless wanderers.” If the wisest
king, ruling over the holiest people and making his home in the very city where
God dwells, is susceptible to restlessness, who then is exempt?59 Throughout his
lectures, Luther recalls the experiences of rulers from world and German history,
both wise and foolish, to show that the answer to this question is “No one.” The
implications of such realism for present economic and political life will become
56
LW 15:13–14; WA 20:17.
57
LW 15:36.
58
See, for instance, LW 15:20.
59
LW 15:22–3.
www.Ebook777.com
apparent as Luther indicates how Solomon depicts the way to contentment

within the oeconomia and politia.
The substantial parallel between Augustine’s Confessions and Ecclesiastes
involves the dialectic of rest and restlessness. Both Luther’s direct references
to the Confessions60 and his persistent use of vocabulary from its opening
chapter to explicate Ecclesiastes [“heart” (cor), “rest” (quietus), and “restless”
(irre-/in-quietus)], show his detection of a connection between the two books. The
“condition of the human heart (cordis humani conditio)” is that it is never satisfied
with present things,61 but rather in everyday life it is filled with a concupiscentia
futurorum.62 Therefore, Ecclesiastes encourages one to confront the bitterness
that such dissatisfaction brings about by “instruct[ing] the heart (cor) in how to
be peaceful and content (quietum et contentum) with things that are present.”63
“[Solomon] wants to set our hearts at rest (Vult pacare cor nostrum).”64 The need
for rest is present in economic-political life as much as in spiritual matters.
Concupiscence brings about restlessness not only in “amorous affairs,” but also
in the desire to see one’s own counsels bring about future success.
In domestic administration, the most vivid proof that one’s heart is not at rest
is one’s body also not being at rest. In other words, restless hearts lead to restless
sleep, which is no sleep at all. Commenting on Eccl. 2:23 (“For all his days are full
of pain, and his work is a vexation; even in the night his mind does not rest. This
also is vanity.”), Luther says, “His heart does not rest (cor ... non quiescit) even
at night when he labors this way, so that he not only achieves and establishes
his business during the day, but even at night he works out plans about how to
conserve and increase it.”65 The avarus especially lives in a perpetual state of
restlessness because the obsession with earning money, and thus security for the
future, makes sleep an obstacle to financial accomplishment.66
Restlessness is no less a problem in governmental administration. In his
exegesis of Eccl. 9:17 (“The words of the wise heard in quiet are better than the
shouting of a ruler among fools.”), Luther equates the “heart of the fool (corde
stulti)” with hearts that do not have rest (non sunt quieta corda), then relates
60
LW 15:11, 30.
61
LW 15:55; WA 20:65.
62
WA 20:59. The concept of the concupiscentia futurorum will be significant in this chapter’s section
on time.
63
LW 15:30; WA 20:36; cf. LW 15:142, which also refers to the instruction of the heart.
64
LW 15:84; WA 20:98.
65
LW 15:46; WA 20:55; cf. LW 15:142–3; WA20:157, which also describes the troubling of the heart
(discruciaretur cor) that produces sleepless nights in relation to Eccl. 8:16.
66
LW 15:87–8; WA 20:102. I will expand on avarice and its relation to sleeplessness in this chapter’s
section on the oeconomia.
www.Ebook777.com
the foolishness of “Sacramentarians” and “heretics” (errant groups within the

ecclesia) to foolish, or restless, hearts in the government.67 The supreme example
of political restlessness and wisdom-turned-foolishness for Luther is Alexander
the Great. Rather than being satisfied with his present kingdom, Alexander
“wants many worlds.”68 Luther’s comment on Eccl. 1:8b (The eye is not satisfied
with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing) is worth quoting at length:
That is, man has restless (irrequietos) eyes and senses.â•¯... The heart (Cor) is
a constantly yawning chasm; it wants everything, and even if it obtained
everything, it would go on looking for still more. Look at Alexander the Great.
He was lord of almost the whole world. Yet when he heard that there were
more worlds, he sighed: “And I have not yet conquered even one!” Thus his
heart wanted innumerable worlds. How could anyone, even the most eloquent,
adequately describe the enormous vanity of this man’s heart (cordis)? The vanity
and insatiability of the human heart (cordis humani) are unspeakable. What a
man has does not please him; what he does not have, that he yearns for.69
While the avarus incessantly accumulates money yet remains restless in domestic
affairs, in political matters Alexander incessantly accumulates kingdoms, not
desiring to stop at all the kingdoms of this world, but having the hubris to desire
to take other worlds too. Thus, in both economic and political life, restlessness is
rooted in discontent with present things and an attempt to exceed the boundaries
God has established, be they the natural necessity to sleep or geographical-
political limitations.
As it should be evident by now, though Luther employs Augustine’s dialectic,
there is an important distinction between the rest of Augustine and that of
Solomon. While Augustine describes the rest he finds in his spiritual conversion
and narrates an intellectual journey (though not excluding details of his other
activities), Luther’s Solomon seeks a “[quietis animus] in the everyday affairs
and business of this life, so that we live contentedly in the present without care
and yearning about the future and are, as Paul says, without care and anxiety
(Phil. 4:6).”70 If Augustine’s rest lies in the contemplation of God through the
intellect’s activities, then Solomon’s rest is mediated through the use of creatures
in quotidian activities. This “rest-in-use” will be an important trope later in this
67
LW 15:155; WA 20:166.
68
LW 15:35; cf. LW 15:43–4, 101.
69
LW 15:19; WA 20:23. Notice how for Luther, the restlessness of the eyes stems from the heart’s
restlessness.
70
LW 15:7; WA 20:9.
www.Ebook777.com
chapter. Now, however, I turn to another figure whose message informs Luther’s
reading of Solomon’s “public sermon,” namely, Jesus of Nazareth.
Ecclesiastes as Solomon’s “Sermon on the Mount”

If Luther uses the Confessions to unpack the rest/restlessness dialectic that he
detects in Ecclesiastes, then he uses the Sermon on the Mount to show how
Solomon prefigures Christ in his exhortation not to worry about the future, but
to delight in the present. There are no fewer than nine references to the Sermon
on the Mount in Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes.”71 In these references, Luther
emphasizes the bearing of life in the present and the sovereignty of God, but
he also makes an important distinction between Solomon’s sermon and Jesus’,
namely, a distinction that assumes Luther’s two kingdoms framework: Christ is
primarily instructing the conscience, while Solomon is primarily instructing the
hand. Closely examining this distinction between the two sermons will enable
one to see the locus of Luther’s ethical vision for Ecclesiastes and will bring this
chapter to its discussion on the three estates.
The most common positive theme that runs between Ecclesiastes and the
Sermon on the Mount is that of a faith in the sovereignty of God, which enables
one to bear burdens in the present and not succumb to the concupiscentia
futurorum that inevitably produces worry. The verse from the Sermon on the
Mount that Luther most associates with Ecclesiastes is Matt. 6:34: “The day’s own
trouble is sufficient for the day.”72 Luther quotes this verse first in his exegesis of
Eccl. 1:13b: “It is an unhappy business that God has given to the sons of men to
be troubled with.”73 Matthew 6:34 helps to explain Eccl. 1:13 in its encouraging
one not to concern oneself with the outcome of the plans one makes according
to one’s own wisdom and council, but rather to rely on the Word of God, who
commands “faith, love, and bearing the cross.”74 According to Luther, the “unhappy
business” that God gives to humans is not meant for their destruction, but rather
to call them back to reliance on God. The “unhappy business” is equivalent to the
“day’s trouble,” which humans must bear in order to learn dependence on God.75
Learning such dependence liberates one from anxiety and enables her or him
to “do what lies at hand.”76 Underlying the appeal to bear the day’s burdens and
71
LW 15:25, 28, 46, 71, 126, 134, 146, 154, 157.
72
LW 15:25; cf. LW 15:46, 71.
73
LW 15:23.
74
LW 15:25.
75
LW 15:25.
76
LW 15:46; cf. LW 15:71.
www.Ebook777.com
to rely on the Word of God is faith in God’s sovereignty. While from a human
perspective, both the righteous and the wicked receive the sameÂ€ fate (Eccl.
9:2-3), it is evil of humans to desert the world in indignation rather than bearing
it. Instead, “Solomon wants us to deal with human affairs and to acknowledge
the world; we are not to be deterred from action by its ingratitude but are to
imitate our Father, who daily causes His sun to shine on the evil and on the
good, as Matt. 5:45 says.”77 In other words, just as God bears the ingratitude of
the wicked in patient anticipation of the final judgment, so also must humans
bear ingratitude. In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus exemplifies such forbearance when
he prays, “Thy will be done.”78 What is interesting about how Luther reads this
supplication through Solomon is that he applies it not primarily to God’s coming
kingdom but to the earthly kingdom.79
Just as Luther applies the restfulness of Augustine’s Confessions to one’s
action in the administration of human affairs through his engagement with
Ecclesiastes, so also does he apply the Sermon on the Mount to economic and
political righteousness rather than heavenly righteousness in his exposition.
Luther makes this application explicit in his exegesis of Eccl. 7:20 (“Surely
there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins”), which
he begins by reminding the reader to “keep in mind that Solomon is speaking
about things that are under the sun and about things that can be carried out.
Nor is he, strictly speaking, instructing consciences here; rather he is teaching
how to have a peaceful heart amid the difficult and troublesome affairs of the
world.”80 It is important to notice here that the prepositional phrase “on earth”
is synonymous with “under the sun,” which for Luther indicates that Solomon
is dealing with the vanity of human works rather than divine works, and how
to perform good works in the fear of God.81 Therefore, Eccl. 7:20 encourages
moderation in the application of “earthly righteousness” (terrena iusticia),
remembering that one’s judgmentÂ€ must include an acknowledgment of one’s
77
LW 15:146.
78
LW 15:25.
79
See LW 15:28.
80
LW 15:126. According to Luther, the most wicked of false interpretations of Ecclesiastes is that in
which the interpreter applies Eccl. 9:1 (“But all this I laid to heart, examining it all, how the righteous
and the wise and their deeds are in the hand of God; whether it is love or hate man does not know”) to
one’s conscience in relation to God rather than applying the verse to relations between benefactors
and beneficiaries within human affairs (LW 15:3–4, 144). Though in some places where Luther
charges the “sophists” with false interpretations, one may not count Bonaventure among them
(because he himself has departed from the interpretive status quo), here, Bonaventure is among
those who applies Eccl. 9:1 to one’s conscience before God (WSB VII:323–6).
81
LW 15:14–15.
www.Ebook777.com
own failings.82 It is precisely in urging one not to rush to judgment that Solomon
prefigures Christ, who in Matt. 7:3 warns one about refusing to notice the
log in her or his own eye when seeing the speck in her or his brother’s eye.
However, Luther points out a distinction between the two sermons: “[Jesus] is
speaking about heavenly righteousness (coelesti iusticia),” whereas Solomon is
speaking of “earthly righteousness” (terrena iusticia), which refers both to that
which takes place “at home” (domi) and to “political righteousness” (iusticia
politica).83 The two “sermons,” then, complement one another, one instructing
the listener in economic-political righteousness, the other instructing one in
spiritual righteousness. In order to make this point more explicit, it is worth
comparing and contrasting Luther’s treatment of Ecclesiastes with his treatment
of the Sermon on the Mount.
Luther’s commentary on the Sermon on the Mount originates in sermons
Luther delivered between November 1530 and April 1532 in Wittenberg’s City
Church, where he filled the pulpit of Pomeranus (Johannes Bugenhagen), the
church’s pastor, as the latter led Reformation efforts in Lübeck. Unlike Luther’s
“Notes on Ecclesiastes,” which originated in the classroom and was published
from student notes (though with revision and a preface from Luther himself),84
the commentary on the Sermon on the Mount likely evolved considerably from
the original sermons to the published form. Consequently, Pelikan suggests that
one must exercise caution when employing the commentary to expound on
Luther’s thought; yet he is quick to challenge skeptical readers of the commentary,
noting that there are numerous parallels between the commentary and other
works of Luther.85 Luther’s work on Ecclesiastes itself is one dependable work
with parallels that verify the accuracy if not word-for-word provenance of the
commentary on the Sermon on the Mount.
It is perhaps a fortuitous historical circumstance for the sake of my argument
about the complementary relationship Luther detects between Solomon’s and
Jesus’ sermons that both Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes” and his “Sermon on
the Mount” were published in the same year (1532).86 However, I suggest that,
along with thematic parallels, there is an allusion to the Ecclesiastes lectures in
the commentary on the Sermon on the Mount that, given the context of the
allusion, supports this complementary connection as well. In his exegesis of
82
LW 15:126; cf. WA 20:146.
83
LW 15:126; cf. WA 20:146.
84
See LW 15:4–5.
85
LW 21:xix–xxi.
86
LW 15:x; LW 21:xxi.
www.Ebook777.com
Matt. 5:31-32 (“It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a
certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except
on the ground of unchastity, makes her an adulteress; and whoever marries a
divorced woman commits adultery.”),87 Luther distinguishes between the action
of God in relation to marriage and the way in which humans treat marriage.
Though God joins spouses together, humans do not think of marriage from the
perspective of God’s Word, but rather become ungrateful for their God-given
spouses. Thus, God arranges their lives to fit their ingratitude. The proper way
to encounter trouble within marriage is not to become ungrateful, but rather to
bear the trouble as one would in any other station of life and to depend on God,
who is the true arbiter of blessing and success in any human work. The unblessed
are those who seek to bring about success without God’s help.88 In the indictment
of human attempts to do what only God is able to do, and in the exhortation
to forbearance and dependence upon God, Luther resounds the message of his
Ecclesiastes lectures. Yet there is clearer evidence that the Ecclesiastes lectures
are in mind.
Having delved into a treatment on burdens in the administration of human
affairs within a broader treatment of heavenly righteousness, Luther concludes
his initial remarks on Matt. 5:31-32 with a declaration of punishment over
those who trust in their own abilities to bring about success in domestic affairs:
“Therefore their reward is a restless and impatient heart; thus they have to suffer
double trouble and have no thanks for it. But we have said enough about this
elsewhere.”89 Given the preceding discussion of the relationship between Luther’s
“Notes on Ecclesiastes” and Augustine’s Confessions, and the allusion to the
Confessions here (along with the thematic parallels I have just noted), I propose
that the location of Luther’s “elsewhere” in this quotation is his “Notes on
Ecclesiastes.”90 The historical circumstances would suggest that the publication
of the Ecclesiastes lectures are fresh in Luther’s mind. It remains for me to show,
however, how exactly the two pieces complement each other.
As with his Ecclesiastes lectures, in his commentary on the Sermon on
the Mount, Luther is forging a middle way between two extremes, and is
encouraging participation in, rather than flight from, the world. He even has
the same opponents in mind. Those who misinterpret Christ’s sermon are the
87
LW 21:92.
88
LW 21:94–5.
89
LW 21:96.
90
Pelikan does not provide a suggestion for that to which Luther is alluding.
www.Ebook777.com
“schismatics” and the “papists.”91 Luther also reads the Sermon on the Mount
against monasticism.92 The Christian life that Jesus is advocating calls one into
the world: “He does not want the kind of saints that run away from human
society. If this were to become prevalent, the Ten Commandments would
become unnecessary. If I am in the desert, isolated from human society, it
is no credit to me that I do not commit adultery or that I do not murder or
steal.”93 There is a striking commonality with respect to both opponents and the
posture toward Christian engagement with the world between Luther’s “Notes
on Ecclesiastes” and his “Sermon on the Mount.” The purpose of these features
for each piece’s argument are both distinct and complementary. Ecclesiastes
grounds the “spiritual” teaching of the Sermon on the Mount, while the Sermon
on the Mount limits the scope of reading Ecclesiastes to living in the estates.
As I will elaborate below, the papists and schismatics function in Luther’s
“Notes on Ecclesiastes” to show how improper perspectives on justification
before God also distort perspectives on involvement in economic and political
life. In other words, while matters of faith are certainly in view, the primary
focus of the Ecclesiastes lectures is economic and political life. The Sermon on
the Mount, however, is about the kingdom of heaven.94 The schismatics and
the papists in Luther’s commentary on Christ’s sermon are those who threaten
to trouble consciences. While Solomon does not speak about consciences but
rather urges patience in domestic and political administration, Christ does
precisely the opposite: “He is not giving lessons in the use of the fist or the
sword, nor in the control of life and property. He is teaching about the heart and
the conscience before God. Therefore we must not drag His words into the law
books or into the secular government.”95 Though there are certainly insights into
economic and political life in the Sermon on the Mount, it is primarily related to
the kingdom of heaven.96 Christ, therefore, is a preacher (and teacher) per se,97
unlike Solomon, who is a governor of a household and a kingdom, and whose
advice to his courtiers has the quality of a sermon, worthy of dissemination to
rulers and heads of households.98
91
LW 21:5. See the preceding discussion on the historical context of Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes,”
as well as the discussion below on the ecclesia.
92
93
LW 21:85.
94
LW 21:12.
95
LW 21:90.
96
LW 21:105.
97
LW 21:93.
98
See the preceding discussion on the “efficient cause” of Ecclesiastes.
www.Ebook777.com
In the Sermon on the Mount, Christ speaks primarily as a preacher-teacher

instructing consciences before God. On the other hand, in his “public sermon,”
Solomon speaks primarily as an economic-political leader instructing those
involved in the administration of human affairs. When Luther brings his
discussion on the Sermon on the Mount into the topic of such administration,
he alludes to the fuller discussion of these matters in his “Notes on Ecclesiastes.”
Thus, these two publications from 1532 offer complementary sermons, one
teaching on heavenly righteousness, the other teaching on earthly righteousness.
Making this observation helps to clarify more precisely the purpose of both
commentaries within the context of their publications. One must not expect to
find the totality of Luther’s ethical vision in either commentary, but rather should
read them together in order to discern his ecclesial-economic-political ethos. To
accuse Luther of overspiritualizing the Sermon on the Mount without reading
it alongside the complementary “Notes on Ecclesiastes,”99 or to accuse Luther of
oversecularizing Ecclesiastes without reference to the “Sermon on the Mount”
would be to operate with a functional “canon within a canon,” as well as failing to
grasp how for Luther, persons inhabit all three estates in one station or another
simultaneously. Making such accusations would also be to misunderstand
the positionality of biblical speech. The identity of the speaker matters when
generalizing from what is said. Though their speeches are complementary, it
is significant that Jesus and Solomon are not equivalent speakers. Now it is
appropriate to offer a fuller depiction of the “earthly righteousness” that Solomon
teaches in Ecclesiastes by examining Luther’s use of his doctrine of the estates in
his “Notes on Ecclesiastes.”
The three estates
Introduction to Luther’s drei Stände

In his use of both the Confessions and the Sermon on the Mount, Luther applies what
Augustine and Jesus say about “heavenly righteousness” to “earthly righteousness.”
This distinction implies Luther’s two kingdoms framework. However, as I have
hinted above, Luther expands the notion of earthly righteousness with his
reference to domestic and political administration. His specification of “earthly
99
See, for instance, Bonhoeffer’s critique of Luther’s distinction between person and office in Dietrich
Bonhoeffer, Discipleship, eds. Martin Kuske, Ilse Tödt, Geffrey B. Kelly and John D. Godsey, trans.
Barbara Green and Reinhard Krauss, in Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works 4 (Minneapolis: Fortress Press,
2001), pp. 134–5.
www.Ebook777.com
righteousness” with reference to economics and politics shows in part that he

is working his exegesis through the doctrine of the estates, as well as the two
kingdoms framework. Thus, in this section, I will show the three estates to be more
prominent than the two kingdoms, but more importantly, I will explore the estates’
function in Luther’s exegesis of Ecclesiastes. This treatment will show how Luther
theologically renders the cultic, economic, and political language of Ecclesiastes,
which I introduced in Chapter 1. Luther’s comments on the oeconomia will be
especially important for the ethics of work toward which this book is heading.
According to Luther, “no less noxious” than the application of Eccl. 9:1 to the
conscience is the contemptus mundi interpretation of the “illustrious theologians”
(including Jerome).100 While Luther himself in the end arrives at a modified
version of contemptus mundi,101 in the preface to his Ecclesiastes lectures he
expresses his concern that the interpretation of his predecessors encourages one
to forsake the dona Dei102 available within the oeconomia, the politia, and even
the ecclesia,103 while fleeing to the desert.104 Along with the Sacramentarians and
the spiritualists, the monks are the objects of Luther’s polemic in his Ecclesiastes
lectures, with Jerome (who mentions in his own preface to Ecclesiastes that he
read Ecclesiastes to Blesilla in order to encourage her to take monastic vows)105
serving as “arch-monk.” For Luther, the only way effectively to condemn the evils
100
LW 15:4.
101
LW 15:9, 176–8.
102
WA 20:8.
103
WA 20:7. While Luther explicitly employs oeconomiam and politiam to refer to the economic and
political estates, here, rather than ecclesiam, he uses the phrase “ministeria Episcopalia seu verius
Apostolica” to refer to the ecclesial estate, which Pelikan translates as “the episcopal (or, rather, the
apostolic) office” (LW 15:4). Luther does employ ecclesia when he refers to the community who
compiled the contents of Solomon’s “public sermon” (WA 20:15; cf. LW 15:12). However, Luther
usually varies his language when referring to the ecclesial estate throughout the commentary (see,
for instance, his reference to religione when comparing problems in the politia with problems in the
Church in WA 20:51, as well as his reference to the praedicator Euangelii alongside his references to
administrators of households and government in WA 20:144). Because for Luther, Ecclesiastes more
directly involves the economic and political estates than the ecclesial (as will be apparent below), the
minimal usage of explicitly ecclesial language is not a problem. In any case, Luther’s language for the
estates is dynamic. Because of such fluidity of terms, exploring how Luther employs the doctrine of
the estates in any of his works demands more than merely locating lexemes, but rather detecting the
thematic threads running throughout his argument, with multiple synonyms at play. Though the
fact that Luther often uses politia and oeconomia in his Ecclesiastes lectures is advantageous for my
argument that the estates form for Luther a more primary interpretive thread than his doctrine of the
two kingdoms, it is important to note that he also uses terms such as paterfamilias and magistratus to
refer to administrators within the economic and political estates (see, for instance, WA 20:143, which
includes both terms). Thus, the estates framework serves as a heuristic device with lexical flexibility.
104
LW15:4.
105
Jerome, “Preface to the Commentary on Ecclesiastes,” in Philip Schaff (ed.), trans. The Hon. W.
H. Freemantle, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series II, vol. 6 (Grand Rapids: Christian Classics
Ethereal Library, 2005), p. 1039, http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf206.pdf [accessed 13 June
2013]; cf. LW15:4.
www.Ebook777.com
in the world is precisely to live in its midst (in media res)106 and not to succumb
to anxiety, instead soberly embracing God’s gifts of food, drink, fellowship,
marriage, government, and work.
Some previous readings of Luther’s work on Ecclesiastes have shown him to be
expounding primarily on the earthly side of the two kingdoms doctrine.107 While
the two kingdoms doctrine is certainly in view in Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes,”
there is evidence that the three estates provide a fuller framework for his exegesis
than the two kingdoms. First, in his preface to Ecclesiastes, Luther refers to the
three estates as gifts from God under threat by the actions of the monks and the
contemptus mundi interpretation of the book,108 as I have already mentioned.
Second, he uses the language of the oeconomia and the politia in his proposal
for a new title for the book, renaming the book, “The Politics or the Economics
of Solomon.”109 Third, he continues especially to employ economic and political
language, as well as ecclesial language, throughout his lectures, as will be evident
in my look at each estate’s role below. Thus, though previous interpreters are not
wrong to locate in Luther’s exegesis what Kenneth Hagen calls “an ethic for the
left hand,”110 a focus on the estates enhances their interpretation first by expanding
the ethic of the left hand to economic and political ethics, and second by allowing
the voice of the ecclesia (which exists simultaneously with the other two estates) to
inform the ethics of the left hand. The teaching on the estates not only provides a
guideline for Ecclesiastes exegesis, but also reflects a prominent hermeneutic of the
world and of Scripture in general. Such a hermeneutic includes with it implications
for Luther’s ethics. Therefore, it is worth considering the contours of Luther’s drei
Stände before considering the estates’ place in his work on Ecclesiastes.
Oswald Bayer is one among a handful of scholars seeking to recover the
teaching on the estates for contemporary Lutheran ethics.111 He suggests that
106
See for instance, WA 20:103; cf. LW 15:88.
107
For instance, Rosin suggests that Luther is continuing his debate with Erasmus on the will, but
illustrating its implications for the kingdom of the left hand (Reformers, the Preacher, and Skepticism,
107–8). Wright shows Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes” to be illustrative of Luther’s application of
the two kingdoms framework to daily life (Martin Luther’s Understanding of God’s Two Kingdoms,
pp. 149–52).
108
LW 15:4; cf. WA 20:7.
109
LW 15:5; cf.WA 20:8.
110
Kenneth Hagen, “An Ethic for the Left Hand: Luther on Vocation,” in Luther Digest: An Annual
Abridgment of Luther Studies 20, Supplement (2012): 25–47.
111
For an appraisal of Hans Ulrich’s appropriation of the estates teaching, see Brian Brock, “Why the
Estates? Hans Ulrich’s Recovery of an Unpopular Notion,” in Studies in Christian Ethics 20.2 (2007):
179–202. In his essay “The Concrete Commandment and the Divine Mandates,” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
employs the estates, but splits the oeconomia into “work” and “family.” See Bonhoeffer, Ethics, pp. 388–
408. Karl Barth assumes Bonhoeffer’s mandates in his radical expansion on the divine command in
Church Dogmatics, III.4.
www.Ebook777.com
the three estates form a more fundamental framework for Luther’s theological
imagination than the two kingdoms doctrine.112 Pointing to summarizing
and confessional documents as his frames of reference, Bayer shows that the
doctrine of the three estates stands alongside the Word-sacrament nexus
in the presentation of the Reformational self-understanding,113 the former
corresponding to the second table of the Decalogue, the latter to the first.114 For
instance, in his preface to the Smalcald Articles, Luther quickly identifies two
gifts the Reformational churches received through God’s grace: the equipping
of “the pure Word and right use of the Sacraments,” along with “knowledge
of the various callings (Stände) and of right works.”115 Taking into account the
teaching on the estates halts the tendency of the exclusively two kingdoms
framework to overdichotomize the spiritual and the temporal by placing the
spiritual estate (the ecclesia) alongside the two temporal estates (the oeconomia
and the politia).116 This sensitivity allows the ecclesia to maintain its necessary
critical posture with respect to the other two estates, while also remaining
open to insights from them.117 Yet although the three estates assume a more
prominent position than the two kingdoms in Luther’s theology, Bayer suggests
that one ought not to exclude the latter completely nor simply collapse it into the
former.118 In Luther’s own writing, one can detect a flexibility that allows him to
move between the two tropes as the context demands, even combining them.119
As I seek to carry Bayer’s proposal forward through my reading of Luther in
his Ecclesiastes lectures, I aim to show how the estates function and interact
in Luther’s exposition, having already illustrated in the above section on the
Sermon on the Mount how Luther combines the estates doctrine with that of the
two kingdoms by emphasizing economic and political righteousness more than
spiritual righteousness.120
112
Oswald Bayer, Freedom in Response: Lutheran Ethics: Sources and Controversies, trans. Jeffrey F.
Cayzer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 94.
113
Bayer, Freedom in Response, p. 94.
114
Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp
(Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2008), p. 124.
115
The Smalcald Articles, Preface, 10, http://bookofconcord.org/smalcald.php, and http://
bookofconcord.org/german-sa.php [accessed 6 April 2013]. Bayer cites this passage in support of
his argument (Freedom in Response, p. 94).
116
Bayer, Martin Luther’s Theology, p. 125.
117
For further insight into the interconnections between the estates, see Bernd Wannenwetsch, Political
Worship: Ethics for Christian Citizens, trans. Margaret Kohl (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004),
pp. 59–66.
118
Bayer, Freedom in Response, pp. 95–6.
119
120
LW 15:124; cf. LW 15:121.
www.Ebook777.com
Where does this doctrine of the estates originate and what classical and
biblical sources inform it? Both Aristotle and the primeval creation accounts
in Scripture influence Luther’s estates teaching, which incorporates the insights
of reason on the left hand and revealed truth on the right. Luther borrows
the economic-political framework from Aristotle, who distinguishes between
domestic and civic life, as well as arranging them hierarchically. The most basic
association, according to Aristotle, is the household, a concept that includes
family life and labor. The political association ensures the flourishing of
domestic life by protecting its citizens and managing resources appropriately. It
is the “most sovereign and inclusive association,”121 existing “prior in the order
of nature to the family and the individual.”122 According to Aristotle, humans
are naturally “political animals.”123 As I will further explicate below, though
Aristotle is insightful, Luther believes that his insight is incomplete and distorts
the order of associations. Aristotle’s framework does not account for the first and
foremost estate, namely, the ecclesia. Nor does it account for the proper origin
and necessity of the politia. To illustrate the primacy of the ecclesia, Luther must
turn to the primeval accounts of creation in Genesis. In his exposition of Gen.
2:16-17, Luther offers his most articulate summary of the estates doctrine.124 The
double command to eat from every tree in the garden of Eden, but not toÂ€eat from
the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which God commanded to Adam
before the creation of Eve, establishes the Church before there is any domestic or
civil administration.125 The Church is established in this moment because in the
double command, “the Lord is preaching to Adam and setting the Word before
him.”126 The Church, then, is that estate which is addressed by the Word of God
and called to respond to the Word in faith.127 However, the primeval history also
funds Luther’s understanding of the other two estates.
Like the Church, the oeconomia is a creation ordinance, which God establishes
with the creation of Eve, making it so that “the temple is earlier than the home.”128
The oeconomia covers the relationship between Adam and his spouse (see Gen.
2:23-25), parents and their offspring (see Gen. 1:28), and that between humans
and the earth, along with the work the humans do for the production of the
121
Aristotle, Politics, trans. Ernest Barker (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 7.
122
Aristotle, Politics, p. 11.
123
Aristotle, Politics, p. 10.
124
125
LW 1:103.
126
LW 1:105.
127
128
LW 1:103–4.
www.Ebook777.com
means of life (see Gen. 2:15).129 Unlike the ecclesia and the oeconomia, the politia
is not a creation ordinance, because “there was no government of the state before
sin, for there was no need of it.”130 Thus, for Luther, the political association is
not logically prior to the household (as it is for Aristotle), but instead arises of
necessity as a result of sin. Had the fall never happened, there would be no need
for the imposition of laws and penalties because there would be no transgression,
but only faithful obedience to the Word of God. The fall, however, ruptured
the life of the Church in the garden, as well as the relationships within the first
household (see Gen. 3:12). The necessity of the politia in light of these relational
ruptures shows that one should interpret the politia as an estate founded in the
oeconomia and as an application of household life. The politia, then, bears a
kind of creaturely status,131 but it is not an order of creation per se. One sees,
then, that in Luther’s interpretation of the primeval creation accounts, he detects
the validity of Aristotle’s economic-political ethics, along with its deficiency.
Because the use of reason in the administration of household and government is
an important feature in Luther’s exegesis of Ecclesiastes, I move now to a fuller
discussion of philosophy’s place in Luther’s doctrine of the estates.
In his doctrine of the estates, Luther joins an appropriation of Greco-Roman
ethics (particularly, the economic and political thought of Aristotle and Cicero)132
to his exegesis of the biblical primeval history (and the Decalogue).133 Just as
the inclusion of the ecclesia with the oeconomia and the politia accounts for the
interplay of the spiritual and the temporal, as well as accounting for the reality
of believers’ faithful presence in temporal vocations, the teaching on the estates
also accounts for the truthfulness of philosophical claims, forging a media via
between the complete dismissal of philosophy by Christian theology on the
one hand and the acquiescence of theology to philosophy on the other. Luther
negotiates the relationship between philosophy and theology, between pagan and
Christian ethics, with several distinctions.134 First, Luther distinguishes between
holiness and blessedness. One is blessed through Christ alone and becomes
129
130
LW 1:104.
131
132
Both Aristotle and Cicero figure prominently in Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes” as examples of those
possessing economic and political wisdom, yet failing to find success because they seek to exceed
their God-given limitations in favor of their own counsels. See, for instance, LW 15:103 on Aristotle,
and LW 15:38–9 on Cicero.
133
134
These distinctions are not binaries in a dialectical sense, but rather serve to distinguish between
unbelievers and believers while at the same time accounting for the universal ethical patterns and
norms that both groups acknowledge.
www.Ebook777.com
holy through participation in the life of faith. Yet, because being holy and being
blessed are not identical, Luther is able to conceive of unbelievers possessing
certain features of holiness. This distinction between holiness and blessedness
accounts for both the sinfulness of the world and the world’s creaturely status.
Unbelievers, too, may engage in practices within the oeconomia and the politia
that are holy, without necessarily being blessed by Christ.135
This holiness-without-blessedness is evident in another distinction, namely
that between the universality of pagan ethics and the particularity of Christian
ethics. Pagan ethics offers for Luther the image of the antique humanitas, who
effectively engages in economic and political activity and gains universal insight
from such participation that can be true without being blessed.136 Yet Scripture
tells a particular story, which centers on a particular people and a particular
person in whom the salvation of the world lies. Antique philosophy cannot make
those claims that are dependent upon divine revelation, and thus cannot convey
the triune God’s wisdom to the world. The world must depend on the ecclesia
for such wisdom. Luther even employs Aristotelian categories to make this very
point, with yet another distinction. In one of his treatments of Ps. 127,137 Luther
assumes Aristotle’s four causes to describe the relationship between pagan and
Christian ethics. According to Luther, philosophers may grasp the material and
formal causes of social life and the arts, of economics and politics (as Luther’s
appropriation of Aristotelian economic and political ethics in his estates framework
implies), but they are unable to understand the final and efficient cause, namely
the Christian God, who orders all things and directs all things to their final goal,
which is God’s very self.138 Thus, there is always a conflict between philosophy and
Christian theology, with theology simultaneously engaging in both appropriation
and critique of philosophical thought.139 One could say that the acknowledgment
of the distinction between the wisdom of philosophy and Christiana sapientia140 is
one of the “final causes” of “the Politics or the Economics of Solomon.”141
While Bayer shows Luther distinguishing between pagan and Christian ethics
in his exegesis of Ps. 127, I suggest that for Luther, the distinction is even clearer
in Ecclesiastes, because the distinction is part and parcel of the book’s message. As
Solomon complements Christ’s Sermon on the Mount with his public sermon for
135
136
137
WA 40/3:202–69.
138
139
140
WA 20:31.
141
LW 15:5.
www.Ebook777.com
the oeconomia and the politia, he shows both the validity and the futility of pagan
wisdom, and he ultimately directs one to fear the God whom the ecclesia proclaims.
Solomon corrects both isolationism and anxiety in ancient philosophy, as well as
completing the four causes of antique ethics with his attention to the Word and work
of God. When commenting on Eccl. 5:12 (“Sweet is the sleep of a laborer, whether
he eats little or much; but the surfeit of the rich will not let him sleep.”),142 Luther
contrasts the wisdom of isolationist philosophers with the wisdom of Solomon.
While Crates and Diogenes resort to solitary lives because they witness injustice
in the administration of human affairs, Solomon commendsÂ€using (utendis)143 the
things of the world even while bearing its injustices. Such wisdom “was hidden
and unknown to all the philosophers.”144 Solomon shows himself to be a different
sort of teacher for the student of wisdom: “But let us, who have Solomon as our
teacher, do what we can; what we cannot do, let us permit to slip away.”145 In his
comment on the exhortation to the “young man” to rejoice in his youth (Eccl. 11:9),
Luther furnishes a fuller depiction of Solomon’s superiority to the philosophers.
Solomon is the best teacher for young people because he instructs the heart to be
content with present circumstances and to enjoy the pleasures of the senses, albeit
under the guidance of a good teacher. Solomon’s methodology differs from that
of the monks (as well as the isolationist tactics of Crates and Diogenes) in that he
begins by educating the spirit rather than disciplining the body. When the heart
finds rest in the use of creatures, the body is able to bear whatever difficulties it
encounters.146 Yet Solomon is not only superior to the philosophers and monks
who retreat from civic life and live in isolation in order to discipline the body and
avoid injustice, but also to those who engage in economic and political affairs but
in so doing attempt to exceed their God-given limits.
According to Luther, the two giants of the Athenian academy (Plato and
Aristotle) are among those who “multiply words” (Eccl. 6:10-11) “about the
administration of the state and about civic morality,” but see no success because
they seek to accomplish things beyond their given vocation.147 Their wisdom is
142
LW 15:87.
143
WA 20:89. Luther’s use of Augustine’s usus/fruitio distinction throughout his commentary will be an
important feature later in this chapter.
144
LW 15:89.
145
LW 15:89.
146
LW 15:176–8.
147
LW 15:103. In relating Aristotle to those who “multiply words,” Luther bears similarities to
Bonaventure, who relates the Athenians to the curiosi who never stop making books, in his exegesis
of Eccl. 12:12 (WSB VII:425). As I have noted above, both Bonaventure and Luther are careful to
provide space for human reason and philosophy, while at the same time warning against granting
philosophy too much authority.
www.Ebook777.com
limited because they do not seek guidance from the Word and work of God, as
Solomon does.148 While the history of the Gentiles teaches “wonderful” things,
it is that of the Jews that “was carried on in the Word of God and teaches us
that everything happens by the ordinance of God.”149 As a participant in this
history, Solomon has access to the efficient cause of ethics (“the ordinance of
God”), which makes clear its final cause (God’s self). Thus, though Plato and
Aristotle have plenty to say concerning economic and political righteousness,
there are limits to such righteousness because they do not have access to the
efficient and final causes of ethics. Their philosophical overexertion leads only
to ultimate failure. Learning to embrace the limits of economic and political
wisdom involves leaning on the wisdom of God and walking the “middle way”
between being righteous overmuch and being evil overmuch.150
Above, I have briefly introduced the biblical, historical, and philosophical
background to Luther’s teaching on the estates. I have also shown how Luther’s
Ecclesiastes lectures strengthen Bayer’s case concerning the relationship
conceived between philosophy and theology in the estates doctrine, as well as
the prominence of the estates doctrine when considered in comparison with
the doctrine of the two kingdoms. Before treating each estate’s role in Luther’s
“Notes on Ecclesiastes,” I shall suggest how they relate to wisdom in Ecclesiastes
and provide a hermeneutic of the world that guides economic-political ethics.
Luther defines wisdom early in his commentary along the lines of one’s ability
to take knowledge of circumstantial particularities into account when exercising
political rule.151 Wisdom (sapientia) “is the insight by which I know how the state
ought to be established and administered; this is then modified by knowledge152
or experience, in accordance with things as they are at present and with
circumstances, in the manner and pattern that the facts and the times warrant.”153
As Luther’s definition implies, wisdom involves not only administrative acumen,
but also “knowing the world (nosse/cognoscere mundum).”154 When one properly
knows the world, one is able to use its foolishness wisely. Thus, though the world’s
injustices abide on this side of the eschaton, one who knows this about the world
148
LW 15:10–11, 103.
149
LW 15:103.
150
LW 15:122.
151
He relates such wisdom to the oeconomia as the topic moves from politics to economics. See, for
instance, LW 15:37.
152
Prior to this definition of wisdom, Luther suggests that knowledge (scientia) in Ecclesiastes “does
not refer to speculative knowledge, but to a practical and experiential insight, a discretion in the
performance of actions, what we call experience and practice in human affairs, as in the psalm (Ps.
119:66): “Teach me good judgment and knowledge” (LW 15:28; cf. WA 20:33).
153
LW 15:28; cf. WA 20:33.
154
LW 15:140–1; WA 20:155–6.
www.Ebook777.com
may make necessary adjustments, even though the world will not adjust to the
person.155 This wisdom becomes Christian when one acknowledges that no
human is able to correct injustices apart from divine aid, and therefore entrusts
one’s self to God.156 The “height of human wisdom,” therefore, is “to know that
no wisdom is worth anything or achieves anything unless God grants success.”157
Humans rarely acquire this sort of wisdom, not least those philosophers who
do not have the Word’s guidance. Luther calls this wisdom sapientia negativa
because it acknowledges the futility of human counsels divorced from the Word
and work of God.158 However, might not this sapientia negativa draw one to
despair or idleness, considering the futility of human wisdom on the one hand
and the utter dependence of humans on God’s seemingly arbitrary actions on
the other? Luther provides an answer to this question with his appeal to follow
the media via, which forms the ethos of negative wisdom.
The sapientia negativa that Luther draws from Ecclesiastes has significant
implications for economic and political ethics, with the ecclesia providing insight
at pivotal points. Negative wisdom provides ethical insight in its exhortation to
travel along the “royal road” (via regia), or the “middle way” (media via).159 Being
“truly wise”160 involves forging a media via between the inactivity that tempts
those who sense their utter dependence on God for success, and the overexertion
of those who trust their own efforts.161 The fool (Stultus),162 on the other hand, is
one who veers to extremes on the right hand or the left.163 Luther detects a link
between failure to take the middle road in matters of faith and failure to do so
in economic-political matters, thus showing a connection between justification
and everyday life, between the concerns of the ecclesia and those of the other
two estates.164 For example, in his exegesis of Eccl. 7:3,Â€which for Luther is part
155
LW 15:140–1.
156
LW 15:27.
157
LW 15:132.
158
LW 15:132; WA 20:150.
159
See, for instance, LW 15:111/WA 20:129 (“royal road”/via regia) and LW 15:42/WA 20:50 (“middle
way”/media via).
160
LW 15:42.
161
The above philosophical examples of Crates and Diogenes on the one hand, and Plato and Aristotle
on the other, illustrate these extremes.
162
WA 20:129.
163
LW 15:111; cf. LW 15:77. Below, I will specify those whom Luther understands to fulfill the veering
to the right and to the left, as I discuss the polemical context of Luther’s doctrine of the estates and
Ecclesiastes commentary.
164
Rosin makes just this argument with respect to the debate over free will. He proposes that in his
Ecclesiastes lectures, Luther continues his famous debate with Erasmus, not in a formal response
to Hyperaspistes, but rather by showing in Ecclesiastes the effect of the free will debate not only in
matters of justification, but also in matters pertaining to everyday life (Reformers, the Preacher, and
Skepticism, p. 90).
www.Ebook777.com
of an exhortation to “good works before men”165 in the politia et oeconomia,166

