Pengkhotbah 7:2-6

7:2 It is better to go to a funeral ¹ 

than a feast. ² 

For death ³  is the destiny ⁴  of every person, ⁵ 

and the living should ⁶  take this ⁷  to heart.

7:3 Sorrow ⁸  is better than laughter,

because sober reflection ⁹  is good for the heart. ¹⁰ 

7:4 The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning,

but the heart of fools is in the house of merrymaking. ¹¹ 

Frivolous Living Versus Wisdom

7:5 It is better for a person to receive ¹²  a rebuke from those who are wise ¹³ 

than to listen to the song ¹⁴  of fools.

7:6 For like the crackling of quick-burning thorns ¹⁵  under a cooking pot,

so is the laughter of the fool.

This kind of folly ¹⁶  also is useless. ¹⁷ 

Amsal 14:13

14:13 Even in laughter the heart may ache, ¹⁸ 

and the end ¹⁹  of joy may be ²⁰  grief.

Yesaya 22:12-13

22:12 At that time the sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies, called for weeping and mourning,

for shaved heads and sackcloth. ²¹ 

22:13 But look, there is outright celebration! ²² 

You say, “Kill the ox and slaughter the sheep,

eat meat and drink wine.

Eat and drink, for tomorrow we die!” ²³ 

Amos 6:3-6

6:3 You refuse to believe a day of disaster will come, ²⁴ 

but you establish a reign of violence. ²⁵ 

6:4 They lie around on beds decorated with ivory, ²⁶ 

and sprawl out on their couches.

They eat lambs from the flock,

and calves from the middle of the pen.

6:5 They sing ²⁷  to the tune of ²⁸  stringed instruments; ²⁹ 

like David they invent ³⁰  musical instruments.

6:6 They drink wine from sacrificial bowls, ³¹ 

and pour the very best oils on themselves. ³² 

Yet they are not concerned over ³³  the ruin ³⁴  of Joseph.

Amos 6:1

The Party is over for the Rich

6:1 Woe ³⁵  to those who live in ease in Zion, ³⁶ 

to those who feel secure on Mount Samaria.

They think of themselves as ³⁷  the elite class of the best nation.

The family ³⁸  of Israel looks to them for leadership. ³⁹ 

Pengkhotbah 4:2-4

4:2 So I considered ⁴⁰  those who are dead and gone ⁴¹ 

more fortunate than those who are still alive. ⁴² 

4:3 But better than both is the one who has not been born ⁴³ 

and has not seen the evil things that are done on earth. ⁴⁴ 

Labor Motivated by Envy

4:4 Then I considered ⁴⁵  all the skillful work ⁴⁶  that is done:

Surely it is nothing more than ⁴⁷  competition ⁴⁸  between one person and another. ⁴⁹ 

This also is profitless – like ⁵⁰  chasing the wind.

[7:2]  ¹ tn Heb “house of mourning.” The phrase refers to a funeral where the deceased is mourned.

[7:2]  ² tn Heb “house of drinking”; or “house of feasting.” The Hebrew noun מִשְׁתֶּה (mishteh) can denote (1) “feast; banquet,” occasion for drinking-bouts (1 Sam 25:36; Isa 5:12; Jer 51:39; Job 1:5; Esth 2:18; 5:14; 8:17; 9:19) or (2) “drink” (exilic/postexilic – Ezra 3:7; Dan 1:5, 8, 16); see HALOT 653 s.v. מִשְׁתֶּה 4; BDB 1059 s.v. שָׁתַה.

[7:2]  sn Qoheleth recommended that people soberly reflect on the brevity of life and the reality of death (It is better to go to a house of mourning) than to waste one’s life in the foolish pursuit of pleasure (than to go to a house of banqueting). Sober reflection on the brevity of life and reality of death has more moral benefit than frivolous levity.

[7:2]  ³ tn Heb “it”; the referent (“death”) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[7:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “the end.” The noun סוֹף (sof) literally means “end; conclusion” (HALOT 747 s.v. סוֹף 1; BDB 693 s.v. סוֹף). It is used in this context in reference to death, as the preceding phrase “house of mourning” (i.e., funeral) suggests.

