Prooemium
PROOEMIUM OF THE COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES
General Introduction.
1. Blessed is the man whose hope is the name of the Lord, and who has not looked upon vanities and false madnesses . Since, as blessed Dionysius holds, the good is the first object of desire: but the good is twofold, namely temporal and eternal, according to that passage in Second Corinthians chapter four: The things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal: it generates in us a twofold love or appetite, namely of charity and of concupiscence, so that charity is the love returning to eternal things, concupiscence to earthly things. And because agreement and disagreement of customs follows upon the agreement and difference of appetites: and according to agreement in laws and customs the unity of the city consists: from this twofold love arises a twofold city, namely the city of the heavenly Jerusalem and the city of Babylon . The foundation of the first is ordered charity, of the second, perverted concupiscence. The heavenly city, therefore, because it is founded in charity, which raises one to eternal things, rests in eternal things and places its beatitude in them. But the city of Babylon, which through concupiscence is pressed down to earthly things, places its beatitude in these earthly things.
And thus it follows from the foregoing that just as the good is twofold, so love is twofold, so the city is twofold, so also beatitude is twofold, namely true beatitude in eternal things, and false in temporal and passing things: the Psalm: They called the people blessed who have these things etc.
And just as the love of charity and of concupiscence so oppose each other that they cannot exist together: so also these two beatitudes: Matthew chapter six: No man can serve two masters. Therefore, if anyone wishes to be blessed, it is necessary that he love future goods and despise present ones. Therefore the Holy Spirit through the Psalmist describes the blessed man by this twofold act: by the love of heavenly things, which make one blessed, when he says: Blessed is the man whose hope is the name of the Lord: and by the contempt of earthly things, which make one vain, when he says: And he has not looked upon vanities and false madnesses. Truly blessed is the man whose hope is the name of the Lord.
2. But the Lord alone beatifies, nor is there any other name under heaven that beatifies. For the Lord alone is blessed by essence: First Timothy chapter six : Keep the commandment without spot, irreproachable, until the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, whom in his own times the blessed and alone mighty King of kings and Lord of lords shall show. To him alone, therefore, belong beatitude and power by essence, but our beatitude is by participation: insofar as it is by participation, it has its origin from that which is by essence: therefore we are blessed by participating in the font of beatitude, who is God. Therefore Revelation chapter nineteen: Blessed are they who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb. For God first communicates beatitude to the Lamb through espousal, and consequently to those who have been called by the Lamb.
3. He alone also has affluence: because of Wisdom, which is God, it is said uniquely in Proverbs three: She is more precious than all riches, and all things that are desired cannot be compared to her.
Length of days is in her right hand, and in her left
Are her riches and glory. But our beatitude is through the aggregation of all goods: therefore it is in him alone who has the affluence of all things. Therefore it is immediately inferred: She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her, and whoever holds her fast is blessed: Wisdom seven: All good things came to me together with her etc.
4. He alone has the repose of immutability, because all things change, but He himself does not change: James one: With whom there is no change nor shadow of alteration. But our beatitude is through the tranquil possession of gathered goods, because without peace there can be no beatitude. Since
therefore in nothing is there perfect tranquility except in God, we cannot therefore be made peaceful nor made blessed except in God: whence Revelation fourteen: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord. Henceforth now the Spirit says, that they may rest from their labors.
5. He alone also has the immortality of eternity, as is said in the last chapter of 1 Timothy: Who alone has immortality and dwells in inaccessible light. But our beatitude is through the interminable duration of possessed goods. For a state which can come to an end is not blessed, but is subject to misery. Since therefore no one can have interminability except from the font of immortality, one is made blessed in him alone: Therefore it is said in the Psalm: Blessed are those who dwell in your house, O Lord: they shall praise you forever and ever, because theirs shall be everlasting joy: Isaiah thirty-five: They shall come to Zion with praise, and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness.
Blessed therefore is the man, whose hope is the name of the Lord.
6. But not blessed, indeed truly vain is the one who hopes in the world: for he looks upon vanities and
false madnesses: therefore he vanishes, according to that saying in Jeremiah two: Your fathers went far from me and went after vanity, and became vain: after vanity, that is, after the world.
