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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Ecclesiastes 12:13 - 12:13
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“The final result, after all is learned, (is this): Fear God and keep His commandments; for this is the end of every man.” Many expositors, as Jerome, the Venet., and Luther, render נִשְׁמָע as fut.: The conclusion of the discourse we would all hear (Salomon); or: The conclusion of the whole discourse or matter let us hear (Panzer, 1773, de Wette-Augusti); Hitzig also takes together soph davar hakol = soph davar kol-haddavar: The end of the whole discourse let us hear. But הַכֹּל for כֻּלָּנוּ is contrary to the style of the book; and as a general rule, the author uses הכל for the most part of things, seldom of persons. And also soph davar hakol, which it would be better to explain (“the final word of the whole”), with Ewald, §291a, after yemē-olam mosheh, Isa 63:11, than it is explained by Hitzig, although, in spite of Philippi's (Sta. const. p. 17) doubt, possible in point of style, and also exemplified in the later period of the language (1Ch 9:13), is yet a stylistic crudeness which the author could have avoided either by writing soph devar hakol, or better, soph kol-haddavar. נִשְׁמָע, Ewald, §168b, renders as a particip. by audiendum; but that also does not commend itself, for נשמָע signifies nothing else than auditum, and acquires the meaning of audiendum when from the empirical matter of fact that which is inwardly necessary is concluded; the translation: The final word of the whole is to be heard, audiendum est, would only be admissible of also the translation auditum est were possible, which is not the case. Is נִשְׁמָע thus possibly the pausal form of the finite נשׁמַע? We might explain: The end of the matter (summa summarum), all is heard, when, viz., that which follows is heard, which comprehends all that is to be known. Or as Hoelem.: Enough, all is heard, since, viz., that which is given in the book to be learned contains the essence of all true knowledge, viz., the following two fundamental doctrines. This retrospective reference of hakol nishm'a is more natural than the prospective reference; but, on the other hand, it is also more probable that soph davar denotes the final resultat than that it denotes the conclusion of the discourse. The right explanation will be that which combines the retrospective reference of nakol nishm'a and the resultative reference of soph davar. Accordingly, Mendelss. appears to us to be correct when he explains: After thou hast heard all the words of the wise ... this is the final result, etc. Finis (summa) reî omnia audita is = omnibus auditis, for the sentence denoting the conditions remains externally undesignated, in the same way as at Ecc 10:14; Deu 21:1; Ezr 10:6 (Ewald, §341b). After the clause, soph ... nishm'a, Athnach stands where we put a colon: the mediating hocce est is omitted just as at Ecc 7:12 (where translate: yet the preference of knowledge is this, that, etc.).
The sentence, eth-naeolohim yera (“fear God”), repeating itself from Ecc 5:6, is the kernel and the star of the whole book, the highest moral demand which mitigates its pessimism and hallows its eudaemonism. The admonition proceeding therefrom, “and keep His commandments,” is included in lishmo'a, Ecc 5:1, which places the hearing of the divine word, viz., a hearing for the purpose of observing, as the very soul of the worship of God above all the opus operatum of ceremonial services.
