author points when he says, Ecc 7:19, that wisdom is a stronger protection to a city than “ten mighty men;” Grätz refers this to the decuriones of the Roman municipal cities and colonies; but probably it refers to the dynasties[1] (cf. Assyr. salat, governor) placed by the Persian kings over the cities of conquered countries. And generally, the oppressed spirit pervading the book would be so much clearer if we knew more of the sacrifices which the Jewish people in the later time of the Persians had to make, than merely that the Phoenicians, at the same time with “The Syrians in Palestine,” had to contribute (Herod. vii. 87) to Xerxes for his Grecian expedition three hundred triremes; and also that the people who “dwelt in the Solymean mountains” had to render him assistance in his expedition against Greece (Joseph. c. Ap. i. 22).
The author was without doubt a Palestinian. In Eccl 4:17 he speaks of himself as dwelling where the temple was, and also in the holy city, Ecc 8:10; he lived, if not actually in it, at least in its near neighbourhood, Ecc 10:15; although, as Kleinert remarks, he appears, Ecc 11:1, to make use of a similitude taken from the corn trade of a seaport town. From Ecc 4:8 the supposition is natural that he was alone in the land, without children or brothers or sisters; but from the contents and spirit of the whole book, it appears more certain that, like his Koheleth, he was advanced in years, and had behind him a long checkered life. The symptoms of approaching death presenting themselves in old age, which he describes to the young, Ecc 12:2., he probably borrowed from his own experience. The whole book bears the marks of age, - a production of the Old Covenant which was stricken in age, and fading away.
The literature, down to 1860, of commentaries and monographs on the Book of Koheleth is very fully set forth in the English Commentary of Ginsburg, and from that time to 1867, in Zöckler's Commentary, which forms a part of Lange's Bibelwerk. Keil's Einleitung, 3rd ed. 1873, contains a supplement to these, among which, however, the Bonner Theolog. Literaturblatt, 1874, Nr. 7, misses Pusey's and Reusch's (cf. the Tübingen Theol. Quartalschrift, 1860, pp. 430-469). It is not possible for any man to compass this literature. Aedner's Catalogue of the Hebrew books in the Library of the British Museum, 1867, contains a number of Jewish commentaries omitted by Ginsburg and Zöckler, but far from all. For example, the Commentary of Ahron B. Josef (for the first time printed at Eupatoria, 1834) now lies before me, with those of Moses Frankel (Dessau, 1809), and of Samuel David Luzzatto,
- ↑ Vid., Duncker's Gesch. des Alterthums, II p. 910.
