Hermeneia: Qoheleth: A Commentary (Herm)
Overview
Qoheleth presents a special challenge not only for professional commentators but also for ‘normal’ readers of the Hebrew text (or a modern translation). Most people in modern Western industrial societies can relate without great difficulty to the reflections of the book of Qoheleth on work and rest or on behavior vis-á-vis those in power, and they can understand these reflections in terms of their own experiences. Nonetheless, the way in which these and other themes are handled in Qoheleth is a little puzzling. The fact that the book reveals no clear organization and no overall progression of ideas may be accepted as a literary peculiarity and perhaps even strike one as interesting. Yet when one finds on various themes many statements that are highly contradictory in both the broad and the narrow context, one begins to ask what could be the point of this book and what is the purpose expressed in it. The present commentary seeks to help answer these questions.
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- Includes a number of valuable insights
- Presents a detailed and authoritative interpretation
- Provides a fantastic commentary for students, teachers, scholars, and professors
Top Highlights
“Yet even here the meaning of הֶבֶל hebel seems to vary according to context between the negative: ‘worthless, futile,’ and the neutral: ‘transitory, fleeting.’ The translation with ‘futile and fleeting’ attempts to keep this range of meaning open at the beginning of the book.” (Page 42)
“These insights can help a person to accept and endure ‘times of unhappiness’ in his life—especially since the openness and unpredictability of the future (v. 14bβ*) always contain the possibility of an improvement in one’s situation.” (Page 138)
“Wisdom and power are not necessarily connected with each other (cf. 4:13*).” (Page 40)
“Thus human beings can understand the idea that God made everything beautiful in its time, and they can also experience this fragmentarily and at certain points, if they are happy and enjoy their lives (vv. 12–13*; cf. 5:17*: טוֹב אֲשֶׁר־יָפֶה ṭȏb ʾăšer-yāpeh). But they cannot grasp and comprehend in every individual case how and in what sense that which God has made is ‘beautiful.’” (Page 87)
“That indicates that 1:3–12:7* not only develops variations on one and the same basic thought formulated in 1:2* and 12:8*11 but also points to an overall argumentative inclination.” (Page 43)
- Title: Qoheleth: A Commentary
- Author: Thomas Kruger
- Series: Hermeneia
- Publisher: Fortress Press
- Print Publication Date: 2004
- Logos Release Date: 2006
- Pages: 320
- Era: era:contemporary
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subject: Bible › Commentaries--Collected works
- ISBNs: 9780800660369, 0800660366
- Resource ID: LLS:HRMNEIA21QLH
- Resource Type: Bible Commentary
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-03-25T20:00:58Z