How Should We Interpret The Book Of Ecclesiastes?
Q: What are the different ways Ecclesiastes is interpreted—especially Ecclesiastes 2:24—and can multiple interpretations be biblically valid?
Ecclesiastes 2:24 – Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor. This also, I saw, was from the hand of God.
A: There are different interpretive approaches to Ecclesiastes. I’ll give you my take on this. For most of Ecclesiastes, Solomon speaks from the standpoint of an educated, cultured fool. Now, in using the word fool, he’s not saying that he’s not smart, or that he can’t perceive the things around him. Rather, he speaks from the perspective of a fool, because he is considering life “under the sun” – which is a key phrase in Ecclesiastes. My understanding of the phrase under the sunis that it simply means anything regarding this life, without any consideration of eternity and the life beyond. When Solomon uses this phrase in Ecclesiastes, he’s looking at life as if there were no eternity, no meaning, no life after this life, as though life does not continue on after this life that we know under the sun.
Looking at life from that under the sun perspective, what he says in Ecclesiastes 2:24 makes perfect sense. “Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor. This also, I saw, was from the hand of God.” Basically, if this life is all there is, and there is nothing in eternity for us, and nothing in the world beyond, then enjoy your best life now, because it’s all you’re going to get.
Not until the very end of Ecclesiastes 12, in the last half of the final chapter of the book, does Solomon change gears and begin to speak from the perspective of a man who takes eternity seriously. Only at the end of his book is he considering eternity as a reality.
That’s my approach to understanding Ecclesiastes. Throughout most of the book, Solomon is speaking wisdom from a worldly perspective which excludes eternity, and he only fixes that perspective by adding in a view of eternity at the very end of the book.