Deeper Commentary
Ecc 3:1 For everything there is a season, and a time for every
purpose under heaven-
"The time" in view appears to be the day of judgment.
Having spoken of how there is a time "to plant... pluck
up... kill... heal" etc., we are then told that "God shall judge the
righteous and the wicked (at the second coming): for there is a time there
for every purpose and for every work" (Ecc. 3:1-8,17). Thus our actions
and purposes in
every department of life will be examined at "the place of judgment" (Ecc.
3:16).
Ecc 3:2 a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time
to pluck up that which is planted-
As noted on :1, the "time" for these things may mean 'a time for
judgment' (:17). We are judged for the time of our birth and death in the
sense that God takes into account human lifespan. A sinful man may only
encounter God's ways later in life, starting at a certain point on the
spectrum, God expects him to move a particular distance from there. Others
live long lives and heard God's call in childhood; and a further distance
of development is perhaps hoped for from them. God Himself planted and
then plucked up His people and also other nations (Jer. 12:17; 18:7).
There is a time to pull out of projects, to give up. But we will be judged
as to how, when and with what motives we do so.
Hezekiah had once learnt that even if there is a time to die, even that is open to dialogue. For God gave him another 15 years added to his "days", his appointed time. See on :14. He rationalized the miracle as meaning that in any case, his "time" to die was simply 15 years from the point when he had been terminally ill. Now he just sees all events in human life as predetermined in a fatalistic way. He had pleaded with God to give him more life so that he could produce sons, but now he sees that there is simply a time to give birth and a time to die. It's so tragic when God does great things for man, but they are then later rationalized and philosophized away- as faith and relationship with God grow cold. Indeed the Hebrew here is translated by Blenkinsopp "A time to give birth and a time to put an end to one's life". Giving birth is a conscious act and appears parallel with consciously chosing to end life. In this case, the author sees suicide as a possibility and not, theoretically, a bad one. All so tragic that Hezekiah, who had been given extra life, should reason like this.
Ecc 3:3 a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a
time to build up-
As noted on :2, God Himself breaks down and builds up, kills and heals.
We cannot do all these things, but perhaps Solomon has himself in view. Or
maybe he is commenting upon the legislation in the law of Moses which
required these things to be done. Although in :9 he argues that there is
no profit in any of these things.
Ecc 3:4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to
dance-
Solomon speaks elsewhere of the spiritual advantage of going to a
funeral to weep and mourn, rather than to a wedding to laugh and dance.
And here he seems to be saying that for our attitude to all these things,
our behaviour in joy or grief, we will be brought into judgment at some
time (:17).
Ecc 3:5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing-
"Cast away" is "cast", perhaps alluding to stoning people. I suggested
on :3,9 that Solomon may have the Mosaic legislations partially in view.
He recognizes that there are times when we withdraw from relationships,
and times when we form them. And again, there is a time for judgment for
all these things (:17).
Ecc 3:6 a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to
cast away-
The opposition between seeking and losing suggests that the losing is
effectively the opposite of seeking. The idea is that there is a time to
seek, and also a time to accept as lost, and give up seeking. It could be
argued that the parables of Lk. 15 imply that God never gives up seeking.
This would be one of many examples of where later scripture takes
issue with what koheleth says in this book. But in practical reality, there does come a time to cease dialogue, to
accept the loss, as God did with Israel. And there is a time for those
inevitable choices to be judged (:17). There is a time when we accept that
things are lost, cast away. But when and how we decide that, and from what
motives, will have its time for judgment.
Ecc 3:7 a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a
time to speak-
In these examples, it is impossibly to define the precise time when we
should keep silence compared to speaking out, to unite in relationship or
move away in it. And trying to define the precisely correct moment is
unwise and inappropriate. But our motives and reasons will have their time
for judgment (:17). As noted on :6, many of the examples given seem to be
pertinent to human relationships (:8 also).
Ecc 3:8 a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for
peace-
I observed on :6,7 that Solomon seems to have in view how human
relationships begin and at times come to an end. He accepts that
relationships sometimes come to an end, and there is even a time for
contention. But when, how, with what motives... has its time for judgment
(:17).