For the world with its things is vain, because it does not provide support to the one leaning upon it: whence Isaiah thirty: Egypt will help in vain and to no purpose, because it does not provide support to the one leaning upon it. For it is a reed staff, upon which if a man leans, it will pierce both his hands: because the world and all worldly things render all who trust in them weak and infirm and unfit for every good work: Therefore it is said to pierce the hands, therefore the Prophet, despairing of the help of worldly things, asks from the Lord: Give us help from tribulation, for vain is the salvation of man.
Vain also, because it does not provide fullness to the one who possesses it: whence it is said in Ecclesiastes 5: The covetous man shall not be satisfied with money. And the reason for this is that all worldly things are vain, and vain things do not satisfy: whence it is said in Ecclesiasticus 34: Vain hope and falsehood to the senseless man, as one who grasps at a shadow and pursues the wind: so is he who attends to lying visions: whence just as the wind does not satisfy the stomach, nor does a shadow fill it, so neither do temporal things, which are the shadow of eternal things, for which the soul was created.
8. Vain also, because it does not give rest to the one who labors, and therefore he who labors for worldly things labors in vain: Ecclesiastes 2: What does it profit a man from all his labor, by which he labors under the sun? All his days are full of labors and sorrows, nor does his mind rest at night: and is this not vanity? because he labors in vain, because he does not rest. This world cannot give rest, because it itself does not endure, but rather always revolves: therefore those who cling to it must needs go around in circles. Therefore it is said in the Psalm: The wicked walk round about.
Vain also, because it does not yield fruit to the one who loves it: whence it is said in Ecclesiastes 5: He who loves riches shall not reap fruit from them: and this therefore is vanity. He reaps no fruit, but rather loss, because by gaining the world he loses God and loses himself: and according to what is said in Matthew 16: What does it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, yet suffer the loss of his own soul?
10. Man by gaining the world suffers the loss of his soul.
For the world, by displaying loftiness, raises one up into pride, and through this causes man to become vain, according to that passage in Job 11: A vain man is puffed up into pride, and thinks himself free like the colt of a wild ass. For while he stretches toward vain things, he is lifted up into vain pride, according to what is said in Job 30: You have lifted me up and, as it were, setting me upon the wind, you have dashed me down mightily.
The world also, by displaying sweetness, inflames to lust, just as wine by its sweetness draws to gluttony and through this to lust: whence in 3 Esdras 3: Wine, which prevails over all who drink it, seduces the mind. Likewise of the king and of the orphan
it makes the mind vain, and this by inflaming to lust, according to that passage in Ephesians 5: Be not drunk with wine, wherein is lust. To this vanity the world drew Solomon; Ecclesiastes 2: I said: I will go and abound in delights and enjoy good things;
and I saw that this also was vanity. The world also, by holding out sufficiency, draws one to cupidity, and through this makes the heart of man vain, according to that passage of Proverbs twenty-one: He who gathers treasures by a lying tongue is vain and is senseless. Not only does avarice make a man vain, indeed even without heart: for it is said in Ecclesiasticus ten of the avaricious man who has cast away his inward parts: because, according to what the Truth says in Matthew six, where your treasure is, there is your heart also: but the treasure is outside:
therefore the heart also is outside.
The world also, by holding out wisdom, entices to curiosity, and through this makes one vain: whence the Apostle says in First Corinthians three, and draws from the Psalm: The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain; because, according to that passage of Jeremiah ten, every man is made foolish by his knowledge. For this is human wisdom, which does not know useful things, but mutable things: and therefore the Lord made it foolish, as is said in First Corinthians one: God has made foolish the wisdom of this world. Foolish wisdom is vain, because it is erroneous: whence it is said in Ecclesiasticus thirty-four: Divination of error and lying auguries and the dreams of evildoers are vanity.
11. From this fourfold vanity of the interior heart,
man vanishes in a fourfold manner exteriorly.
For first, the vanity of pride renders one unfruitful, according to that passage of Ecclesiasticus six: Do not exalt yourself in your thought like a bull, lest perhaps your strength be crushed, and you be left like a dry tree in the desert, and thus vain as regards the fruit of good work: concerning which, in Jeremiah ten: Vain are their works and worthy of derision; in the day of their visitation they shall perish.