he illustrates the failure to follow the “royal road” with an example taken from
responses to the preaching of the evangelical message: “If we teach that nothing
but faith alone justifies, then wicked people neglect all works ... if we teach
that faith must be attested by works, they immediately attribute justification to
these.”167 On the other hand, those who fail to follow the “royal road” by being
“either too negligent of their work or too concerned about it” need the “treatise
on piety”168 in Eccl. 5:1-7 so they may “let themselves be governed by the Word
of God and meanwhile to work diligently.”169 Ecclesiastes 5:1-7, the section of
the book that is most related to the ecclesia, shows that faith and unbelief affect
all areas of life. A lack of confidence in and dependence upon God in matters of
justification not only results in the polar extremes of antinomianism and works-
righteousness, but also in sloth and avarice within the oeconomia, and in anarchy
and ambition within the politia.
Economic and political righteousness, then, depends on following the
middle path that lies between polarities. Being “righteous overmuch” leads to
one extreme (avarice or ambition), being “evil overmuch” to the other (sloth or
anarchy).170 Following the “royal road” means doing what one is able to do and
leaving alone what one cannot do: “If [God] has granted us some opportunity,
let us use (utamur) it; if He has given something, let us accept (accipiamus)171
it; if He takes it away, let us bear it.”172 It is necessary to practice moderation,
making adjustments according to the time and the place, and, as I will show
below, waiting expectantly for God to do a new thing in God’s hora rather than
trying to produce novelty one’s self. Thus, just as the estates teaching includes
both universality and particularity at a philosophical-theological level, so also
does the ethics of negative wisdom, which exhorts one to take the “royal road.”
This media via acknowledges the validity and necessity of both the “lawgiver”
and the “moderator of the law” (to take an example from the politia),173 forming
an ethic that is at once static and dynamic, reflecting the nature of the estates
themselves.
165
LW 15:107.
166
WA 20:128.
167
LW 15:111.
168
LW 15:82.
169
LW 15:74–5.
170
See Eccl. 7:15-17, and Luther’s interpretation in LW 15:121–3.
171
The verb accipio will be an important term later in this chapter.
172
LW 15:42; cf. WA20:50.
173
LW 15:128.
www.Ebook777.com
Though times and places change, as well as the people inhabiting them
who symbolize reality for their respective periods in their particular speech,
basic needs do not change.174 In establishing the estates, God has ensured that
the needs of creatures in whatever age are met, and that the hindrances to the
meeting of these needs, which arise as a result of sin, are halted. As I have stated
above, the estates doctrine provides for Luther a hermeneutic of Scripture and
reality. Because Ecclesiastes does not have the ecclesia as a central topic, it must
say something about the oeconomia and the politia.175 While the estates teaching
enables Luther to pick up on economic and political themes in Ecclesiastes and
place them in a theological register, at the same time the economic-political ethics
of Ecclesiastes informs Luther’s doctrine of the estates, particularly in offering a
positive valuation of economic and political activity that also soberly accounts
for the reality of hindrances to economic and political flourishing. While God
bestows a multitude of gifts in the oeconomia and the politia, it is easy for one
to fail to receive them as such. Thus, the role of the ecclesia includes reminding
people of their status as recipients and dependents by proclaiming the “fear
of God,” and showing that justification frees one to labor for the sake of one’s
neighbor without any self-justificatory motivation. Now, it is in order to examine
the function of the three estates in Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes” more closely.
The ecclesia
Like most modern biblical scholars, Luther recognizes that the cultic language in
Ecclesiastes is not as prominent as the economic and political language. Rendering
this observation in the language of the conscience, he says that Solomon “is not
instructing consciences before God, except that he occasionally refers to the
fear of the Lord, but he is instructing man about political life, telling him to
control his heart.”176 However, the “fear of God,” though its use is occasional,
is nonetheless an instructional theme for Luther. Ecclesiastes 5, along with the
book’s epilogue,177 serves as the address of the ecclesia to administrators in the
174
175
176
LW 15:133.
177
In his comment on Eccl. 12:13 (“Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His
commandments.”), Luther says, “That is, this is the summary of it all: Fear and worship God and keep
Him in view; thus you will observe everything that I have set forth in this book. For unless someone
fears God, he will not be able to observe any of these things. He has cited examples of men who lived
wisely and excellently, without fear, but who, when evil times came, were nevertheless not used to it
and brought affliction upon themselves. But those who fear God are able to despise and make fun of
every evil and adversity when it comes, and to give thanks if it does not come” (LW 15:186).
www.Ebook777.com
oeconomia and the politia. The spiritual and the temporal, though distinct, exist
simultaneously in Luther’s estates teaching, with the ecclesia holding a necessary
critical posture before the other estates.178 Thus, in this section, I will show how
Luther understands the ecclesia to be informing this treatise on economics and
politics with its teaching on the fear of God, particularly in Eccl. 5.
In the preceding discussion of the efficient cause of Ecclesiastes, I pointed
out that, according to Luther, members of the ecclesia gathered the words of
Solomon’s address before his courtiers in order to disseminate them for the
benefit of those involved in the oeconomia and the politia. Yet, the ecclesia is not
only involved in the dissemination of Solomon’s “public sermon.” It is also in
view when Solomon breaks the pace of his “catalog of vanities” with a “treatise on
piety” in Eccl. 5:1-7 [4:17-5:6, Heb.].179 “[I]n the middle of his sermon,”180 he
seems to be anticipating an objection here and addressing a salutary exhortation

to those who are not traveling on the middle road but are either too negligent
of their work or too concerned about it. He advises them to let themselves be
governed by the Word of God and meanwhile to work diligently.181
This quotation shows that Luther sees the two groups who fail to follow the
media via in their work ethic as those who have first failed to grasp the proper
distinction between faith and works. Rather than receiving the Word in faith and
freely performing their work in love, work has become the means of salvation
before God for some, and a useless exercise for those who see that their work does
nothing for their standing before God. Both extremes, avarice and sloth, arise
from a distortion of the proper distinction between faith and works. Thus, both
groups need the preaching of the Word in the Temple to ease their consciences
before God and to enable them to return to their domestic and political duties
in freedom. What, then, does Luther say about the ecclesia in his exegesis of this
passage, and how do his remarks on the right- and left-hand detractors within
the ecclesia show how getting justification wrong will result in a failure to take
the “royal road” in the other two estates?
178
Luther intimates this point when he suggests that one should respect the government, because it
is God’s ordinance and it is God who rebukes the government, “Those who occupy the ministry of
the Word have the right to issue rebukes, but not the common people” (LW 15:170). It is important,
though, to remember Luther’s distinction between person and office (see, for instance, LW 21:83).
While as an individual citizen, the minister should submit to authorities, when occupying the office
of the Word, if necessary, the same minister may rebuke the government.
179
LW 15:82.
180
LW 15:82.
181
LW 15:74–5.
www.Ebook777.com
Luther’s comments on the ecclesia in his exegesis of Solomon’s “treatise on piety”

resonate with what he says about the ecclesia years later in his commentary on
Genesis. Though the Church established in Eden was “without walls,” theÂ€Temple
was nonetheless instituted there prior to the household of Adam and Eve.182 It
was instituted for the preaching and teaching of the Word.183 Thus, one must
grant authority to the one whom God has entrusted to deliver God’s message (the
preacher). Whether one is the head of a household or a governor, the preeminent
authority of the Word allows that person to be content in the Temple, because
she or he is able to rely on that which is outside of herself or himself, not being
required to enact “self-chosen works.”184 One’s vocation in the “house of God” is
to listen and be silent, to let God do the talking, through the Word.185 Though
one’s conscience is tempted either to trouble oneself to bring about justification
without God or to do nothing at all, the preaching of the Word comforts the
conscience and draws one to deeper dependence on God.186 This dependence is
precisely what the “fear of God” signifies. As I have pointed out above, whereas
the fool eschews dependence upon God, the one who is truly wise recognizes the
limits of human efforts and takes the “royal road,” trusting God for success.
One must keep in view the significance of the media via for Luther’s ethics
when considering his treatment of the three estates in his Ecclesiastes lectures.
The opponents in Luther’s ecclesial ethics here are those who veer off the “royal
road” to the right hand or to the left, and they negatively influence those who fail
to stay on the “highway” in economic and political ethics. Those who veer to the
right in ecclesial matters are the “sectarians,” and those who veer to the left are
the “papists.”187 While these groups appear at other points in the commentary as
illustrations for Luther’s economic and political insights,188 it is in this section that
Luther offers his most concentrated critique of them. Simply put, the “papists”
are those who neglect the Word and faith, while the “sectarians” are those who
neglect works of love. Thus, they represent two sides of a misinterpretation of
the relationship between faith and works.
According to Luther, the “papists” are those who are deaf to the Word, thus
lacking faith and attempting to justify themselves with their own works. Luther
reads Eccl. 5:2 [1, Heb.] (“Do not be rash with your mouth, nor let your heart
182
LW 1:103–4.
183
LW 15:75.
184
LW 26:215.
185
LW 15:77–8.
186
LW 15:80–1.
187
LW 15:77.
188
www.Ebook777.com
be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven, and you upon earth;
therefore let your words be few.”)189 as a contestation of those who would have
a dispute with God over God’s counsels. The “papists” are those who refuse to
listen to God’s Word and even “teach the Lord what He ought to do.”190 They
attempt to add to God’s works with their own, as if they can justify themselves.
In his exegesis of Eccl. 5:1b [4:17b, Heb.] (“to draw near to listen is better than
to offer the sacrifice of fools; for they do not know that they are doing evil”),191
Luther shows the monks, who serve as narrow examples of “papists,” to resemble
the Pharisees, who for him are the supreme example of works-righteousness
in Scripture. The works of the monks are the same as the “sacrifice of fools.”
The exhortation to those who are tempted to follow in the fools’ footsteps, then,
is, “Remain therefore in the Word, lest by your neglect of it you follow your
own zeal and end up with the sacrifice of fools.”192 Thus, the first exhortation in
Solomon’s “treatise on piety” is to remember that one’s own efforts do not justify,
but rather faith alone, which is synonymous with listening to God’s address.
Failure to remember this truth will result in the economic or political equivalent
of works-righteousness. However, if one remembers to be attentive to the divine
address in faith, might they succumb to the opposite extreme, namely, failing to
perform good works at all?
The sectarians are those who neglect good works upon realizing that their
works accomplish nothing for them in terms of their standing coram Deo. Luther
chooses an unexpected passage within Solomon’s “treatise on piety” to prove this
point, namely, Eccl. 5:4-5 [3-4, Heb.] (“When you vow a vow to God, do not delay
paying it; for He has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you vow. It is better that you
should not vow than that you should vow and not pay.”).193 Though others have
used this passage as support for the taking of monastic vows, Luther reads the
passage as a safeguard against the antinomianism of the sectarians, suggesting
that “this passage of Solomon seems to me to pertain obviously to those who
deviate to the right, who upon hearing that their efforts do not avail do not want
to do any works at all.”194 While justification by faith liberates the conscience
before God, it does not liberate one from the duty to do good works. It does
precisely the opposite: it further binds one to one’s neighbor. While justification
189
LW 15:76.
190
LW 15:78.
191
LW 15:74.
192
LW 15:76.
193
LW 15:79.
194
LW 15:80.
www.Ebook777.com
frees one to perform works of love minus the motivation of self-justification,Â€it

nonetheless calls one to do what needs to be done. As will be evident below,
while God is ultimately responsible for the success of human endeavors, one is
not free from putting one’s hand to the plow.
In his exegesis of Solomon’s “treatise on piety,” which recalls the listening
function of the ecclesia in order to draw one to deeper dependence on God in the
face of economic and political difficulties, Luther promotes a media via between
works-righteousness and antinomianism in matters pertaining to justification.
In doing so, he conveys a close connection between the misinterpretation
of spiritual realities and the misinterpretation of temporal ones. Indeed, the
misinterpretation of the relationship between faith and works often results
in erroneously transferring ecclesial doctrines into economic and political
action. In other words, those who succumb to works-righteousness in matters
of justification imagine their vocations in the economic and political estates to
be where they work out their salvation. For Luther, this is precisely why monks
eschew secular lives for spiritual vocations. In locating their labor in a sacred
estate, they may toil for salvation with undivided attention. Likewise, those who
succumb to antinomianism with respect to justification abandon their duties in
economic and political matters, opting for sloth and anarchy instead. However,
just as the two extremes in the ecclesia are archetypes of the extremes in the
oeconomia and the politia (seeing that in Luther’s hierarchy, the ecclesia is the first
estate), the media via in the ecclesia may provide a model for following the media
via in the oeconomia and the politia. In fact, following the media via in matters
of faith liberates one to enjoy the fullness of economic and political life without
a troubled conscience.
The oeconomia
Though Solomon interrupts his “catalog of vanities” with the “treatise on piety”
in Eccl. 5:1-7 and with various exhortations and sets of proverbs in other
places, the catalog itself has much to say about the hindrances to economic and
political flourishing. The breaks in the catalog offer wisdom for dealing with
these hindrances. The oft-repeated chorus about taking pleasure in food, drink,
and labor will be a special topic of discussion below, though some features of it
will show up in this section. In this look at the oeconomia and in the following
section on the politia, I will first examine the hindrances to flourishing within
each estate by paying particular attention to the “catalog of vanities”. I will
especially consider the extremes on either side of the “royal road,” as well as the
www.Ebook777.com
motivations for veering to either side. Then, I will consider the solutions offered
in the proverbial or exhortatory sections.
I have argued above that failing to take the media via in matters pertaining
to faith results in the same failure in domestic and political life. Whereas in the
ecclesia, the two extremes resulting from this failure are works-righteousness
(most evident among the “papists”) and antinomianism (most evident among
the “sectarians”), the two extremes in the oeconomia are the vices of avarice
(avaritia)195 and sloth (socordia/ignavia).196 Regarding the former, one is able
to see how the anxiety of the papists (particularly the monks) in their works-
righteousness spills over into the oeconomia. Just as the monks “stockpile” their
works with self-justificatory motivation, so also do misers measure their success
by the treasures they mount up on earth. Measuring success according to the
calculus of accumulation makes one blind to the appropriate use of resources
and contributes to economic restlessness:
A miser (Avarus) cannot use (uti) his money for the purpose for which it was
established, namely, to eat, drink, and clothe himself, and to serve others with
what is left. For this is why wine and grain grow and why gold and silver circulate,
that we should put them to such use (utamur). But the flesh does not care about
this; in fact, it despises it and follows its own desires. Therefore it also attains to
an utterly miserable life, without rest or peace.197
The most obvious symptom of this restless misery is sleeplessness. While nature
has so constituted humans that they need rest, the miser does not experience
it. Even if one brings one’s body to the point of total exhaustion in her or his
labor, the miser’s mind continues to scheme, even at night (see Eccl. 5:12).198
In the last chapter, I conveyed how curiosity concerning objects of knowledge
circumvents contemplation’s rest by constantly seeking new percepts. Here,
curiosity’s “kissing cousin,” avarice, resists the “rest-in-use” I will examine below
by interrupting one’s sleep with dreams about new objects to acquire and the
means of acquisition.
While avarice leads one down the road that veers to the left of the economic
media via, sloth steers one too far to the right, mirroring the antinomianism
195
LW 15:69; WA 20:81.
196
Luther uses ignavia (“laziness”) as a synonym for socordia. See WA 20:187, where he uses the terms
collectively (nostram socordiam et ignaviam) to refer to the phenomenon Solomon is speaking
against in Eccl. 11:5.
197
LW 15:87; WA 20:102. Notice that the two Augustinian threads I am emphasizing in this chapter
(rest/restlessness and usus/fruitio) are at play in Luther’s comment here.
198
LW 15:87–9.
www.Ebook777.com
of the sectarians. Luther recognizes that acknowledging God as the arbiter of

human success may lead one to question the value of exerting effort at all in
the oeconomia. Thus, he constantly stresses that Solomon is pushing one into
economic life and not urging flight from the world. Luther begins his exposition
of the exhortation199 in Eccl. 7:11-12 (“Wisdom is good with an inheritance,
excelling those who see the sun. For the protection of wisdom is like the protection
of money; and the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the life of him
who has it.”) by noting that “Solomon’s only purpose here is to avoid giving the
impression that he approves of laziness (ignaviam), which is what those who hear
the teaching of godliness usually claim.”200 Having noted that being wise involves
neither glorifying the past nor expecting to change the world (see Eccl. 7:10),201
Solomon soberly suggests that it is still worth the effort to employ wisdom when
possible. “Giving up” flows from a failure to perceive the relative worth of both
money and wisdom. If avarice is the vice whereby one misinterprets the proper
use of one’s resources (namely, to use the resources God gives for the sake of one’s
neighbor), then sloth is that whereby one fails to make use of one’s resources at
all. In either case, one forfeits proper communal existence, which is a central
feature of Luther’s economic ethos.
Both departures from the “royal road” of the oeconomia represent two sides
of a self-referential posture that fails to live according to what it means to be
human, namely, to live in community with others. Because one’s conscience is
not free, instead making economic and political concerns into matters of faith
and thus embodying the works-righteousness of the monks or the laziness of
the sectarians, one is unable to relate healthily with her or his neighbor. One is
concerned only with the interests of one’s self, interpreting neighbors as obstacles.
Craftspeople become envious of other craftspeople,202 and heads of households
become ungrateful for their spouses.203 Locating worth in acquisitions results in
self-obsession and loss of sleep. Another’s despair over the inability to bring about
199
According to Luther, the “treatise on piety” in Eccl. 5:1-7 serves as a break in the “catalog of vanities”
to exhort one to the “fear of God,” which is a matter of the ecclesia. Ecclesiastes 7:1-14 is another
exhortatory section that interrupts the catalog. However, the matters that Solomon discusses in
Eccl. 7:1-14 are economic and political. Luther makes the connection between the two passages
explicit: “Solomon wants to comfort the impatient in their fruitless efforts, just as heretofore he was
concerned, after reciting a catalog of human vanities, to interject comfort and exhortation to fear
God, urging our hearts to rise toward God, encouraging us to listen to the Word of God, not to be
hasty in speaking, etc. So here again he inserts an exhortation after he has completed a catalog; later
on he will return to the catalog” (LW 15:105).
200
LW 15:118; WA 20:137.
201
LW 15:117–18.
202
LW 15:63–5.
203
LW 15:101.
www.Ebook777.com
success leads her or him not to provide for family members or neighbors, opting
instead to do nothing. In Eccl. 4:9-12, Luther hears a striking condemnation of
forsaking the community:
Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they
fall, one will lift up his fellow; but woe to him who is alone when he falls and has
not another to lift him up. Again, if two lie together, they are warm; but how can
one be warm alone? And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two
will withstand him. A threefold cord is not quickly broken.204
In these verses, Solomon recommends a social existence and the sharing

of goods. Being human entails living such a life. On the other hand, “solitary
accumulators ... are not human beings but beasts and dogs.”205 One must not miss
the anthropological significance of Luther’s comment. The vices in question not
only devalue one’s neighbor. They dehumanize the offender herself or himself.
How, then, might one forge a path that does not veer to the right hand or the left,
a path that restores one to her or his neighbor?
Luther’s paraphrase of and commentary on Solomon’s message in Eccl. 7:11-12
encapsulates well the economic media via:
“I am not condemning work nor approving of laziness. In fact, I approve both

of riches and of wisdom, but I prefer wisdom to riches because it gives life to
man. In addition, I am condemning human counsels in acquiring riches and all
other things. I am saying to you that you should neither be laborious nor idle,
neither foolish nor wise; for neither of them matters. That is, do not scheme
or strive to obtain either riches or wisdom; but be concerned about the things
about which God wants you to be concerned, and get rid of your own concerns,
which are only vanity ...” In this way, therefore, he condemns human counsel in
the acquisition of anything; and yet at the same time he also urges people to be
active in things, manage and direct them, but in the present, and that they wait
for the hand of God to intervene when they see that things are not succeeding.
For if you begin to insist upon your own plans, you will get nothing out of it but
vanity and affliction.206
Just as the ecclesial media via enables one properly to interpret the distinction
between faith and works, the economic media via enables one properly to locate
one’s work in the work of God. God’s providence does not relieve one from
working within the oeconomia any more than it relieves one of good works. In
204
LW 15:68.
205
LW 15:68.
206
LW 15:118.
www.Ebook777.com
fact, one’s freedom of conscience is precisely what enables one to work well for
the sake of the neighbor and to enjoy work itself, for one no longer erroneously
interprets economic matters as ecclesial matters, but participates in the oeconomia
with complete freedom. Knowing that the success of the labor of the paterfamilia
or the artifex depends on God liberates one simply to enjoy the labor itself and
to trust God for the outcome. The following quotation, which is the inspiration
for the title of this book, sums up Luther’s work ethic well, in its promotion of
enjoyment in labor and its call to “equanimity” or the media via: “Indeed, all
our toil should be like that of those who, in the winepress or in the harvest, sing
as they work. In the midst of our labor and sweat we should be happy and have
the feeling that we can lose everything with equanimity.”207 Following the “royal
road” in economic life means neither being anxious about the acquisition of
provisions (avarice), nor giving up when threats hinder such acquisition (sloth).
Rather, taking this course involves exercising as much effort as one is able to
muster, but recognizing the limits of one’s efforts and completely entrusting the
outcome to God. Not only must one exercise this trust in domestic affairs, but
also in political endeavors, which I now move to consider.
The politia
The media via ethic of Luther’s sapientia negativa not only applies to the ecclesia
and the oeconomia, but also the politia. As with the oeconomia, in the politia, the
departures from the “royal road” mirror the departures in the ecclesia. Along
with avarice, political ambition reflects the works-righteousness of the papists.
Anarchy, on the other hand, is the political counterpart to sloth and reflects
the antinomianism of the sectarians. In fact, the sectarians themselves translate
their antinomianism into political anarchy, the evidence of which for Luther lies
in the Peasants’ Rebellion.
In this chapter’s section relating Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes” to Augustine’s
Confessions, I included a long quotation regarding Alexander the Great and
political restlessness. Alexander’s thirst for greatness flowed from measuring
success according to lands conquered. He became insatiably restless in his need
to conquer, so much so that this world would not be enough. He longed for
other worlds. Luther calls this insatiable desire “ambition” (ambitione).208 Luther
207
LW 15:90–1.
208
LW 15:69; WA 20:81. Though this is the only use of ambitione in Luther’s Ecclesiastes lectures, it is a
fitting signifier for Luther’s depiction of political desire.
www.Ebook777.com
explicitly links the avarice of the miser to the ambition of the royal officeholder,209
and in his exposition of Eccl. 10:17 (“Happy are you, O land, when your king is
the son of wise men and your princes feast at the proper time, for strength and
not for drunkenness!”), he shows how the avarice of princes leads them to seek
their own advantage rather than using their office to handle the problems of
poverty and the lack of education in society.210 Like avarice, ambition reflects
the self-justificatory motivation of works-righteousness, involves self-referential
pursuits, and makes one restless.
Luther mines the resources of history and examines his own period to illustrate
this truth. Alexander is not the only figure from history who exemplifies political
restlessness. Antony and Caesar both “went beyond the assigned limit ... and
all they attained was sorrow, anguish, and calamity.”211 In extreme cases, this
calamity manifests itself in violent deeds by rulers who are ungrateful for those
subjects who exercise wisdom on behalf of their kingdoms, as in the case of
Antiochus and Justinian.212 No matter what the period or the scale of political
corruption, “the world always has evil.”213 Though Caesar came upon the scene
at a ripe time, the hearts of Esau and Absalom were just as ambitious and would
have wreaked as much havoc.214 Luther notices the same ambitious condition
affecting Germany and Spain in his own period.215 As his other political writings
show, though Luther is critical of anarchy, he does not avoid condemning the
ambition of those in power.216 While the peasants fail to recognize the God-
given authority of their rulers, the rulers themselves have forgotten their
God-given task and have made life unmanageable for their citizens. However, as
will be evident below, evil rulers eventually will have to submit to God’s hora, in
which they will be judged, and their time of power will come to an end, as has
happened in every age.217
The chief problem with political anarchy is the anarchists’ attempt to bring
about God’s hora in their own time. Though on the surface, it would seem that
the anarchists’ activity does not mirror the inactivity of slothful domestics, at a
deeper level, both of these “right-hand departures” result from a lack ofÂ€trustÂ€in
God’s ultimate provision of success in God’s good timing. Sloth “gives up”
209
LW 15:69; WA 20:81.
210
LW 15:166–7.
211
LW 15:103.
212
LW 15:115.
213
LW 15:117.
214
LW 15:117–18.
215
LW 15:165.
216
LW 15:89–90; cf. the political writings in LW 46.
217
LW 15:151–2.
www.Ebook777.com
on God’s intervention in the oeconomia, while anarchy does the same in the
politia. Luther refers to the Peasants’ Rebellion multiple times in his Ecclesiastes
lectures.218 Though he is not ignorant of the wicked rulers who ignited the peasants
to action in the first place, as I have intimated above, he also harshly judges the
peasants for failing to recognize their place as subjects and to be obedient to their
magistrates no matter how evil the magistrates themselves are.219 The lawlessness
of anarchy arises from a failure to trust in God’s ultimate judgment. Just as sloth
prevents economic flourishing, anarchy makes the political situation of citizens
even more dangerous. The memory of death is all too fresh for Luther’s auditors
not to grasp his point.
Both ambition and anarchy reflect self-referential political postures that
veer off the “royal road.” What, then, does the political media via look like?
Luther believes that rulers would do well to follow Solomon’s political advice.220
Ecclesiastes is an appropriate book for young rulers to read because of its fitting
and timely political reflections. Commenting on Eccl. 8:10 (“Then I saw the
wicked buried; they used to go in and out of the holy place and were praised in the
city where they had done such things. This also is vanity.”),221 Luther says:
All of this is being said by Solomon so that we might learn to know the world and
to use the foolishness of this world wisely. Therefore this book should especially
be read by new rulers who have their heads swollen with opinions and want to
rule the world according to their own plans and require everything to toe the
mark. But such people should first learn to know the world, that is, to know that
it is unjust, stubborn, disobedient, malicious, and, in short, ungrateful.222
Rather than responding to ingratitude in the violent manner of Antiochus or

