place hearing is meant, not immediately, but mediated through others, the expression would not in good Greek be with the lxx ... τοῦ δούλου σου καταρωμένου σε, but τὸν δοῦλόν σου καταρᾶσθαι σε. The warning has its motive in this, that by such roundabout hearing one generally hears most unpleasant things; and on hearsay no reliance can be placed. Such gossiping one should ignore, should not listen to it at all; and if, nevertheless, something so bad is reported as that our own servant has spoken words of imprecation against us, yet we ought to pass that by unheeded, well knowing that we ourselves have often spoken harsh words against others. The expression וגו ידע, “thou art conscious to thyself that,” is like פּע ר, 1Ki 2:44, not the obj. accus. dependent on ידע (Hitz.), “many cases where also thou ...,” but the adv. accus. of time to קּלּלתּ; the words are inverted (Ewald, §336b), the style of Koheleth being fond of thus giving prominence to the chief conception (Ecc 7:20, Ecc 5:18; Ecc 3:13). The first gam, although it belongs to “thine, thy,” as at Ecc 7:22 it is also connected with “thou,”[1] stands at the beginning of the sentence, after such syntactical examples as Hos 6:11; Zec 9:11; and even with a two-membered sentence, Job 2:10.
Verse 23
Ecc 7:23 “All this have I proved by wisdom: I thought, Wise I will become; but it remained far from me.” The ב in בּחכמה is, as at Ecc 1:13, that designating the organon, the means of knowledge. Thus he possessed wisdom up to a certain degree, and in part; but his purpose, comprehended in the one word אחכּמה, was to possess it fully and completely; i.e., not merely to be able to record observations and communicate advices, but to adjust the contradictions of life, to expound the mysteries of time and eternity, and generally to solve the most weighty and important questions which perplex men. But this wisdom was for him still in the remote distance. It is the wisdom after which Job, chap. 28, made
- ↑ גּם־אתּ, on account of the half pause, accented on the penult. according to the Masora.
