Mr. Tyler’s introduction to his Ecclesiastes is a work of great acuteness and originality, and seeks to provide against all reasonable objections; I cannot do justice to it here. One part of his theory, however, is too remarkable to be passed over (see above, pp. [240], [241]). He supposes that Stoic and Epicurean doctrines were deliberately set over against each other by the wise man who wrote our book, in order by the clash of opposites to deter the reader from dangerous and unsatisfying investigations. The goal of the author’s philosophising thus becomes the negation of all philosophy, and this ‘sacrificio dell’ intelletto’ he insinuatingly commends by the subtlest use of artifice. Such a theory may have occurred to one or another early writer (see Ginsburg), but seems out of harmony with the character of the author as revealed in his book. He is not such a weak-kneed wrestler for truth. You may fancy him sometimes a Stoic, sometimes an Epicurean; but he always speaks like a man in earnest, however his opinions may change through the fluctuations of his moods. Mr. Tyler’s theory confounds Koheleth’s point of view with that of a far inferior thinker, the author of Ecclesiasticus (see above, p. [199]).
I cannot, therefore, be persuaded to explain this enigmatical book by a supposed contact with Greek philosophy such as we do really find in the Book of Wisdom. I have no prejudice against the supposition in itself. It would help me to understand the Hellenising movement at a later day if Stoic and (still more) Epicurean ideas had already filtered into the minds of the Jewish aristocracy. The denunciations in the Book of Enoch (xciv. 5, xcviii. 15, civ. 10) not impossibly refer to a heretical philosophical literature (see p. [233]); the only question is, To a native or to a half foreign literature? I see no sufficient reason at present for adopting the latter alternative. Koheleth is really a native Hebrew philosopher, the first Jew who, however awkwardly and ineffectually, ‘gave his mind to seek and explore by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven’ (i. 13). Very touching in this light are the memoranda which he has left us. They are incomplete enough; Koheleth is but the forerunner of more systematic philosophisers. His ideas are nothing less than scholastic; how could we expect anything different, his first object being in all probability to soothe the pain of an inward struggle by giving it literary expression? If, however, I was compelled to suggest a secondary reference to any foreign system, I could most easily suppose one to the pessimistic teaching of Hegesias Peisithanatos, who, after Ptolemy Soter and Philadelphus had made Alexandria the seat of the world’s commerce and the centre of Greek literature and culture, was seized with the thought of the vanity of all things, of the preponderance of evil, and of the impossibility of happiness.[[411]] Koheleth’s teaching would be a safeguard to any Jew who might be tempted by this too popular philosopher. He admits ματαιότης ματαιοτήτων, but insists that, granting all drawbacks, ‘the light is sweet’ (xi. 7), the living are better off than the dead (ix. 4-6), and sensuous pleasure, used in moderation, is at least a relative good (ii. 24); also that it is futile to inquire ‘why the former days (of the earlier Ptolemies?) were better than these’ (vii. 10), and, if a later view of his meaning may be trusted, he sought to displace the many dangerous books which were current by words which were at once pleasantly written and objectively true (xii. 10, 12).
Koheleth is a native Hebrew philosopher. The philosophy of an eastern sage is not to be tied up in the rigid formulæ of the West. Easterns may indeed take kindly to Western doctrines; but where they think independently, they eschew system. Koheleth’s seeming Stoicism is, as we have seen, of primitive Hebrew affinities; his seeming Epicureanism, if it be not sufficiently explained as a mental reaction against the gloom of the times, may perhaps be connected more or less closely, not with the schools of Greek philosophers, but with the banquet-halls of Egypt. The Hebrew writer’s invitations to enjoy life remind us of the call to ‘drink and be happy,’ which accompanied the grim symbolic ‘coffin,’ or mummy, at Egyptian feasts (probably they were funeral-feasts), according to Herodotus (ii. 78), and of the festal dirges translated by Goodwin and Stern.[[412]] A stanza in one of the latter may be given here. It is from the song supposed to be sung by the harper at an anniversary funeral feast in honour of Neferhotep, a royal scribe, and still to be seen cut in the stone at Abd-el-Gurna, in the Theban necropolis. As Ebers has remarked,[[413]] the song ‘shows how a certain fresh delight in life mingled with the feelings about death that were prevalent among the ancient Egyptians, who celebrated their festivals more boisterously than most other peoples.’ By a poetic fiction, the dead man is supposed to be present, and to listen to the song.
Make a good day, O holy father!
Let odours and oils stand before thy nostril.
Wreaths of lotus are on the arms and the bosom of thy sister,
Dwelling in thy heart, sitting beside thee.
Let song and music be before thy face,
And leave behind thee all evil cares!
Mind thee of joy, till cometh the day of pilgrimage,