Justinian, the recipients of Solomon’s wisdom ought to forge a political media
via that is neither too righteous (as is the case with ambition) nor impatient (as
is the case with anarchy), but makes adjustments according to the limitations of
time, place, and persons. For instance, in law, there is need for both lawmakers
and moderators who are wise enough to know when to adjust the law.223 Thus,
the political media via involves negotiating the proper balance between the
universal and the particular, between the static and the dynamic. While trusting
in one’s own wisdom for discerning this balance will lead one to despair of
218
See, for instance, LW 15:89–90, 125, 137.
219
LW 15:137.
220
LW 15:74.
221
LW 15:139.
222
LW 15:140.
223
LW 15:125–30.
www.Ebook777.com
being successful, waiting for God enables one to trust that God will intervene
in political affairs in God’s appropriate timing. Luther names “David, Abraham,
Solomon, and Joshua” as exemplars from Scripture “who could administer the
laws properly.”224 Not only does scriptural wisdom offer suitable political advice
to young rulers, but biblical narrative also tells stories of the few who were able
to walk the “royal road” in their political administration.
In each of the three estates, the media via ethic of the sapientia negativa calls
one to do what lies at hand, but not too much. The failure to “do what lies at
hand” results in antinomianism, sloth, and anarchy. Doing “too much” results
in works-righteousness, avarice, and ambition. Undergirding each of these
failures is unbelief in God’s involvement in human affairs through Church,
household, and state, as well as the delusion that humans are somehow able to
predict the outcome and expedite God’s timing. Regardless of the “rusty irons”
with which domestic and political leaders have to work (the “rusty irons” being
those people who are resistant to leadership), like the craftsperson who is able
“to sharpen an old rusty ax,” these leaders must exercise the wisdom necessary
to work with their “rusty irons.”225 “As the proverb says, ‘He who does not
have plaster, will have to build his wall with manure or putty.’â•›”226 While these
leaders improvise with what they have, they are not without the help of God, on
whom they must patiently wait to intervene, when God sees fit. The theological
imagination that steers one back to the “royal road,” then, is one that properly
understands God’s timing. It is an eschatology that enables one to live in the
present in the knowledge of God’s future work. Thus, I now turn to consider
Solomon’s theology of time.
Time
In the introduction and first chapter, I suggested that many of the time concepts
that contemporary biblical scholars introduce in commentaries on Ecclesiastes
are theologically thin. Even when eschatology is invoked, it is rarely invoked in
the most pivotal places, and it is not taken far enough. Luther, with his notion
of the hora (Stündelein) fills this lack in his “Notes on Ecclesiastes,” portraying
the significance of one’s theology of time for the ethos of the media via. Thus, in
224
LW 15:123.
225
LW 15:162.
226
LW 15:162.
www.Ebook777.com
this section, I will pay particular attention to Luther’s exposition of this theme,
especially in Eccl. 3, but with reference to other sections. First, however, I will
examine Luther’s diagnosis of humanity’s problem in relation to its understanding
of time.
The concupiscentia futurorum

With contemporary biblical critics, Luther recognizes the problem of the
lack of novelty in human affairs: the monotonous cycle of failure that plagues
human existence. He would not disagree with Fox’s declaration that “Novelty
is a delusion.”227 However, with St Bonaventure, Luther is sure to note that the
problem is not creation, but humanity, and this is where he differs from much
of contemporary scholarship. It is not that the world turns ad nauseum and
circumvents human pleasure in its redundancy, nor that there is an eternal
recurrence of events taking place within the world’s motions, but that in their
own works, humans themselves are unable to do anything new. Whereas for
contemporary scholars, either the mythic Sisyphus228 or Camus’s Sisyphus229 is
paradigmatic of ‫האדם‬, for Luther it is ‫ אדם‬himself who sets the standard for
human dissatisfaction. In his exposition of Eccl. 1:9-11 (“What has been is what
will be, and what has been done is what will be done; and there is nothing new
under the sun. Is there a thing of which it is said, ‘See, this is new’? It has been
already, in the ages before us. There is no remembrance of former things, nor will
there be any remembrance of later things yet to happen among those who come
after.”),230 which is part of the introduction of the theme of Solomon’s “public
sermon,” Luther notes that the “same old Adam” (vetus Adam) resides in all
humans, producing hearts that bear insatiable attitudes toward the world.231 The
phrase “under the sun” is crucial for Luther’s exegesis. It signifies the location of
human activity in the “kingdom of the left hand.” So long as Adam’s descendants
inhabit this kingdom, they will never be able to do anything new. For novelty,
they are dependent upon those works that come from “above the sun”: those
that God performs. According to Luther, Scripture testifies that God is always
doing new things, not the least of which is the coming of Christ.232 Thus, the
227
228
See, for instance, Murphy, Ecclesiastes, p. 10.
229
Fox, A Time to Tear Down, pp. 8–11; cf. Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays, trans.
Justin O’Brien (New York: Vintage Books, 1955).
230
LW 15:19.
231
LW 15:21; WA 20:25.
232
LW 15:20–1.
www.Ebook777.com
vetus Adam is dependent upon the advent of the novus Adam for any experience
of newness. If this is indeed the case, and if Ecclesiastes describes the manner
of human works “under the sun,” is there then any eschatological hope for
Solomon’s auditors, who are seeking to honor God in their particular vocations?
I will suggest below that Luther’s exegesis offers such hope, but first it will be
necessary further to explicate the condition that Adam has passed down to his
descendants, which directly motivates the economic and political vices I have
described above.
Luther describes the condition that humans have inherited from their father,
Adam, as a concupiscentia futurorum.233 While in the last chapter I showed how
the vice of curiositas is related to the concupiscentia oculorum, here, the vices
within the three estates are related to the lust for future things. The vicious
activity (or inactivity) that Luther chides is rooted in an anxiety about the future.
The concept of the concupiscentia futurorum permeates Luther’s introduction
to Ecclesiastes, as well as his treatment of the statement of the book’s theme
in Eccl. 1:3-11. The concupiscentia futurorum is the condition that appears
prominently in Solomon’s early catalog, and it has a direct bearing on the vices he
describes when he moves from his depiction of the vanity of the human heart’s
counsels to that of the hindrances to human counsels. Therefore, in this section I
will examine Luther’s introductory material and his depiction of human vanity in
relation to the concupiscentia futurorum, before showing how the concupiscentia
futurorum influences the vices I have described above.
The problem of future-related anxiety is central to both the positive and the
negative theses that Luther proposes for Ecclesiastes. Positively, Luther suggests
that in Ecclesiastes, Solomon wants to put the reader at peace with respect to
everyday affairs so that she or he may be content in the present without care
or the “desire for future things” (cupiditate futurorum).234 In Luther’s negative
summary of Ecclesiastes, he names a “twofold evil” with which one tortures
oneself: not making use of present things235 and being anxious about future things.
Then, Luther offers his paraphrase of Augustine concerning the punishment of
a restless heart to the one who plagues oneself with the “twofold evil.”236 Moving
233
WA 20:59; cf. LW 15:50.
234
WA 20:10; LW 15:7. Interestingly, in the alternate lecture notes provided in WA 20, rather than
cupiditate futurorum, after the allusion to Paul’s words in Phil. 4:6 (also included in the notes from
George Rörer), the notetaker names avaritia and ambitione as foils to contentment in the present.
In other words, this student understands these domestic and political vices to be the workings of
future-related care and solicitude. I will explore this relation further below.
235
As will be evident below, making use (usus) of present things is precisely the activity that cures one
of the concupiscentia futurorum.
236
LW 15:11.
www.Ebook777.com
to Luther’s actual exposition of Ecclesiastes, one sees that the concept of the
concupiscentia futurorum provides the foundation for his explication of the
Leitmotiv “vanity of vanities” (Eccl. 1:2). This superlative phrase indicates the
greatest possible vanity, namely, those human endeavors that fail to use present
things and thus do not enjoy future things, producing ultimate discontent.237
The labor (‫ )עמל‬into which Solomon inquires in the rhetorical question in Eccl.
1:3 does not refer to work itself, but rather to the fruitless strivings of humans
concerned with their own counsels, which stem from a desire to control the
future.238 This desire can only produce restless hearts, which all descendants of
Adam possess in their incessant search for novelty.239 Solomon’s ensuing catalog
will illustrate what such a thirst for what is new and enticing does to restless
wanderers.
Memory (or, more precisely, a lack of memory) plays an important role in
Solomon’s portrayal of the labor of Adam’s descendants, who consistently busy
themselves with future-oriented desires. Their “selective amnesia” operates
in two ways. First, they are forgetful of the laudable deeds of their ancestors,
becoming bored with the narratives of the past and eagerly borrowing from the
future to write their own stories. Second, and ironically, they fail to see that in
their obsession with novelty, they actually imitate the misdeeds of their ancestors.
History (both biblical and otherwise) informs its students of the limitations of
the former sages’ wisdom and the magnitude of ancestors’ folly.240 Eschewing
history’s lessons in an attempt to forge an altogether novel tale is indicative of
the concupiscentia futurorum, which in turn especially motivates the “left-hand”
vices of the ecclesia, oeconomia, and politia. Works-righteousness banks on
the merits of one’s good works in the future while failing to have present faith.
Avarice seeks to secure wealth for the future rather than using one’s God-given
riches for the sake of neighbors who are present. Ambition stops at nothing to
preserve one’s future legacy, all the while ignoring the need for timely laws and
policies for the citizens entrusted to one’s care. These vices show that obsession
with the future is integrally related to vicious attempts at manipulation of time.
When one comes to the realization that it is utterly foolish even to attempt such
manipulation, one experiences the pain of despair. Is there, then, an alternative
time concept to the concupiscentia futurorum, one that alleviates despair and
relieves the pressure of human manipulation? In his exegesis of Eccl. 3, Luther
237
LW 15:13.
238
LW 15:13–14.
239
LW 15:19–22.
240
LW 15:42–4.
www.Ebook777.com
proposes such a perspective on time, which is rooted in an eschatology that

informs life in the present.
The hora (Stündelein)

It may seem odd to propose a sort of eschatology as the cure for the concupiscentia
futurorum in as “this-worldly” a book as Ecclesiastes. In the first chapter of this
book, I asked whether one might locate an eschatological dimension in the book
outside of its closing poem, which some biblical scholars read eschatologically.241
I specifically asked about the significance of the LXX’s rendering of ‫ עת‬in
Eccl. 3 as kairόV. Here, I suggest that Luther does in fact ascribe eschatological
significance to this poem, which in turn informs the ethos he employs to counter
the economic and political vices. Specifically, Luther articulates an understanding
of the relationship between time and ethics with his notion of the Stündelein (in
Latin, the hora), or the “hour.” In this section I will pay particular attention to
how Luther uses the Stündelein concept, first in his exegesis of Eccl. 3, then in
particular instances dealing with economic and political ethics.
Luther begins his discussion of Eccl. 3 by immediately highlighting the
futility of human attempts to manipulate outcomes, even the outcomes of their
own works. According to Luther, though the famous “catalog of times” is about
human works, the poem’s principal message is that the outcomes of human works
are beyond their control. Rather, there is “a certain and definite time of acting,
of beginning and ending.”242 According to Luther, “this is spoken in opposition
to free will (contra liberum arbitrium).”243 Rosin suggests that in his Ecclesiastes
lectures, Luther is continuing his debate with Erasmus over the freedom of the
will. Rather than offering a formal response to Erasmus’s work Hyperaspistes,
which itself is Erasmus’s rebuttal of Luther’s De servo arbitrio,244 Luther counters
Erasmus with an exposition of Ecclesiastes. An important and distinctive feature
of these lectures, according to Rosin, is that Luther illustrates that the debate
over the will is not only significant in matters pertaining to salvation, but that it
also has an effect on quotidian existence.245 Seeing that Luther does not explicitly
name Erasmus in relation to Eccl. 3:1 (even thoughÂ€ heÂ€ mentions Erasmus
241
See, for instance, Seow, “Qoheleth’s Eschatological Poem.”
242
LW 15:49.
243
LW 15:49; WA 20:58.
244
Rosin provides a detailed account of the exchange between Erasmus and Luther (Reformers, the
Preacher, and Skepticism, pp. 97–102.
245
Rosin, Reformers, the Preacher, and Skepticism, pp. 133–7.
www.Ebook777.com
elsewhere),246 it seems likely that, though the debate with Erasmus isÂ€certainly
in the background and probably even informs Luther’s exegesis, “Notes on
Ecclesiastes” is not primarily Luther’s (informal) response to Erasmus, but
rather they encounter a whole range of recent events in Luther’s life. However,
Rosin’s suggestion that Luther has moved the free will debate from soteriological
concerns into domestic and political ones is an important one. Just as the failure
properly to distinguish between faith and works informs domestic and political
failures, so too does one’s valuation of the human will in salvation inform the
status one gives the will in everyday affairs. It is a lofty estimation of the human
will’s ability to manipulate events that ultimately leads to despair, once one
realizes that one is not the final arbiter of her or his success. Ecclesiastes 3 serves
as a primer on the will. However, does such an articulation of the bondage of the
will in quotidian life offer any hope?
In the course of his exegesis of Eccl. 3, Luther moves from the denial of free
will to an explicitly theological perspective on time that funds an eschatological
hope, particularly with his use of the Stündelein concept. After denying the notion
of free will, Luther specifies what Eccl. 3 means by tempus with his use of the term
hora: humans accomplish nothing “unless the proper time and the hour (hora)
appointed by God has come.”247 Luther intensifies this statement when he says that
“the power of God comprehends all things in definite hours (certis horis), so that
they cannot be hindered by anyone.”248 Thus far, the doctrine of the hora makes
divine providence sound like a harsh taskmaster. Indeed, in Scholastic style, Luther
anticipates an objection: what, then, should one make of the declaration regarding
human dominion in Gen. 1:26?249 Luther answers that the recognition of God’s
hora enables one freely to make use of present things, as Gen. 1:26 intimates,
but without the anxiety that accompanies human attempts at manipulating the
future. It is in the context of warning against such attempts at manipulation that
Luther introduces the phrase concupiscentia futurorum into the commentary.250
Such yearning is the condition of the human heart.251 Yet, those who prematurely
anticipate their hora experience nothing but travail.252 It is better, then, and actually
liberating, to let go of one’s pseudomastery over time and to wait patiently for
God’s surprising intervention, which is the substance of eschatological hope.
246
See, for instance, LW 15:126–7.
247
LW 15:49; WA 20:58.
248
LW 15:49; WA 20:58.
249
LW 15:49.
250
WA 20:59; cf. LW 15:50.
251
LW 15:55.
252
LW 15:52.
www.Ebook777.com
In his exegesis of Eccl. 3:9, Luther answers my question from the first chapter
about whether the LXX’s usage of kairόV in Eccl. 3 has an eschatological
dimension by using kairόV himself to explicate what he means by hora. Gustaf
Wingren describes Luther’s notion of the Stündelein in detail in The Christian’s
Calling: Luther on Vocation, noting that Luther’s exegesis of Eccl. 3:1-17 (as
well as 9:11) is one of the principal places in which he develops his notion of
the Stündelein/hora.253 According to him, this notion of the “appointed time”
in Luther indicates both the bondage of humanity before God and humanity’s
freedom to carry out an action. Humans are bound before God in that they
are unable to determine the proper moment for a particular action, but free in
the hora to carry out an action that God has ordained them to perform. “Man
cannot escape that which is to be. But there is no power on earth which can
prevent us in the hour when we carry out a work which God wants done, i.e.
in the hour when we do the hour’s work.”254 Luther explicitly connects the use
of tempus in Eccl. 3:1-8 with kairόV, then uses both horam and Stundlin (in
what seems to be a quotation of a German proverb) as synonyms of kairόV
and of one another.255 To the question regarding the worker’s gain in Eccl. 3:9,
Luther answers that, without the presence of the kairόV, the worker will achieve
nothing. “The worker has nothing else except his own appointed time (horam)
... if the appointed time (Stundlin) is right, then he is right, too.”256 In making
these semantic connections, along with his other comments, Luther seems to
be linking what he has said earlier in his exposition of Eccl. 1:9-11 about God
doing new things from “above the sun” to the human experience of God’s hora
in the hic et nunc. In anticipation of God’s hora, the worker may experience the
liberating feeling of eschatological hope, even in her or his mundane business.
Not only may one find freedom in the hora, but one may experience joy there
as well.257 Commenting on Eccl. 3:11a (“He has made everything beautiful in its
time.”), Luther says,
For everything that God makes or that happens through the gift of God in its
appointed time (sua hora) is pleasant. That is to say, when the heart is empty
of cares and yet something happens to it that is pleasant or some interesting
sight comes along, this is very delightful. Therefore such people have pleasure
253
Gustaf Wingren, The Christian’s Calling: Luther on Vocation, trans. Carl C. Rasmussen (Edinburgh:
Oliver and Boyd, 1957), p. 213.
254
Wingren, The Christian’s Calling, pp. 213–14.
255
WA 20:62; cf. LW 15:52.
256
LW 15:52; WA 20:62.
257
LW 15:52–3.
www.Ebook777.com
where others have affliction, because they do things at the time which has been
appointed by God.258
In doing “whatever their hand finds to do” (Eccl. 9:11) in the hora, humans do
not have time to worry about the future, but rather live in faith, receptive to
what God is doing in the present.259 Such a receptive posture makes possible the
experience of novelty, even in mundane tasks, because rather than attempting
to manipulate the future and consequently becoming anxious, one awaits the
surprising delights God gives in God’s hora. Thus, it is fitting now to look at
how Luther encourages the ethos of the media via, not only in his indictment of
the concupiscentia futurorum but also in his positive statements concerning the
hora.
In Luther’s commentary, the hora concept features prominently in the
summary and epilogue to Solomon’s “catalog of vanities” in Eccl. 9:11-12. Luther
here relates the concept of vocation (vocatio) to God’s timing and then describes
“timely ethics” for each of the three estates. Carrying on from his exegesis of
Eccl. 9:10 (“Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might ...”), Luther
suggests that the point in Eccl. 9:11 is for one not to worry about the abilities or
inabilities of others, but to remain in the specific task that God has ordained one
to do. He invokes the story of Samuel anointing Saul in 1 Sam. 10, particularly
the passage in which Samuel tells Saul that the spirit of the LORD will possess
him and that he should be confident to do what he sees fit because God will be
with him (1 Sam. 10:6-7). Then Luther makes a point about vocation from this
illustration that is not only important for the ethics he locates in Ecclesiastes, but
one that also challenges the notion that Luther’s concept of vocatio is too static to
be useful for contemporary ethics.260 He says, “[Samuel] has not prescribed any
law (legem) for him; but whatever matter presents itself, that he should take on,
on that he should work. That is what Solomon teaches here also: Always stick
to that which lies at hand and belongs to your calling (vocationis).”261 Following
Samuel’s lead, Solomon’s advice is not prescriptive in terms of the mechanics
of fulfilling one’s office. Instead, it encourages one to live in the freedom of the
Spirit. If one is patiently waiting for God, one is free to do what lies at hand.
Luther’s concept of vocation is not as restrictive as it may seem on the surface,
because it has as its basis a dependence upon the Spirit, who moves as she wills.
258
LW 15:53; WA 20:62
259
Wingren, The Christian’s Calling, pp. 214, 226.
260
See, for instance, Volf, Work in the Spirit, p. 108.
261
LW 15:151; WA 20:163.
www.Ebook777.com
Luther’s concept of vocation frees one to take part in whatever task she or he has
in the knowledge that God approves of her or his labor as much as God approves
of the labor of the priest. This is the point of Eccl. 9:7b: “for God has already
approved what you do.”262 Now, in whatever station one finds oneself, one must
put one’s “hand to the plough.”
Luther urges this plowing in the face of difficulties, and in the belief that God
will intervene in God’s hora in each of the estates. If one is a preacher, regardless
of the temptation to get caught up in concerns about various possible outcomes,
one must continue with the office of preaching the Word, in dependence upon the
very Word to superintend the outcome.263 There is too much “at hand” for one to
obsess over potentialities. Such obsession is symptomatic of the concupiscentia
futurorum, which is the opposite of trusting in God’s good timing. If one is a
political leader, in matters of war specifically, one must not worry about the
strength of opponents but should learn from history that God has already
determined the hora of the demise of unruly emperors and their empires.264 If
one is a craftsperson or has some other domestic duty, one must labor in the
knowledge that God has appointed a time to use that labor.265 God chooses to
work through various offices, regardless of the people occupying them. This is
why sometimes the fastest runner loses a race or the mightiest soldier is slain
in battle. When God decides to intervene, the wisest of human plans and the
strongest of human persons cannot thwart God’s action.
The analogies in Eccl. 9:12 (“For man does not know his time. Like fish which
are taken in an evil net, and like birds which are caught in a snare, so the sons of
men are snared at an evil time, when it suddenly falls upon them.”)266 illustrate
the wonders of God’s confounding of human expectations, even in everyday
tasks. “Time” in this verse does not refer to the end of life, but rather to the
hora and the outcome of an event.267 Luther summarizes the implication of this
observation: “We should labor but commit the outcome to God. For the time
of success is hidden from us.”268 The analogies of the fish and the bird illustrate
that the outcome of events is usually contrary to human expectations. While for
the unlucky persons who have sought to succeed according to their own plans,
this reality is frustrating, for the one who does what lies at hand in anticipation
262
LW 15:148.
263
LW 15:146.
264
LW 15:151–2.
265
LW 15:152.
266
LW 15:152.
267
LW 15:152.
268
LW 15:153.
www.Ebook777.com
of God’s intervention, the surprise is welcome. To summarize such welcome

surprise, I recall the significance of Matt. 6:34 for Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes,”
and quote a section of his comment on Matt. 6:34 from his “Sermon on the
Mount”:
If God is kindly disposed to a man and gives him success, he can often accomplish
more in one hour without care and anxiety than another man in four whole days
with great care and anxiety. Whereas the one has dragged on with his anxiety
and made it tedious for himself, the other has disposed of it in an hour. Thus no
one can accomplish anything except when the hour (das Stundlin) comes that
God gives as a free gift without our anxiety. It is vain for you to try to anticipate
and with your concern to work out what you think are great schemes.269
When God’s hour comes, the laborer experiences the novelty of surprising
success, an experience that does not depend upon one’s own wisdom or effort,
but on God’s intervention. The concept of the hora urges one simply to engage
in the task at hand in the present moment rather than lusting for the future or
striving to manipulate reality. It is in the mundane daily tasks of one’s office that
one experiences the new work of God. God intervenes in media res as much
as God intervened in the nativity. Laboring in this eschatological hope for the
present enables one truly to enjoy God in the midst of labor, to sing like those at
the winepress. The laborer’s song is the content of the oft-repeated chorus that
helps to structure Ecclesiastes, and it is the subject of the next and final section
of this chapter.
Accipe horam
I suggested in Chapter 1 that the seven so-called carpe diem passages in

Ecclesiastes break up the narrative at pivotal places and help to structure the
book as a whole. I also noted that there is debate among biblical scholars about
whether these passages depict a sort of hopeless abandon to hedonism, a hopeful
urge simply to enjoy the material pleasures that God gives, or even the words of a
supposed opponent of Qoheleth’s message. The modern debate is not altogether
different from precritical arguments concerning these passages. In fact, as will
be evident below, perhaps the most significant aspect of Luther’s departure
from previous interpretations of Ecclesiastes lies precisely in his interpretation
269
LW 21:207–8; WA 32:471; cf. Wingren, The Christian’s Calling, pp. 215–16.
www.Ebook777.com
of these passages. Does Luther hear the song of fools in these choruses, or the
gospel for everyday life? In this section, I will first look at Luther’s interpretation
of this chorus. Then, I will propose that Luther uses another Augustinian trope
to explicate what rest in economic and political life looks like, and finds such rest
most apparent in these passages. Finally, I will suggest how Luther’s interpretation
of these passages, and Ecclesiastes as a whole, both complements and challenges
earlier readings of the book.
Carpe diem?
As I showed in the introduction and first chapter, there is a marked transition
between Eccl. 2:23 and the first of the so-called carpe diem passages in Eccl.
2:24-26. The chorus’s disruptive nature, and the author’s repetitive use of it,
makes it a central feature, whether it offers a positive or a negative message.
Luther highlights the significance of this chorus, suggesting that it is the point
of the entire book of Ecclesiastes.270 He interprets the focus on the present in
this chorus as a theologically positive move. It reinforces Luther’s belief that the
economic and political estates, rather than being contemptible, are actually gifts
from God. The problem with humanity is, as I have stressed above, “Whatever
is present is boring, whatever is absent is intriguing. And yet there is nothing
new. For once it is present, it is already old; it brings no pleasure, and something
else seems desirable.”271 According to Luther, contentment only happens as a
gift from the Holy Spirit.272 Luther recognizes a discernment of this gift in the
so-called carpe diem passages. Writing on the introductory verse of the first of
these passages (Eccl. 2:24: “There is nothing better for a man that that he should
eat and drink, and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of
God.”), Luther says, “This is the principal conclusion, in fact the point, of the
whole book, which he will often repeat. This is a remarkable passage, one that
explains everything preceding and following it.”273 This passage agrees with what
precedes it in the condemnation of human counsels and labors attempting to
achieve something for the future.274 It agrees with what follows it in its recognition
of the goodness of the pleasures and labors that God gives.275 TheseÂ€gifts “are to
270
LW 15:46.
271
LW 15:43.
272
LW 15:43.
273
LW 15:46.
274
LW 15:46–7.
275
LW 15:47.
www.Ebook777.com
be used for the present without anxiety about either future afflictions or future
pleasures.”276 This contentment with present labor, even in the midst of the
burdens it entails, is a gift from God.
Luther understands the so-called carpe diem passages not only as summaries
of Solomon’s sermon; they also have an important rhetorical function, and they
carry forth the eschatological-ethical message of Eccl. 3 at necessary junctures
in Solomon’s catalog of vanities. Luther observes the repetition of these passages
and comments upon their necessity, not only for reminding the reader of the
book’s central theme, but also for interrupting the cataloging of sad realities
withÂ€consolation and the exhortation to enjoy life in the present, which is the
explicit purpose of the book.277 One may ask why the book has such a sad tenor that
it necessitates this joyous chorus. Luther appeals to the rhetoric of the Decalogue
to answer this question. While the godly would grasp the ethical implications
of God’s declaration “I am the LORD your God,” the ungodly would need the
command not to have other gods before the LORD, as well as the explication of
that negative command in the other commandments. Taking a cue from Moses’
tablets, Solomon understands the rhetorical forceÂ€ ofÂ€ repetition,Â€ ofÂ€ cataloging
vice after vice. This repetition regularly reiterates to the ungodly the futility
of their wisdom, prompting the fear of God. The godly would need only the
simple summary to fear God and keep the commandments in Eccl. 12:13. While
the ungodly might be tempted to lose heart in the reading of the catalog, the
recurring chorus encourages the opposite.278
Like inset poetry in other OT narratives,279 the so-called carpe diem chorus in
Ecclesiastes not only disrupts the flow of the narrative, but also has an affective
dimension, encouraging the reader to take heart even in the midst of trials.
In using the phrase “take heart,” I am alluding to Augustine’s dialectic of rest
and restlessness. More than any other place in Ecclesiastes, Solomon’s chorus
illustrates what restfulness looks like in everyday affairs. In reading this chorus
positively, as gospel, Luther conveys his most significant departure from the
interpretative tradition, himself proposing an inverted version ofÂ€ contemptus
mundi. While Bonaventure suggests that this chorus could originate in the mouth
of the fool (thus securing strict boundaries for engagement with creation),280
276
LW 15:47.
277
LW 15:142.
278
LW 15:47.
279
See James W. Watts, “Song and the Ancient Reader,” in Perspectives in Religious Studies 22.2 (1995), p.
146.
280
WSB VII: 232–5.
www.Ebook777.com
Luther shows in his exegesis of the final refrain that this chorus is the true version
of contemptus mundi: by having a “quiet and peaceful heart” (cor quietum ac
pacatum) in the use of present things, one may overcome the world’s evils. One
does not condemn the world properly by sequestering the senses, as the monks
do, but rather by enjoying them restfully (quiete), in the fear of God.281
God bestows divine blessings not only in the quiet contemplation of the
Trinity, but also in the partaking of the fruits of one’s labor. It is the “height of
spiritual wisdom” to recognize that it is God’s good pleasure for humans to enjoy
these fruits (Eccl. 9:7).282 These fruits, be they wine or bread or other artifacts of
human work, are, to use a phrase Luther employs elsewhere, larvae Dei (“masks
of God”).283 As in Johann Georg Hamann’s formula, creation is “an utterance
to created things through created things.”284 Both in labor and in its fruits, in
participation in quotidian existence, one may hear the Word of God. Luther says
in his “Sermon on the Mount” that “You have as many preachers as you have
transactions, goods, tools, and other equipment in your house and home.”285 To
flee the world, then, is to forfeit hearing the divine address in creaturely gifts.
The “portion of the righteous,” on the other hand, is to enjoy the mundane gifts
of God in the present without anxiety concerning the future.286 By invoking
the language of inheritance,287 Luther hints at the eschatological significance of
Solomon’s chorus.
After describing the “portion of the righteous” as the enjoyment of present
things without future-oriented worry (brought about by the concupiscentia
futurorum), Luther declares that this enjoyment does not happen “under the
281
LW 15:176–8; WA 20:189–93. Notice how the Augustinian theme of rest is prominent in this
exposition of the call to make use of God’s gifts. This observation will be an important one to
remember in the next section. Luther’s version of contemptus mundi is aptly summarized in the
modern period by Bonhoeffer: “For Luther ... a Christian’s secular vocation is justified only in that
one’s protest against the world is thereby most sharply expressed. A Christian’s secular vocation
receives new recognition from the gospel only to the extent that it is carried out while following
Jesus. Luther’s reason for leaving the monastery was not justification of the sin, but justification of
the sinner” (Discipleship, p. 49).
282
LW 15:148.
283
See Anthony J. Steinbronn, “Luther’s Use of Larvae Dei,” in Concordia Journal 19.2 (1993), pp. 135–
47.
284
J. G. Hamann, “Aesthetica in Nuce: A Rhapsody in Cabbalistic Prose (1792),” in J. M. Bernstein
(ed.), Classic and Romantic German Aesthetics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), p.
4. Bayer says, “The conciseness and expressiveness of this formula citing Psalm 19 can scarcely be
overestimated. It is the terse formula of a Christian doctrine of creation as such.” See Oswald Bayer,
A Contemporary in Dissent: Johann Georg Hamann as a Radical Enlightener, trans. Roy A. Harrisville
and Mark C. Mattes (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company: 2012), p. 75.
285
LW 21:237.
286
LW 15:61.
287
The Hebrew word for “lot” or “portion” in Eccl. 3:22, on which Luther is commenting when he
describes the “portion of the righteous,” is ‫חלק‬.
www.Ebook777.com
sun.”288 One may wonder whether this declaration, then, contradicts the call
to enjoy the life which indeed takes place “under the sun.” Recalling Luther’s
distinction between human works “under the sun” and those of God “above
the sun”289 (an appeal that assumes Luther’s two kingdoms framework) resolves
the problem, at the same time evoking the eschatological imagination. As the
following section on Augustine’s usus/fruitio distinction will state, enjoyment
lies only in God. Yet, for Luther, God comes to meet humanity, hidden behind
various creaturely masks. Thus, the enjoyment of wine is the enjoyment of God,
if one sees and hears rightly. The eschatological emphasis here is that the efficient
cause of this enjoyment, God, works from “above the sun,” from within another
kingdom, in God’s own hora. Enjoyment in labor implies a pious patience, a
recognition and anticipation of God’s action. The point is that one need not
wait for heaven to experience pleasure in God: in a clear example of “realized
eschatology,” Luther says that when one finds joy in labor (gaudium in labore),
even in the midst of the world’s evils, one enters Paradise.290 The God who resides
in heaven offers a foretaste of the heavenly feast not only in the Eucharist, but
also in the delights of unconsecrated bread and wine. Luther, though, is not
profaning the Eucharist so much as he is sacramentalizing the fruits of human
vocation. Conversely, however, the miser, in failing to make proper use (usus)
of resources, does not find enjoyment (fruitio) in toil and thus already suffers
the torments of hell.291 Eschatological rewards and punishments are not only
reserved for the final judgment, but in God’s hora, may even be meted out in the
hic et nunc. The ethical implication is to take heart, to keep “plow[ing] with the
horses one has,”292 and not to attempt to bring about the hora prematurely.
Luther’s eschatology of the present in his interpretation of the so-called carpe
diem passages turns the reader from contempt toward created things and worry
about the future, to contempt toward humanity’s concupiscentia futurorum. In
changing the object of contempt, Luther enables the reader to embrace present
things and present labor as gifts from God, which demand a posture of receipt.
Treier suggests that because of their nature as gifts, one cannot seize the gifts of
labor, but rather must receive them.293 Thus, perhaps it would be preferable to
288
LW 15:61.
289
LW 15:14–15.
290
WA 20:108; LW 15:93.
291
WA 20:108; LW 15:93.
292
LW 15:83.
293
Treier, Proverbs & Ecclesiastes, p. 147. In replacing the notion of “seizing” with “receiving,” Treier is
offering a corrective to the scholarly designation of the repeated chorus in Ecclesiastes as a carpe
diem passage.
www.Ebook777.com
render the recurring chorus in Ecclesiastes the title accipe diem rather than carpe
diem, or, to take a cue from the previous section on time and Luther’s concept
of the hora, one could go a step further with the designation accipe horam. In
accepting God’s labor in God’s hora, one may finally find rest. Yet, as I have
intimated, “rest” for Luther does not imply inactivity, but precisely the opposite.
In order to indicate how quietus and activity are not contradictory realities,
Luther employs another Augustinian trope, namely, the usus/fruitio distinction.
Rest-in-use: Luther’s deployment of Augustine’s