[7:2]  ⁵ tn Heb “all men” or “every man.”

[7:2]  ⁶ tn The imperfect tense verb יִתֵּן, yitten (from נָתָן, natan, “to give”) functions in a modal sense, denoting obligation, that is, the subject’s obligatory or necessary conduct: “should” or “ought to” (see R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 31-32, §172; IBHS 508-9 §31.4g).

[7:2]  ⁷ tn The word “this” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for smoothness.

[7:3]  ⁸ tn NEB suggests “grief”; NJPS, “vexation.”

[7:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “in sadness of face there is good for the heart.”

[7:3]  ¹⁰ tn Or possibly “Though the face is sad, the heart may be glad.”

[7:4]  ¹¹ sn The expression the house of merrymaking refers to a banquet where those who attend engage in self-indulgent feasting and riotous drinking.

[7:5]  ¹² tn Heb “hear.”

[7:5]  ¹³ tn Heb “rebuke of the wise,” a subjective genitive (“the wise” administer the rebuke).

[7:5]  ¹⁴ tn Or “praise.” The antithetical parallelism between “rebuke” (גַּעֲרַת, ga’arat) and “song” (שִׁיר, shir) suggests that the latter is figurative (metonymy of association) for praise/flattery which is “music” to the ears: “praise of fools” (NEB, NJPS) and “flattery of fools” (Douay). However, the collocation of “song” (שִׁיר) in 7:5 with “laughter” (שְׂחֹק, sÿkhoq) in 7:6 suggests simply frivolous merrymaking: “song of fools” (KJV, NASB, NIV, ASV, RSV, NRSV).

[7:6]  ¹⁵ tn The term “thorns” (הַסִּירִים, hassirim) refers to twigs from wild thorn bushes which were used as fuel for quick heat, but burn out quickly before a cooking pot can be properly heated (e.g., Pss 58:9; 118:12).

[7:6]  ¹⁶ tn The word “kind of folly” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity.

[7:6]  ¹⁷ tn It is difficult to determine whether the Hebrew term הֶבֶל (hevel) means “fleeting” or “useless” in this context. The imagery of quick-burning thorns under a cooking pot is ambiguous and can be understood in more than one way: (1) It is useless to try to heat a cooking pot by burning thorns because they burn out before the pot can be properly heated; (2) the heat produced by quick-burning thorns is fleeting – it produces quick heat, but lasts only for a moment. Likewise, the “laughter of a fool” can be taken in both ways: (1) In comparison to the sober reflection of the wise, the laughter of fools is morally useless: the burning of thorns, like the laughter of fools, makes a lot of noise but accomplishes nothing; (2) the laughter of fools is fleeting due to the brevity of life and certainty of death. Perhaps this is an example of intentional ambiguity.

[14:13]  ¹⁸ sn No joy is completely free of grief. There is a joy that is superficial and there is underlying pain that will remain after the joy is gone.

[14:13]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and its end, joy, is grief.” The suffix may be regarded as an Aramaism, a proleptic suffix referring to “joy.”

[14:13]  ²⁰ tn The phrase “may be” is not in the Hebrew but is supplied from the parallelism, which features an imperfect of possibility.

[22:12]  ²¹ tn Heb “for baldness and the wearing of sackcloth.” See the note at 15:2.

[22:13]  ²² tn Heb “happiness and joy.”

[22:13]  ²³ tn The prophet here quotes what the fatalistic people are saying. The introductory “you say” is supplied in the translation for clarification; the concluding verb “we die” makes it clear the people are speaking. The six verbs translated as imperatives are actually infinitives absolute, functioning here as finite verbs.

[6:3]  ²⁴ tn Heb “those who push away a day of disaster.”

[6:3]  ²⁵ tn Heb “you bring near a seat of violence.” The precise meaning of the Hebrew term שֶׁבֶת (shevet, “seat, sitting”) is unclear in this context. The translation assumes that it refers to a throne from which violence (in the person of the oppressive leaders) reigns. Another option is that the expression refers not to the leaders’ oppressive rule, but to the coming judgment when violence will overtake the nation in the person of enemy invaders.

[6:4]  ²⁶ tn Heb “beds of ivory.”

