Introduction To Ecclesiastes Series

If Solomon were the author, why would he conceal his name? One simple reason is that he may not have been the author of Ecclesiastes. One scholar argues, “It is much more likely that the nickname Qoheleth was adopted by the actual writer to associate himself with Solomon, while retaining his distance from the actual person. It is a way of indicating that the Solomonic persona is being adopted for literary and communicative purposes. In brief, the wise man who adopts the nickname Qoheleth pretends to be Solomon while he explores avenues of meaning in the world.”

However, regardless of who wrote it, whether Solomon or a later Jewish sage, the presence of this book in the Bible indicates that it is God’s Word. Throughout this sermon series I will refer to the author usually as the Preacher and sometimes as Qoheleth.

II. Who Were the Original Recipients of Ecclesiastes?

Second, who were the original recipients of Ecclesiastes?

One scholar says that the recipients were “young Israelite men who were living at better than subsistence level, probably in or near Jerusalem. They might include government officials, businessmen, and farm owners. . . . Junior members of the bureaucracy may have been the principal audience.”

Another scholar says that the Preacher’s “‘congregants’ were apparently preoccupied with all sorts of social and economic issues—the volatility of the economy, the possibility of wealth, inheritance, social status, the fragility of life, and the ever-present shadow of death. Qoheleth drew on these concerns and employed idioms that were familiar to his audience in order to subvert their preoccupations.”

Even though Ecclesiastes was written several thousand years ago, I hope you will come to see, as one commentator says, “Ecclesiastes is the most contemporary book in the Bible.”

Ecclesiastes is an exposé of the very things which dominate modern culture: sex, work, education, fame, drink. The writer creates a rogue’s gallery of satirical portraits of the hedonist (2:1-11), the workaholic (2:18-23), the big shot (5:8-17), the fool (7:1-8), and the unfaithful woman (7:26-29). Ecclesiastes stands as the ultimate critique of secular humanism.

III. When Was Ecclesiastes Written?

Third, when was Ecclesiastes written?

Ecclesiastes was most likely “written many centuries after Solomon, most probably in the third century BC. The main reasons for this dating are three: the character of the Hebrew in which it is written, its mood and style of argument, and its place in the history of thought. Each of these considerations would be sufficient in itself to prove that it is one of the latest compositions in the Old Testament.”

It was a period of “intense economic development. . ., expansion of international trade. . ., opportunities for great fortunes to be made by entrepreneurs. Money as a means of exchange assumed an importance which it had never had before. These developments help to explain Qoheleth’s preoccupation with money and profit.”