usus/fruitio distinction
While perhaps Luther would designate the recurring chorus in Ecclesiastes with
the phrase accipe horam rather than carpe diem, receptivity for him does not
imply inactivity. Yet, he remains firmly an Augustinian, showing rest (quietus)
to lie in the proper use (usus) of creatures through his deployment of Augustine’s
usus/fruitio framework. Thus, this chapter will close by returning full circle to
Augustine. Not only does Augustine’s rest/restlessness dialectic provide Luther
with an interpretive framework for Ecclesiastes as a whole, but also Augustine’s
usus/fruitio distinction provides Luther with a framework for articulating how
rest may take place in economic-political activity as much as in contemplation.
Luther’s use of this distinction is most pronounced in his exegesis of Solomon’s
chorus (though the commentary is replete with other instances). Therefore,
I shall continue to consider the implications of Luther’s interpretative turn
with this chorus. First, however, in order to understand better the significance
of Luther’s appropriation of Augustine’s framework, it will be helpful here to
introduce the framework itself.
Augustine explains the distinction between usus and fruitio in the first book
of De Doctrina Christiana: “To enjoy (Frui) something is to hold fast to it in
love for its own sake. To use (uti) something is to apply whatever it may be to
the purpose of obtaining what you love—if indeed it is something that ought to
be loved.”294 Augustine superimposes this distinction on his earlier distinction
between res (“thing”) and signum (“sign”).295 Rowan Williams says that the
usus/fruitio distinction “is the means whereby Augustine links what he has to
say about language with what he has to say about beings who ‘mean’ and about
the fundamentally desirous nature of those beings—a link which is undoubtedly
294
DDC 1.4.4.
295
DDC 1.1.2.
www.Ebook777.com
the most original and interesting feature of the treatise.”296 God is “supremely
res,” with “no signum adequate to his being. Yet he has himself provided a signum
in the Word made flesh.”297 The Word makes speech about God possible: “the
mind of God is embodied in Christ as our thoughts are in our words, and by this
means God can be truly enjoyed by us, perceived, contemplated and loved in his
self-sufficient being.”298 Williams succinctly draws the connection between the
res/signum pair and the usus/fruitio pair: “God is res, and, in respect of him, all
else is signum; God alone is to be enjoyed in and for himself, and in respect of
him all else is to be used.”299 However, does this distinction not imply a reduction
of neighbors’ significance (as well as that of other creatures) to use-value?
Oliver O’Donovan notes that Augustine’s distinction is precisely an attempt
to make sense of the double love command in the gospels within a Neoplatonist
eudaemonistic imagination. Having made a journey from the consideration of
theology within a philosophical context to that of theology as the exposition of
Scripture, Augustine is caught in a struggle of resolution. Is the eudaemonistic
imagination of Neoplatonism reconcilable to the logic of Scripture? In other
words, how is one able to treat two distinct objects, God and neighbor, as
worthy of her or his love of a thing for its own sake, when in the eudaemonistic
imagination, only the supreme Good is worthy of this kind of love? Augustine
schematizes the usus/fruitio distinction as a way of dealing with this problem.300
In Book I, he “characterize[s] ‘use’ as a kind of love, so that the use-enjoyment
pair correspond[s] to the twofold command of love to God and neighbor.”301 If
God is humanity’s final (contemplative) end, beyond which there is no further
thing to be desired, then all else is to be used for the enjoyment of that end. “The
language of uti is designed to warn against an attitude towards any finite person
or object that terminates their meaning in their capacity to satisfy my desire,
that treats them as the end of desire, conceiving my meaning in terms of them
and theirs in terms of me.”302 While at face value, thinking of the usefulness of
fellow humans for the end of one’s own desire seems to reduce their significance
and thus to pervert love, in fact the opposite is actually the case. If one seeks
296
Rowan Williams, “Language, Reality and Desire in Augustine’s De Doctrina,” Journal of Literature &
Theology 3.2 (1989), p. 139.
297
Williams, “Language, Reality and Desire,” pp. 139–40.
298
Williams, “Language, Reality and Desire,” p. 140.
299
300
Oliver O’Donovan, “Usus and Fruitio in Augustine, De Doctrina Christiana,” Journal of Theological
Studies, N.S., 33.2 (1982), pp. 380–3.
301
Oliver O’Donovan, The Problem of Self-Love in St. Augustine (New Haven and London: Yale
University Press, 1980), p. 25.
302
www.Ebook777.com
enjoyment in another human, that human’s significance only goes so far as the
imagination of the finite subject who is seeking enjoyment. In other words, the
fellow human’s significance is reduced to finitude. On the other hand, if this
fellow human is a sign (signum) used for the enjoyment of that thing (res) which
is totally sufficient in itself (God), then the significance of the fellow human is
irreducible and infinite. As with Bonaventure’s notion of contemptus mundi, in
which love for creation looks like hatred in comparison to the love for the Creator
whom the creation signifies, here, love for the fellow human is subordinated to
the love of God, but in so being is the fullest possible love for a fellow human.
On the path to contemplation of the God who is the final Good, fellow humans
(as well as all other creatures), if used properly, help direct one to her or his final
goal.303
Luther employs Augustine’s usus/fruitio framework to show that participating
in economic and political life is not condemnable, but that in fact, the oeconomia
and the politia are loci of divine activity no less than heaven itself.304 Luther
locates the enjoyment of God in the active usage of God’s gifts, rather than
locating ultimate enjoyment in the object of “foolish affections.”305 In fact, Luther
acknowledges that when the foolish seeker finally obtains the object of desire,
that seeker does not enjoy (non fruitur) it.306 The reason the fool is frustrated
with seeking enjoyment in temporal goods rather than using (usus) those
goods for the purpose of obtaining what one loves is because temporal goods,
located “under the sun,” are not worthy of being loved for their own sake.307
The implication of this demonstration, then, is that enjoyment (fruitio) only
lies “above the sun,” in God, who gives the gifts of creaturely life, because God
is the only object that one can love for its own sake.308 Yet, as will be evident
below, for Luther, God acts from “above the sun” in such a way that there is no
logical or temporal gap between usus and fruitio. Before exploring this radical
303
O’Donovan suggests that De Doctrina Christiana is not a sufficient indicator for Augustine’s mature
teleology, that “In fact, it was a false step” (The Problem of Self-Love, p. 29). It is beyond the scope of
this chapter to delve further into this issue. The goal here has been simply to introduce the concept
in order to show in due course how Luther appropriates it.
304
Though Luther does not explicitly declare that he is employing this distinction, I am suggesting
that his continual employment of usus and fruitio conveys his dependence on the Augustinian
distinction. Independently of Luther, Susannah Ticciati puts Augustine’s distinction directly into
dialogue with Ecclesiastes, in Susannah Ticciati, “Ecclesiastes, Augustine’s uti/frui Distinction, and
Christ as the Waste of the World,” in Katharine Dell and Will Kynes (eds), Reading Ecclesiastes
Intertextually (London and New York: T&T Clark, 2014).
305
LW 15:10; WA 20:12.
306
LW 15:10; WA 20:12.
307
See LW 15:9–10; cf. DDC 1.4.4.
308
DDC 1.5.5. Luther distinguishes between humanity’s vain and repetitive labors “under the sun” and
the works of God from “above the sun,” which do “many great and ever new things” (LW 15:21).
www.Ebook777.com
appropriation of Augustine’s distinction in full detail, however, I will show how

the other Augustinian theme from this chapter (the rest/restlessness dialectic)
plays into Luther’s use of the distinction.
Not only does Luther employ the usus/fruitio distinction in order to advocate
the use of God’s gifts, but he also connects usus to quietus, linking the two
Augustinian themes I have explored in this chapter. In his exegesis of Eccl. 2:1,
Luther mentions Augustine’s struggle in the midst of his “amorous affairs” in
connection to Solomon’s test of pleasure. He then suggests that the solution to
such a struggle is to “instruct the heart (cor) ... in how to be peaceful and content
(quietum et contentum) with the things that are present.”309 The instruction of
the heart takes place when one accepts material goods from God’s hand and
uses them as God’s gifts: “In sum, we should not find enjoyment (fruendum) in
happiness, goods, our own counsels, or any other thing; only as God has given
them should we use (utamur) them.”310 Though I have already elaborated on
how Augustine’s rest/restlessness dialectic carries through Luther’s lectures, here
I wish to show precisely how, for Luther, quietus may be found in usus. In a
passage to which I have already referred, Luther compacts the salient points of
his entire exposition of Ecclesiastes into one paragraph, in which he finds the
restful heart entering Paradise by experiencing joy through the use (usus) of
God’s gifts in labor.
In his exegesis of the accipe horam passage, Eccl. 5:18-20, Luther explicitly
employs usus and fruitio in articulating how one receives and uses riches as gifts
of God. God does not grant riches so that humans will reject them, “but rather
so that we use (utamur) them and distribute them to the poor.”311 The statement
in Eccl. 5:20, that one will not remember much the days of one’s life because
God occupies that person with the joy of the heart, is, according to Luther, “the
interpreter of the entire book.”312 Luther says that “Solomon intends to forbid
vain anxieties, so that we may happily enjoy (fruamur) things that are present
and not care at all about the things that are in the future, lest we permit the
present moment, our moment, to slip away.”313 In focusing on “our moment,”
while at the same time eschewing the concupiscentia futurorum, Luther collapses
eschatological enjoyment into the present, such that the use of present things
looks like the enjoyment of present things. Though Luther does not employ the
309
LW 15:30; WA 20:35–6.
310
LW 15:30; WA 20:36.
311
LW 15:93; WA 20:108.
312
LW 15:93.
313
LW 15:93; WA 20:108.
www.Ebook777.com
term hora to describe this moment of enjoyment, he does emphasize waiting on

the moment “when God wills” to use the gifts of God (dona Dei). At this ripe
and opportune moment, one’s heart (cor) is not weighed down by anxieties, but
rests in the fact that one may find joy in labor (gaudium in labore), and find it
here (hic). Even in the midst of evils (in mediis malis), it is here in present labor
and in God’s hora that one may enter Paradise.314
Luther’s language in his Ecclesiastes lectures seems to confuse the objects of
Augustine’s terms. Without hesitation, Luther speaks of enjoying “things” other
than God. This seeming confusion could mean that Luther contradicts himself,
or that I am mistaken in my proposal of Luther’s use of Augustine’s distinction.
Yet I have hinted above why I should remain confident in my detection of the
usus/fruitio distinction’s use in Luther’s “Notes on Ecclesiastes.” My point about
creatures existing as larvae Dei helps explain why it is unproblematic for Luther
to confuse the terms. For him, the enjoyment of God is mediated through the
creature in such a way that the proper use of the creature is difficult to distinguish
from enjoyment of the creature itself. As gift, the creature bears the imprint of the
Giver, if the recipient has eyes to see and ears to hear (cf. Eccl. 1:8). The reason
that Luther seems to confuse Augustine’s terms is that he elides the logical and
temporal gap between use and enjoyment implied in Augustine’s framework. If
one is able to enter Paradise in the hora of economic-political activity, one need
not climb Jacob’s ladder into heaven to find rest (quietus). Instead, one may walk
the via regis that draws one deeper into the oeconomia and the politia. Luther’s
eschatology of the present enables him to appropriate Augustine’s usus/fruitio
framework radically, such that use and enjoyment become synonymous as God
meets the user-enjoyer in the hora of the hic et nunc through various creaturely
masks. Thus, rest is found not in a contemplative ascent to God, but rather in
active engagement in quotidian existence, in which one may expect to meet God
in what William Brown calls “the glory of the ordinary.”315
Importantly, rest (quietus) for Luther is not synonymous with the classical
notion of leisure (otium). In his lectures on Genesis, Luther declares that humanity
“was created not for leisure but for work (non ad otium sed ad laborem), even
in the state of innocence.”316 Whatever hardships the postlapsarian Adam and
his descendants experience in labor remind one of sin.317 In Paradise, however,
314
LW 15:93; WA 20:108.
315
Brown, Ecclesiastes, p. ix.
316
LW 1:103; WA 42:78.
317
LW 1:103; WA 42:78.
www.Ebook777.com
Adam worked in a state “abounding in peace (plenus pace).”318 The activity of

labor in no way contradicted the quietude of rest in God. One may ask, however,
about God’s resting on the Sabbath, after which humans were to model their own
sabbatarian practices. Does rest not imply the cessation of activity? According
to Luther, there is no contradiction between the Lord resting on the seventh
day and Jesus’ declaration in Jn 5:17 that his Father “works until now.”319 The
Lord’s sabbatarian rest meant a cessation from creating another heaven or
another earth. “It does not denote that God gave up preserving and governing
the heaven and the earth which had already been created.”320 For God to have
rested (Quievit) from God’s work means that God was satisfied (contentus) with
that which was created by the Word of God.321 Yet, God still works even now,
governing and preserving what was originally created, and God does so still
“through the effectiveness of the Word.”322 The Sabbath, then, is not primarily
about inactivity, but rather is a time ordained for the development of that for
which humanity was created, namely, “the knowledge and worship of God.”323
The following long quotation from Luther links work and worship:
And so through sin man lost this bliss. But Adam would not have spent his
life in Paradise in idleness if he had remained in the state of innocence. On
the Sabbath day he would have taught his children; through public preaching
he would have bestowed honor on God with the praises which He deserved;
and through reflection on the works of God he would have incited himself and
others to expressions of thanks. On the other days he would have worked, either
tilling his field or hunting. But this would have been far different from the way
it is done now. For to us work is something burdensome; but for Adam it would
have been more welcome than any leisure (gratior omni otio). Therefore just as
the other misfortunes of this life remind us of sin and of the wrath of God, so
work, too, and the well-known hardship of providing sustenance should remind
us of sin and rouse us to repentance.324
Thus, as I have stressed, there is not so much a subordination of work to worship,

or of the oeconomia to the ecclesia, as there is an interplay between the two. The
preaching of the Word in the ecclesia recalls the work of God, in which one is to
318
LW 1:89; WA 42:67.
319
LW 1:74–5.
320
LW 1:75.
321
LW 1:75; WA 42:57.
322
LW 1:75.
323
LW 1:80.
324
LW 1:82; WA 20:62
www.Ebook777.com
locate one’s own works. Yet the question remains as to whether this locating of
one’s works in the work of God is possible in a postlapsarian world. On Luther’s
reading of Ecclesiastes, the possibility is present.
It is of crucial significance that Luther invokes paradisiacal language with
respect to joy in labor (gaudium in labore) in Ecclesiastes. He is implying that
in God’s hora, the burdensome state of the worker descended from vetus Adam
may be transformed into the bliss of Paradise in the hic et nunc. The solution to
overcoming the burden of labor, then, is not to flee economic-political existence,
but, having had the conscience cleansed in heaven, to dive headlong further into
quotidian existence. Thus, Luther’s Solomon, though he fell greatly and repented,
has also tasted the joy of redeemed labor. Labor need not be experienced as toil
any longer, but through the Word’s continuing work, may be experienced as
paradisiacal bliss. In redeemed labor, the worker is content (contentus) as the
Creator is in the Creator’s own work. Thus, Solomon’s chorus in Ecclesiastes is as
eschatologically significant as his Song. In this chorus, he sings the melody of those
at the winepress, who even in their toil find rest in the use of God’s good gifts.
Conclusion
In this chapter, I have shown how Luther interprets the significance of Solomon’s
account in Ecclesiastes for active participation in creaturely life. Thus, Luther
may be seen both to complement and challenge Bonaventure. Taking linguistic
and thematic cues from Augustine and Jesus, Luther reads Solomon’s “public
sermon” as radically calling one to find rest (quietus) in economic-political
existence, rather than calling one to flee the oeconomia and the politia. Further
to this point, I have shown how Luther reads Ecclesiastes within the framework
of the drei Stände. Governing life in the oeconomia and the politia especially is a
sapientia negativa that orients one to follow the via regia/media via, avoiding the
polarities of avarice and sloth (in the oeconomia), as well as those of ambition
and anarchy (in the politia). I have also stressed the significance of Luther’s
understanding of time in Ecclesiastes. In avoiding the foolish economic-
political polarities, the one embodying the sapientia negativa depends upon an
eschatological outlook on quotidian existence, patiently awaiting God’s hora.
Resisting the concupiscentia futurorum, the economic-political administrator
anticipates God’s new work in the hic et nunc. Finally, I have suggested that Luther
provides the fullest picture of God’s involvement in present labor inÂ€his exegesis
www.Ebook777.com
of the accipe horam passages, in which he collapses Augustine’s distinction

between usus and fruitio in order to show how eschatological rest (quietus) may
be experienced in the use (usus) of God’s gifts. I now move to the fourth and
final chapter of this book, in which I offer an account of Solomon’s work ethic
that is still fitting for life in the twenty-first-century oeconomia.
www.Ebook777.com
186
www.Ebook777.com
Qoheleth’s Work Ethic: Human Work

in the Work of God
“Indeed, all our toil should be like that of those who, in the winepress or in the
harvest, sing as they work.”1
At the outset of this, the final chapter of this book, it is in order to summarize
the direction the project has taken thus far before allowing what has been gained
from the previous chapters to shape the more constructive proposal here. In the
introduction, I promised modestly to fill a gap in both OT ethics and the theology
of work by proposing an ethic of work from the thought world presented by
the book of Ecclesiastes. On both historical-critical and historical-theological
grounds, I suggested why the two primary interpreters I have encountered,
St Bonaventure and Martin Luther, are relevant for assisting me in this endeavor,
proposing that the Seraphic Doctor’s reading of Ecclesiastes encourages a
contemplative posture toward creation, while the Wittenberg Reformer’s lectures
on Ecclesiastes encourage an appropriate handling of creation. I also suggested
that these perspectives have purchase for both protological and eschatological
considerations of work and are significant for the proposal of an Ecclesiastan
work ethic. After stating my case for the form and content of this project,
I moved in Chapter 1 to examine Ecclesiastes primarily at a historical-critical
level, exploring six topics particularly relevant for thinking of Qoheleth’s work
ethic: the significance of the figure of Solomon; the meaning of ‫“( הבל‬vanity”);
perception and epistemology; cult, economy, and politics; time; and the so-called
carpe diem refrain. I concluded the chapter by enlisting Bonaventure and Luther
to assist in exploring these topics further.
Chapters 2 and 3 formed the nucleus of this book. Bonaventure and Luther,
as members of the sanctorum communio, hopefully have proven still to speak
1
Martin Luther, “Notes on Ecclesiastes,” ed. and trans. Jaroslav Pelikan, Luther’s Works 15 (Saint
Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1972), p. 90.
www.Ebook777.com
fitting words to those in the ecclesia who are interested in the theological and
ethical significance of their economic-political lives. Though the two interpreters
diverge from one another in important ways, their treatments of Ecclesiastes may
still be read in concert with one another in the formulation of an Ecclesiastan
work ethic. For instance, though they interpret the significance of Solomon’s
character for Ecclesiastes differently, there is room for reading Ecclesiastes
both penitentially and kerygmatically without necessarily doing injustice to the
interpretation of either reader.2 This point is an appropriate place from which to
move to summarize Chapters 2 and 3.
In Chapter 2, I showed how Bonaventure’s Solomon is a penitent king
reflecting on his misdeeds in order to teach contemptus mundi, which prepares
those on the contemplative journey for the beatific union with Christ expressed
in Song of Songs. Yet I also pointed out that it is crucial not to read Bonaventure’s
version of contemptus mundi as a negative judgment on creation per se. His
theological metaphysics enables him to interpret creation first as a mutable gift
from the divine Giver, resembling a wedding ring. Solomon’s penance, then,
involves not casting a negative judgment upon creation, but acknowledging a
failure on his part to receive it as a gift and interpret it according to its vestigial
significance. Bonaventure’s deployment of Hugh of St Victor’s triplex vanitas
concept is informed by his metaphysics, and it strengthens his case for Solomon’s
penitential tone. Vanitas does not in the first place refer to sin, but rather to
the mutability of creation, which is utterly dependent upon the Creator for its
continued existence. Only after Solomon misinterprets creation does vanitas
come to refer not to created mutability, but to sin and its consequent guilt,
which is a kind of fallen mutability (the final change humans endure is the
passing from life to death, which is the result of their sin). I showed that for
Bonaventure the vice of curiositas is what transforms the holy contemplation of
the mutable words of creation into the vanity of sin and guilt. In recognizing and
expanding upon curiositas as Solomon’s principal vice, Bonaventure is able then
to reflect on and warn his students against curiosity in both the liberal and the
mechanical arts. At the same time, he implicitly implicates those in Paris swayed
by Aristotelian doctrines, as he relates Solomon’s vice to that of the Athenians
in Acts 17.Â€ I concluded the chapter by suggesting that Bonaventure’s reading
of Solomon’s incessant search for knowledge within the register of curiositas is
2
Indeed, Treier’s aim in his commentary on Ecclesiastes, in part, is to reconcile pre-Reformation and
Reformation readings of the book. See Treier, Proverbs & Ecclesiastes, pp. 125–6.
www.Ebook777.com
Qoheleth’s Work Ethic: Human Work in the Work of God 189
instructive for how moderns think of the cultivation of knowledge and skill for
contemporary work. His contemplative approach encourages one to draw the
knowledge of all things into the knowledge of God.
In Chapter 3, I turned from the Middle Ages to the Reformation, engaging
the work of Martin Luther on Ecclesiastes. From the beginning, the points of
similarity to and departure from the commentary of the Seraphic Doctor were
clear. Rather than interpreting Solomon’s character as a penitential preacher
par excellence, Luther interprets Solomon as a wise economic-political
administrator who preaches good news to those involved in the oeconomia
and the politia. I proposed that Luther reads Ecclesiastes as both Solomon’s
Confessions and a sermon which complements Jesus of Nazareth’s Sermon on
the Mount. What is significant about the way Luther pairs Ecclesiastes with
Augustine’s spiritual autobiography and Christ’s hilltop homily is that Luther
applies the rest (quietus) that both figures advocate to everyday existence. This
fulfillment of the gospel in quotidian life in Ecclesiastes is further expounded
by Luther through his use of the drei Stände framework to explain Solomon’s
ethics. Though the ecclesia is certainly significant for Solomon’s ethics—in
that its worship is constitutive of both faith and practice in all areas of life—
Ecclesiastes is meant primarily to offer a vision for life in the oeconomia and
the politia. Not only does Ecclesiastes name the oeconomia and the politia as
loci of divine activity, but it also speaks to the timeliness of divine activity.
Luther deploys his Stündelein concept in order to expound upon Solomon’s
“catalogue of times,” stressing God’s involvement in present labor. Labor
provides the worker with an experience of novelty, so long as the worker is
not caught up in the concupiscentia futurorum but anticipates God’s work
in the hic et nunc. Nowhere is the call to receive present labor as a gift more
pronounced for Luther than in the so-called carpe diem chorus that punctuates
Solomon’s sermon at pivotal places. Because Luther stresses the receipt of
God’s gifts in God’s hour, I suggested that a more appropriate designation
for this chorus would be accipe horam rather than carpe diem. According to
Luther, this chorus aptly summarizes the positive claim of the entire book of
Ecclesiastes. In doing whatever one’s hand finds to do, one may enter Paradise
even in the present. I concluded Chapter 3 by suggesting that Luther’s reading
of Ecclesiastes both complements and corrects that of Bonaventure by adding
to Bonaventure’s restoration of sight an account of the restoration of the hand.
In other words, Luther’s approach to Ecclesiastes frees one for economic and
political engagement, because it is precisely in such activity that Christ comes
www.Ebook777.com
to meet the worker. Thus, Luther’s account does not fit squarely within the vita
activa as opposed to the vita contemplativa, but, according to a designation of
his elsewhere, is an account of the vita passiva,3 which is a reconciliation of the
vita contemplativa and the vita activa.4
In this chapter, I seek to bring these perspectives to bear on a positive account
of Qoheleth’s5 theology and ethic of work. There is a theological framework for
this account that I believe is instructive for contemporary theologies of work.
In sum, the work ethic I locate in Ecclesiastes is grounded in a theological
imagination that simultaneously works protology and eschatology through
christology, not on a chronological line but as aspects of what is constitutive
for good work in the present. In drawing these three theological foci together,
I am working with an understanding that both the beginning and the end are
experienced in Christ in the hic et nunc. Governing this perspective is not a
salvation history that is linearly construed, but rather an account of Advent.
In other words, Christ, the eternal Word who is the agent of both creation and
eschaton, is concretely present as this Word to the worker. Developing an ethic of
work in the thought world presented by Ecclesiastes, then, will involve inquiring
into the concrete claim the Word is making on the worker and asking how both
protology and eschatology feature into this claim. In order to arrive at a more
substantial articulation, in this inquiry I will turn to Eccl. 1:4-11 and Eccl. 3:1-15
to provide an exegetical basis for locating the words and works of humanity in
the Word and work of God.
Following this exegetical section, I will offer a modest proposal for how
Qoheleth’s work ethic may sharpen contemporary theologies of work, particularly
in its ability to hold protology and eschatology together through christology.
Finally, I will conclude this chapter, and the book as a whole, byÂ€ proposing
that Qoheleth’s refrain serves as a song of both protest and praise. Thus, when
members of the ecclesia learn to “sing at the winepress,” they are learning also
how to say “No” to both the totalization and denigration of labor, how to accept
God’s “Yes” to their own labors, and how to anticipate God’s hora in the midstÂ€of
their labor.
3
WA 5:165–6.
4
Wannenwetsch, Political Worship, p. 202. Wannenwetsch says of the vita passiva, “This new form of
life has its home in worship, and it is characterized by a receptivity which is in the highest degree
active.”
5
In this chapter, I resume my use of the name “Qoheleth” to refer to the protagonist in Ecclesiastes.
However, when drawing on the exegesis of Bonaventure and Luther, I will employ the name
“Solomon.”
www.Ebook777.com
The words and works of humanity in the Word and work

of God: Reading Ecclesiastes christologically
In this section, I will seek to provide a firm exegetical basis for the positive
theological-ethical claims I make with respect to work, drawing on the treatments
of Bonaventure and Luther that I have just summarized. Through engagement
with Eccl. 1:4-11 and Eccl. 3:1-15, I will propose, in sum, that Ecclesiastes invites
humans to understand their words and works in the Word and work of God.6
This basic thesis confronts the principal vices that I have shown in this thesis to be
related to work, namely curiositas and avaritia.7 It is worth briefly summarizing
and relating these vices before turning to exegesis.
Both Bonaventure and Luther stress that in Ecclesiastes, the problem
Solomon is confronting is not creation in itself, but the way in which humanity
sees it and responds to it in word and deed. The specifically economic vices
Solomon addresses are rooted first in a failure to perceive creation as a gift
from the divine Giver. This reality is most evident in the intimate relationship
between curiositas and avaritia.8 If the curiosus is set on sequestering knowledge
for selfish ends, then the avarus engages in a similar act of sequestration with
regard to money. Both vices betray a discontentment with God’s gifts and a
failure to use (uti) them properly. The obsession with the acquisition of new
things, be they objects of knowledge or material objects, on the one hand resists
contemplation and on the other hand resists the intrinsic benefits of labor itself.
Instead, the curiosus chatters like an arrogant savant and the avarus stores
away money and goods without regard for neighbor or even family. In order
to confront curiositas, I will return to Eccl. 1:4-11, which I will argue invites
contemplation by summoning the reader to see reality through the Word, who
is both the sole agent of novelty and the ancient source of all that exists. In
order to confront avaritia, I will expand on the relationship between time and
6
In this move, I am following the logic of Luther: “Without the action and the Word of God we do
nothing, even though we may begin something” (LW 15:24).
7
As I showed in Chapter 3, the vice of socordia (“sloth”), though the opposite of avaritia, is like
avaritia in that it is rooted in the concupiscentia futurorum. The inactivity of socordia stems from a
sense that one’s work does not avail the worker anything for the future and is therefore a waste of
energy.
8
Gilson aptly relates the two vices: “Curiosity consists in the desire to know what is hidden simply
because we do not know it, to see what is beautiful for its beauty merely, and to seize what we like
simply to have it for ourselves. Curiosity thus necessarily implies avarice, and this it was that ruined
the first man—the passion to know simply for the sake of knowing, to see for the sake of seeing, to
take what he coveted” (The Philosophy of St. Bonaventure, p. 450).
www.Ebook777.com
toil that I discussed in Chapter 3, through engagement with Eccl. 3:1-15. I will
argue that Ecclesiastes invites the enjoyment of labor by stressing the time of
the present as that which makes possible the experience of a new work of God.
In so doing, it draws attention to the intrinsic value of the worker’s labor. It will
be seen that contemplation through the Word and human activity that is done
in anticipation of divine activity turns the worker away from self-referential
and self-salvific pursuits and toward good speech and action for the sake of the
neighbor.
Ecclesiastes 1:4-11: Work as an invitation to perceive the “words”

through the Word
In Chapter 2, I looked closely at Bonaventure’s treatment of Qoheleth’s
opening poem (Eccl. 1:4-11), suggesting that the Seraphic Doctor’s theological
metaphysics informs his exegesis of the cosmological movements in Eccl. 1:4-7,
in turn enabling a spiritual interpretation that presents creatures in their primal
significance. I also showed how the diagnosis of humanity’s participation in
the vice of curiositas is present in the poem as well. In fact, it is what renders
the “words” of the book of creation illegible to human perception. In the end,
I suggested that Bonaventure’s rigid triplex vanitas framework for interpreting
Ecclesiastes, as well as his concept of the soul’s ascent to God through the stages
of contemplation, prohibits him from making any christological claims from the
literal sense of the book, having instead either to invoke allegorical interpretation
or to move to Song of Songs. Here, then, I shall show that one need not resort to
allegory or Song of Songs, nor to Bonaventure’s stages of contemplative ascent,
in order to meet Christ, but in fact may hear a summons to see reality through
the divine Word, who renders the book of creation legible. It will be evident
that this reading is in fact not an account of an ascent to God, but rather an
account of God’s descent to humanity in order to repair humanity’s perception of
creation. I will suggest that Ecclesiastes, then, not only narrates a perceptual fall
but also proclaims the restoration of sight. This move is one that Bonaventure
may only imply. Before making this move, however, it is necessary to return to
the diagnosis of humanity’s curiosity.
When one compares the creaturely movements in Eccl. 1:4-7 to the descriptions
of humanity’s senses and speech in Eccl. 1:8, one detects a stark contrast. This
contrast is evident in the parallelism between the first line of Eccl. 1:7 and that
of Eccl. 1:8:
www.Ebook777.com
‫כל־הנחלים הלכים‬
‫כל־הדברים יגעים‬
All the streams are going
All the words are wearying9
Formally, each verse begins the same: the adjective ‫“( כל‬all”), attached to a
masculine plural noun with the definite article ‫ה‬, and the form of a masculine
plural participle. The writer imposes formal similarity upon these two lines in
external parallelism in order to draw attention to lexical differences. First, “the
streams” are compared to “the words.” While translators generally translate
‫ הדברים‬as “things,”10 some commentators suggest that the plural forms of ‫דבר‬
(whether in construct or absolute) in Ecclesiastes always mean “words,” and
should thus be translated as “words” here.11 The usage of ‫“( לדבר‬to speak”) in
Eccl. 1:8a supports this conclusion. It is the words that are wearying, such that
a man (‫ )אישׁ‬is no longer able to speak. This wearying nature of words is where
the contrast with the streams of Eccl. 1:7 lies. Though they should replicate the
water (which flows to its place, evaporates, and returns again) in a kind of verbal
cycle, they have come to resemble a parched riverbed rather than a flowing
stream. In Chapter 2, I drew on the work of Griffiths, who notes that loquacity is
one crucial aspect of Augustine’s understanding of curiositas. I showed how this
aspect is relevant to the diagnosis of humanity’s perceptual problem in Eccl. 1, as
well as the warning in Eccl. 12:12. Whether the words themselves are wearied or
wearisome in Eccl. 1:8a, the chattering of the loquacious distorts speech, which
should be a faithful response to the perception of creation. Instead speech is an
opportunity for self-glorification (see Eccl. 1:16). Not only that, but humanity’s
9
Seow says that the form ‫ יגעים‬could be “either an adjective or a participle that is stative in form,”
afterward stating his preference for taking the form as a participle. He goes on to note that
“the distinction ‘weary’ and ‘wearisome’ is one made in English, not Hebrew.... To preserve this
ambiguity, therefore, we translate the participle as ‘wearying.’ ... [The words] are both worn out
and wearisome” (Ecclesiastes, p. 109). I follow Seow in both his preference and his translational
decision. The ambiguity of the term invites multiple reflections. On the one hand, the words of the
loquacious (as with the countless books in Eccl. 12:12) are wearisome to the listener. On the other
hand, words themselves are worn out, emptied of significance, by the speech of the loquacious. I
will expand on this phenomenon later in this section.
10
See, for instance, KJV, NASB, NIV, NJPSV, and NRSV (though this translation does contain a note
naming the option to render the term as “words”).
11
See Murphy, Ecclesiastes, p. 100; Fox, A Time to Tear Down, p. 163; and Seow, Ecclesiastes, p. 109. One
contemporary translation (CEB) does follow Murphy, Fox, and Seow, rendering the line “All words
are tiring.”
www.Ebook777.com
entire perceptual apparatus has become tainted. The eyes are not satisfied with
what they see, and the sounds that meet the hearer, to put it colloquially, “go in
one ear and out the other.”
In Chapter 2, I showed how Bonaventure reads creation as a book, the words
of which speak of God, and how he relates the perceptual rupture in Eccl. 1:8 to
a misreading of these words through the vice of curiositas. The curiosus is not
content to contemplate creation, but incessantly longs to find new things “under
the sun.” The reason the search of the curiosus is in vain is that genuine novelty,
as in the sense in which Jeremiah the Prophet and John the Revelator speak,
only comes from “above the sun.” Though Bonaventure speaks both of existence
in the eternal Word and the newness of God’s work, his overall framework for
Ecclesiastes according to the triplex vanitas disallows a detection of the Word’s
presence in the book.12 For Bonaventure to get to Christ, who is the divine Word,
he must either employ a spiritual interpretation of passages in Ecclesiastes13 or
move ahead to Song of Songs. What, however, would a detection of the divine
Word’s presence in Eccl. 1 mean for one’s understanding of the opening poem;
and, consequently, what would this interpretation imply for the message of the
entire book? In order to answer these questions, I will focus intently on the
presence of the lexeme ‫ דבר‬in Eccl. 1:8-11 and its significance within particular
parallel lines in the poem.
There is a tension between how Qoheleth uses ‫“( חדשׁ‬new”) in Eccl. 1:9 and
how he uses it in Eccl. 1:10, one sustained by the rest of his story. Ecclesiastes
1:9-10 draws a contrast between two perspectives on novelty through the usage
of particles of negation and existence in succeeding cola:
ׁ‫ואין כל־חדשׁ תחת השׁמש‬
‫יש ׁדבר שׁיאמר‬
And there is nothing new under the sun
There is a Word of whom one says ...
Ecclesiastes 1:9 concludes the statement of its first line by joining with it the
statement “There is nothing new under the sun.” Ecclesiastes 1:10, however, marks
a stark contrast to Eccl. 1:9 with its asyndetic use of the particle of existence (‫)ישׁ‬.
Qoheleth makes the counterassertion to Eccl. 1:9 with no introduction. There
12
See WSB VII:97–8.
13
www.Ebook777.com
simply is a different way to perceive reality, whether that way corresponds to

reality or not.
What is it that this opposing perspective perceives as new? It is a ‫דבר‬. Earlier,
I suggested translating the plural of ‫ דבר‬in Eccl. 1:8 as “the words,” mentioning
scholarship that has suggested that the plural forms of ‫ דבר‬in Ecclesiastes
always mean “words.” However, none of these scholars translate the singular
‫ דבר‬in Eccl. 1:10 as “word,”14 and none of them provide explanations in their
commentaries for this translational decision. I suggest that this decision reflects
a certain theological assumption. If biblical scholars were consistent in their
translations of ‫דבר‬, then they would offer a strikingly different, theologically
imaginative reading. How, then, would staying consistent and translating ‫ דבר‬in
Eccl. 1:10 as “word” change interpretation of this passage?
Contrary to some interpretations of this passage, I suggest that the theology
Qoheleth offers in Eccl. 1:10 is not a course in contradistinction to the apocalyptic
and prophetic imagination, but rather one that resonates with it.15 In the MT,
Eccl. 1:10a reads, ‫ישׁ דבר שׁיאמר ראה־זה חדשׁ הוא‬. One possible literal translation
of this verse in English is “There is a Word of whom one says, ‘Behold this one!
New he is!’â•›” A comparison of the LXX translation of this verse with Rev. 21:5
reflects a compelling similarity. LXX Eccl. translates ‫ ראה־זה חדשׁ הוא‬in Eccl. 1:10a
as Ἰdὲ toῦto kainόn ἐstin. In Rev. 21:5, Jesus says, ἰdoὺ kainὰ poiῶ pάnta
(“Behold, I am making all things new”). In LXX Eccl. 1:10, the imperative ‫ראה‬
is translated with Ἰdὲ, while in Rev. 21:5, Jesus summons the reader with the
interjection ἰdoὺ. Ἰdoὺ in the LXX usually translates the Hebrew ‫הנה‬, yet both
ἰdoὺ and ἰdὲ are forms of the verb ὁrάw, which the LXX usually uses to translate
14
See Fox, A Time to Tear Down, p. 164; Murphy, Ecclesiastes p. 5; and Seow, Ecclesiastes, p. 100. The
CEB follows suit, though it does offer a fresh rendering of Eccl. 1:10 (especially its quotation) which
invites the correction I offer in this section. The CEB renders the verse “People may say about
something: ‘Look at this! It is new!’ But it was already around for ages before us.” I do not read the
particle of existence, ‫ישׁ‬, subjunctively, but indicatively. Moreover, there is no conjunction connecting
v.10a with v.10b. Rather, v.10b simply begins with ‫“( כבר‬already”). Thus, the CEB’s insertion of “But”
between the lines is contrived. The quotation in v.10a, however, is rendered in its proper cadence
by the CEB (“Look at this! It is new!”), though I prefer to translate the quotation in personal terms.
Therefore, if one reads ‫ ישׁ‬indicatively, interprets ‫ דבר‬literally as “word,” translates the quotation in
v.10a personally, and (finally) elides the CEB’s conjunction in v.10b, one may read Eccl. 1:10 thusly:
“There is a Word of whom one says, ‘Behold this one! New he is!’ He has already existed for ages
before us.” I will elaborate on this explicitly christological interpretation in this section.
15
See, for instance, Seow, Ecclesiastes, pp. 116–17; and Francis Watson, Text, Church and World: Biblical
Interpretation in Theological Perspective (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1994), pp. 283–5. Perdue suggests that in Ecclesiastes, Qoheleth counters apocalyptic sages
(his major opponents), especially in the sections punctuated by the so-called carpe diem passages
See Leo G. Perdue, “Wisdom and Apocalyptic: The Case of Qoheleth,” in F. García Martinez (ed.),
Wisdom and Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Biblical Tradition (Leuven: Leuven
University Press, 2003), pp. 231–58.
www.Ebook777.com
the Hebrew ‫“( ראה‬to see”). Thus, initiating both quotations is a summons for the
reader to see reality in a new way.
Both LXX Eccl. 1:10 and Rev. 21:5 follow the Hebrew of Eccl. 1:10 in
prepositioning “new” (kainόn/kainὰ) for emphasis. In Eccl. 1:10, Qoheleth
emphasizes the newness of the singular Word, calling the reader to perceive
reality anew through this Word. In Rev. 21:5, it is the Word himself who is
speaking about his own work of making all things new. It is also significant that
Rev. 21:5 uses poiέw, with which LXX Eccl. translates ‫עשׂה‬, which is often used to
describe the work of God. For instance, Qoheleth beckons the reader to perceive
(using the imperative ‫ראה‬, as in Eccl. 1:10) God’s works (‫מעשׂה‬/poiήmata)16
in Eccl. 7:13. Both Eccl. 1:10 and Rev. 21:5 declare the newness that the Word
inaugurates, the former in the genre of wisdom, the latter in apocalyptic. In both
instances, however, perception of the Word of God is crucial for making sense of
the contradictions humanity faces in everyday existence.
Ecclesiastes instructs one how wisely to see movements in creation as providing
opportunities to witness—and witness to—God’s continuous providential care
for creatures rather than as monotonous recurrences of the “same old thing.”
The new Word is also the one who “has already existed for ages before us”
(Eccl. 1:10b), in whom all the elements in Eccl. 1:4-7 subsist (cf. Col. 1:15-17).
Though humans experience dynamism without novelty, the Word has been
doing new things since the dawn of creation. Therefore, humans may expect to
find novelty from “above the sun,” from the very Word who created the world ex
nihilo and still maintains it. In the eternal and incarnate Word, curiosi find rest
from their unending toil (cf. Eccl. 12:12).
In the christological reading of the opening poem of Ecclesiastes, the
penitential Solomon invites the reader to contemplate the “true Solomon” of
Bonaventure’s Itinerarium,17 the Word who is God’s eternal Wisdom. Bonaventure
need not move to Song of Songs to complete the contemplative ascent. Indeed,
he need not make an ascent at all. Rather than expecting the human to progress
from vestiges to the image of God and then to beatific similitude by ascending
“Jacob’s ladder,”18 Christ the Word descends to meet humans where they are,
in media res. Thus, though Bonaventure offers keen insight into the perceptual
16
These terms are nominal forms of the verbs discussed in the previous sentence.
17
See WSB II:133.
18
Bonaventure says of this ascension in the Itinerarium, “Now since we must ascend before we can
descend on Jacob’s ladder, let us place the first step of our ascent at the bottom, putting the whole
world of sense-objects before us as a mirror through which we may pass to God, the highest creative
Artist” (WSB II:53).
www.Ebook777.com
rupture that curiositas precipitates, his contemplative vision, even given his
devaluation of reason (compared to Aquinas) and the importance he grants
to revelation, finally rests too heavily on humans’ ability to “think themselves”
back to God.19 Thus, Luther’s complaint about Bonaventure, which I depicted
in the introduction, is not merely an insult to “speculative theology,” but stems
from a genuine concern that speculative theology has forgotten that Christ is
not only the contemplative end of humanity, but also Immanuel, “God with
us.” For Luther, Advent is a reality as present to contemporary Christians as to
the shepherds in Bethlehem. The coming of Christ to the worker in the midst
of labor opens the worker’s eyes to see creation in a new way. Thus, there is a
reversal of Bonaventure’s rubric for contemplation. Rather than first meditating
on the “words” of creation and ascending to Christ, Christ descends to humanity
and restores sight, that humans might reinterpret the creaturely “words.” Because
such restoration of sight is available to all of the justified (and in God’s hora,
even to pagans), attending to the vita contemplativa as a separate way of life is
unnecessary. Rather, it is a constitutive aspect of a life that is open and actively
responsive to God’s work in the world.
Qoheleth is repenting in part because he has lost the ability properly to read
the book of creation, yet he summons the reader of his words to read the book of
creation anew through the Word, and thus to respond in word and deed wisely.
This summons, paralleling the summons of Christ in Rev. 21:5, also exists as a
promise. The Word who descends to meet humanity actually opens eyes to see.
Yet, this Word also opens up the other senses too, that the justified may taste as
well as see the goodness of God. Therefore, I move now to consider Qoheleth’s
reflections on manual engagement with material reality.
Ecclesiastes 3: 1-15: Work as an invitation to participate

in Christ’s new work in the present
Alongside the vice of curiositas, which hinders the worker from accepting the
invitation to contemplation in labor, is the vice of avaritia, which is likewise self-
19
Indeed, Gilson notes the difficulty in reconciling Bonaventure’s apprehensiveness regarding human
reason and the principal role he seems to grant reason in the contemplative journey: “But the spot
upon which one falls is that on which one leans to rise again; thus, strange as it may at first appear, it is
upon our very insufficiency that we must set the foundation of our deliverance. That such is indeed the
first step required of man in St Bonaventure’s theory seems to be shown by the mysterious incipit of the
Itinerarium—‘here begins the speculation of the poor man in the desert.’ No theme is more often in his
mind or in his mouth than this. Man has turned by a free act from the supreme God who is at once his
beginning and his end; a new free act in the reverse direction can never be sufficient to re-united him
to God, but such an act is necessary all the same” (The Philosophy of St. Bonaventure, p. 439).
www.Ebook777.com
referential and fails to make proper use of God’s gifts, only this time joining to
the misuse of the sense of sight a corresponding misuse of the sense of touch.
Avarice and sloth, manifested in what moderns might call workaholism and
laziness, are rooted, as it was shown in Chapter 3, in the concupiscentia futurorum.
Both the insatiable thirst for acquisition and the resignation to do nothing are
symptomatic of a condition that narrows one’s focus to labor’s extrinsic rewards
in the future rather than its intrinsic value in the present. In Eccl. 3:1-15, Qoheleth
challenges future-oriented acquisitive lust in his meditation on time, countering an
eschatology of death and war20 that seeks the glorification of the human king (see
Eccl. 1:12–2:23) with a different eschatology. In looking at this countereschatology,
I will expand on Luther’s concept of the Stündelein, which I explored in Chapter 3,
beginning with the famous “catalogue of times” in Eccl. 3:2-8.
The catalog contains fourteen pairs of “opposites,” indicating that Qoheleth
is drawing attention to the totality of human existence. The number fourteen, as
a multiple of seven, indicates completeness. Concerning the poem’s structure,
James A. Loader recognizes an intricate chiastic pattern.21 Throughout the poem,
the positive and negative elements of the pairs switch places, such that in some
pairs, the positive element comes first and the negative element second, while
in others, the negative element comes first and the positive second. When one
examines the poem’s first and last lines, one should notice this reversal,Â€rendering
the following pattern:
Â€Â€– (3:2a)
–Â€Â€(3:8b)22
Noticing this pattern draws attention to the first and last “times” in the poem.
The poem begins with new life (‫ )ללדת‬and ends with peace (‫)שׁלום‬, rather than
beginning with death and ending with war. Tamez suggests the significance of
this structure, saying, “Although everything is vanity for Qoheleth, he offers
a spark of hope by opening his lyrical discourse with birth, and ending with
shalom.”23 Perhaps paying attention to the LXX translation of this passage, as
well as focusing on Eccl. 3:11, will shed light on the theological significance of
this structuring.
20
In using the phrase “death and war,” I am anticipating the ultimacy of new life and peace in
Eccl. 3:2-8.
21
James A. Loader, Polar Structures in the Book of Qohelet, BZAW 152 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1979), p.
11.
22
I follow Bartholomew (Ecclesiastes, p. 161) in my use of the symbols “/–” to characterize the line
halves rather than using terms that necessarily imply value judgments.
23
Tamez, When the Horizons Close, p. 60.
www.Ebook777.com
The LXX translates the Hebrew ‫“( עת‬time”) with the Greek kairὸV (kairos).
Brown describes this passage as a “Chronology without History.”24 However,
I prefer to place emphasis on chronological time in Eccl. 1:12–2:26,25 with
Eccl. 3:1-15 offering quite a different perspective. Though the LXX uses crόnoV
(chronos) to translate ‫“( זמן‬season”) in 3:1, it is kairos that remains throughout
the rest of the poem. Given the Greek influence I showed in the introduction,
Lohfink’s reading is preferable to Brown’s in that he suggests that the Greek notion
of kairos informs Qoheleth’s treatment of time.26 Kairos could refer to an “exact
point of time, [a] critical point, [an] occasion, [or a] propitious time.”27 In other
words, kairos refers to something paradigmatically new. Luther’s articulation of
the Stündelein concept in relation to this passage unpacks the significance of this
move theologically, directing attention to God as the sole agent of novelty and
success in human endeavors. Just as the presence of the new yet eternal Word
theologically grounds the appropriate expectation of novelty from “above the
sun” in Qoheleth’s opening poem, so here the structure and terminology of the
poem, along with the comment in Eccl. 3:11, theologically grounds the concept
of time.
Given the high level of intentionality in the structure of the poem on time
(Eccl. 3:2-8), especially its beginning with new life and its ending with shalom, as
well as the understanding of time as kairos, of which the book’s Greek provenance
and the LXX translation are evidence, I suggest that Qoheleth’s understanding
of time in this passage parallels that in which kairos “corresponds to the coming
of the era of Jesus Christ.”28 Jesus is the Word who establishes creation and
consummates the eschaton. What is theologically significant about reading
Qoheleth’s opening poem (Eccl. 1:4-11) and his meditation on time (Eccl. 3:1-15)
together is that creation and consummation by the divine Word are seen to be
experienced simultaneously in quotidian existence. Jesus’ second coming is near,
but the time of this coming remains a mystery. Yet, this does not mean he is
not at work in the world, even now making all things new. It simply means that
humans must accept the newness Christ offers in the present and trust that new
life and shalom form the envelope of God’s time (Eccl. 3:2-8), a structuring of
time and reality which challenges Qoheleth’s earlier eschatology of death and
24
Brown, Ecclesiastes, pp. 40–7.
25
Norbert Lohfink relates this section to the notion of historicity, expressing that in 2:24-26, “out of a
discussion of ‘historicity’ anthropology can become theology” (Qoheleth, p. 56).
26
Lohfink, Qoheleth, p. 60. See also Tamez, When the Horizons Close, p. 158.
27
Lohfink, Qoheleth, p. 60.
28
www.Ebook777.com
war (Eccl. 1:12–2:23). Though they do not know God’s work “from beginning
to end (ἀp᾽ ἀrcῆV kaὶ mέcri tέlouV)” (LXX Eccl. 3:11), humans nonetheless
know that Christ is the “beginning and end (ἡ ἀrcὴ kaὶ tὸ tέloV)” (Rev. 22:13),
the mystery of creation and eschaton. Humans do not need the full disclosure
of God’s work from beginning to end, but accept the Word’s work in the present,
trusting its fitting completion (shalom) in God’s time (Eccl. 3:8b; 11a).
Revelation 22 resembles Eccl. 3 in exposing human ignorance concerning
the full disclosure of God’s work from creation to eschaton within their own
calculations, while at the same time expressing trust that God will make
everything beautiful in God’s time (Eccl. 3:11a). The point of connection between
Ecclesiastes and Revelation, both here and in the discussion on Eccl. 1:4-11,
resonates with J. G. Hamann’s summary of Ecclesiastes:
Ecclesiastes seems to have been chiefly written in order that he, the wisest of
all seekers after wisdom, might point to the revelation of God in the flesh and
the preaching of his kingdom as the sole new thing that would be significantly,
universally and really new for all the earth and would never cease to be new.29
While there is nothing new “under the sun” (Eccl. 1:9), the perspective on time in
Eccl. 3, in concert with Eccl. 1:10, proclaims the reality of newness from “above
the sun.” As Luther suggests, though humans do nothing new, “God is constantly
doing new things.”30 While Ecclesiastes exposes the hubris of humanity’s curiosity
and avarice, in their search for newness within their own calculations, it also
presents a message of eschatological hope. What is unique about Qoheleth’s
eschatology, and perhaps what causes theologians to fail to recognize it, is that
God’s new work takes place not only in the apocalypse, but also in everyday
labor.
Ecclesiastes 3:11 comprises the theological crux of Eccl. 3:1-15 in that it
explicitly links the work of God to Eccl. 3:1-8 (3:11a) and unpacks what kairos
means for humanity living in the present (3:11b). Ecclesiastes 3:11a notes that
the business of humanity (Eccl. 3:10) is something that God has made beautiful,
and that it takes place in God’s time (‫)בעתו‬.31 The use of both ‫“( עת‬time”) and ‫כל‬
(“all, everything”) in v.11a no doubt has the reader thinking back to the poem
29
J. G. Hamann, “Biblical Reflections,” in Ronald Gregor Smith (ed.), J. G. Hamann 1730-1788: A Study
in Christian Existence, With Selections from His Writings (London: Collins, 1960), p. 136.
30
LW 15:21.
31
The phrase ‫ בעתו‬literally reads “in his/its time.” I take the third masculine singular pronominal
suffix to refer to the subject of ‫“( עשׂה‬makes”), who is ‫“( אלהים‬God,” see v.10). Crenshaw poses this
interpretive possibility (Ecclesiastes, p. 97).
www.Ebook777.com
ofÂ€Eccl. 3:1-8. If Qoheleth is now observing life within the scope of this “time for
everything” reality, here there is both a confession of God’s control over these
“times” and an expression of the beauty of God’s own work in this process. Some
form of ‫ עשׂה‬occurs seven times throughout this passage, initiated with the use
of ‫“( העושׂה‬the worker”) in Eccl. 3:9. In answer to his own question concerning
the gain of the worker’s labor in Eccl. 3:9, Qoheleth shows that God too is at
work. Qoheleth relates God’s work both to the totality of human existence in
Eccl. 3:2-8, and also to the life of the worker to whom God gives the business of
being busy in Eccl. 3:9-10. While Qoheleth previously depicted the details of his
work toward self-glorification with several usages of ‫( עשׂה‬in Eccl. 2:4-8), now
he is locating human work in the work of God. Humans find meaning in their
work when, rather than engaging in self-centered and self-salvific poiesis, they
acknowledge their vocation to be part of God’s continuing poiesis in the world.
Making such an acknowledgment enables humans to expect the unexpected in
the midst of their labor. Kairos is no less involved in the hammering of a nail
than in the bringing about of peace, and it reveals ways in which the hammering
of a nail can be the bringing about of Christ’s peace.
The second half of Eccl. 3:11 introduces another term for time and further
explicates humans’ experience of God’s work in their labor. The asseverative use
of ‫“( גם‬moreover”) between the first and second parts of v.11 indicates that the
second part intensifies the idea that Qoheleth presents in the first. Eccl. 3:11b
says that God has placed eternity (‫)העלם‬32 in the hearts of humans. Qoheleth
shows God’s purpose for implanting eternity into human hearts in the emphatic
purpose clause “so that humanity will not find out the work that God is doing
from beginning to end.” God has placed eternity in the hearts of humans, but for
the purpose of their not finding out God’s own work “from beginning to end.”
Far from being a frustration for humanity, this lack of finding out is actually
liberating. God is at work from creation to eschaton, but it is not for humanity
to worry about all the details of what takes place in this work. God has presently
placed eternity in human hearts in order to bring about a receptivity to God’s
timely and present gifts, a knowledge totally distinct from knowing the whole
sweep of divine activity.
32
Scholars have offered a range of suggestions for interpreting this word, here in its defective spelling,
from various time concepts (“eternity,” “distant time,” “world”) to textual emendations, including
converting ‫ עלם‬to ‫“( עמל‬labor”), or to a segolate, ‫“( עלם‬knowledge” or “ignorance”). Yet given the
immediate context and the scope of the whole passage (3:1-15), it seems interpreting this term as a
time concept is the best option, and I see no reason not to interpret the term as “eternity.” See Krüger,
Qoheleth, p. 80.
www.Ebook777.com
Though Qoheleth expresses humanity’s inability to find out God’s work from
beginning to end, he nonetheless acknowledges God’s work, as well as its finality.
God’s work endures unto eternity, with nothing adding to or taking away from
it (Eccl. 3:14). Though humans struggle to make sense of life’s contradictions
within linear conceptions of time, God is not constrained by this limitation.
For God, every event might as well have already happened. In God’s time, what
is has already been, and what will be has already been (Eccl. 3:15). One may
recognize God’s work across the totality of human existence (Eccl. 3:2-8), but
also experience God in daily labor (Eccl. 3:9-15).
What is interesting about how Qoheleth answers his own question in
Eccl. 3:9 is that the “gain” (‫ )יתרון‬he locates in the worker’s labor, which one could
interpret in terms of economic profitability,33 does not actually lie in his own
calculated excess but rather in the gift of labor itself. In Ecclesiastes, “God is
above all the one who gives.”34 Recognizing labor as a gift and God as the Giver,
Qoheleth resounds his accipe horam chorus. He knows that there is “nothing
better for humans than to take pleasure and do good in their lives.” The use of ‫טוב‬
(“good”) in Eccl. 3:12 is ambiguous.35 Does “doing good” (‫ )לעשׂות טוב‬intensify the
declaration regarding pleasure or does it make explicit an ethical dimension to
work? Whereas in both Eccl. 2:24 and Eccl. 3:13, ‫ טוב‬is the object of some form of
‫“( ראה‬to see”), forming an idiomatic expression for the experience of pleasure, in
Eccl. 3:12, ‫ טוב‬is the object of ‫“( לעשׂות‬to work, to make, to do”). While one could
render ‫( לעשׂות טוב‬LXX, poieῖn ἀgaqὸn) as “work well,” one could also render
the phrase as simply “do good.” Perhaps the latter translation provides a clue into
Qoheleth’s thought about work’s role in cultivating happiness, here paralleling
Aristotle’s eudaimonia.36 As for Aristotle, for Qoheleth, flourishing consists not
in gaining wealth, which is only useful for another end, but rather consists in
action (praxis) that is inherently pleasing for the soul.37 Yet, Qoheleth levels the
playing field in a way that Aristotle does not, and herein lies his critical edge.
33
Seow, Ecclesiastes, p. 103.
34
Ellul, Reason for Being, p. 250.
35
For a discussion on the ambiguity of ‫ טוב‬in Ecclesiastes, see Doug Ingram, Ambiguity in Ecclesiastes
(New York: T&T Clark, 2006), pp. 169–249.
36
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. Terence Irwin (Indianapolis, IN/Cambridge, UK: Hackett
Publishing Company, Inc., 1999), pp. 3, 175. Gabriel Richardson Lear points out the difficulties
in defining eudaimonia, suggesting that it does not mean “happiness” in an emotional sense. The
term includes connotations of flourishing and success, but in a specifically human register (because
animals too may flourish, eudaimonia must mean something more specific than simply flourishing).
See Gabriel Richardson Lear, “Happiness and the Structure of Ends,” in Georgios Anagnostopoulos
(ed.), A Companion to Aristotle (Chichester, UK: Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2009), pp. 393–5.
37
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, pp. 3–5, 172.
www.Ebook777.com
While Qoheleth exposes a universal dissatisfaction with labor across social

statuses, the flourishing that he promotes is universally accessible, because the
God who creates and ordains the times is the God who unexpectedly intervenes
even in human labor (this is the thrust of Luther’s Stündelein concept). Qoheleth’s
ethos applies not only to those engaging in theoretical contemplation, but also
to those who put their hands to the task (Eccl. 9:11).38 While he himself may
be subject to Hellenistic rulers, as “King over Israel in Jerusalem” (Eccl. 1:12),
Qoheleth governs a polis centered on the oikos of God (see LXX Eccl. 4:17 [5:1,
Engl.]), a household that recognizes the worker’s worth and whose owner sides
with the slave. Qoheleth’s Solomonic guise is thus significant beyond the royal
testament (Eccl. 1:12–2:26). In Eccl. 4–5, Qoheleth enacts the verbal root of his
name, assembling the ecclesia39 in the manner of Solomon in 2 Chron. 1–7. There,
Solomon’s “qahaling” activity involves the construction of the Temple,40 which
incorporates both poiesis and praxis,41 with laborers, architects, and administrators
working together to build an oikos where they will listen for God’s voice.42
38
Brown distinguishes the biblical from the Greco-Roman tradition, suggesting that, “The Bible ...
knows no split between the manual and the mental, the life of the mind apart from that of the body”
(“Whatever Your Hand Finds to Do,” p. 273). While this discrepancy between Aristotle and the OT
in terms of their valuation of labor has been noted in the conversation surrounding biblical ethics
[see also, Alan Richardson, The Biblical Doctrine of Work (London: SCM, 1952), p. 20], such has
not always been the case in theological studies. Brock points out that with the rise in popularity of
Aristotle’s increasingly available works in the Middle Ages, some theologians acquiesced to Aristotle’s
devaluation of manual labor and his privileging of the vita contemplativa over the vita activa. This
new ethos took shape even in monasteries. Whereas Benedict’s Rule had sought to join the head
and the heart to the hand, “Monks now began to set work and worship into conflict, giving up
work in favor of worship, obscuring its function as a necessary crucible for the formation of faith....
Manual labor and the mechanical arts were officially classified as subordinate to all other sciences
due to their preoccupation with bodiliness or the physical world” (Christian Ethics in a Technological
Age, p. 305). This devaluation is evident in the work of Bonaventure and perhaps elucidates why
he is reticent to read the accipe horam refrain kerygmatically. In his On the Reduction of the Arts
to Theology, he explicitly says that the “light of mechanical art” is “in a certain sense, servile and of
a lower nature than philosophical knowledge” (WSB I:37). Thus, though he is certainly critical of
Aristotle as a metaphysician, he incorporates enough of Aristotle’s thought on life “on the ground” to
invite Luther’s criticism.
39
Note the LXX’s rendering of “Qoheleth” as ἘkklhsiastὴV (LXX Eccl. 1:12).
40
There is a clue, however, to Solomon’s eventual falling from grace in monarchic excess in the addition
of the phrase “and a royal palace for himself ” (2 Chron. 2:1; cf. 7:11) along with the mention of the
Temple’s construction.
41
In my deployment of Aristotelian terminology here, I am suggesting points of connection with the
biblical text rather than attempting to deploy poiesis and praxis as terms that exhaustively clarify the
matter of work in Ecclesiastes. While work in the Ecclesiastan sense involves aspects of both, it does
not dwell neatly within either.
42
I should add, however, that it is also evident that the Temple construction was not accomplished
without some degree of oppression, seeing that “forced labor” was employed at various stages
(see 1 Kgs 5:13; 9:15-22; 2 Chron. 8:7-10). To the degree that Qoheleth clothes himself in a Solomonic
guise in order to ironize his own story, I suggest, following Bonaventure, that Ecclesiastes is not
uncritical of oppressive economic-political structures but stands soberly in the memory of the abuse
of power, even by divinely appointed figures.
www.Ebook777.com
Ecclesiastes structurally parallels 2 Chron. 1–7 by focusing on labor in

the context of community (Eccl. 4:9-12), then activity in the house of God
(Eccl. 4:17ff. [5:1ff., Engl.]). Both Qoheleth’s comments on the dissatisfactory
nature of working in isolation for self-referential external rewards (Eccl. 4:4, 7–8)
and his preference for laboring in community with and for the sake of the
neighbor (Eccl. 4:9-12) bespeak a free and non-self-justificatory motivation for
labor that locates its inner logic in the worship life of the ecclesia. Indeed, having
colleagues with whom to labor is itself an intrinsic reward of labor. Not only
is there an egalitarian vision in Eccl. 4–5 that reconciles the oikos and the polis
in Qoheleth’s ecclesia,43 but Qoheleth also locates the work of the laborer, even
in the midst of oppression, in divine poiesis. Yet, far from romanticizing labor,
Qoheleth approaches the possibility of enjoyment of labor with sober hesitation.
“Doing good” ultimately must flow from God’s own good work, a reality Qoheleth
presses further in Eccl. 3:13, where he proclaims that “every human should eat
and drink and see good in44 all his labor. A gift from God it is!” The construct
phrase ‫“( מתת אלהים‬a gift from God”) is emphatic due to its placement before
the independent pronoun; and it points back to ‫“( עמלו‬his labor”). Labor (‫)עמל‬,
typically construed as a curse and associated with pain, is now rendered and
perceived as a gift.
The combination of the resolve to locate joy in labor and the recognition of
it as a gift from God results in what one may call an “accipe horam work ethic,”
which Qoheleth introduces in Eccl. 2:24-26 and grounds in his theology of time in
Eccl. 3:12-13. It is in the context of enjoying labor in the present, and in the context
of community, that humanity experiences God’s kairos. This experience means
that humanity may understand work not in terms of a competitive chronology,
which measures success solely by an evaluation of what work affords in the future
or how much it produces, but rather in terms of its quality as a gift, which calls
for a posture of receipt and ultimately undermines the Ptolemaic (and modern)
economic-political logic; the latter dehumanizes labor’s rhythm and disregards
the worker.45 This gift quality of labor calls attention to the intrinsic rewards of
labor, which is neither to ignore its difficulties nor to ignore its extrinsic goods,
43
Here, I am drawing upon Wannenwetsch’s account of the reconciliation of polis and oikos in Political
Worship, pp. 133–59.
44
As in Eccl. 2:24, the writer includes the preposition ‫“( ב‬in”), rather than ‫“( מן‬from”), with a
prepositional phrase involving ‫“( עמל‬labor”). This occurrence intensifies the message of the first by
adding ‫“( כל‬all”). Thus, Eccl. 2:24 suggests delighting in one’s toil, while 3:13 suggests delighting in all
one’s toil.
45
Tamez, When the Horizons Close, p. 24; cf. p. 54.
www.Ebook777.com
but to ensure that external benefits not be the primary motivating factors for it.46
Qoheleth’s chorus summons the worker to understand her or his work in the
work of Christ, who is the only agent of the transformation of labor from curse
to gift. Sensory engagement with material creation is an opportunity to meet
Christ. In such a meeting, the creating and redeeming Word frees one from self-
salvific concerns and for good work in behalf of one’s neighbor.
Qoheleth’s work ethic and contemporary theologies of work
In the christological readings of Eccl. 1:4-11 and Eccl. 3:1-15 above, I enlisted the
interpretations of both Bonaventure and Luther for assistance, in order to show
46
It is precisely at this point that I wish to expand this line of inquiry further in the future, especially
drawing on the recent work of sociologist Richard Sennett. In The Craftsman, Sennett lays out
his plan for a three-volume work on material culture: “This [The Craftsman] is the first of three
books on material culture, all related to the dangers in Pandora’s casket, though each is intended
to stand on its own. This book is about craftsmanship, the skill of making things well. The second
volume addresses the crafting of rituals that manage aggression and zeal; the third explores the
skills required in making and inhabiting sustainable environments. All three books address the issue
of technique—but technique considered as a cultural issue rather than as a mindless procedure;
each book is about a technique for conducting a particular way of life. The large project contains a
personal paradox that I have tried to put to productive use. I am a philosophically minded writer
asking questions about such matters as woodworking, military drills, or solar panels.” See Richard
Sennett, The Craftsman (London: Penguin Books, 2008), pp. 8–9. In the second volume, Together,
Sennett characterizes this project as “the homo faber project” [see Together: The Rituals, Pleasures
and Politics of Cooperation (London: Penguin Books, 2012), p. x]. The third and final volume has not
yet been published. In referring to this three-volume work as “the homo faber project,” Sennett is
alluding to the work of his teacher, Hannah Arendt, particularly The Human Condition [see Hannah
Arendt, The Human Condition, 2nd edn (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958)]. Sennett
suggests that there is more of a connection between the “head and the hand” in Animal laborens than
Arendt allows in her distinction between Animal laborens and Homo faber: “This division seems to
me false because it slights the practical man or woman at work. The human animal who is Animal
laborens is capable of thinking; the discussions the producer holds may be mentally with materials
rather than with other people; people working together certainly talk to one another about what they
are doing” (The Craftsman, p. 7). In fact, “Animal laborens might serve as Homo faber’s guide” (The
Craftsman, p. 8). The attentiveness of Animal laborens to materials (in this respect, another helpful
guidebook is Matthew Crawford, The Case for Working with Your Hands, or Why Office Work is Bad
for Us and Fixing Things Feels Good [London: Penguin Books, 2009]), the dialogue that takes shape
among co-laborers, and the “skill of making things well” are themes that are not only interesting
from a sociological standpoint, but also from a theological-ethical one. While some theologies of
work have touched on these aspects, less constructive work has been done on the conditions and
environments that enable all three aspects to flourish. I am particularly interested in reflecting from
a theological-ethical perspective on the intrinsic motivations (which include all three aspects)
that precipitate good work. Sennett has noted how “the structure of rewards” organized around
“individualized competition” has failed in companies trying to encourage employees to make things
well (The Craftsman, p. 35). Daniel H. Pink has expanded this basic insight in Drive: The Surprising
Truth About What Motivates Us (Edinburgh: Canongate Books, 2011). While Christopher Frayling
has warned against the romanticization of craftwork [see On Craftsmanship: towards a new Bauhaus
(London: Oberon Books, 2011), pp. 7–9], Sennett judiciously avoids such a pitfall and offers an
account well worth considering theologically.
www.Ebook777.com
how drawing their perspectives together might offer a picture of Qoheleth’s

