Ecclesiastes 7:26

And I find more bitter than death The result is a strange one in its contrast to the dominant tendency of Hebrew thought; especially we may add to that thought as represented by the Son of David with whom the Debater identifies himself. We think of the praises of the Shulamite in the Song of Solomon; of the language of Proverbs 5:13; and (though that is probably of later date) of the acrostic panegyric on the virtuous woman in Proverbs 31:10-31; and we find here nothing like an echo of them, but rather a tone of scorn, culminating in Ecclesiastes 7:28 in that which reminds us of the misogyny of the later maxim-makers of Greece, or of the Eastern king who never heard of any great calamity or crime without asking, Who is she?Such a change might, it is true, be explained as the result of the satiety into which the historical Solomon might have fallen as the penalty of his sensuality; and has its parallel in the cynical scorn of Catullus for the Lesbia whom he had once loved so tenderly (see Introduction, ch. iii.) and in that of a thousand others. Doubtless the words speak of such a personal experience on the part of the Debater. He had found no wickedness like that of the "strange woman," such as she is painted in Proverbs 2:16-19; Proverbs 7:1-27. But we can scarcely fail to trace the influence of the Greek thought with which, as we have seen, the writer had come into contact. Of this the following may serve as samples out of a somewhat large collection.

Μεστὸν κακῶν πέφυκε φορτίον γυνή.

"A woman is a burden full of ills."

Ὅπου γυναῖκες εἰσι, πάντʼ ἐκεῖ κακά.

"Where women are, all evils there are found."

Θηρῶν ἁπάντων ἀγριωτέρα γυνή.

"Woman is fiercer than all beasts of prey."

Poet. Graec. Gnomici, Ed. Tauchnitz, p. 182.

It might, perhaps, be pleaded in reference to this verse that the writer speaks of one class of women only, probably that represented in the pictures of Proverbs 2 or 7 and that the "corruptio optimi est pessima," but the next verse makes the condemnation yet more sweeping. The suggestion that the writer allegorizes, and means by "the woman" here the abstract ideal of sensuality is quite untenable.

In the imagery of "snares" and "nets" and "bands" some critics (Tyler) have traced a reminiscence of the history of Samson and Delilah (Judges 16). Such a reference to Hebrew history is however not at all after the writer's manner, and it is far more natural to see in it the result of his own personal experience (see Introduction, ch. iii.). The Son of Sirach follows, it may be noted, in the same track of thought, though with a somewhat less sweeping condemnation (Sir 25:15-26; Sir 26:6-12).

whoso pleaseth God The marginal reading, whoso is good before God should be noted as closer to the Hebrew.