Reaching Out to the 20th Century

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Scores of contemporary artists and writers have used Qoheleth’s words as springboards for their own. They may truly be called children of the Preacher.

The American novelist Thomas Wolfe, in his last novel, You Can’t Go Home Again, wrote:

“I am not given to dogmatic judgments in the matter of literary creation, but if I had to make one, I could only say that Ecclesiastes is the greatest single piece of writing I have ever known, and the wisdom expressed in it the most lasting and profound.”

Ecclesiastes was number one on Wolfe’s list of influential books, ahead of Shakespeare, Milton and Tolstoy.

In a letter written toward the end of his life, Wolfe wrote:

“I have lately had a very thorough soaking in Ecclesiastes and that remarkable man … magnificently expressed what I have myself been almost thirty years in finding: I not only have nothing to add to what I found there, I even fall far short of the wisdom.”

Wolfe was not alone in his admiration for Ecclesiastes. Tolstoy himself, the author of War and Peace and Anna Karenina, regarded Ecclesiastes as the apex of biblical wisdom. George Bernard Shaw equated Ecclesiastes with works by Shakespeare. The Irish poet William Butler Yeats regularly quoted the Preacher.

Thomas Hardy, in Tess of the D’Urbervilles, expressed his heroine’s deepest utterances in verses borrowed from Ecclesiastes: “Was there another such a wretched being as she in the world? and thinking of her wasted life, [she] said, ‘All is vanity.’ ”

T. S. Eliot infused his poetry with images from Ecclesiastes.

The modern American novelist John Updike, in his probing Rabbit trilogy, calls Ecclesiastes “the Lord’s last word.” Even the salty sage of American literature, Herman Melville, alluded to the Preacher’s 035time-tested wisdom in a passage in Moby Dick: “The truest of all … books is Solomon’s, and Ecclesiastes is the fine-hammered steel of woe. ‘All is vanity.’ All. This willful world hath not got hold of … Solomon’s wisdom yet.”

Ernest Hemingway was another of the Preacher’s children. For Hemingway, Ecclesiastes was the real stuff of life, the permanent, unchanging human commentary. Hemingway regarded the Preacher as “a better writer.”

Hemingway’s most durable novel, The Sun Also Rises, begins with the following epigraph:

“One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth forever … The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to the place where he arose …. The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits …. All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again.”

—Ecclesiastes

“You are all a lost generation.”

—Gertrude Stein

Shortly after his controversial novel was published, Hemingway explained that his point in writing the book had been to contrast the permanence of the natural world with the impermanence of his own superficial, pagan generation. Hence, the juxtaposed quotes from Ecclesiastes and from one of Hemingway’s literary mentors, Gertrude Stein.

Reexamining the Ecclesiastes quote used in his epigraph, however, I believe we can see a deeper truth: The simple recognition of what is. As a realist, Hemingway is interested in what is. Not what was, or what shall be, or what should be. But what is. The emphasis is on the present, the touchable, discernible, present reality. From start to finish, Hemingway’s work focuses on what is.

Likewise, throughout the Preacher’s impressive themes and thinly spun narrative, we see a penetrating focus on what is: At the book’s end we realize that ultimately what we have read is a transcription of reality—a transcription that sounds much like Hemingway or some other modern writer. The language and terms are simple. The meanings are straightforward, the implications down-to-earth and everyday. No high-minded spirituality exists. No promises of immortality. No false hopes. Just straight, honest examination of human beings and the world in which we move.

Theologian Paul Tillich explains the Preacher’s appeal to modern authors by characterizing him as the forerunner of existentialist philosopher-poets. Because many modern writers are existentialists, who believe that meaning must be created or imposed by man in an otherwise meaningless universe, they find great resonance in Ecclesiastes. Wrote Tillich:

“The spirit of the Preacher is strong today in our minds. His mood fills our philosophy and poetry. The vanity of human existence is described powerfully by those who call themselves philosophers or poets of existence. They are all children of the Preacher, the great existentialist of his period.”¹

George Orwell regarded Ecclesiastes as the paragon of style. In his famous essay, “Politics and the English Language,” Orwell compared Ecclesiastes’ statement of its theme to the same thought as it might be expressed in modern, bureaucratic, degraded English. Here is Ecclesiastes (9:11):

“I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.”

Then, to illustrate the decay and decline of modern English usage, Orwell translated this passage into what a modern pedestrian writer might give us:

“Objective consideration of contemporary phenomena compels the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.”

As the English-speaking world gasps for breath in a milieu of vagueness and ambiguity (from political rhetoric to advertising copy), we all benefit from immersing ourselves in the clear, focused thinking of 036Ecclesiastes.

The Preacher gives us his own comments on style, with which Orwell would certainly agree:

“A fool’s voice is known by a multitude of words” (Ecclesiastes 5:3).

“The more words, the less the meaning, and how does that profit anyone?” (Ecclesiastes 6:11).

“The Preacher sought to find out acceptable words: and that which was written was upright, even words of truth. The words of the wise are as goads, and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies” (Ecclesiastes 12:10–11).

In his unique way, the Preacher teaches us that clear thinking and honesty begin with a focused attention on the words of our language. Weigh them carefully, use them judiciously, keep them simple and from the heart.

Orwell concluded his essay with advice based loosely on what he had learned from the Preacher:

“Never use a long word where a short one will do. If it is possible to cut a word out, do so. Never use the passive where you can use the active. Never use a jargon word when an everyday English word will do.”

As a purely realistic statement, Ecclesiastes provides a marvelous counterweight to all the history, prophecy and spiritual promise elsewhere in the Bible. Where David praises, the Preacher sulks. Where Daniel prophesies, the Preacher says: “Don’t pay too much attention to what will be: Think about what is.” Where John promises, the Preacher negates. And where the Gospels say “accept,” the Preacher says “analyze.”

While no one really knows how Ecclesiastes came to be accepted into the sacred canon, its existence there suggests that there is indeed a “backside” to biblical truth. Perhaps the Bible should be likened to a two-sided coin. On the “heads” side are the wonderful, positive truths of grace and salvation. On the “tails” side are the harsh truths of doubt and unbelief. As believers, we tend to focus only on the heads side; as skeptics, we see only the tails side. Perhaps we should acknowledge, as the original creators of the canon may have intended, that belief and skepticism exist in all of us, and that we should be more willing to stand the coin of truth on its edge so that we may see both sides simultaneously.

Scores of contemporary artists and writers have used Qoheleth’s words as springboards for their own. They may truly be called children of the Preacher.