work ethic. Qoheleth summons the worker to contemplate the mutable words
of creation through the divine Word while engaging material reality through the
sense of sight. Yet, Qoheleth not only instructs the eye; he also instructs the hand.
By grasping material objects with the hand, the human delves further into the
way the world works.47 So long as she or he is handling material objects properly,
there is further opportunity to meet Christ in the creaturely masks. Qoheleth
invites the worker to labor in the present with the expectation that God through
the Word will do a new thing in the midst of human labor. In anticipating this
new thing, the worker trusts that the God who justifies apart from any human
deed is also the one who brings about success in human labor in God’s good
timing. Therefore, though Qoheleth certainly draws attention to the experience
of labor as a curse, within his account there is also a transformation of labor
from curse to gift, a move punctuated especially in the accipe horam refrain. This
transformation, however, is a matter of the perception of faith. Once Qoheleth
is liberated from his own attempt to remake the world, his faith in God’s timing
enables him to work freely and joyfully.
Drawing the readings of Bonaventure and Luther together in the way
articulated above brings to the fore three doctrinal foci typically considered
(either as separate paths of inquiry or in various combinations) in contemporary
theologies of work: protology, eschatology, and christology. It is my contention
that Ecclesiastes holds the three together tightly in such a way that it enhances
contemporary considerations of work within the field of theology and theological
ethics. Therefore, I move now to a concluding engagement with contemporary
theologies of work. First, I will look at treatments that tend to emphasize protology.
Then, I will consider those treatments that place greater weight on eschatology.
Finally, I will suggest a reading of Ecclesiastes in which both protology and
eschatology are read through christology, offering a vision of human work within
the work of God that challenges and enhances contemporary visions for work.
This section is not an attempt at a fully developed theology of work. It does not
seek to define work over against other definitions,Â€offerÂ€aÂ€socioeconomic analysis
of Western society, present an encyclopedic treatment of work in historical and
contemporary theology, or even to attempt to describe “the biblical view” of work.
Rather, it is a modest proposal for how Ecclesiastes might sharpen some existing
47
For a compelling account of the epistemological significance of the sense of touch (as well as sight),
see Michel Serres, The Five Senses: A Philosophy of Mingled Bodies, trans. Margaret Sankey and Peter
Cowley (London: Continuum International Publishing Group, 2008).
www.Ebook777.com
theologies of work along the doctrinal lines I have suggested. Future work may
expand this analysis with insights from the sociological work of Richard Sennett,
as well as deeper engagement with economic, political, and theological literature
relevant for thinking about work, in order to explore further those conditions
that either promote or undermine good work in contemporary society, and to
suggest more concrete ways in which the ecclesia may speak to the oeconomia and
the politia about those conditions and form practices that stand to counter the
competitive-capitalist ethos, which is driven by an eschatology vastly different
from Qoheleth’s. In the conclusion of this chapter, I will make a start toward this
goal, pointing to Qoheleth’s critical edges and encouraging the ecclesia to sing
Qoheleth’s chorus as a song of both protest and praise.
Work and protology

In this section, I will broadly outline the basic contours present in the protological
understanding of work. Protological accounts largely focus on themes based on
the narratives of initial creation and that of the fall in Gen. 1–3. These themes,
broadly speaking, are: creation order, creation mandates, Sabbath, the image of
God, cocreation (a theme related to the image of God), and the ramifications
of the fall for human work.48 Genesis is an obvious starting place for these
discussions, and thus will factor heavily here.
Darrell Cosden has pointed out that changing working conditions arising
from various socioeconomic developments related to industrialization and
the two world wars caused twentieth-century Protestant theologians to reflect
theologically and ethically on work.49 Here, I will briefly highlight the threads
operative in three significant Protestant theologians, namely, Emil Brunner,
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Karl Barth. Common to all three theologians is an
emphasis on the divine command as the basis of Christian ethics. However, they
differ in their characterization of the divine command, as well as their principal
foci within the primitive narratives in Genesis.
Brunner notes that with the Reformation came a recovery of a positive
understanding of labor and work from the medieval theologians who, following
Aristotelian logic, subordinated human work to a higher, contemplative end. In
his own reflection on the upshot of this recovery, he states, “Civilization and thus
48
Joshua R. Sweeden, The Church and Work: The Ecclesiological Grounding of Good Work [uncorrected
proofs] (Eugene: Pickwick Publications, 2013), pp. 56–65.; cf. Cosden, A Theology of Work, pp. 41–2.
49
Cosden, A Theology of Work, p. 40.
www.Ebook777.com
work, is a Divine order of creation. It is significant that the Divine Command:

‘make the earth subject unto you,’ precedes the curse on labour.”50 Brunner
betrays a high esteem for European civilization in his reflection on humanity’s
civilizing role in the order of creation, suggesting its biblical basis.51 Given the
European situation in 1932 (the year the German edition of Brunner’s ethics
was published), perpetuating the notion of “creation order” alongside that of
humanity’s superiority over other creatures precisely in its role of “maintaining
order,” at the least borders on the dangerous.52 Indeed, his later reflections in
Nature and Grace are the object of Barth’s famous “Nein!”53 In the introduction,
I noted that talk of creation order in the 1930s, in both biblical studies and
theology, became unpopular, thanks in no small part to Barth.
In Chapter 3, I noted how Bonhoeffer expands Luther’s doctrine of the drei
Stände to the four mandates. Not only does Bonhoeffer expand the Lutheran
concept of the estates, but also, in referring to “mandates” rather than “orders,”
he avoids the pitfalls inherent in Brunner’s reflections on the command for
humanity to work. In “The Concrete Commandment and the Divine Mandates,”
Bonhoeffer articulates his preference for the language of “mandate” in relation
to that of “order,” saying, “Understood properly, one could also use the term
‘order’ [Ordnung] here, if only the concept did not contain the inherent danger
of focusing more strongly on the static element of order rather than on the divine
authorizing, legitimizing, and sanctioning, which are its sole foundation.”54
Bonhoeffer’s doctrine of the divine mandates, though rooted in the accounts of
initial creation, also has both a christological and eschatological dimension, in
that it hinges on the revelation of God’s command in Jesus Christ.55 His comments
on work in “Christ, Reality, and Good” show how these three doctrinal foci
converge in Bonhoeffer. The mandate to work is given in Gen. 2:15. Even after the
fall, “No one can withdraw from this mandate.”56 Bonhoeffer provides a reason
for this inability to defer a working existence: “For in the work that humans do
50
Emil Brunner, The Divine Imperative: A Study in Christian Ethics, trans. Olive Wyon (London: The
Lutterworth Press, 1937), p. 386.
51
Brunner, The Divine Imperative: A Study in Christian Ethics, p. 387.
52
Brunner, The Divine Imperative: A Study in Christian Ethics, p. 384. To be fair, Brunner does emphasize
the notion of “use” over “abuse” when it comes to humanity’s engagement with material reality, as
well as the significance of work for serving fellow creatures (pp. 386–9).
53
See Emil Brunner, Natural Theology: Comprising “Nature and Grace” by Professor Dr. Emil Brunner,
and the Reply “No!” by Karl Barth, trans. Peter Fraenkel (Eugene: Wipf and Stock Publications,
2002).
54
Bonhoeffer, Ethics, p. 389.
55
Bonhoeffer, Ethics, pp. 388–9.
56
Bonhoeffer, Ethics, pp. 70–1.
www.Ebook777.com
according to divine commission, a reflection of the heavenly world emerges that

reminds those who know Jesus Christ of that world. Cain’s first creation was a
city, the earthly reflection of the eternal city of God.”57 All work, whether the
worker knows it or not, “expects Christ, is directed toward Christ, is open for
Christ, and serves and glorifies Christ.”58 Bonhoeffer’s protological perspective
on work is thus grounded in christology, following the lines of argumentation
he develops in his lectures on Creation and Fall.59 I will build upon these basic
theological sensibilities when I suggest the ways in which Ecclesiastes holds
together protology, eschatology, and christology.
Barth radically expands his concept of the command of God in part through
his deployment of Bonhoeffer’s mandates in Church Dogmatics III.4. Yet he
spends considerable time developing his theology of work from the Sabbath
command in Gen. 2:1-3, rather than the seemingly more obvious places from
which Brunner and Bonhoeffer draw (Brunner drawing from Gen. 1:28, and
Bonhoeffer from Gen. 2:15). In the section below, entitled “Ecclesiastes: Protology
and eschatology worked through christology,” I will engage Barth’s reflections on
the Sabbath more substantially. Regardless of their different points of emphasis
and even given the appropriate caveats, the works of Brunner, Bonhoeffer, and
Barth all have in common the critical distinction between Creator and creature.
This distinction is basically missing in those reflections on the image of God
under the rubric of “cocreation.”60
Pope John Paul II’s 1981 encyclical Laborem Exercens is credited by many
as one of the most significant—if not solely the most significant61—documents
reflecting on the theological significance of human work from the last half
century. Yet in the encyclical, John Paul II commits a critical error that stands
as an over-valuation of humanity’s role in creation. He says that “Man is the
image of God partly through the mandate received from his Creator to subdue,
to dominate, the earth. In carrying out this mandate, man, every human being,
reflects the very action of the Creator of the universe.”62 Stanley Hauerwas has
pointed out the drastic misunderstanding of Genesis betrayed by this comment:
57
58
59
Bonhoeffer, Creation and Fall, p. 22.
60
Bonhoeffer does indeed refer to humanity’s “co-creative deeds,” but clarifies his comment in an
important way: “It is not creation out of nothing, like God’s creating, but it is the creation of new
things on the basis of God’s initial creation” (Bonhoeffer, Ethics, p. 70, italics mine).
61
Reed, Work, for God’s Sake, p. 31.
62
John Paul II, Laborem Exercens, http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/
documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_14091981_laborem-exercens_en.html [accessed July 23, 2013].
www.Ebook777.com
“The good news of the creation account is that God completed his creation and
that mankind needs to do nothing more to see to its perfection. That is exactly
why God could call it good and rest—and more importantly invite us to rest
within his completed good creation.”63 With Barth, Hauerwas emphasizes the
significance of the Sabbath, not as arbitrarily delimiting human work but as
indicating the completeness of God’s initial creation without reference to human
labor. The Sabbath, then, reminds the reader of the crucial distinction between
the Creator and creation, and in so doing, refuses to grant the kind of ultimacy
to human work that accounts of “cocreation” in fact do.
The same forgetfulness that is present in John Paul II inheres in the work
of Dorothee Sölle, albeit from a vastly different doctrinal perspective.64 Based
on her reading of Genesis, Sölle explicitly challenges the notion of divine
transcendence, which, according to her, implies an unrelatedness between
God and creation. On her reading, God is actually in need of communing with
humanity.65 Sweeden notes that the work of Sölle “provides one of the most
explicit protological interpretations of the concept [of co-creation].”66 Humanity,
both prior to and in spite of the fall, and quite apart from the redemptive work
of Christ,67 is endowed with the capacity to aid God in a creatio continua that
liberates captives from oppressive work environments. Like John Paul II, Sölle
invokes protology in an appeal to dignify human work in the face of social ills,68
but in so doing places too much faith in humanity’s ability to relieve society
of such ills. The purpose in drawing together both Sölle and John Paul II
(methodologically following Sweeden) is to emphasize the broad impact of the
“work as cocreation” thread in protological considerations of work. Implicit in
these overvaluations of humanity’s role in creation is an anthropocentrism that
both discounts the fall and fails fully to trust that God the Creator is the ultimate
arbiter of successful work, both now and in the world to come.
63
Stanley Hauerwas, “Work as Co-Creation: A Critique of a Remarkably Bad Idea,” in John W. Houck
and Oliver F. Williams, C.S.C. (eds), Co-Creation and Capitalism: John Paul II’s Laborem Exercens
(Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1983), p. 45.
64
Dorothee Sölle, To Work and to Love: A Theology of Creation (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984),
p. 37.
65
Sölle, To Work and to Love: A Theology of Creation, pp. 13–16; cf. Sweeden, The Church and Work,
p. 62.
66
Sweeden, The Church and Work, p. 64.
67
Sweeden points out that the “redemptive or liberative work of Jesus” is absent in Sölle’s work
(Sweeden, The Church and Work, p. 65).
68
I should note that Sölle does not quite acquiesce to a romanticization of labor that further exacerbates
rather than corrects the misperception of those in undignified labor in the way John Paul II does
(see Hauerwas, “Work as Co-Creation,” pp. 47–51 for a detailed critique of John Paul II’s ethics of
work).
www.Ebook777.com
While the works of Brunner, Bonhoeffer, and Barth and those of John Paul II
and Sölle differ in significant respects, a common thread at stake is a sense of
what Darrell Cosden calls the “ontological aspect of work.” After introducing
work’s instrumental and relational significance, Cosden suggests that by
“ontological,” he means “that work in its broadest richness is considered to be
more than, or its fuller meaning is understood to incorporate but to transcend,
both its instrumental and relational functions.”69 Work may be considered “a
thing in itself with its own intrinsic value apart from but of course related to these
functions,” as it has “been built into the fabric of creation by God.”70 Humans
work because “God first is a worker and persons are created in his image.”71 Thus,
in Cosden’s account, the command to work is not an arbitrary exhortation that
humans are simply to heed but a call to live into their vocation as image-bearers.
On his account, part of what it means to be human is to work. The attention he
draws to the ontological aspect of work is helpful. One critical question that
arises, and which has been touched on briefly, is how the fall affects this positive
vision of work, or if the fall indeed actually precipitates human work in the first
place. Answering this question will involve an appeal to eschatology, which has
already been evident in Bonhoeffer. I move now to eschatological considerations
of work.
Work and eschatology

There are two basic threads concerning work and eschatology that I wish to
introduce here. The first thread may be called the “contemplative thread”; this is
a contemporary repristination of the Scholastic logic that has featured in various
ways into this chapter already, in which the vita activa is seen as subordinate
to the vita contemplativa. The second thread emphasizes new creation as more
significant than initial creation for the theology of work, in that it implies
completion or a teleological end to work. Both threads account for initial
creation and the ramifications of the fall, albeit in different ways. I will reserve
more substantial engagement with those perspectives on work which attempt to
hold protology and eschatology more tightly together for the next section.
The “contemplative thread” relates eschatology to the logic of creation and
fall by reconciling the concept of the Sabbath, particularly in its emphasis on
69
70
71
www.Ebook777.com
rest, with Greek thought. I have already shown this sensibility to be operative
in Bonaventure, who is influenced in this regard by both Pseudo-Dionysius
and Aristotle. If eternal rest—the ideal state toward which the Christian is
heading—implies inactivity, and if the toilsome nature of work is a result of the
fall (Gen. 3:17), then surely rest (in the sense of inactivity) is a higher ideal than
the activity of labor. Put in classical terms, the vita activa is subordinate to the
vita contemplativa. Labor is merely a mean necessity, more servile in character
than contemplation. In the twentieth century, German Catholic philosopher Josef
Pieper appropriated this classical ideal for contemporary society in Leisure as the
Basis of Culture.72 In order to confront the notion of “total work” (exposed by
Max Weber),73 Pieper proposes that leisure, as one of the foundations of Western
culture, is a concept that may strip labor of its ultimacy and restore the Christian-
Western balance between the vita contemplativa and the vita activa.74 Whereas
others in Pieper’s era oppose the world of “total work” with another type of activity
(that of the “artist-craftsman”), Pieper opposes it with the concept of leisure.75
R. R. Reno, in his essay on work in The Blackwell Companion to Christian Ethics,
echoes Pieper’s basic sensitivities. The following long quotation is indicative of
the contemporary appropriation of the classical Greek and medieval Scholastic
tradition:
That work should serve the Sabbath is expressed by Augustine’s well-known

observation about use and enjoyment: we should enjoy God, and others in God,
and we should use everything else in such a way that we might enter ever more
fully into that enjoyment. In a great deal of the theological tradition, this proper
ordering of worldly activity and love of God is expressed in terms of the ancient
priority of the vita contemplativa over the vita activa (for a contemporary
restatement, see Pieper, 1963). Beatitude is our proper end. Neither the tinkering
of the tinker nor the tailoring of the tailor brings us to the heavenly feast. Our
joy is in the Sabbath, and we live well when we work toward that end.76
Reno’s comment suggests an eschatological perspective on work that Luther’s

exegesis of Ecclesiastes has been shown to problematize, particularly in the
72
Josef Pieper, Leisure as the Basis of Culture, trans. Alexander Dru (London: Faber and Faber Ltd.,
1952).
73
See Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the “Spirit” of Capitalism, and Other Writings. eds and trans.,
Peter Baehr and Gordon C. Wells (New York: Penguin Books, 2002).
74
Pieper, Leisure as the Basis of Culture, pp. 25–8.
75
John Hughes, The End of Work: Theological Critiques of Capitalism (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing,
2007), p. 168.
76
R. R. Reno, “Participating: Working toward Worship,” in Stanley Hauerwas and Samuel Wells (eds),
The Blackwell Companion to Christian Ethics (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2004), p. 319.
www.Ebook777.com
latter’s collapsing of Augustine’s concepts of use and enjoyment into one

eschatological moment rather than assuming a chronological progression. In
Reno’s configuration, work’s activity is subordinate to a future contemplative
end, which the Sabbath anticipates. The movement of labor defies contemplative
rest. Therefore, viewed eschatologically, though a valuable enterprise in this
life, work primarily has an anticipatory significance; its ultimate value for the
eschaton, finally, is minimal.
If in the “contemplative thread” labor is a result of the fall, the activity of
which will cease in the final, contemplative rest in God, then the second thread
sees labor as a reality that is transformed in the eschaton. Though the fall has
severe ramifications for work, in that it is at least partially characterized by
labor-as-curse, the eschaton holds out the promise of meaning and significance
for it, even in the present. In the introduction, I noted the significance attached to
Miroslav Volf ’s Work in the Spirit in current theological considerations of work,
even as I pointed out the neo-Marcionite tendencies that inhere in his project.
He nonetheless moves from enumerating the pitfalls involved in developing
a theology of work from descriptions of biblical material to indicating the
guiding theme (based on a biblical motif) that is present within his systematic-
theological account, namely, new creation. In this move lies his most significant
contribution. Whereas other theological treatments of work start from the
perspective of initial creation, Volf starts from new creation, and in so doing, he
brings together eschatology and pneumatology as his primary theological foci.
Drawing on the work of his teacher Jürgen Moltmann (particularly Theology of
Hope),77 Volf argues that starting from the perspective of new creation allows his
theology of work to be ethically normative, as it is rooted in the themes of justice
and love.78 Having this starting place also accounts for the “radical newness of
God’s future creation”;79 and it is able to be comprehensive, detailing the myriad
ways in which human work is related to all reality, including God, other humans,
and the nonhuman environment.80 The pneumatological dimension of this “new
creation” perspective, according to Volf, frees one from thinking within the static
doctrine of vocation and allows for thinking in a way which accords with the
mobility of contemporary society. Aside from misreading Luther’s doctrine of
vocation by failing to notice Luther’s own continual sense of the Spirit’s leading
77
See Jürgen Moltmann, Theology of Hope: On the Ground and the Implications of a Christian
Eschatology, trans. James W. Leitch (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993).
78
79
80
www.Ebook777.com
in the midst of economic and political activity81—itself a bold affirmation in

the face of the denigration of labor as the activity of those “less spiritual”—Volf
also praises the economic status quo, even as he attempts to speak a fitting
word vis-à-vis contemporary labor situations.82 Yet in spite of these pitfalls,
Volf ’s Work in the Spirit has nonetheless inspired theological accounts of work
since its publication, if only for its shift in emphasis to new, rather than initial,
creation. This influence is most evident in the work of Darrell Cosden, who has
substantially improved upon the work of Volf.
Cosden, desiring to expand upon the “eschatological realism” of Moltmann
and Volf,83 has significantly enhanced the eschatological understanding of work.
First, drawing upon the work of Oliver O’Donovan and Alasdair MacIntyre,84
he joins a teleological claim to his ontological claim about work, establishing a
firmer ethical ground for work.85 He wants to hold protology and eschatology
together, such that the ontological significance of work is met with a purpose,
a teleology that directs one toward the final goal of work. Second, and more
significantly for my purposes, as those who follow the “contemplative thread,”
Cosden grants eschatological significance to the Sabbath, yet in a way that differs
strikingly from the sabbatarian logic of Reno. Having suggested that “the end is
more than the beginning,” Cosden relates the Sabbath to the Shekinah, stressing
that the latter (a spatial concept) is the fulfillment of the former (a temporal
81
This is a reality I stressed in Chapter 3. On the other hand, John Hughes, who otherwise is critical
of Volf ’s reflections on capitalism, praises Volf ’s project in general and Volf ’s critique of Luther’s
doctrine of vocation in particular: “This is an impressive theology of work with much to commend
it. The eschatological turn succeeds in moving away from the problems of the Natural Law tradition
noted in Laborem Exercens, adding a more properly evangelical note throughout. Likewise the
critique of the Lutheran vocatio externa, itself a radical further secularizing of the Natural Law
tradition, with its political quietism and lack of transformative potential, is powerful and persuasive”
(The End of Work, p. 27). Both Volf and Hughes acquiesce to an all-too-easy reduction of Luther’s
doctrines of both vocation and the estates. It is my hope that the third chapter of this thesis has
helped to problematize this popular criticism of Luther.
82
Note Brock’s critique of Volf: “By paying attention at this point to the demands of created materiality
on the provision of food, shelter, and government as well as the necessity of cultural/cultic stability in
the church’s habits of gathering, we are alerted to the tendency to overemphasize the eschatological
or pneumatological on the basis of work to capitulate to the ideology of mobility. This is the primary
danger of theologies of work like Miroslav Volf ’s, which unquestioningly baptize modern ideologies
of mobility without considering the many associated problems they engender, such as deskilling,
outsourcing, poor provision for retraining and health care, and so on.... This view is relentlessly and
voluntaristically optimistic, and because it is lacking an account of the claim of created materiality,
is deaf to the limitations materiality and finitude place on social change” (Christian Ethics in a
Technological Age, p. 308).
83
84
See Alasdair C. MacIntyre, After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory (Notre Dame: University of Notre
Dame Press, 1984); idem, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (London: Duckworth, 1988); and
O’Donovan, Resurrection and Moral Order.
85
Cosden, A Theology of Work, pp. 92–9.
www.Ebook777.com
concept).86 The upshot of this move is a new definition of rest in eternity.

Whereas in initial creation, rest as a metaphor of time indicates God’s rest from
God’s work, in new creation, as a metaphor of space, rest indicates God’s rest
in God’s work.87 If such is the case, then there will be such a thing as “glorified
work” in eternity, “characterized by the new eternal rest.”88 Present work, then,
is a kind of proleptic participation in the glorified work of eternity. In his final
definition of work, Cosden says, “workers express, explore and develop their
humanness while building up their natural, social and cultural environments
thereby contributing protectively and productively to the order and the one to
come.”89 The value of present work lies precisely in its contribution to the world
to come.
Cosden improves upon the “contemplative” eschatology of work by
emphasizing the tangible quality of the new creation and humanity’s active
participation in it. Yet, he parallels the “contemplative” account by assuming
chronological progress. If the former narrates a contemplative ascent to God,
reaching its zenith in eternal rest, then the latter narrates a progression of
human poiesis in which the artifacts of human work will reach their peak in
eternal glorification. Cosden’s account betrays a tendency paralleling that of
John Paul II and Sölle. While the latter two emphasize cocreation in relation to
protology, Cosden simply transfers the cocreative weight to eschatology. Brock,
detecting this misstep, directs a stringent critique at Cosden. Brock notes that,
following Volf, Cosden defines “good work as that which is rendered meaningful
in creating products that will endure the fires of judgment. The criterion of
goodness is its eschatological purity.”90 Cosden’s motivation is to correct what
he sees as an overemphasis upon justification (“God’s prior work”), which on
his account “evacuates joy and thus meaning from work.”91 In other words, in
their desire to avoid works-righteousness, those whose accounts of vocation are
rooted in justification remove any eternal significance from their work.
Brock points out two pitfalls in Cosden’s account. First, Cosden misunderstands
the Reformers, who do not denigrate the significance of human work but rather
draw attention to the reality that “the glory of human work is not that humans
become cocreators, but that God involves himself with it in order to use it for his
86
Cosden, A Theology of Work, pp. 159–61.
87
88
89
90
Brock, Christian Ethics in a Technological Age, p. 297.
91
www.Ebook777.com
purposes.”92 For the Reformers, what gives work meaning is not the achievement
of goals (whether in the present age or in the one to come), but that God,
precisely “in not judging us by the success of our work,” involves God’s self with
human work “in order to sustain us, serve the neighbor, and build his kingdom,
if he so wills.”93 The second pitfall in Cosden’s eschatology of work is that its
assumption of a chronological progress in humanity’s work comes close to the
false eschatology that inheres in the technological definition of work, which
“is an attempt to endow human efforts with meaning.”94 An anthropocentrism
seeps into Cosden’s teleological account, making it susceptible to being co-opted
by the capitalist ethos, just as is the case with Volf ’s acquiescence to the praise of
modern mobility.
The two primary threads I have considered under the rubric of “work
and eschatology,” though offering different valuations of the meaning of
activity and rest, hold an important feature in common: they both assume a
chronological progression that grants eschatological purity to human works
(be they contemplative or active in nature), betraying a tendency toward works-
righteousness, the ecclesial vice which, as I showed in Chapter 3, manifests itself
economically in the vice of avaritia. Thus, the very attempt to relate human work
to the work of God in the new creation, though seeking to purify work in the face
of capitalist desire, actually succumbs to the concupiscentia futurorum against
which Luther warns and which characterizes capitalist motivations for work. In
the following section, I will suggest how Ecclesiastes, in its eschatological outlook,
challenges each perspective with its own theological outlook, with reference to
what I have said above in relation to Eccl. 1:4-11 and Eccl. 3:1-15. I will also
suggest how Qoheleth’s protological outlook challenges the “work as cocreation”
model that has appeared in this and the previous section.
Ecclesiastes: Protology and eschatology worked through christology

