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Kohelet
The Secret Code
In 1934 the Ovaltine company gave a secret decoder ring to anyone who joined the “Little Orphan Annie” club. With the ring you were able to reveal the real message hidden in a line of plain text. Today, a great many books and sermons about Ecclesiastes also offer a secret code that unlocks the message […]
NOTHING NEW?
A blog post asked if the statement “There is nothing new under the sun” was depressing. My response is below. Kohelet, the writer of Ecclesiastes, states just before this section that his goal in writing was to answer the question, “What do we gain from all the work at which we toil under the sun?” […]
Beautiful in its time?
If you type the words “beautiful in its time” into your web browser and click on images your screen will fill up with flowers, butterflies and sunsets – all with those famous words from Ecclesiastes plastered over top of them in flowing script. What you won’t see is a mushroom cloud from an atomic bomb […]
FAHRENHEIT 451
QUESTION In Fahrenheit 451, what event or quote is in reference to Ecclesiastes? VANSWER The men with Montag (the one who has memorized parts of Ecclesiastes) have just seen the city across the river incinerated by the bombers. They decide to go back to the city to search for survivors and Granger (their leader) speaks […]
IN THE END
QUESTION Was King Solomon right when he said in Ecclesiastes that the only thing that matters in the end is to fear God and keep his commandments? VANSWER It’s important to note that we don’t know for certain who wrote the book of Ecclesiastes. Whoever it was only identified themselves as Kohelet, a word that […]
THE BEST BOOK OF THE BIBLE
QUESTION Why do some firmly believe Ecclesiastes is the greatest and wisest book in the entire Bible? VANSWER Kohelet means “to gather” so early translators decided that it meant to gather people together and teach them wisdom. In latin such a gathering is an “ecclesia” and the one doing the gathering was the “ecclesiastes”. At […]
RAPPING KOHELET
Found a band that does a rap version of the book of Ecclesiastes. The writers do a pretty good job of following the thoughts of Kohelet. I downloaded it for $8 at Bandcamp and you can listen before buying. Try a few selections as they each have a different flavour. http://thebrotherscosmos.bandcamp.com
FAMOUS LAST WORDS
COMMENT A person’s final words may contain the wisdom of a lifetime distilled into a sentence. John Wesley’s last words were repeated several times, “The best of all is, God is with us.” Wise Solomon at the end of Ecclesiastes wrote, “Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God […]
It’s Not Meaningless
If you read the words of Kohelet (the author of Ecclesiastes) in some modern translations you will find that the endless repetition of the word “meaningless” is like Chinese water torture. Work is meaningless, pleasure is meaningless, money is meaningless, life is meaningless, wisdom is meaningless and even death is meaningless. With all this “meaningless” […]
DAILY BREAD OR GET AHEAD
COMMENT My guess was that the author of this book, who I believe was a man of great wealth and power, was trying to say that everything we do that is for our own sake and not for God is meaningless. Working and “toiling” has no purpose and will not “bear fruit” unless God’s purpose […]