[6:5]  ²⁷ tn The meaning of the Hebrew verb פָּרַט (parat), which occurs only here in the OT, is unclear. Some translate “strum,” “pluck,” or “improvise.”

[6:5]  ²⁸ tn Heb “upon the mouth of,” that is, “according to.”

[6:5]  ²⁹ sn The stringed instruments mentioned here are probably harps (cf. NIV, NRSV) or lutes (cf. NEB).

[6:5]  ³⁰ tn The meaning of the Hebrew phrase חָשְׁבוּ לָהֶם (khoshvu lahem) is uncertain. Various options include: (1) “they think their musical instruments are like David’s”; (2) “they consider themselves musicians like David”; (3) “they esteem musical instruments highly like David”; (4) “they improvise [new songs] for themselves [on] instruments like David”; (5) “they invent musical instruments like David.” However, the most commonly accepted interpretation is that given in the translation (see S. M. Paul, Amos [Hermeneia], 206-7).

[6:6]  ³¹ sn Perhaps some religious rite is in view, or the size of the bowls is emphasized (i.e., bowls as large as sacrificial bowls).

[6:6]  ³² tn Heb “with the best of oils they anoint [themselves].”

[6:6]  ³³ tn Or “not sickened by.”

[6:6]  ³⁴ sn The ruin of Joseph may refer to the societal disintegration in Israel, or to the effects of the impending judgment.

[6:1]  ³⁵ tn On the Hebrew term הוֹי (hoy; “ah, woe”) as a term of mourning, see the notes in 5:16, 18.

[6:1]  ³⁶ sn Zion is a reference to Jerusalem.

[6:1]  ³⁷ tn The words “They think of themselves as” are supplied in the translation for clarification. In the Hebrew text the term נְקֻבֵי (nÿquvey; “distinguished ones, elite”) is in apposition to the substantival participles in the first line.

[6:1]  ³⁸ tn Heb “house.”

[6:1]  ³⁹ tn Heb “comes to them.”

[4:2]  ⁴⁰ tn The verb שָׁבַח (shavakh) has a two-fold range of meaning: (1) “to praise; to laud”; and (2) “to congratulate” (HALOT 1387 s.v. I שׁבח; BDB 986 s.v. II שָׁבַח). The LXX translated it as ἐπῄνεσα (ephnesa, “I praised”). The English versions reflect the range of possible meanings: “praised” (KJV, ASV, Douay); “congratulated” (MLB, NASB); “declared/judged/accounted/thought…fortunate/happy” (NJPS, NEB, NIV, RSV, NRSV, NAB).

[4:2]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “the dead who had already died.”

[4:2]  ⁴² tn Heb “the living who are alive.”

[4:3]  ⁴³ tn The word “born” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity.

[4:3]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “under the sun.”

[4:4]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “saw.”

[4:4]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “all the toil and all the skill.” This Hebrew clause (אֶת־כָּל־עָמָל וְאֵת כָּל־כִּשְׁרוֹן, ’et-kol-’amal vÿ’et kol-kishron) is a nominal hendiadys (a figurative expression in which two independent phrases are used to connote the same thing). The second functions adverbially, modifying the first, which retains its full nominal function: “all the skillful work.”

[4:4]  ⁴⁷ tn The phrase “nothing more than” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity.

[4:4]  ⁴⁸ tn The noun קִנְאַה (qin’ah, “competition”) has a wide range of meanings: “zeal; jealousy; envy; rivalry; competition; suffering; animosity; anger; wrath” (HALOT 1110 s.v.; BDB 888 s.v.). Here, as in 9:6, it denotes “rivalry” (BDB 888 s.v. 1) or “competitive spirit” (HALOT 1110 s.v. 1.b). The LXX rendered it ζῆλος (zhlos, “envy; jealousy”). The English versions reflect this broad range: “rivalry” (NEB, NAB, NASB), “envy” (KJV, ASV, RSV, NRSV, MLB, NIV, NJPS), and “jealousy” (Moffatt).

[4:4]  ⁴⁹ tn Heb “a man and his neighbor.”

[4:4]  ⁵⁰ tn The word “like” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity.