When Life Feels Meaningless
Hi GAMErs!
Today we begin the book of Ecclesiastes, often considered one of the most puzzling books in the Bible. The book of Ecclesiastes is about a person known only as “Qohelet”, a Hebrew word often translated into English as the “Teacher” or the “Preacher”, or “Ecclesiastes” in Greek. Qohelet looks back on his life and draws a number of conclusions based on his life experiences. Traditionally Qohelet has been identified with King Solomon for many reasons: he is described as a “son of David” (1:1), was “king over Israel in Jerusalem” (1:12), had more wisdom than anyone who ruled in Jerusalem before him (1:16), undertook huge projects (2:4-6), amassed incredible wealth (2:7-8a), owned a harem (2:8), imparted knowledge to the people (12:9), searched out and arranged many proverbs (12:9) and came up with many of his own wise sayings (12:10). All that certainly sounds like Solomon, although his name is never mentioned explicitly in the book. Some scholars question whether the author of Ecclesiastes was actually Solomon. They instead argue that Ecclesiastes falls within a genre of ancient Near Eastern writing known as a fictional autobiography, where someone adopts the persona of a famous person (in this case, Solomon) in order to communicate their ideas. Ecclesiastes reads like an old, jaded, disillusioned King Solomon in his later years, expressing what is left of his faith in God after he had married many foreign wives and worshiped many foreign gods. Whether the writer of Ecclesiastes was actually Solomon or not, there is much we can learn from this book in the Bible.