For Solomon, his "wisdom" was merely knowledge. The promises to David,
the hope of the Kingdom, had no personal bite for him. He muses that
"there is a time" for everything (Ecc. 3:1-7), as if his nihilism led him
conclude that all behaviour is somehow predestined, all is cyclical,
nothing is ultimately new, and even God is caught up in this- for "God
seeks again that which He has driven away" (Ecc. 3:15). As water goes
around the water cycle (Ecc. 1:7), so everything repeats, things just
happen to us (Ecc. 3:1-8), there will be no resurrection, no coming back
(Ecc. 3:22 RV); and there is therefore no real point in spiritual endeavour (Ecc.
3:9). This attitude reveals a pathetic failure to let the knowledge of God
dynamically impact daily life; there's no appreciation of the Spirit, of
God's radical life co-joining with human life, of His mind meeting that of
man. Leaving knowledge as mere theory, as so much Bible study can too
easily remain, is a dangerous thing. And Solomon is the parade example of
it.
T
Ecc 3:9 What profit has he who works in that in which he labours?-
"Profit" is a favourite theme of Solomon. He had an incredibly
utilitarian view of life, wanting to see the tangible effect of work in
this life. Some of the things in :2-8 may allude to obedience to Mosaic
legislation, yet he considers this of no profit; just as Israel later did
(Mal. 3:16 perhaps alludes to Solomon's claim that there was no profit in
working). I noted on Ecc. 2:17,18 that he ends up hating his life because
he hates his works. The parallel between works and life meant that he was
a human doing rather than a human being. He saw no ultimate profit in his
works and life because he was now going to die. He had no sense at all
that the works of the righteous "follow them" (Rev. 14:13), and we shall
be given the eternal consequence of our works (Rev. 22:12). He concludes
Ecclesiastes by admitting that this is the final truth (Ecc. 12:14), but
this was not his personal belief nor how he had lived his life. He finally
comes to the right conclusion, and had known it all along on some level,
occasionally alluding to in his book of Proverbs; but he did not
personalize it. He looked for the result of works in this life and didn't
find it, and so he hated life, hated his works, and his heart turned away
from God to idols. This is the kind of realization which men facing death
often come to, but still they refuse to personalize it. We have all surely
encountered this kind of thing. And this is our challenge; to personalize
it, and live right now as if we are in God's judgment presence, for things
great and small, things public and hidden.
The idea is that all human labour, physically and spiritually, is in vain. Ecc. 12:14 adjusts this by the inspired editor warning that in fact it is not vain because it will be incorporated somehow into our final judgment at the last day. Paul criticizes this by arguing that because of the resurrection [which koheleth denies], our labour is not in vain "in the Lord". And Isaiah critiques this position by saying that Messiah will be satisfied by the toil / travail of His soul (Is. 53:11). Hezekiah could have been a Messiah figure. But he failed, and didn't want to look forward to the future Messiah whose labour would not be in vain- in that it would bring forth the resurrection of all in Him.
Ecc 3:10 I have seen the burden which God has given to the sons of men to be
afflicted with-
This "burden" or "travail" is something Solomon laments throughout
Ecclesiastes, and considers himself the parade example of it. He seems to
complain that God has given this to people. I suggested on :8 that he
considers the time for everything to be somehow predestined, and yet
complains that for all these things God seeks to judge people (:17). And
so he considers this to be a burden God has given to men to afflict them
with. And yet the Biblical idea of travail or burden is that God brings
these things in order to spiritually develop His people, to do them good
in their latter end (s.w. Dt. 8:2,3,16). The travail of Israel in Egypt
was to bring a new nation to birth. But Solomon has no sense of ultimate,
eternal outcomes; he expects an immediate consequence right now in this
life. And so he considers God unreasonable.
Being "afflicted" was what went on throughout his father David's life (s.w. 1 Kings 2:26; Ps. 132:1). But unlike David, he sees no positive outcome for it.
