The Five Rolls.
The second division of the Hagiographa, known as the Five Rolls, or Megilloth, contains five small books—The Song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, Lamentations, Ruth, and Esther.
The Song of Solomon, Song of Songs, or Canticles, as it is variously called, and Ecclesiastes, or The Preacher, are said to be the works of Solomon—the former a product of his youth, the latter of his old age. It is quite certain that the same author did not write both, and equally certain that Solomon wrote neither.
The Song of Solomon, Ewald affirms, is an anonymous poem, written about the middle of the tenth century B.C..—after Solomon’s time. It is doubtless of much later origin. It belongs to Northern, and not to Southern Palestine. This alone proves that Solomon did not write it. The Talmud says, “Hezekiah and his company wrote Isaiah, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Songs.” Hengstenberg, one of the most orthodox of commentators, says that Ecclesiastes was written centuries after the time of Solomon. Davidson believes that it was written as late as 350 B.C.; while Hartmann and Hitzig, German critics, contend that it was written still later.
Solomon’s Song is an amorous poem, beautiful in its way. But when we turn to it in the Christian Bible and find the running titles of every page and the table of contents of every chapter filled with sanctimonious drivel about Christ and his bride, the Church, we are reminded of a lecherous parson masquerading under the cloak of piety among his female parishioners. The Preacher of Ecclesiastes is something of a Freethought preacher. He is a skeptic and a philosopher.
Lamentations, it is claimed, was composed by Jeremiah. There is little evidence either for or against this claim. Oort affirms that its ascription to Jeremiah is a “mistaken tradition,” that its five poems were written by five different authors and at different times. The habit of ascribing anonymous writings to eminent men was prevalent among the Jews. Moses, Joshua, Samuel, David, Solomon, Daniel, and probably Jeremiah, have been declared the authors of books of which they never heard.
Ruth is the only book of the Bible whose authorship is generally conceded by Christians to be unknown. Dr. Hitchcock says: “There is nothing whatever by which the authorship of it can be determined.”
Many orthodox scholars admit that Esther’s authorship, like that of Ruth, is unknown. Some credit it to Mordecai. It was written as late as 300 B.C., 150 years after Mordecai’s time. The Vulgate and modern Catholic versions include six chapters not found in our authorized version. There are many books in the Bible devoid of truth, but probably none so self-evidently false as Esther. It has been described as “a tissue of glaring impossibilities from beginning to end.” Luther pronounces it a “heathenish extravagance.”