The vanity of avarice renders one busied, and through this subject to many labors: Ecclesiastes four: Considering, I found yet another vanity under the sun: there is one alone, and he has not a second, and yet he does not cease to labor, nor are his eyes satisfied with riches. For riches are foreign gods, concerning which, in Jeremiah sixteen: You shall serve foreign gods, who will give you no rest day or night.
The vanity of lust renders a man adorned, because the lustful are accustomed to ornament themselves outwardly: whence in their person it is said in Wisdom two: Let us crown ourselves with roses, before they wither: and this indeed is vanity, because it is said in the last chapter of Proverbs: Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain: therefore vain, because all the glory and beauty of the flesh is as the flower of grass.
The vanity of worldly wisdom renders one a vain talker. For while the heart errs, the mouth pronounces vain things: First Timothy, chapter one: The end of the commandment is charity from a pure heart and a good conscience and an unfeigned faith, from which some having strayed have turned aside to vain talking, understanding neither what they say nor the things about which they affirm. And because by worldly wisdom they are corrupted and deceived, they wish to seduce others through vain words: whence Titus, chapter one: There are many
disobedient, vain talkers and seducers, especially those who are of the circumcision, who must be rebuked.
Thus therefore from the vanity of exterior things arises the vanity of hearts, and from this arises the vanity of exterior works.
12. According to this, therefore, it is gathered that there is a threefold vanity, namely of mutability, iniquity, and penality, and as Hugh of Saint Victor says, "the first is natural and fitting, the second is culpable because perverse, the third is penal and wretched"; and one has its origin from another, as has been seen. Whoever therefore wishes to withdraw from the vanity of misery, let him abandon the vanity of fault, and whoever wishes to abandon this, let him not look to the vanity of mutable nature, but let him hope in and cling to the divine, and thus he will be blessed. Blessed therefore is the man whose hope is the name of the Lord.
13. Since therefore it belongs to the wise man to teach the way to attain beatitude, this was the chief concern and worthwhile task of the wise Solomon; but because, as is clear from what has been said, for acquiring beatitude it is necessary that eternal things be loved and present things be despised, and furthermore to know how to conduct oneself properly in the midst of a crooked generation,
therefore he produced three books, namely Proverbs, in which he teaches his son to conduct himself wisely in this world; Ecclesiastes, in which he teaches to despise present things; and the Song of Songs, in which he teaches to love heavenly things, especially the Bridegroom Himself.
On the fourfold cause of this book.
14. Thus therefore it is clear what the end of the book of Ecclesiastes is. And since "the end imposes necessity upon those things which are ordered to the end," since the end is the contempt of present things, he treats of them, not in that respect by which they attract, but in that respect by which they are despised: they attract under the aspect of good, but are despised under the aspect of the vain. Therefore it follows from this that the matter of this book is the vanities of present things, or the things themselves insofar as they are vain, to speak more precisely, because he proves vanity as a quasi-property in things, first proposing, second proving, third concluding. Whence he proceeds by persuading and proving that threefold vanity which was spoken of above, namely of nature, fault, and misery.
And from this is clear the mode of treatment, or the form. For it has a singular mode of treatment among the other books: for it proceeds as a preacher, setting forth the opinions of various persons, now of the wise man, now of the fool, so that from the opinions of many the one truth may shine forth in the minds of the hearers. - From the foregoing it is concluded who the efficient cause ought to have been. For in this book pleasures, riches, honors, and curiosities are taught to be despised as vanities. And because one is not believed concerning the contempt of such things unless he is experienced—
for a poor man who has not had riches is not believed concerning the contempt of them, because he has not experienced them, and
therefore does not recognize them—
it was necessary that the author be such a one who had experience of all these things, namely one who was powerful, wealthy, given to luxury, and curious, that is, wise. We have neither read nor heard of any other who possessed these things in such great excellence as Solomon did.
Therefore he above all others was the more fitting author of such a book.
It is therefore clear what is the material, formal, efficient, and final cause of this book.
But according to these four causes, four particular questions may be raised.