Ecc 3:11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set
eternity in their hearts, yet so that man can’t find out the work that God
has done from the beginning even to the end-
On Ecc. 2:17 I noted that Solomon despised all the 'work that he had
worked', because he was obsessed with his own works rather than God's
works of salvation by grace. "The work that is worked" is the phrase used
for how Israel were to "do your work" for six days and then observe the
Sabbath (Ex. 23:12). That provision was to teach them that life is more
than works; and the spirit of the Sabbath was to point forward to
salvation by grace in Christ. This lesson was totally lost upon Solomon.
The history of Israel repeatedly talked of how their salvation was the
work which God worked (s.w. Dt. 11:3,7 etc.). But Solomon ignored
God's work because he was so obsessed with his own work, briefly passing
off the work God worked as beyond understanding (Ecc. 3:11 s.w.), and any
grasp upon eternity as therefore having been made too difficult by God.
He
made the mistake so many make, assuming that God's word and work is a
riddle to be solved, with eternal life as the reward for figuring it out.
God is not like that, hiding as it were behind the Bible or some doctrinal
system which He has established as a code to be broken before He deals
with men. He is far more proactive than that in seeking our salvation. And
to those who truly love Him, His teachings are plain, as they were to
David (Jn. 7:17).
But it seems Solomon or Hezekiah liked to think that finding God was a far too difficult intellectual exercise to be achievable, and God had in fact made it so (Ecc. 3:11; 8:17). Because, presumably, He wants to hide Himself from His own creations. Indeed there is the implication that God is cruel to have placed a desire for eternity in man's structure, and yet make it unattainable for him. Man sees a beautiful sunset and reaches for his camera to photograph it, sensing the eternal, but not able to make ultimate sense of it. It's the same idea as the comment that what is crooked cannot be made straight (Ecc. 1:15; 7:13), especially when God has made it crooked (although Isaiah's response is that the crooked will be made straight before Messiah). The argument seems to be that nobody can get totally right with God because He doesn't let them have the chance to change. This is part of the travail or curse which God gave man (:10). But this was just a convenient excuse to not pursue relationship with God. Paul rightly says that God is not far from every man. It is also a studied denial of the possibility of future eternity, at the resurrection. And we hear it today. Isaiah, as so often, comments on this verse by saying that God does declare [Heb. 'explain'] the end from the beginning- it can be found out through His word (Is. 46:10).
The goodness of God can lead all men to repentance (Rom.
2:4). God has set a sense of the eternal in the human heart (Ecc. 3:11 AVmg).
An awareness of judgment is alive as a basic instinct in people. God is “not
far from every one of us… forasmuch as we are [all] the offspring of God”
(Acts 17:27-29- stated in a preaching context), being created in His image.
But Solomon passes all this off as too hard for any human being. The truth
was that he presented it as too difficult because he didn't actually want
eternity as God offers it, in His Kingdom; he wanted an eternal
now, enjoying his own titillations of his own flesh. And he
considered that it was better never to have existed (Ecc. 4:3).
Ecc 3:12 I know that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice, and
to do good as long as they live-
As noted on :1, his sense may be that he now knows [so he
thinks] that it is better to just enjoy life, because God cannot resurrect
to judgment (:22).
Ecc 3:13 Also that every man should eat and drink, and enjoy good in all
his labour, is the gift of God-
I have suggested on Ecc. 3:1,17,24 that Solomon is accusing God of
being unable to resurrect and judge, and therefore his previous
understanding that everything will be brought to judgment was misplaced.
Solomon concludes Ecclesiastes however with an admission that this is in
fact the case; all in human life will be judged finally. So I take chapter
3 as bravado, which in the face of his final death he has to admit was
wrong, although he still fails to repent and accept the personal
implications of this. The idea that work is a "gift of God" appears to be
deconstructed in the New Testament allusions to this; for they insist that
the "gift of God" is the grace of salvation without human works (Eph. 2:8;
Rom. 5:15; 6:23; Jn. 4:10). This suggests that as in Ecc. 2:24,26, Solomon
uses this idea of "this is the gift of God" wrongly and sarcastically.
As often, the allusion is to early Genesis- where God
'gave' labour as part of the curse, labouring to "eat and drink" until he
dies.
Ecc 3:14 I know that whatever God does, it shall be forever. Nothing can
be added to it, nor anything taken from it; and God has done it, that men
should fear before Him-
This must be taken in the context of Solomon's denial that God can
resurrect to judgment (:22), and his complaint that all the life choices
of :2-7 are predestined and so God is burdening man with the idea of
judging them (:8). Solomon reasons as if he has no perspective of eternity
at all. I suggested on :8 that God is being accused of predestining the
behaviour of people and then calling them to judgment. This is what
Solomon once believed, but he is mocking that belief. And saying that in
this case, then God is just putting men in fear of Him.
Human behaviour is
irrelevant, Solomon is saying, because nothing can be added nor subtracted
from God's permanent actions.
The comment that nothing can be added to what God does clearly alludes to the adding of 15 years to Hezekiah's days. Perhaps Hezekiah is lamenting that nothing more could now be added to his 15 years. But verse 14 has alluded to the curse in Eden, and so here the idea may be that that curse from God cannot be changed. But that is a studied denial of the implications of Gen. 3:15, that the curse will be reversed through the future Messiah.
Ecc 3:15 That which is has been long ago, and that which is to be has been
long ago: and God seeks again that which is passed away-
This continues Solomon's accusation that God is unreasonable in
demanding judgment for that which is past, because everything is merely
cyclical, as Solomon began Ecclesiastes by complaining. The "new song"
which his father David loved to sing (Ps. 33:3; 40:3; 96:1; 98:1 etc.)
reflected the sense that the movement of the Spirit results in our living
in "newness of life". But for Solomon, all was as it were old and boring.
He had no sense of the Spirit's renewing work within him. The
previous verses have alluded to the curse in Eden, which koheleth sees as
having been given by God "long ago", and is an unreasonable 'seeking
again' by God of the past sin in Eden. Instead of wallowing in the curse,
koheleth should have seen that the answer to the problem is in the Christ.
Ecc 3:16 Moreover I saw under the sun, in the place of justice, that
wickedness was there; and in the place of righteousness, that wickedness
was there-
Solomon may simply mean that there is no justice in this world, and
therefore he had been attracted toward the idea that the final judgment is
from God, and at a future time (:17). But "the place of justice" is the
phrase used of the place to be established under the Mosaic law for
justice (Dt. 17:8). Solomon is saying that the Mosaic idea didn't work,
because there was wickedness even in the place of justice. He has little
to say about the Mosaic law even in Proverbs, apart from appropriating the
language of blessing for obedience to obedience to his Proverbs, which he
seems to see as a replacement torah. He was specifically disobedient to
the commands about trading in horses and marriage to Gentiles. So
specifically disobedient that it was as if he wished to as it were trash
the Mosaic law and demonstrate it was obsolete or inapplicable to him.
This is relevant to Hezekiah because their leaders judged for bribes at his time (Mic. 3:11). "The place of righteousness" was the term for the middle court where laws were made, according to Rashi. But this was where Isaiah had received the gracious message of Hezekiah's salvation. But now Hezekiah shrugs that off as just a corrupt place. He has no concept of future judgment, and laments that in this life there is no justice in courts, as he does also in Ecc. 5:8. Hence the inspired editor concludes the book with the good news that there is in fact judgment to come.
Ecc 3:17 I said in my heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked;
for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work-
This could mean that this is what he once said in his heart. The whole of
this chapter could be a description of how he once thought, and the
contradictions he now sees in the idea of a Divine judgment leads him up
to the final conclusion in :22, that because "God" cannot resurrect man to
judgment, therefore man may as well get on and enjoy life in a moderate
kind of way. The inspired epilogue reminds us that
indeed, God will do this, as the Preacher once believed (Ecc. 12:14).
Solomon had previously correctly understood that
"God shall judge the righteous and the wicked (at the second coming): for
there is a time there for every purpose and for every
work... for God shall bring every work into judgment, with every
secret thing, whether it be good or bad" (Ecc. 3:17; 12:14). Note the
emphasis on "every". Even what we have spoken in the ear will be
shouted out (Lk. 12:3) -implying others will somehow observe our judgment,
cp. Mt. 12:41. If the judgment is merely a yes/no statement which has been
worked out taking our whole life into consideration, then this emphasis on
every work having a time for consideration and judgment "there" is
pointless. However, these verses must be considered in conjunction with
those which speak of God's 'forgetting' of bad deeds on account of how
people later chose to live. This need not mean that they are
erased from God's infinite knowledge; all too often we perceive God's
memory as a vast memory bank which can have our sins erased from it. But
His knowledge knows no such bounds of human perception; yet He is willing
not to hold those things against us, and to therefore count us as having
never committed them.
Ecc 3:18 I said in my heart, As for the sons of men, God tests them, so
that they may see that they themselves are like animals-
Again we see the outworking of God's judgment upon Hezekiah- he was "left" by God, so that Hezekiah might know what was in his own heart. And here he writes it down.
As suggested on :17, this may be Solomon's recollection of how he had
previously [correctly] understood things. Although all this leads up to
the conclusion in :22; that Solomon no longer considers God able to raise
the dead and bring them to judgment.
Ecc 3:19 For that which happens to the sons of men happens to animals.
Even one thing happens to them. As the one dies, so the other dies. Yes,
they have all one breath; and man has no advantage over the animals: for
all is vanity-
I suggested on
Ecc 3:20 All go to one place. All are from the dust, and all turn to dust
again-
The "all" here refers in the context to both man and animals. As
noted on :19, this is summary of how Solomon had correctly understood
things; indeed he is here quoting Gen. 3:19; Job 10:9; 34:15; Ps. 104:29.
There is no inherent immortality in man; in the way he dies, he is as an
animal. The division between the righteous and unrighteous is not at
death, seeing all go to the same place; rather is it at the resurrection
to judgment at the last day. This belief is necessitated by the simple
fact that at death, all go to the same place; not some to heaven and some
to "hell".
This is one of many allusions to the curse in Eden, whereby "to dust you shall return" (Gen. 3:19), alluding also to the Genesis 2 description of human formation from dust and spirit of God, which must return to Him. There are many allusions to the curse in Ecclesiastes, especially in the verses which speak of man's labour being in vain and just to satisfy his appetite / need to eat. Especially Ecc. 5:17 "All his days he also eats in darkness, he is frustrated, and has sickness and wrath". "God made man upright" (Ecc. 7:29), "one sinner destroys much good." (Ecc. 9:18 cp. Rom. 5:18 "for as by one man sin entered the world... so death passed upon all men"). But Genesis 3 held out the great Hope of redemption from the curse through Messiah. But the koheleth doesn't want to factor that in. He sees death as the final impenetrable frontier, the ultimate boundary, which no man can pass beyond. Although he surely knew Gen. 3:15 as well as he knew Gen. 3:19. Unlike Abraham, he refused to rejoice at the prospect of the day of Christ. But he wallows in the curse [as so much art and human thinking does today, just endlessly lamenting that we are only human], rather than the long term blessing of Eden restored in the Kingdom. But we are intended to perceive this glaring omission- and thereby to be led out of postmodern meaninglessness, to Christ. For it is His resurrection which changes the whole narrative about wallowing in the curse. This is how Ecclesiastes leads to Christ. As Spurgeon used to say, from every town, village and hamlet of England, there is a London road that leads towards London. And so all Scripture leads to the Lord Jesus.
Ecc 3:21 Who knows the spirit of man, whether it goes upward, and the
spirit of the animal, whether it goes downward to the earth?-
This is not saying that the spirit of man goes upward to heaven, and
the spirit of animals goes downward. "Who knows..." as in :22 means 'It is
not the case that...'. The wrong idea is being deconstructed- there is no such distinction; for
Solomon has just stated in :20 that man and animals all go to the same
place. There is no reincarnation, but death is simply a return to the dust
and the life force is retracted by God.
Ecc 3:22 Therefore I saw that there is nothing better, than that a man
should rejoice in his works; for that is his portion: for who can bring
him to see what will be after him?-
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