The connection of the clause, ki-zeh kol-haadam, Hitzig mediates in an unnecessary, roundabout way: “but not thou alone, but this ought every man.” But why this negative here introduced to stamp כי as an immo establishing it? It is also certainly suitable as the immediate confirmation of the rectitude of the double admonition finally expressing all. The clause has the form of a simple judgment, it is a substantival clause, the briefest expression for the thought which is intended. What is that thought? The lxx renders: ὃτι τοῦτο πᾶς ὁ ἄνθρωπος; also Symm. and the Venet. render kol haadam by πᾶς ὁ ἄνθρ., and an unnamed translator has ὃλος ὁ ἄνθρ., according to which also the translation of Jerome is to be understood, hoc est enim omnis homo. Thus among the moderns, Herzf., Ewald, Elst., and Heiligst.: for that is the whole man, viz., as to his destiny, the end of his existence (cf. as to the subject-matter, Job 28:28); and v. Hofmann (Schriftbew. II 2, p. 456): this is the whole of man, viz., as Grotius explains: totum hominis bonum; or as Dale and Bullock: “the whole duty of man;” or as Tyler: “the universal law (כל, like the Mishnic כְּלַל) of man;” or as Hoelem.: that which gives to man for the first time his true and full worth. Knobel also suggests for consideration this rendering: this is the all of man, i.e., on this all with man rests. But against this there is the one fact, that kol-haadam never signifies the whole man, and as little anywhere the whole (the all) of a man. It signifies either “all men” (πάντες οἱ ἄνθρωποι, οἱ πά ἄνθρ οἱ ἄνθρ πά), as at Ecc 7:2, hu soph kol-haadam, or, of the same meaning as kol-haadam, “every man” (πᾶς ἄντηρωπος), as at Ecc 3:13; Ecc 5:18 (lxx, also Ecc 7:2 : τοῦτο τέλος παντὸς ἀντηρώπου); and it is yet more than improbable that the common expression, instead of which haadam kullo was available, should here have been used in a sense elsewhere unexampled. Continuing in the track of the usus loq., and particularly of the style of the author, we shall thus have to translate: “for this is every man.” If we use for it: “for this is every man's,” the clause becomes at once distinct; Zirkel renders kol-haadam as genit., and reckons the expression among the Graecisms of the book: παντὸς ἀντηρώπου, Ϛιζ., πρᾶγμα. Or if, with Knobel, Hitz., Böttch., and Ginsburg, we might borrow a verb to supplement the preceding imperat.: “for this ought every man to do,” we should also in this way gain the meaning to be expected; but the clause lying before us is certainly a substantival clause, like meh haadam, Ecc 2:12, not an elliptical verbal clause, like Isa 23:5; Isa 26:9, where the verb to be supplied easily unfolds itself from the ל of the end of the movement.
We have here a case which is frequent in the Semitic languages, in which subj. and pred. are connected in the form of a simple judgment, and it is left for the hearer to find out the relation sustained by the pred. to the subj. - e.g., Psa 110:3; Psa 109:4, “I am prayer;” and in the Book of Koheleth, Ecc 3:19, “the children of men are a chance.”
(Note: Vid., Fleischer's Abh. ü. einige Arten der Nominalapposition, 1862, and Philippi's St. const. p. 90ff.)
In the same way we have here to explain: for that is every man, viz., according to his destiny and duty; excellently, Luther: for that belongs to all men. With right, Hahn, like Bauer (1732), regards the pronoun as pred. (not subj. as at Ecc 7:2): “this, i.e., this constituted, that they must do this, are all men,” or rather: this = under obligation thereto, is every man.
(Note: Hitz. thus renders הִיא, Jer 45:4, predicat.: “And it is such, all the world.”)
It is a great thought that is thereby expressed, viz., the reduction of the Israelitish law to its common human essence. This has not escaped the old Jewish teachers. What can this mean: zeh kol-haadam? it is asked, Berachoth 6b; and R. Elazar answers: “The whole world is comprehended therein;” and R. Abba bar-Cahana: “This fundamental law is of the same importance to the universe;” and R. Simeon b. Azzai: “The universe has been created only for the purpose of being commanded this.”
(Note: Cf. Jer. Nedarim ix. 3: “Thou oughtest to love thy neighbour as thyself,” says R. Akiba, is a principal sentence in the Law. Ben-Azzai says: “The words zěh ... adam (Gen 5:1) are it in a yet higher degree,” because therein the oneness of the origin and the destiny of all men is contained. Aben Ezra alludes to the same thing, when at the close of his Comm. he remarks: “The secret of the non-use of the divine name יהוה in Gen 1:1-2:3 is the secret of the Book of Koheleth.”)