style with the finite of the verb, נעשׂה is not the 3rd pret., but the particip. It is not, however, necessary, with Hitz., to read נישׂה. The foreign word, like the (Arab.) firdans, παράδεισος, admits of use in the double gend. (Ewald, §174g); but it is also possible that the fem. נעשׂה is per. attract. occasioned by הרעה, as Kimchi, Michlol 10a, supposes (cf. besides, under Ecc 10:15). מעשׂה is const. governed by phithgam, and hara'ah is thus obj. gen. The lxx, Syr., and Jerome read מעשׂי, which would be possible only if phithgam min - after the analogy of the Heb.-Aram. phrase, niphra' ('ithpera') min, to take one's due of any one, i.e., to take vengeance on him, to punish him - could mean the full execution of punishment on any one; but it means here, as Jerome rightly translates, sententia; impossible, however, with me'ose hara'ah, sententia contra malos. Hengst. supposes that not only the traditional text, but also the accentuation, is correct, for he construes: because a sentence (of the heavenly Judge) is not executed, the work of wickedness is haste, i.e., speedy. Thus also Dachselt in the Biblia accentuata. Mercerus, on the contrary, remarks that the accents are not in the first instance marks of interpunction, but of cantillation. In fact, genit. word-connections do not exclude the keeping them asunder by distinctives such as Pashta and Tiphcha, Isa 10:2, and also Zakeph, as e.g., Est 1:4. The lxx well renders: “Therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully persuaded in them to do evil;” for which Jerome, freely, after Symm.: absque timore ullo filii hominum perpetrant mala. The heart of one becomes full to do anything, is = it acquires full courage thereto (Luzzatto, §590: gli blastò l'animo); cf. Est 7:5 : “Where is he who has his heart filled to do?” (thus rightly, Keil), i.e., whom it has encourage to so bold an undertaking. בּהם in itself unnecessarily heightens the expression of the inwardness of the destructive work (vid., Psychol. p. 151f.). The sentence of punishment does not take effect mehera, hastily (adv. accus. for bimherah, Ecc 4:12), therefore men are secure, and they give themselves with full, i.e., with fearless and shameless, boldness to the practice of evil. The author confirms this further, but not without expressing his own conviction that there is a righteous requital which contradicts this appearance.
Verses 12-13
Ecc 8:12-13 “Because a sinner doeth evil an hundred times, and he becometh old therein, although I know that it will go well with them that fear god, that fear before Him: but it will not go well with the wicked, and he shall not live long, like a shadow; because he feareth not before God.” Ewald (whom Heiligst., Elst., and Zöckl. follow), as among the ancients, e.g., Mendelssohn, translates Ecc 8:12 :