In the section above, I have sought to outline understandings of work in which
either protology or eschatology is conceptually dominant. Here, I wish to begin
by suggesting the ways in which Ecclesiastes challenges the various pitfalls
I enumerated above, particularly the concept of work as “cocreation” and the ideas
of human achievement and progress that lead both the contemplative and active
92
93
94
www.Ebook777.com
eschatological threads to assume that humanity is making its way on a chronological

line to glorification. After showing how Ecclesiastes confronts the high valuation
of human achievement in both protological and eschatological accounts of work,
I will move to showing how Ecclesiastes enhances the attempts of Bonhoeffer
(from the perspective of creation and fall) and Barth (from the perspective of the
Sabbath) to hold protology and eschatology tightly together through christology,
particularly by interweaving them into an explicit account of quotidian existence.
I move now to show how Qoheleth confronts the concept of work as “cocreation.”
In the Priestly creation account, it is only God who creates (‫;)ברא‬95 yet it seems
that accounts of work emphasizing “cocreation” forget this reality. Seeming to
anticipate this problem, Qoheleth says, “Remember your Creator (‫ )בוראיך‬in
the days of your youth.” He makes this exhortation just before presenting an
allegory of the body’s decay in old age. There are two relevant points to take
from this admonition to remember. First, if read in concert with the accipe
horam passages, it intensifies the call to embrace the material gifts of creaturely
existence before “the breath returns to God, who gave it” (Eccl. 12:7). The second
point delimits the first in a significant way: it reminds those who do embrace
creaturely gifts, including labor, that the consequent artifacts of human labor are
not finally determinative for the present or the future. To remember the Creator
is to remember that nothing one makes (‫ )עשׂה‬is ex nihilo but is rather something
shaped from what God has already created (‫)ברא‬.96 It is to “see with God,” but
not to be God.97 Another may reshape what one has made. Indeed, God will
do what God pleases with human artifacts, whether in judgment or not. The
point is that God determines whether or not one’s work will be successful and
whether its success will extend noticeably to the eschaton. Though this reality
initially frustrated Qoheleth, who in his concupiscentia futurorum obsessed over
his legacy (Eccl. 2:18-23), it ultimately liberated him from the logic of works-
righteousness-turned-avarice, allowing him to exist and work freely for the sake
of others. When he exhorts one to remember (‫)זכר‬, he is reminding the reader
that the end of work is not to produce an artifact that itself may become an
object of contemplation, but to “do good” (‫לעשׂות טוב‬, Eccl. 3:12) that reminds
others that the Creator has made time for them as well.
95
See, for instance, von Rad, Old Testament Theology, vol. 1, p. 142.
96
See WSB VII:99.
97
In my use of the phrase “see with God,” I am drawing on the reflections on the poem in Gen. 1
of Ellen Davis, who herself is drawing on Bonhoeffer. See Ellen F. Davis, Scripture, Culture, and
Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible, Foreword by Wendell Berry (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2009), p. 42; cf. Bonhoeffer, Creation and Fall, p. 45.
www.Ebook777.com
In the exegetical section above, I have already hinted at the ways in which
Qoheleth stands to counter the eschatological perspectives of both the
contemplative and active threads. Concerning the former, my reading of
Eccl. 1:4-11 showed that humanity is not ascending to Christ as up a contemplative
ladder, but rather that Christ as the Word descends to humanity, restoring its
vision to see creation differently, as the larva Dei that it is. The contemplation of
Christ, and of creation through Christ, is not a matter of chronological progress
but of Christ’s being concretely present to the justified just now. Yet not only
is Christ concretely present in contemplation, but also in labor itself, and in
clarifying this point, Ecclesiastes counters the eschatology of Volf and Cosden.
Though Qoheleth does not dismiss chronology altogether, his sober judgment
that humans do nothing new and his eschatological view of the present combine
to promote a radical dependence on God’s continuing work in the world in
order to experience novelty, rather than dependence on human progress. On
my reading of Eccl. 3:1-15, Qoheleth challenges the anthropocentric notions of
progress that may seep into those teleological understandings of work that are
tied to new creation motifs. Work for Qoheleth is an experience of the newness
of God in the mundane experiences of the present that entrusts future outcomes
to God. While Volf and Cosden significantly point out the “this-worldliness”
of the eschatological future toward which creation is heading and for which
present work is significant, it is the “this-timeliness” of Ecclesiastes, particularly
its “kairological viewpoint,”98 that I want to propose is eschatologically significant
and offers a new dimension to the discussion of work’s relation to the eschaton.
Bonhoeffer and Barth both hold protology and eschatology together in a way
more compelling than Volf or Cosden. Here, I will briefly highlight the ways
in which they do so, drawing on Bonhoeffer’s Creation and Fall and Barth’s
Church Dogmatics III.4. In Creation and Fall, Bonhoeffer offers a perspective
on the time in which humans live, as well as the relation between humanity’s
existence within that time and both the beginning and the end. This perspective
is radically rooted in christology. The time in which humans live is, according
to Bonhoeffer, “the middle.” Humanity has lost its beginning and now “finds
itself in the middle, knowing neither the end nor the beginning, yet knowing
that it is in the middle.... Humankind knows itself to be totally deprived of its
own self-determination, because it comes from the beginning and is moving
toward the end without knowing what that means.”99 Because humans know
98
99
www.Ebook777.com
they exist in the middle without self-determination, they initially rebel against
their creatureliness, hating their beginning because they are unable to get to it
without being told by God what their beginning is.100
Though humans initially are frustrated by the deprivation of their self-
determination, of having to be told what the beginning was like, the recognition
of their utter dependence on God becomes also the ground of their hope. All that
exists, exists wholly by God’s freedom, which means not only that what is created
belongs to the Creator but also that “the God of creation, of utter beginning, is
the God of the resurrection. The world exists from the beginning in the sign of
the resurrection of Christ from the dead.”101 In his resurrection, Christ “creates
a new creation. By his resurrection we know about the creation.”102 Bonhoeffer
notes in the introduction to Creation and Fall, “The new is the real end of the old;
the new, however, is Christ. Christ is the end of the old. Not the continuation, not
the goal, the completion in line with the old, but the end and therefore the new.
The church speaks within the old world about the new world.”103 Bonhoeffer thus
reads the account of creation as already possessing the logic of new creation, not
in the sense of anticipating a completion but as a promise of genuine novelty
that will obliterate the old logic, marred as it is by empty attempts at self-
determination on the part of humans.
If, as I pointed out in the section on work and protology, Bonhoeffer bases his
account of work on the mandate to till and keep the garden in Gen. 2:15, then
Barth works from the logic of the Sabbath, yet in so doing also draws together
protology and eschatology through christology. Brock notes specifically how
Barth does so: “Barth uses the notion of Sabbath to draw into constructive
tension the content derived from the creative, redemptive, and eschatological
moments of salvation history, so enriching our grasp of the language and the
grammar of Christian life to which worship exposes us.”104 Barth says himself,
If we link the significance of the holy day in salvation history and its eschatological
significance, and if we remember that in most instances we are concerned
with its relationship to the particularity of God’s omnipotent grace, we shall
understand at once, and not without a certain awe, the radical importance, the
almost monstrous range of the Sabbath commandment.105
100
Bonhoeffer, Creation and Fall, pp. 28–9.
101
Bonhoeffer, Creation and Fall, pp. 34–5.
102
103
104
105
Barth, Church Dogmatics, III.4, p. 57; cf. Brock, Christian Ethics in a Technological Age, p. 294.
www.Ebook777.com
After expanding on this basic logic in Barth, Brock points out a Zwinglian
character inhering in the implications Barth draws for work from the Sabbath
command:
Barth in his more Zwinglian moments can sometimes appear to be suggesting

that the Sabbath is an attitude of awareness of what is behind us at creation,
or before us as an eschatological ideal to be celebrated and remembered, when
both concepts find their true depth and unity only when grasped as part of a
corporate experience of place before God as part of the living body of Christ,
what Wannenwetsch has called the kairos that displaces secular time.106
Sabbath, then, tends to be rendered a sign of what is behind and before one
rather than a constitutive aspect of a life that grasps the beginning and the end
in communion with the body of Christ, in God’s kairos. In what follows, I will
put my reading of Ecclesiastes in conversation with Barth as well as Bonhoeffer,
suggesting ways in which Ecclesiastes might enhance their accounts of work.
Wisdom literature in general, and Ecclesiastes in particular, brings the
theological motifs present in the macrocosm that is salvation history into the
microcosm of quotidian existence. If the basic logic of the macrocosm unfolds
linearly, progressing from creation through the fall to the eschaton,107 then the
microcosm conveys a sensitivity to the way in which time that is not “going
anywhere” is nonetheless fulfilled. My account resonates with the recent
theological-anthropological work of David Kelsey108 in that it draws attention
to the work of God in the midst of quotidian existence, yet it departs from
Kelsey precisely by drawing attention to the interweaving of both protology and
eschatology—through christology—specifically in Ecclesiastes. I suggest that
it is in its very way of expressing the fulfillment of time in the quotidian that
Ecclesiastes enhances the work of Bonhoeffer and Barth.
I have argued above that Christ is the new Word of Eccl. 1:10a. When Qoheleth
declares this new Word, he opens up a perspective on novelty that is not based
on what humans declare in their false self-determination, but rather is based
on God’s determination to do a new thing in the microcosm that is everyday
existence, being the final arbiter of success in human labor. God unexpectedly
intervenes in God’s own hora in order to confront the old logic of “labor-as-
curse” and to render the labor as gift. Precisely in its contrasting perspectives on
106
107
Of course, this is not to say that eschatology is not present in the creation accounts, and vice versa.
108
See David Kelsey, Eccentric Existence: A Theological Anthropology, 2 vols. (Louisville: Westminster
John Knox Press, 2010), especially vol. 1.
www.Ebook777.com
novelty, hinging on the work of the Word, Ecclesiastes enhances Bonhoeffer’s

claims about the beginning, the end, and the middle, with a more explicit
account of how the old and the new are operative within its own quotidian
logic. In other words, when reading Ecclesiastes, one does not need to reflect
on life in the “middle” in light of the salvation-historical motifs of creation, fall,
and resurrection. Rather, Ecclesiastes itself is already an account of such a life
in the “middle,” in which the logic of creation and eschaton, worked through
christology, is already operative.
Though Ecclesiastes says nothing of the Sabbath, it does, as Luther suggests,
depict a restfulness (quietus) that takes place even in the midst of labor. This
restfulness is rooted in the presence of Christ the Word in the worker’s midst.
Precisely in its “kairological viewpoint,” Ecclesiastes interweaves protology and
eschatology together and brings them to bear on life in the present. Thus, the
experience of the beginning and the end becomes most concrete in Qoheleth’s
reflections on peace in the midst of labor. While I resonate with Brock’s critique
of Barth, I wish to add one more, to which a constructive response will further
highlight the significance of Ecclesiastes for current considerations of work
within the disciplines of Christian theology and theological ethics.
In placing human work within the grand narrative of salvation history through
his interpretation of the Sabbath command, there is a tendency on Barth’s part
to dissolve the experiences of particular people into the larger story, rather than
accounting for the specific moments of transformation in their lives which are
also, in themselves, stories of redemption.109 The significance of Ecclesiastes lies
partially in its ability to hone in on the individual experiences of the worker
herself or himself, while at the same time tightly holding together the theological
motifs present in accounts of salvation history. I suggest that this interweaving of
theological foci along with the inclusion of particularity is evident in the interplay
between Qoheleth’s opening question in Eccl. 1:3, and its slightly reworked
repetition in Eccl. 3:9. In the first instance, Qoheleth asks generally what gain
(‫ )יתרון‬there is for Adam (‫ )האדם‬in the labor (‫ )עמל‬with which he labors under the
sun. Initially, Qoheleth affirms the “labor-as-curse” perspective (cf. Gen. 3:17),
declaring that there is no gain (‫ )אין יתרון‬for the descendants of the first parent
in their labor (Eccl. 2:11). The ground does not yield to the king engaging in
self-centered poiesis but reminds him that he is not the arbiter of success or
109
This critique is broadly in line with that which Susannah Ticciati offers of Barth’s reading of Job, in
Susannah Ticciati, Job and the Disruption of Identity: Reading Beyond Barth (Edinburgh: T&T Clark,
2005).
www.Ebook777.com
transformation.110 Yet this ultimate lack of self-determination is not entirely

negative: “That God cursed the ground is gospel in releasing humanity from the
aspiration to total control.”111 Creation is subjected to futility (ματαιότης), but
not without hope (Rom. 8:20).112 While commentators point out that Rom.Â€8:20
may be an allusion to Ecclesiastes (in that ματαιότης is the LXX translation of
‫)הבל‬, they often elide the phrase “in hope” in relation to Ecclesiastes. This is a
move I wish to counter below.
In Chapter 2, I suggested that Bonaventure reads Ecclesiastes according to
the logic of creation and fall but does not offer a corresponding account of
redemption outside of spiritual interpretation, even given his nuanced reading
of vanitas as not necessarily negative. In this move, he anticipates the readings of
Ecclesiastes that grant it primarily illustrative significance in terms of the curse
on labor in Gen. 3:17.113 However, as I have shown, there is not only an account
of the fall in Ecclesiastes but also an account of the redemption of labor. After
the initial accipe horam passage in Eccl. 2:24-26 and the “catalogue of times” in
Eccl. 3:1-8, Qoheleth asks again in Eccl. 3:9 about a gain (‫ )יתרון‬in labor (‫)עמל‬,
but changes the subject from Adam (‫ )האדם‬to “the worker” (‫)העושׂה‬. Not only
does he particularize the subject, but he also offers an answer that is strikingly
different from his initial one. He responds not only with a theological comment
about God’s work in the midst of human labor (Eccl. 3:11) but also (repeating
his accipe horam refrain) says there is nothing better than to eat, drink, and do
good in one’s labor, for the labor itself is a gift of God (Eccl. 3:13). The labor is
now the gain.
Thus, in the first three chapters of Ecclesiastes, there seems to be a reversal of
the curse depicted in Gen. 3. Whereas in Genesis, serving God’s garden in Paradise
is transformed to sweating while toiling over a cursed ground, Ecclesiastes
depicts a transformation of labor from curse to gift, a transformation rooted
in the creating Word’s continuing poiesis in the world. This transformation of
labor is brought to the fore in Ecclesiastes, and the plight and redemption of the
worker in her or his labor take center stage, not being relegated to the margins
of salvation history. With each—and ever more intense—recurrence of the
accipe horam refrain, punctuating the narration of various economic-political
injustices, the worker is reminded that no power is great enough to prevent God
from doing a new thing through the Word in God’s hora, even in the midst
110
Brock, Christian Ethics in a Technological Age, pp. 297–8.
111
112
113
See, for instance, Wright, Living as the People of God, p. 72.
www.Ebook777.com
of harrowing situations. Luther catches the redemptive significance when he

refers to the laborer entering into Paradise when joy is experienced in labor.114
As I stressed in Chapter 3, Luther’s use of paradisiacal language evidences his
detection of a redemptive transformation in Ecclesiastes. Thus, contra Reno, in
God’s time the tailoring of the tailor does indeed bring one to the heavenly feast.
The justification that the Church proclaims, then, is not without ramifications for
quotidian existence but in fact permeates all of it. The christological significance
of Ecclesiastes, then, lies not merely in illustrating the ramifications of the fall
for human work but precisely in applying the logic of the Sermon on the Mount
particularly to economic and political life and therefore witnessing to Christ’s
transformative presence in the hic et nunc. Thus, Qoheleth’s summons, “Behold
this one! New he is!” is an exhortation for those who “have eyes to see” to
witness to Christ’s work not only in the apocalyptic imagination, but even—and
especially—in quotidian existence.
One area of domestic life that vividly illustrates the way in which Christ
intervenes into a “labor-as-curse” moment, and in so doing brings about a
novelty that simultaneously turns curse to gift and gives to the worker a new
sense of vocation, is that of the conception of children. Would-be parents labor
in planning and implementing “programs” for their self-determined ends. They
consider the most advantageous “life contexts” for bearing children, gather
material provisions, and mechanize their work of conceiving with scientific
sophistication. Yet they experience their labor as a curse when their plans prove
unsuccessful. In Luther’s terms, they become irrequietus, succumbing to the
concupiscentia futurorum that manifests itself in an attempt to expedite God’s
hora. Once hope is lost, nothing remains but to rest in Christ and to recognize that
the successfulness of human work is not dependent upon humans themselves.
Then, in the “fulness of time,” the “time to bear (‫עת ללדת‬, Eccl. 3:2a)” visits the
would-be parents when they least expect it, in God’s kairos. This experience
opens up a vocation in which Christ lays a genuinely new concrete claim upon
the would-be parents. The maternity period is then intermixed with both the
experience of fallen pregnancy (for instance, in the experience of morning
sickness) and a desire to live into the new claim Christ has laid on the parents
in God’s timing. The old world remains, but Christ nonetheless makes all things
new. Ecclesiastes speaks to those complex moments in quotidian existence in
which kairos brings newness into the curse of labor when one relieves oneself of
self-determination and depends upon God as the arbiter of success.
114
LW 15:93.
www.Ebook777.com
In this section, I have sought to show how Ecclesiastes may sharpen theological
deliberation of work in its own protological and eschatological visions, worked
as they are through christology. Qoheleth confronts the concept of “cocreation”
as a forgetfulness of one’s creaturely status. In refusing to grant human works
determinative significance for both the present and the future, Qoheleth also
challenges the contemplative and active threads in eschatological considerations
of work, by eliding the temporal gap between labor and restÂ€onÂ€theÂ€one hand, and
between labor and its eschatological fulfillment on the other. It is precisely his
christological outlook that enables Qoheleth to confront these two eschatological
perspectives. Furthermore, he does not merely pursue protology and eschatology
as separate lines of inquiry but, through christology, intermixes them. This working
of protology and eschatology through christology in quotidian existence is what
enables Ecclesiastes to enhance the reflections on work of both Bonhoeffer and
Barth. The anticipatory perspective of Bonhoeffer and the Zwinglian tendency
in Barth are both sharpened by the attention Qoheleth pays to the individual
worker, for each and every age. Not simply subordinating wisdom to salvation
history, but rather rendering the theological motifs of salvation history operative
for everyday life, Qoheleth does not merely “apply” salvation history to work
situations but rather exposes work situations as loci of divine activity themselves.
The Church, then, would do well to consider how Ecclesiastes, as this sort of
speech-act, may sharpen her own response to the contemporary socioeconomic
climate of the West. One way, I propose, is to learn how to sing Qoheleth’s chorus
as a song of both protest and praise.
Conclusion: Singing at the Winepress
In the introduction, I noted how it is precisely the “liturgical reasoning” of Esther

Reed that causes her to ignore Ecclesiastes in her theological-ethical account of
work. Though she, David Jensen, and Joshua Sweeden all appeal to the liturgy
and practices of the Church in various and significant ways, there seems to
be little in the Church’s liturgical life that promotes reflection on Ecclesiastes.
What is present from Ecclesiastes, at least in the Sunday lectionary, is only the
“shadow side” of Qoheleth’s work ethic. I wish to suggest, in closing, that though
this “shadow side” certainly is crucial for reflections on vicious postures toward
work, not least in its soberly realistic outlook, learning to sing Qoheleth’s chorus
as gospel may likewise serve both to protest the totalization and denigration
www.Ebook777.com
of work and to praise the Word who says “Yes” to the labors of humanity and
even transforms them in God’s hora. Thus, the accipe horam refrain walks the
media via between over-dignifying labor on the one hand and denigrating it
on the other, inviting the Church to reflect anew in each age how her context
bends toward either extreme. Should the church follow suit, she will learn the
balance between decrying the injustices that sweep across the social landscape
and punctuating those cries with a chorus of praise that gathers steam with each
repetition. As with the psalmist who intersperses memories of divine assistance
into complaints about present calamities, “singing at the winepress” is the way
in which the Church may remember God’s own memory of us, extending the
liturgical logic of the Eucharist even to those pressing the grapes long before
consecration:115
Go, eat your bread with enjoyment, and drink your wine with a merry heart; for
God has long ago approved what you do. Let your garments always be white;
do not let oil be lacking on your head. Enjoy life with the wife whom you love,
all the days of your vain life that are given you under the sun, because that is
your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. Whatever
your hand finds to do, do with your might; for there is no work or thought or
knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going.116
As we sing the story of salvation history on Sundays in order to welcome Christ’s

presence in the Eucharist, may we not forget also to sing on Mondays, likewise
welcoming Christ’s presence, even at the winepress.
115
For a compelling account of how precisely this logic takes shape in a Greek Orthodox village, see
Juliet du Boulay, Cosmos, Life, and Liturgy in a Greek Orthodox Village (Limni, Evia, Greece: Denise
Harvey (Publisher), 2009), pp. 134–60.
116
Eccl. 9:7-10 (NRSV).
www.Ebook777.com
226
www.Ebook777.com
Bibliography
Ackroyd, Peter R., “Chronicles,” in Michael D. Coogan and Bruce M. Metzger (eds),
The Oxford Companion to the Bible. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993.
Alter, Robert, The Art of Biblical Narrative. New York: Basic Books, 1981.
—, The Wisdom Books: Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes: A Translation with Commentary.
New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2010.
Anderson, William H. U., Qoheleth and Its Pessimistic Theology: Hermeneutical Struggles
in Wisdom Literature. Mellen Biblical Press Series 54. Lewiston, NY: The Edwin
Mellen Press, 1997.
Arendt, Hannah, The Human Condition, 2nd edn. Chicago: The University of Chicago
Press, 1958.
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. Terence Irwin. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing
Company, Inc., 1999.
—, Politics, trans. Ernest Barker. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.
Atkinson, Tyler, “Contemplation as an alternative to curiosity: St Bonaventure on
Ecclesiastes 1:3-11,” Scottish Journal of Theology 68.1 (2015): 16–33.
—, “Overcoming Competition through Kairological Enjoyment: The Implications of
Qoheleth’s Theology of Time for the Ethics of Work,” Studies in Christian Ethics 26.4
(2013): 395–409.
Augustine, “Confessiones,” in James J. O’Donnell (ed.), Augustine: Confessions, Vol. 1:
Introduction and Text. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992, http://www.stoa.org/
hippo/ (accessed April 5, 2013).
—, Confessions, trans. Henry Chadwick. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.
—, De Doctrina Christiana, ed. and trans. R. P. H. Green. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1991.
—, “Of True Religion,” in J. H. S. Burleigh (ed.), Augustine: Earlier Writings. The Library
of Christian Classics: Ichthus Edition. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1953.
—, The Trinity, ed. John Rotelle, trans. Edmund Hill. New York: New City Press, 1991.
Barth, Karl, Church Dogmatics, III.1, ed. G. W. Bromiley and T. F. Torrance, trans. J. W.
Edwards, O. Bussey, and H. Knight. London: T&T Clark, 1958.
—, Church Dogmatics, III.4, ed. G. W. Bromiley and T. F. Torrance, trans. A. T. Mackay,
T. H. L. Parker, Harold Knight, Henry A. Kennedy, and John Marks. Edinburgh: T&T
Clark, 1961.
Bartholomew, Craig, “A God for Life, and Not Just for Christmas! The Revelation of
God in the Old Testament Wisdom Literature,” in Paul Helm and Carl R. Trueman
www.Ebook777.com
228 Bibliography
(eds), The Trustworthiness of God: Perspectives on the Nature of Scripture. Grand

Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2002.
—, “A Time for War, and a Time for Peace: Old Testament Wisdom, Creation and
O’Donovan’s Theological Ethics,” in Craig Bartholomew, Jonathan Chaplin, Robert
Song, and Al Wolters (eds), A Royal Priesthood?: The Use of the Bible Ethically and
Politically: A Dialogue with Oliver O’Donovan. Carlisle, Cumbria: Paternoster Press,
2002.
—, Ecclesiastes. Baker Commentary on the Old Testament Wisdom and Psalms. Grand
Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009.
Barton, John, Understanding Old Testament Ethics: Approaches and Explorations.
Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2003.
Bayer, Oswald, A Contemporary in Dissent: Johann Georg Hamann as a Radical
Enlightener, trans. Roy A. Harrisville and Mark C. Mattes. Grand Rapids: William B.
Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2012.
—, Freedom in Response: Lutheran Ethics: Sources and Controversies, trans. Jeffrey F.
Cayzer. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
—, Martin Luther’s Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation, trans. Thomas H. Trapp.
Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2008.
Biernoff, Suzannah, Sight and Embodiment in the Middle Ages: Ocular Desires. New York:
Palgrave, 2002.
Birch, Bruce C. and Larry L. Rasmussen, Bible and Ethics in the Christian Life: Revised &
Expanded Edition. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press, 1989.
Bonaventure, “Breviloquium,” Opera Omnia S. Bonaventure. Tomus V. Florence:
Quaracchi, 1891, 199–291.
—, Breviloquium, ed. and trans. Dominic V. Monti, O.F.M. Works of St. Bonaventure IX.
St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2005.
—, “Collationes in Hexaëmeron,” Opera Omnia S. Bonaventure. Tomus V. Florence:
Quaracchi, 1891, 327–454.
—, “Commentarius in librum Ecclesiastae,” Opera Omnia S. Bonaventure. Tomus VI.
Florence: Quaracchi, 1893, 1–103.
—, Commentary on Ecclesiastes, ed. and trans. Robert J. Karris, O.F.M., and Campion
Murray, O.F.M. Works of St. Bonaventure VII. St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan
Institute Publications, 2005.
—, Disputed Questions on the Mystery of the Trinity, trans. Zachary Hayes, O.F.M. Works
of St. Bonaventure III. St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 1979
(reprinted in 2000).
—, Itinerarium Mentis in Deum, ed. Philotheus Boehner, O.F.M., and Zachary Hayes,
O.F.M., trans. Zachary Hayes, O.F.M. Works of St. Bonaventure II. St. Bonaventure,
NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 1996.
—, On the Reduction of the Arts to Theology, trans. Zachary Hayes, O.F.M. Works of
St Bonaventure I. St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 1996.
—, The Sunday Sermons of St. Bonaventure, ed. and trans. Timothy J. Johnson. Works of
St. Bonaventure XII. St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2008.
www.Ebook777.com
Bibliography 229
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich, Creation and Fall: A Theological Exposition of Genesis 1-3, ed.
Martin Rüter, Ilse Tödt, and John W. de Gruchy, trans. Douglas Stephen Bax. Dietrich
Bonhoeffer Works 3. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997.
—, Discipleship, ed. Martin Kuske, Ilse Tödt, Geffrey B. Kelly, and John D. Godsey, trans.
Barbara Green and Reinhard Krauss. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works 4. Minneapolis:
Fortress Press, 2001.
—, Ethics, ed. Ilse Tödt, Heinz Eduard Tödt, Ernst Feil, and Clifford Green, trans.
Reinhard Krauss, Charles West, and Douglas Scott. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works 6.
Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005.
Bougerol, J. Guy, O.F.M., Introduction to the Works of Bonaventure, trans. José de by
Vinck. Paterson, NJ: St. Anthony Guild Press, 1964.
Boulay, Juliet du, Cosmos, Life, and Liturgy in a Greek Orthodox Village. Limni, Evia,
Greece: Denise Harvey (Publisher), 2009.
Braun, R., Kohelet und die frühhellenistische Popularphilosophie. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift
für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 130. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1973.
Brock, Brian, Christian Ethics in a Technological Age. Grand Rapids: William B.
Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2010.
—, Singing the Ethos of God: On the Place of Christian Ethics in Scripture. Grand Rapids:
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2007.
—, “Why the Estates? Hans Ulrich’s Recovery of an Unpopular Notion,” Studies in
Christian Ethics 20.2 (2007): 179–202.
Brown, William P., Ecclesiastes. Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and
Preaching. Louisville: John Knox Press, 2000.
—, “â•›‘Whatever Your Hand Finds to Do’: Qoheleth’s Work Ethic,” Interpretation 55
(2001): 271–84.
Brueggemann, Walter, “The Loss and Recovery of Creation in Old Testament Theology,”
Theology Today 53.2 (1996): 177–90.
Brunner, Emil, Natural Theology: Comprising “Nature and Grace” by Professor Dr. Emil
Brunner, and the Reply “No!” by Karl Barth, trans. Peter Fraenkel. Eugene: Wipf and
Stock Publishers, 2002.
—, The Divine Imperative: A Study in Christian Ethics, trans. Olive Wyon. London: The
Lutterworth Press, 1937.
Byassee, Jason, Praise Seeking Understanding: Reading the Psalms with Augustine. Grand
Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2007.
Camus, Albert, The Myth of Sisyphus, and Other Essays, trans. Justin O’Brien. New York:
Vintage Books, 1955.
Carpenter, Charles, Theology as the Road to Holiness in St. Bonaventure. New York:
Paulist Press, 1999.
Carroll, R., M. Daniel, and Jacqueline E. Lapsley (eds), Character Ethics and the Old
Testament: Moral Dimensions of Scripture. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press,
2007.
Christianson, Eric S., A Time to Tell: Narrative Strategies in Ecclesiastes, Journal for the
Study of the Old Testament Supplement 280. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998.
www.Ebook777.com
230 Bibliography
—, Ecclesiastes Through the Centuries. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2007.

Church of England, Revised Common Lectionary in NRSV: Sundays and Festivals:
Principal Service Lectionary for the Church of England, Pew Edition. London:
Mowbray, 1998.
Cosden, Darrell, A Theology of Work: Work and the New Creation. Carlisle, Cumbria:
Paternoster Press, 2004.
—, The Heavenly Good of Earthly Work. Milton Keynes: Paternoster, and Peabody, MA:
Hendrickson, 2006.
Cousins, Ewert H., Bonaventure and the Coincidence of Opposites: The Theology of
Bonaventure. Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1978.
Crawford, Matthew, The Case for Working with Your Hands, or Why Office Work is Bad
for Us and Fixing Things Feels Good. London: Penguin Books, 2009.
Crenshaw, James, Ecclesiastes: A Commentary. Old Testament Library. Philadelphia: The
Westminster Press, 1987.
—, Gerhard von Rad. Makers of the Modern Theological Mind, ed. Bob E. Patterson.
Waco: Word Books, 1978.
Cross, Frank Moore, Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in the History of the
Religion of Israel. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1973.
Crüsemann, Frank, “The Unchangeable World: The ‘Crisis of Wisdom’ in Koheleth,” in
Willy Schottroff and Wolfgang Stegemann (eds), God of the Lowly: Socio-Historical
Interpretations of the Bible. New York: Orbis Books, 1979.
Cullen, Christopher M., Bonaventure. Great Medieval Thinkers. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2006.
Dahood, Mitchell J., “Canaanite-Phoenician Influence in Qoheleth,” Biblica 33 (1952):
30–52, 191–221.
—, “Canaanite Words in Qoheleth 10, 20,” Biblica 46 (1965): 210–12.
—, “Qoheleth and Northwest Semitic Philology,” Biblica 43 (1962): 349–65.
—, “The Phoenician Background to Qoheleth,” Biblica 47 (1966): 264–82.
Davis, Ellen F., Scripture, Culture, and Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible,
Foreword by Wendell Berry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009.
Davis, Ellen F. and Richard B. Hays (eds), The Art of Reading Scripture. Grand Rapids:
Delio, Ilia, O.S.F., “Bonaventure’s Metaphysics of the Good,” Theological Studies 60.2
(1999): 228–46.
—, “From Metaphysics to Kataphysics: Bonaventure’s ‘Good’ Creation,” Scottish Journal
of Theology 64.2 (2011): 161–79.
—, Simply Bonaventure: An Introduction to His Life, Thought, and Writings. Hyde Park,
NY: New City Press, 2001.
Delitzsch, Franz, Song of Songs and Ecclesiastes, trans. M. G. Easton. Grand Rapids:
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1982 (1877).
Ellermeier, Friedrich, Qohelet, Teil I, Abschnitt 1. Herzberg am Harz: Erwin Junger, 1967.
Ellul, Jacques, Reason for Being: A Meditation on Ecclesiastes, trans. Joyce Main Hanks.
www.Ebook777.com
Bibliography 231
Enns, Peter, Ecclesiastes. The Two Horizons Old Testament Commentary. Grand Rapids:
Fisch, Harold, Poetry with a Purpose: Biblical Poetics and Interpretation. Bloomington,
IN: Indiana University Press, 1990.
Fox, Michael V., A Time to Tear Down and a Time to Build Up: A Rereading of
Ecclesiastes. Eugene: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 1999.
—, “Frame-Narrative and Composition in the Book of Qohelet,” Hebrew Union College
Annual 48 (1977): 83–106.
—, Qohelet and His Contradictions. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament
Supplement 71. Sheffield: Almond Press, 1989.
Frayling, Christopher, On Craftsmanship: Towards a New Bauhaus. London: Oberon
Books, 2011.
Fredericks, D. C., Qoheleth’s Language: Re-evaluating Its Nature and Date. Ancient Near
Eastern Texts and Studies 3. Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellon Press, 1988.
Gammie, John, “Stoicism and Anti-Stoicism in Qoheleth,” Hebrew Annual Review 9
(1985): 169–87.
Gilson, Etienne, The Philosophy of St. Bonaventure, trans. Dom Illtyd Trethowan and
F. J. Sheed. London: Sheed & Ward, 1938.
Gordis, Robert, Koheleth—The Man and His World. Texts and Studies of the Jewish
Theological Seminary of America, vol. XIX. New York: Bloch Publishing Company,
1955.
Gregory the Great, The Dialogues of Saint Gregory the Great, ed. Edmund G. Gardner.
Merchantville, NJ: Evolution Publishing, 2010.
Griffiths, Paul J., Intellectual Appetite: A Theological Grammar. Washington, DC: The
Catholic University of America Press, 2009.
—, “The Vice of Curiosity,” Pro Ecclesia XV.1 (2006): 47–63.
—, The Vice of Curiosity: An Essay on Intellectual Appetite. Winnipeg: Canadian
Mennonite University Press, 2006.
Hagen, Kenneth, “An Ethic for the Left Hand: Luther on Vocation,” Luther Digest: An
Annual Abridgment of Luther Studies 20, Supplement (2012): 25–47.
Hamann, J. G., “Aesthetica in Nuce: A Rhapsody in Cabbalistic Prose (1792),” in J. M.
Bernstein (ed.), Classic and Romantic Aesthetics. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2002.
—, “Biblical Reflections,” in Ronald Gregor Smith (ed.), J. G. Hamann 1730-1788: A
Study in Christian Existence, with Selections from His Writings. London: Collins,
1960.
Hatton, Peter, “A Cautionary Tale: The Acts-Consequence ‘Construct,’â•›” Journal for the
Study of the Old Testament 35.3 (2011): 375–84.
Hauerwas, Stanley, The Peaceable Kingdom: A Primer in Christian Ethics. Notre Dame:
University of Notre Dame Press, 1983.
—, “Work as Co-Creation: A Critique of a Remarkably Bad Idea,” in John W. Houck and
Oliver F. Williams C.S.C. (eds), Co-Creation and Capitalism: John Paul II’s Laborem
Exercens. Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1983.
www.Ebook777.com
232 Bibliography
Hayes, Zachary, The Hidden Center: Spirituality and Speculative Christology in

