Ecclesiastes 1:11

There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after. (THERE IS) NO REMEMBRANCE OF FORMER (THINGS) or persons. The reason why some things are thought "new," which are not really so, is the imperfect record that exists of preceding ages among their successors. NEITHER SHALL THERE BE (ANY) REMEMBRANCE OF (THINGS) (RATHER, OF THE PERSONS) THAT ARE TO COME WITH (THOSE) THAT SHALL COME AFTER - i:e., with these that live still later than, the 'things (rather, the persons or 'generations,' , with which this verse is connected, the six intermediate verses being merely illustrations of , Weiss) that are to come' ...

9-11 Men's hearts and their corruptions are the same now as in former times; their desires, and pursuits, and complaints, still the same. This should take us from expecting happiness in the creature, and quicken us to seek eternal blessings. How many things and persons in Solomon's day were thought very great, yet there is no remembrance of them now!...

Verse Ecclesiastes 1:11. THERE IS _NO REMEMBRANCE_] I believe the general meaning to be this: Multitudes of _ancient transactions_ have been lost, because they were not _recorded_; and of many that have been recorded, the _records_ are _lost_. And this will be the case with many others which are yet to occur. How many persons, not much acquainted with books, have supposed that certain things were their own discoveries, which have been _written_ or _printed_ even long before they were born! _Dutens_, in his _Origin of the_ _Discoveries attributed to the Moderns_, has made a very clear case....

THINGS - Rather, men....

EXPOSITION ECCLESIASTES 1:1 THE TITLE. THE WORDS OF THE PREACHER, THE SON OF DAVID, KING IN JERUSALEM; Septuagint, "King of Israel in Jerusalem" (comp.Ecclesiastes 1:12). The word rendered "Preacher" is _Koheleth_,_ _a feminine noun formed from a verb _kalal_,_ _"to call" (see Introduction, § 1), and perhaps better rendered" Convener" or "Debater." It is found nowhere else but in this book, where it occurs three times in this chapter (Ecclesiastes 1:1, Ecclesiastes 1:2,...

[THERE] IS NO REMEMBRANCE OF FORMER [THINGS],.... Which is the reason why some things that are really old are thought to be new; because either the memories of men fail them, they do not remember the customs and usages which were in the former part of their own lives, now grown old; or they are ignorant of what were in ages past, through want of history, or defect in it; either they have no history at all, or what they have is false; or if true, as there is very little that is so, it is very deficient; and, among the many things that have been, very few are transmitted to posterity, so that the memory of things is lost; therefore who can say with certainty of anything, this is new, and was never known in the world before? and the same for the future will be the case of present things; see Ecclesiastes 2:16; neither shall there be any remembrance of [things] that are

ANALYSIS AND ANNOTATIONS PART I. Chapter S 1-6 1. The Prologue and the Search Begun CHAPTER 1 _ 1. The introduction and prologue (Ecclesiastes 1:1)_ 2. The seeker; his method and the results (Ecclesiastes 1:12) Ecclesiastes 1:1. In the general introduction we have already referred to the opening verses as giving the information who the author is and what is the object of his treatise. So sure is the critical school that Solomon is not the king mentioned that one says “the fact that Solomon is not the author, but is introduced in a literary figure, has become such an axiom of the present day interpretation of the book, that no extended argument to prove

ECCLESIASTES 1:2 may be called an introduction to the book; it also presents the writer's conclusions. He has surveyed life from many angles and decided that all human effort is fruitless and unavailing, or as he puts it, vanity. This is his key-word (the Hebrew means vapour, breath, and so nothingness): it occurs forty times. VANITY OF VANITIES is the Heb. way of saying utmost vanity. Man toils under the sun, _i.e._ upon the earth, but reaps no gain; like players on a stage the ever-changing generations come and go, while the earth, man's scene of toil, abides. As with man so with nature; sun, winds (north and south, _cf._ Ca. Ecclesiastes 4:16), streams, all pursue a dreary round of endless repetition and accomplish nothing, _e.g._ the sea is never filled. The whole

REMEMBRANCE. memorial. OF FORMER THINGS. Supply the Ellipsis (App-6) with the word "men", to complete the argument from verses: Ecclesiastes 1:2 -. The Chaldee for the former [men] version supplies the word "generation". AFTER. "after [them]", or at the last....

_There is no remembrance of former things_ Better, OF FORMER MEN, or OF THOSE OF OLD TIME, and so in the next clause OF THOSE THAT SHALL COME AFTER. The thought of the oblivion of the past, suggested in the previous verse, as explaining the fact that some things seem new to us which are not so, is reproduced in another aspect as yet a new element in the pessimism into which the writer has fallen. Men dream of a fame that shall outlive them. How few of those that went before them do they remember even by name? How little do they know even of those whose names have survived amid the wreck that has engulfed others? What does it profit to be famous now, just known by name to the generation that follows, and then forgotten altogether? Comp. a striking passage to the same effect in Jeremy Taylor's _Contemplations of the State of Man_, ch. 3, "The name of Echebar was thought by his subjects to...