St. Bonaventure. St. Bonaventure, NY: Franciscan Institute Publications, 1992.
Herrera, Robert A., Reason for Our Rhymes: An Inquiry into the Philosophy of History.
Hertzberg, Hans Wilhelm, Der Prediger. Kommentar zum Alten Testament, XVIII, 4.
Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus Gerd Mohn, 1963.
—, “Palästinische Bezüge im Buche Kohelet,” Zeitschrift des deutschen Palästina-Vereins
73 (1957): 13–24.
Hughes, John, The End of Work: Theological Critiques of Capitalism. Oxford: Blackwell
Publishing, 2007.
Humbert, Paul, Recherches sur les sources égyptiennes de la littérature sapientiale d’Israël.
Neuchatel: Neuchatel Secretariat de l’Universite, 1929.
Ingram, Doug, Ambiguity in Ecclesiastes. New York: T&T Clark, 2006.
Janzen, Waldemar, Old Testament Ethics: A Paradigmatic Approach. Louisville:
Westminster John Knox Press, 1994.
Jensen, David H., Responsive Labor: A Theology of Work. Louisville: Westminster John
Knox Press, 2006.
Jerome, “Preface to the Commentary on Ecclesiastes,” trans. The Hon. W. H. Freemantle,
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series II, vol. 6, ed. Philip Schaff. Grand Rapids:
Christian Classics Ethereal Library, 2005, http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf206.
pdf (accessed June 13, 2013).
John Paul II, Laborem Exercens, http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/
encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_14091981_laborem-exercens_en.html (accessed
July 23, 2013).
Kaiser, Walter C. Jr., Toward Old Testament Ethics. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing
House, 1983.
Kallas, Endel, “Ecclesiastes: Traditium et Fides Evangelica. The Ecclesiastes
Commentaries of Martin Luther, Philip Melanchthon, and Johannes Brenz
Considered within the History of Interpretation.” PhD dissertion, Graduate
Theological Union, Berkeley, 1979.
Kamenetzky, Abraham S., “Der Rätselname Koheleth,” Zeitschrift für alttestamentliche
Wissenschaft 34 (1914): 225–8.
Kelsey, David H., Eccentric Existence: A Theological Anthropology, 2 vols. Louisville:
Westminster John Knox Press, 2010.
Koch, Klaus, “Gibt es ein Vergeltungsdogma im Alten Testament?,” Die Zeitschrift für
Theologie und Kirche 52 (1955): 1–42.
—, “Is There a Doctrine of Retribution in the Old Testament?,” trans. Thomas H. Trapp,
in James Crenshaw (ed.), Theodicy in the Old Testament. Philadelphia: Fortress Press,
1983.
Krüger, Thomas, Qoheleth: A Commentary. Hermeneia—A Critical and Historical
Commentary on the Bible, ed. Klaus Baltzer, trans. O. C. Dean, Jr. Minneapolis:
Augsburg Fortress Press, 2004.
www.Ebook777.com
Bibliography 233
Latour, Bruno and Michel Serres, Conversations on Science, Culture, and Time, trans.
Roxanne Lapidus. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1995.
Lear, Gabriel Richardson, “Happiness and the Structure of Ends,” in Georgios
Anagnostopoulos (eds), A Companion to Aristotle. Chichester, Sussex: Blackwell
Publishing, 2009.
Leeuwen, Raymond van, “Proverbs,” in Leander E. Keck (ed.), The New Interpreter’s Bible
5. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1997.
—, “Wealth and Poverty: System and Contradiction in Proverbs,” Hebrew Studies 33
(1992): 25–36.
Leiman, Shnayer Z., The Canonization of the Hebrew Scripture: The Talmudic and
Midrashic Evidence. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1976.
Loader, James A., Polar Structures in the Book of Qohelet. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die
alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 152. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1979.
Lohfink, Norbert, Qoheleth: A Continental Commentary, trans. Sean McEvenue.
Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press, 2003.
Longman, Tremper III, The Book of Ecclesiastes. The New International Commentary on
the Old Testament. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1998.
Lubac, Henri de, Medieval Exegesis, 3 vols. Ressourcement: Retrieval & Renewal in
Catholic Thought. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company,
1998–2009.
Luther, Martin, Christian in Society III, ed. Helmut T. Lehmann and Robert C. Schultz.
Luther’s Works 46. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1967.
—, “Genesisvorlesung (cap. 1-17) 1535/38,” Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische
Gesamtausgabe. Band 42. Weimar: H. Böhlau, 1911.
—, Lectures on Galatians 1535, Chapters 1–4, ed. and trans. Jaroslav Pelikan. Luther’s
Works 26. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1963.
—, Lectures on Genesis, Chapters 1–5, ed. Jaroslav Pelikan, trans. George V. Schick.
Luther’s Works 1. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1958.
—, “Notes on Ecclesiastes,” ed. and trans. Jaroslav Pelikan. Luther’s Works 15. Saint
Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1972, 1–187.
—, “Psalmvorlesungen 1519/21 (Ps. 1-22),” Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische
Gesamtausgabe. Band 5. Weimar: H. Böhlau, 1892.
—, “The Sermon on the Mount,” ed. and trans. Jaroslav Pelikan. Luther’s Works 21. Saint
Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1956, 1–294.
—, “Tischreden aus der ersten Hälfte der dreißiger Jahre, Sammlungen Veit Dietrichs
und Medlers,” Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe, Tischreden. Band
1. Waimar: H. Böhlau, 1912.
—, “Vorlesung über den Prediger Salomo. 1526. Annotationes in Ecclesiasten. 1532,”
Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe. Band 20. Weimar: H. Böhlau,
1898, 1–203.
—, “Vorlesung über die Stufenpsalmen,” Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische
Gesamtausgabe. Band 40/3. Weimar: H. Böhlau, 1930, 1–475.
www.Ebook777.com
234 Bibliography
—, “Wochenpredigten über Matth. 5-7. 1530/32,” Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische
Gesamtausgabe. Band 32. Weimar: H. Böhlau, 1906, 299–555.
Lys, Daniel L., L’Ecclésiaste ou Que vaut la vie? Traduction; Introduction générale;
Commentaire de 1/1 à 4/3. Paris: Letouze et Ané, 1977.
MacIntyre, Alasdair C., After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory. Notre Dame: University
of Notre Dame Press, 1984.
—, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? London: Duckworth, 1988.
McKenna, John E., “The Concept of Hebel in the Book of Ecclesiastes,” Scottish Journal
of Theology 45.1 (1992): 19–28.
Meilaender, Gilbert C. ( ed.), Working: Its Meaning and Its Limits. Notre Dame:
University of Notre Dame Press, 2000.
Michel, Diethelm, Untersuchungen zur Eigenart des Buches Qohelet. Beihefte zur
Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 183. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1989.
Migne, J. P. (ed.), Patrologia cursus completus. Series latina. Paris, 1844–64, 221
volumes.
Miller, Douglas B., Symbol and Rhetoric in Ecclesiastes: The Place of Hebel in Qohelet’s
Work. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2002.
Mills, Mary E., Biblical Morality: Moral perspectives in Old Testament narratives.
Aldershot, Hampshire: Ashgate Publishing, 2001.
Moltmann, Jürgen, Theology of Hope: On the Ground and the Implications of a Christian
Eschatology, trans. James W. Leitch. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993.
Monti, Dominic V., “Bonaventure’s Interpretation of Scripture in his Exegetical Works,”
PhD dissertion, University of Chicago, 1979, Microfilm.
Murphy, Roland E., O. Carm., Ecclesiastes. Word Biblical Commentary 23a. Dallas: Word
Books, 1992.
—, The Tree of Life: An Exploration of Biblical Wisdom Literature, 3rd edn. Grand Rapids:
—, Wisdom Literature: Job, Proverbs, Ruth, Canticles, Ecclesiastes, and Esther. The Forms
of Old Testament Literature, XIII. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1981.
Nimmo, Paul T., “The Orders of Creation in the Theological Ethics of Karl Barth,”
Scottish Journal of Theology 60.1 (2007): 24–35.
Oberman, Heiko A., “Luther and the Via Moderna: The Philosophical Backdrop of the
Reformation Breakthrough,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 54 (2003): 641–70.
—, Luther: Man Between God and the Devil, trans. Eileen Walliser-Schwarzbart. New
York: Doubleday, 1992.
—, The Dawn of the Reformation: Essays in Late Medieval and Early Reformation
Thought. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1992.
—, The Two Reformations: The Journey from the Last Days to the New World, ed. Donald
Weinstein. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003.
O’Donovan, Oliver, Resurrection and Moral Order: An Outline for Evangelical Ethics,
2nd edn. Leicester: Apollos (Inter-Varsity Press), 1994.
www.Ebook777.com
Bibliography 235
—, The Desire of the Nations: Rediscovering the Roots of Political Theology. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1999.
—, The Problem of Self-Love in Augustine. New Haven and London: Yale University
Press, 1980.
—, “Usus and Fruitio in Augustine, De Doctrina Christiana I,” Journal of Theological
Studies, N.S. 33.2 (1982): 361–97.
Ogden, Graham S., Qoheleth, 2nd edn. Readings: A New Biblical Commentary. Sheffield:
Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2007.
Ogletree, Thomas W., The Use of the Bible in Christian Ethics: A Constructive Essay.
Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1983.
Origen, The Song of Songs: Commentary and Homilies. Ancient Christian Writers, no. 26,
trans. R. P. Lawson. New York: The Newman Press, 1957.
Osborne, Kenan B., “The Trinity in Bonaventure,” in Peter C. Phan (ed.), The Cambridge
Companion to the Trinity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
Otto, Eckart, Theologische Ethik des Alten Testaments. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1994.
Pascal, Blaise, Les Pensees de Pascal, ed. Francis Kaplan. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1982.
Perdue, Leo G., The Sword and the Stylus: An Introduction to Wisdom in the Age of
Empires. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2008.
—, “Wisdom and Apocalyptic: The Case of Qoheleth,” in F. García Martinez (ed.),
Wisdom and Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Biblical Tradition.
Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2003.
Pieper, Josef, Leisure as the Basis of Culture, trans. Alexander Dru. London: Faber and
Faber Ltd., 1952.
Pink, Daniel H., Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. Edinburgh:
Canongate Books, 2011.
Pseudo-Dionysius, the Areopagite, The Works of Dionysius the Aereopagite, Part I,
trans. John Parker. London: James Parker and Co., 1897.
Rad, Gerhard von, Old Testament Theology, 2 vols, trans. D. M. G. Stalker. New York:
Harper & Row Publishers, 1962 (vol. 1); 1965 (vol. 2).
—, The Problem of the Hexateuch and Other Essays. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966.
—, Wisdom in Israel, trans. James D. Martin. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1972.
Ranston, Harry, The Old Testament Wisdom Books and Their Teaching. London: Epworth
Press, 1930.
Reed, Esther D., Work, for God’s Sake: Christian Ethics in the Workplace. London: Darton,
Longman and Todd Ltd., 2010.
Reist, Thomas, O.F.M. Conv., Saint Bonaventure as a Biblical Commentator: A
Translation and Analysis of His Commentary on Luke, XVIII, 34-XIX, 42. New York:
University Press of America, 1985.
Reno, R. R., “Participating: Working toward Worship,” in Stanley Hauerwas and
Samuel Wells (ed.), The Blackwell Companion to Christian Ethics. Oxford: Blackwell
Publishing, 2004.
Richardson, Alan, The Biblical Doctrine of Work. London: SCM, 1952.
www.Ebook777.com
236 Bibliography
Ricoeur, Paul, The Symbolism of Evil, trans. Emerson Buchanan. Boston: Beacon Press,
1967.
—, Time and Narrative, 3 vols, trans. Kathleen McLaughlin and David Pellauer. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1984–85.
Rodd, Cyril S., Glimpses of a Strange Land: Studies in Old Testament Ethics. Edinburgh:
T&T Clark, 2001.
Rogerson, John, “The Old Testament and Christian Ethics,” in Robin Gill (ed.), The
Cambridge Companion to Christian Ethics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2001.
Rosin, Robert, Reformers, the Preacher, and Skepticism: Luther, Brenz, Melanchthon, and
Ecclesiastes. Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Europäische Geschichte Mainz 171.
Mainz: Philipp von Zabern, 1997.
Rudman, Dominic, “A Note on the Dating of Ecclesiastes,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 61
(1999): 47–52.
Salyer, Gary D., Vain Rhetoric: Private Insight and Public Debate in Ecclesiastes. Journal
for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement 327. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic
Press, 2001.
Sandberg, Ruth N., Rabbinic Views of Qohelet. Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen Press,
1999.
Schmid, Hans Heinrich, “Creation, Righteousness, and Salvation: ‘Creation Theology’ as
the Broad Horizon of Biblical Theology,” in Bernard Anderson (ed.), Creation in the
Old Testament. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1983.
—, Gerechtigkeit als Weltordnung: Hintergrund und Geschichte des alttestamentlichen
Gerechtigkeitsbegriffes. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 1968.
—, Wesen und Geschichte der Weisheit: Eine Untersuchung zur altorientalischen und
israelitischen Weisheitsliteratur. Berlin: A. Töpelmann, 1966.
Sennett, Richard, The Craftsman. London: Penguin Books, 2008.
—, Together: The Rituals, Pleasures and Politics of Cooperation. London: Penguin Books,
2012.
Seow, C. L., Ecclesiastes: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. The
Anchor Bible, vol. 18C. New York: Doubleday, 1997.
—, “Qoheleth’s Eschatological Poem,” Journal of Biblical Literature 118.2 (1999): 209–34.
Serres, Michel, The Five Senses: A Philosophy of Mingled Bodies, trans. Margaret Sankey
and Peter Cowley. London: Continuum Books, 2008.
—, The Troubadour of Knowledge, trans. Sheila Faria Glaser, with William Paulson.
Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1997.
The Smalcald Articles, http://bookofconcord.org/smalcald.php, and http://
bookofconcord.org/german-sa.php (accessed April 6, 2013).
Small, Carola, “The Fourth Lateran Council of 1215: A Turning Point in the History of
Medieval Europe,” Religious Studies and Theology 11.2–3 (1991): 66–78.
Smalley, Beryl, Medieval Exegesis of Wisdom Literature: Essays by Beryl Smalley,
ed. Roland E. Murphy. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1986.
www.Ebook777.com
Bibliography 237
Sölle, Dorothee, To Work and to Love: A Theology of Creation. Philadelphia: Fortress

Press, 1984.
Steinbronn, Anthony J., “Luther’s Use of Larvae Dei,” Concordia Journal 19.2 (1993):
135–47.
Sweeden, Joshua R., The Church and Work: The Ecclesiological Grounding of Good Work
(uncorrected proofs). Eugene: Pickwick Publications, 2013.
Tamez, Elsa, When the Horizons Close: Rereading Ecclesiastes, trans. Margaret Wilde.
Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2000.
Tavard, George H., From Bonaventure to the Reformers. Milwaukee: Marquette
University Press, 2005.
Ticciati, Susannah, “Ecclesiastes, Augustine’s uti/frui Distinction, and Christ as the
Waste of the World,” in Katherine Dell and Will Kynes (eds), Reading Ecclesiastes
Intertextually. London and New York: T&T Clark, 2014.
—, Job and the Disruption of Identity: Reading Beyond Barth. Edinburgh: T&T Clark,
2005.
Treier, Daniel J., Proverbs & Ecclesiastes. Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible.
Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2011.
Vanhoozer, Kevin (ed.), Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible. Grand
Rapids: Baker Book House Company, 2005.
Volf, Miroslav, Work in the Spirit: Toward a Theology of Work. Eugene: Wipf and Stock
Publishers, 1991.
Wannenwetsch, Bernd, Political Worship: Ethics for Christian Citizens, trans.
Margaret Kohl. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Watson, Francis, Text, Church and World: Biblical Interpretation in Theological
Perspective. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1994.
Watts, James W., “Song and the Ancient Reader,” Perspectives in Religious Studies 22.2
(1995): 135–47.
Weber, Max, The Protestant Ethic and the “Spirit” of Capitalism, and Other Writings,
ed. and trans. Peter Baehr and Gordon C. Wells. New York: Penguin Books,
2002.
Weisheipl, J. A., “Scholastic Method,” in New Catholic Encyclopedia, 2nd edn, Vol. 12,
ed. Catholic University of America. Detroit: Thomson Gale, 2003.
Wenham, Gordon J., Psalms as Torah: Reading Biblical Song Ethically. Grand Rapids:
Baker Academic, 2012.
—, Story as Torah: Reading Old Testament Narrative Ethically. Grand Rapids: Baker
Academic, 2000.
Westermann, Claus, Blessing in the Bible and in the Life of the Church. Philadelphia:
Fortress, 1978.
—, “Creation and History in the Old Testament,” in Vilmos Vajta (ed.), The Gospel and
Human Destiny. Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1971.
Whitley, Charles F., Koheleth: His Language and Thought. Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die
alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 148. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1979.
www.Ebook777.com
238 Bibliography
Whybray, R. Norman, Ecclesiastes. Old Testament Guides. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic

Press: 1989.
—, “Ecclesiastes 1.5-7 and the Wonders of Nature,” Journal for the Study of the Old
Testament 41 (1988):105–12.
—, “Qoheleth, Preacher of Joy,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 23 (1982):
87–98.
—, The Good Life in the Old Testament. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2002.
Wilch, John R., Time and Event: An Exegetical Study of the Use of ‛ēth in the Old
Testament in Comparison to Other Temporal Expressions in Clarification of the
Concept of Time. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1969.
Williams, Rowan, “Language, Reality and Desire in Augustine’s De Doctrina,” Journal of
Literature & Theology 3.2 (1989): 138–50.
Wingren, Gustaf, The Christian’s Calling: Luther on Vocation, trans. Carl C. Rasmussen.
Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd, 1957.
Wright, Addison, “The Riddle of the Sphinx: The Structure of the Book of Qoheleth,”
Catholic Biblical Quarterly 30 (1968): 313–34.
Wright, Christopher J. H., Living as the People of God: The Relevance of Old Testament
ethics. Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 1983.
—, Old Testament Ethics for the People of God. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press,
2004.
—, Walking in the Ways of the Lord: The Ethical Authority of the Old Testament. Downers
Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1995.
Wright, G. Ernest, The Challenge of Israel’s Faith. Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1944.
Wright, J. Robert (ed.), Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs. Ancient Christian
Commentary on Scripture: Old Testament, IX. Downers Grover, IL: InterVarsity
Press, 2005.
Wright, William J., Martin Luther’s Understanding of God’s Two Kingdoms: A Response to
the Challenge of Skepticism, in Texts & Studies in Reformation and Post-Reformation
Thought. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010.
Zimmerli, Walther, “The Place and the Limit of The Wisdom in The Framework of the
Old Testament Theology,” Scottish Journal of Theology 17.2 (1964): 146–58.
Zimmerman, Frank, “The Aramaic Provenance of Qohelet,” Jewish Quarterly Review
36.1 (1945): 17–45.
www.Ebook777.com
Biblical and Apocryphal sources
Old Testament 11.9–13 52

Genesis
1 98 1 Chronicles
1–3 65, 80, 207 28.1 50
1.26 169 29 50
1.28 146, 209 29.10 50
1.31 89 29.20 50
2.1–3 109
2.15 147, 208–9, 2 Chronicles
219 1–7 130, 133,
2.16–17 146 203–4
2.23–5 146 1.3 50
3 98, 222 1.11–12 51
3.12 147 2.1 203
3.17 212, 221–2 5.3 51
3.19 74, 93 6.3 51
4 53 7.11 203
50.19–21 27 8.7–10 52, 203
9.1–12 109
Numbers
16.30 97 Job
22.28 27 23.11 112
32–7 110
Deuteronomy 42.7–9 111
6.16 101
Psalms
Joshua 39.5 82
10.12 94 49.16 76
91.1 101
1 Samuel 91.11–12 101
10 171 103.5 93
10.6–7 171 119.66 150
127 148
1 Kings 134.7 95
4–11 49
5.6 52 Proverbs
5.13 52, 203 8.29 93
7 51 15.32 58
9.10 113 16.4 87
9.15–22 52, 203 19.8 58
10.1–13 109
11.1–14 130 Ecclesiastes
11.1–8 52 1 45, 193–4
www.Ebook777.com
240 Biblical and Apocryphal sources
1–2 49 1.12–2.26 41, 44, 46, 48,

1.1 41–2, 44, 46–7, 52, 56,
49, 58, 131 58, 99, 102,
1.1–2 47 107, 199, 203
1.2 24, 42, 44–5, 1.13 58, 99–100, 137
47, 53, 1.13a 109
55, 167 1.13b 109, 137
1.3–11 44, 46, 81, 92, 1.16 58, 193
114, 166 1.16–2.3 110
1.3–2.26 91 1.17a 110
1.3–3.15 90–1 1.18 110
1.3–12.7 47 2.1 181
1.3 44, 47, 92–3, 2.4–8 113, 201
128, 133–4, 2.4–11 134
167, 221 2.10 62
1.4 93–4, 96, 2.11 62, 221
115–16 2.12 57
1.4–7 45, 92, 108, 2.12b 111–12
192, 196 2.15 58
1.4–11 44–5, 47, 61, 92, 2.17 55
107, 190–2, 2.17–18 44
199–200, 205, 2.17–19 25
216, 218 2.18–23 24, 217
1.4a 92 2.22–3 25
1.5 45 2.23 135, 174
1.5–6a 94 2.24 62, 174, 202,
1.5–7 45, 93, 95–6, 204
98 2.24–6 44, 46, 62–3,
1.6b 95, 117, 129 174, 204,
1.7 192–3 222
1.8 96, 115, 118, 2.24a 62
182, 192, 3 19–21, 61,
194–5 167–70,
1.8–11 45, 93, 96–8, 175, 200
114, 194 3.1 20, 168, 199
1.8a 115, 193 3.1–8 170, 200–1, 222
1.8b 95, 136 3.1–9 25
1.8b–10 96 3.1–15 44, 46, 48, 91,
1.9–10 194 190–2,
1.9–11 165, 170 197–200,
1.10 21, 194–6, 200 205, 216, 218
1.10a 195, 220 3.1–17 170
1.10b 195–6 3.2–8 198–9, 201–2
1.11 45 3.2a 124, 198, 223
1.12 49, 107–8, 203 3.8b 198, 200
1.12–13a 75 3.9 170, 201–2,
1.12–14 24 221–2
1.12–15 108 3.9–10 201
1.12–2.23 198, 200 3.9–15 202
www.Ebook777.com
Biblical and Apocryphal sources 241
3.10 57, 200 7.1–14 159

3.11 28, 198–201, 7.3 151–2
222 7.5 78
3.11a 170, 200 7.10 27, 159
3.11b 200–1 7.11–12 159–60
3.12 202, 217 7.13 196
3.12–13 46, 204 7.13–14 27
3.13 202, 204, 222 7.15–17 152
3.14 202 7.20 138
3.14–15 28 7.24–12.7 90
3.15 202 7.27 42
3.16 57 7.30 97
3.16–22 46 8.9 60
3.16–4.16 48 8.10 55
3.16–7.23 90 8.10 163
3.17–18 58 8.14 17
3.22 46, 176 8.14–15 46–7
4–5 203–4 8.16b–17a 115
4.1 57, 60 8.17 115
4.1–6 46 9–11 47
4.1–5.19 46 9.1 138, 143
4.4 23, 204 9.1–11.6 47–8
4.7 57 9.2–3 138
4.7–8 204 9.7 176
4.9–12 160, 204 9.7–10 46–7, 62, 225
4.17 46, 51, 112, 9.7b 172
203–4 9.10 171
4.17–5.19 46, 48 9.11 170–1, 203
5 50, 153–4 9.11–12 171
5.1–7 152, 154, 9.12 172
157, 159 9.17 135
5.1b 156 10.3 58
5.2 155 10.17 162
5.4–5 155 11.5 27
5.7–8 60 11.7–10 45–7, 62
5.12 149, 158 11.7–12.7 44–8
5.13–14 124 11.7–12.8 45
5.17 79 11.9 127, 149
5.17–19 46 11.9b 43
5.18–20 181 12.1 18, 45, 59
5.20 181 12.1–7 44–5
6.1–9 46–8 12.1–8 45
6.2 51, 60 12.2a 45
6.3 129 12.7 93–4, 217
6.9 46 12.8 42, 44–5, 48,
6.10–11 149 53, 55
6.10–8.17 47–8 12.8–14 48
6.19 23 12.9 50, 129
7–8 47 12.9–10 43
www.Ebook777.com
242 Biblical and Apocryphal sources
12.9–14 42–4, 46, 48 17.21 114–15

12.12 26, 112, 114–15,
149, 193, 196 Romans
12.13 58, 153, 175 8.20 94, 222
12.13–14 79
12.14 18, 59 1 Corinthians
7.31 94
Song of Songs
8.6 75 Philippians
4.6 136, 166
Isaiah
64.8 111 Colossians
65.17 97 1.15–17 196
Jeremiah 1 Timothy
31.22 96 3.7 105
New Testament James

Matthew 4.4 86–7
4.1–11 101 4.15 93
5.31–2 140
5.45 138 1 John
6.34 137, 173 2.5 86–7
7.3 139 2.16 101
24.35 93
Revelation
Mark 21.1 93, 96–7
10.18 82 21.5 25, 97,
195–7
Luke 22 200
12.13–31 24 22.13 200
18.19 82
Apocrypha
John Sirach
5.17 183 3.22 114
6.2 75 9.24 86
14.19 93
Acts 20.22 78
17 26, 115, 188 23.38 112
www.Ebook777.com
Name Index
Ackroyd, P.â•… 51 Camus, A.â•… 165

Alter, R.â•… 5, 42, 54–5, 57–8, 70, 80 Carpenter, C.â•… 33, 83, 97, 116
Anderson, W.â•… 29 Carroll, R.â•… 7
Aquinas, T.â•… 33–4, 68, 116, 197 Christianson, E.â•… 30, 40, 42, 49, 53, 55, 70–1
Arendt, H.â•… 205 Ciceroâ•… 147
Aristotleâ•… 26, 33, 67, 75, 83, 88, 94–5, 99, Cosden, D.â•… 23, 25, 207, 211, 214–16, 218
114–17, 129, 146–51, 202–3, 212 Cratesâ•… 149, 151
Augustineâ•… 9, 32–3, 36–7, 66, 83, 87, Crawford, M.â•… 205
100–7, 109, 112–13, 122–3, 128, Crenshaw, J.â•… 15, 29, 63, 200
132–6, 138, 140, 142, 149, 161, Cross, F.â•… 14
166, 175, 177–82, 184–5, 189, Crüsemann, F.â•… 54
193, 213 Cullen, C.â•… 67, 81, 91, 116
Barth, K.â•… 13–14, 16, 111–12, 117, 144, Daniel, M.â•… 7

207–11, 217–21, 224 Davis, E.â•… 24, 217
Bartholomew, C.â•… 17–22, 27, 30–2, 41–2, Delio, I.â•… 33, 82–7, 93, 95
47, 49–51, 54, 56, 58–9, 78, 92, Diogenesâ•… 149, 151
99, 198
Barton, J.â•… 6–7, 9 Ellul, J.â•… 53, 202
Bayer, O.â•… 144–8, 150, 153, 176 Enns, P.â•… 54, 57–8
Benedict of Nursiaâ•… 203 Erasmusâ•… 28, 126, 144, 151, 168–9
Biernoff, S.â•… 31 Evagrius of Pontusâ•… 81
Birch, B.â•… 9–10
Bonaventureâ•… 2–3, 12, 21–3, 25–37, 40, 45, Fox, M.â•… 11–12, 28, 40–5, 47, 49, 54, 56–9,
64–119, 121–3, 125–32, 138, 149, 69, 165, 193, 195
165, 175, 180, 184, 187–92, 194, Francis of Assisiâ•… 34, 67, 96, 132
196–7, 203, 205–6, 212, 222 Frayling, C.â•… 205
Bonhoeffer, D.â•… 37, 111–12, 142, 144, 176,
207–9, 211, 217–21, 224 Gilson, E.â•… 83, 191, 197
Bougerol, J.â•… 67–8, 83 Gordis, R.â•… 58
Boulay, J.â•… 225 Gregory the Greatâ•… 72, 77
Braun, R.â•… 12 Griffiths, P.â•… 26, 88, 98–104, 106,
Brock, B.â•… 5, 9, 11, 23, 108, 144, 203, 108, 115, 193
214–16, 219–22
Brown, W.â•… 2, 20–1, 28–9, 46–7, 49, 55, 60, Hagen, K.â•… 144
62, 182, 199, 203 Hamann, J.â•… 176, 200
Brueggemann, W.â•… 13–15 Hatton, P.â•… 15
Brunner, E.â•… 207–9, 211 Hauerwas, S.â•… 10–11, 209–10
Bugenhagen, J.â•… 139 Hayes, Z.â•… 82–3
Byassee, J.â•… 11 Hays, R.â•… 23–4
www.Ebook777.com
244 Name Index
Hughes, J.â•… 212, 214 Oberman, H.â•… 28, 32–4, 124

Hugh of St Cherâ•… 99 O’Donovan, O.â•… 18–22, 31, 56, 59, 99,
Hugh of St Victorâ•… 36, 65, 80, 82, 87, 90, 179–80, 214
93–4, 100, 102, 109, 111, 128, 188 Ogden, G.â•… 39
Ogletree, T.â•… 10–11
Ingram, D.â•… 202 Origen of Alexandriaâ•… 53, 70–3, 117, 126, 132
Osborne, K.â•… 82
Janzen, W.â•… 7, 11 Otto, E.â•… 6–7
Jensen, D.â•… 25, 224
Jeromeâ•… 53–4, 70, 143 Pascal, B.â•… 103
John Chrysostomâ•… 71 Pelikan, J.â•… 128, 139–40, 143
John of Damascusâ•… 71, 82 Perdue, L.â•… 41, 43–7, 49, 62, 195
John Paul IIâ•… 209–11, 215 Pieper, J.â•… 212
Pink, D.â•… 205
Kaiser, W.â•… 4–6, 10 Platoâ•… 34, 75, 83, 149–51
Kallas, E.â•… 72, 81 Pseudo-Dionysiusâ•… 34, 82–4, 89, 212
Kamenetzsky, A.â•… 50
Karris, R.â•… 126 Rasmussen, L.â•… 9–10
Kelsey, D.â•… 220 Reed, E.â•… 24–5, 209, 224
Koch, K.â•… 15–16, 19 Reist, T.â•… 67
Krüger, T.â•… 1, 3, 60, 201 Reno, R.â•… 212–14, 223
Richard of St Victorâ•… 82, 84
Lapsley, J.â•… 7 Richardson, A.â•… 203
Lear, G.â•… 202 Ricoeur, P.â•… 19, 40
Loader, J.â•… 198 Rodd, C.â•… 7
Lohfink, N.â•… 12, 50, 199 Rogerson, J.â•… 4
Lombard, P.â•… 68 Rörer, G.â•… 166
Longman, T.â•… 12, 43, 54 Rosin, R.â•… 126, 144, 151, 168–9
Luther, M.â•… 2–3, 9, 12, 17, 21–3, 25–37, 40,
45, 64–6, 68, 70–6, 79, 97, 105, Schmid, H.â•… 15–16, 19
115, 119, 121–85, 187, 189–91, Sennett, R.â•… 205, 207
197, 199–200, 203, 205–6, 208, Seow, C.â•… 45, 53–4, 57, 193, 195, 202
212–16, 221, 223 Serres, M.â•… 206
Small, C.â•… 76
MacIntyre, A.â•… 214 Smalley, B.â•… 70–3
McKenna, J.â•… 91 Sölle, D.â•… 210–11, 215
Marx, K.â•… 24 Steinbronn, A.â•… 176
Matera, F.â•… 23 Sweeden, J.â•… 207, 210, 224
Meilaender, G.â•… 25
Michel, D.â•… 57 Tamez, E.â•… 2, 28, 54, 62, 198–9, 204, 218
Miller, D.â•… 53, 55 Tavard, G.â•… 33–4
Mills, M.â•… 8 Ticciati, S.â•… 180, 221
Moltmann, J.â•… 213–14 Treier, D.â•… 9, 28, 54, 63, 177
Monti, D.â•… 67–9
Murphy, R.â•… 4, 16, 44, 49, 77, 165, Ulrich, H.â•… 144
193, 195
Vanhoozer, K.â•… 9
Nimmo, P.â•… 13 Van Leeuwen, R.â•… 17, 51
www.Ebook777.com
Name Index 245
Volf, M.â•… 22–5, 171, 213–15, 218 Williams, R.â•… 178–9

Von Rad, G.â•… 13–16, 44, 217 Wingren, G.â•… 170–1, 173
Wright, A.â•… 46
Wannenwetsch, B.â•… 145, 190, 204, 220 Wright, C.â•… 4–6, 10, 25, 222
Watson, F.â•… 195 Wright, G.â•… 13–14
Watts, J.â•… 175 Wright, J.â•… 71, 81
Weber, M.â•… 212 Wright, W.â•… 125, 144
Wenham, G.â•… 7–8
Westermann, C.â•… 14 Yoder, J.â•… 23
Whybray, R.â•… 7, 25, 29, 45
Wilch, J.â•… 61 Zimmerli, W.â•… 15
www.Ebook777.com
246
www.Ebook777.com
247
www.Ebook777.com
248
www.Ebook777.com

Singing at The Winepress

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Singing at The Winepress

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Free ebooks ==> www.Ebook777.

Singing at the Winepress

Singing at the Winepress

Ecclesiastes and the Ethics of Work

Bloomsbury T&T Clark

LON DON • N E W DE L H I • N E W YOR K • SY DN EY

Bloomsbury T&T Clark

Imprint previously known as T&T Clark

50 Bedford Square 1385 Broadway

BLOOMSBURY, T&T CLARK and the Diana logo are trademarks of

First published 2015

© Tyler Atkinson, 2015

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in

No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

ISBN: HB: 978-0-567-65991-0

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Typeset by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India

It is dedicated in loving memory to a teacher, mentor, and friend who invited me

Introduction: Ecclesiastes: Relevant for Theological Ethics? 1

1 Qoheleth’s Perplexing Story: Six Topics for Theological-Ethical

2 Solomon’s Manual for Penitents: St Bonaventure on Ecclesiastes 65

3 Solomon’s Sermon for the Oeconomia and the Politia: Martin

4 Qoheleth’s Work Ethic: Human Work in the Work of God 187

futurorum, Luther proclaimed God’s Stündelein, warning me not to forsakeÂ€God’s

BHS Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia

Qoheleth, Eccl. 1:10

“Verbum divinum est omnis creatura, quia Deum loquitur;

St Bonaventure, Commentarius in librum Ecclesiastae

Qoheleth, Eccl. 5:17-19 [18-20, Engl.]

“Sic habet hic gaudium in labore et hic ingreditur in mediis

Martin Luther, Annotationes in Ecclesiasten

surface of Ecclesiastes. In spite of a broader interest within the field of biblical

ones. Therefore, in working my way through historical-critical treatments of

Ecclesiastes and theological ethics

Above, I stated that current trends in the discussion of OT ethics seem to

ethical reflection on the OT, he is nonetheless focused on the same themes of

In a brief programmatic statement of his working assumptions (p. 10), Otto

for theological exegesis32 as well as theological commentary series,33 has

scriptural passages previously less considered in theological-ethical deliberation,41

Reasons for neglect

interpreting Ecclesiastes in order to arrive at more indicative ethical claims. I want

Qoheleth is no idealist, optimistically calling forth a time of peace and celebration

In his interpretation of Eccl. 3, Brown gives the sense of an unceasing

Ecclesiastes and contemporary theologies of work

I have suggested above that a more concerted theological-ethical treatment of

not immediately obvious what significance should be ascribed to each statement

Qoheleth’s self-indictment and not his statements on the value of work.102

Why St Bonaventure and Martin Luther?

Qoheleth on novelty and nostalgia

linguistic work of Reuchlin and Erasmus in order to advance his understanding

forms in Ecclesiastes are commendatory or condemnatory, wisdom sayings or

both assume pivotal places in the reception history of Ecclesiastes among

Contemptus mundi and the enjoyment of creatures

creation theology for Ecclesiastes interpretation arise from a failure to detect

Points of theological convergence and divergence

usus and fruitio in De Doctrina Christiana, yet, like Bonaventure, appropriating

Thomas’s Aristotelian tendencies to delve into ontology in his articulation of

The speculative learning of the theologians is altogether worthless. I have

Though Bonaventure is not as speculative a theologian as Thomas, he is speculative

Locating an ethic of work in Ecclesiastes:

Qoheleth’s Perplexing Story: Six Topics

A cursory reading of critical commentaries’ introductions to Ecclesiastes verifies