Ecclesiastes 10:5

10:4-10 Solomon appears to caution men not to seek redress in a hasty manner, nor to yield to pride and revenge. Do not, in a passion, quit thy post of duty; wait awhile, and thou wilt find that yielding pacifies great offences. Men are not preferred according to their merit. And those are often most forward to offer help, who are least aware of the difficulties, or the consequences. The same remark is applied to the church, or the body of Christ, that all the members should have the same care one for another.

There is an evil which I have seen under the sun,.... Which Solomon had observed in the course of his life, practised in some kingdoms and by some princes on earth, under the sun; for there is nothing of the like kind, as after mentioned, done in heaven, above the sun; as an error which proceedeth from the ruler; from the supreme ruler of a nation, the king of it; and it is not only as an error, or like one, a seeming one; but it is a real error, bestowing places of honour and profit on undeserving persons: which error proceeds from ignorance of the persons; or from affection to them, and from friendship cultivated with them in the younger time of life, being educated with them; or through the misrepresentation and imposition of those about him, who have ends to serve by their promotion; or through his own lusts and passions, which these men indulge him in. It may be understood of God, the supreme ruler, who suffers such things to be; and which may seem to some an error in providence, though it is not: but the other sense is best.

Ecclesiastes 10:5-7 . There is an evil, &c. — I have observed another great vanity and misdemeanour among men; as an error which proceedeth, &c. — Or rather, as the Hebrew may be translated, which is indeed an error proceeding from the ruler: for the following erroneous conduct must needs come from those who have power of conferring honour and authority. Folly is set in great dignity — Foolish and unworthy persons are frequently advanced by the favour or humour of princes into places of great trust and dignity, which is at once a great reproach to the prince, and a sore calamity to his people. And the rich sit in a low place — Wise and worthy men, rich in endowments of the mind, are neglected and despised, or removed from those places to which their merits had raised them. I have seen servants on horses — Men of a servile condition and disposition riding in pomp and state as princes; and princes — Men of noble birth and qualities, fit to rule a kingdom, walking as servants — In a state of poverty and degradation, despised and disregarded.

I have observed another great vanity and misdemeanour amongst men. As an error which proceedeth from the ruler; so the sense is, like those errors which rulers commonly commit. Or rather, which is indeed an error proceeding from the ruler ; for the following miscarriage must needs come from those who have power of conferring honour and power, &c. So the Hebrew caph is not a note of likeness, but of reality, as it is Judges 13:23 Nehemiah 7:2 Hosea 4:4 5:10 , and oft elsewhere.

5 . as an error which proceedeth from the ruler ] The last word serves as a link connecting this verse with the preceding. It might be wise at times to bow to the temper of a despotic ruler, but the ruler was not always right. What the Debater had seen was to him a blot upon the government of him who allowed it. There lies below the surface the half-suppressed thought that this anomaly, stated in the next verse, was as a blot in the government of the supreme Ruler of the Universe. Technically the word was used in the Mosaic Law of the involuntary sins of ignorance ( Leviticus 4:22 ; Leviticus 4:27 ; Leviticus 5:18 ). The unequal distribution of honours seemed to men as a blunder of Providence.

Verse 5. - Koheleth gives his personal experience of apparent confusion in the ordering of state affairs. There is an evil which I have seen under the sun. Power gets into the hands of an unwise man, and then errors are committed and injustice reigns. As an error which proceedeth from the ruler. The כְּ here is cash veritatis , which denotes not comparison, but resemblance, the idealization of the individual, the harmony of the particular with the general idea. The evil which he noticed appeared to be (he does not affirm that it is) a mistake caused by the ruler; it so presented itself to his mind. The caution observed in the statement may be owing partly to the tacit feeling that such blots occasioned difficulties in the view taken of the moral government of the world. He does not intend to refer to God under the appellation "Ruler." The Septuagint renders, Ὡς ἀκούσιον ἐξῆλθεν , "As if it came involuntarily;" Vulgate, to much the same effect, Quasi per errorem egrediens . The idea here is either gnat the evil is one not produced by any intentional action of the ruler, but resulting from human imperfection, or that what appears to be a mistake is not so really. But these interpretations are unsuitable. Those who adhere to the Solomonic authorship of our book see here a prophetic intimation of the evil of Jeroboam's rule, which evil proceeded from the sins of Solomon himself and his son Rehoboam. (So Wordsworth, Motais, etc.) Ecclesiastes 10:5

"There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, like an error which proceedeth from the ruler." The introduction by the virtual relative raithi is as at Ecclesiastes 5:12 ; Ecclesiastes 6:1 . Knobel, Hengst., and others give to the כ of כּשׁ the meaning of "according to," or "in consequence of which," which harmonizes neither with ra'ah nor with raithi. Also Kleinert's translation: "There is a misery - I have seen it under the sun - in respect of an error which proceedeth from the ruler," is untenable; for by this translation ra'ah is made the pred. while it is the subj. to ישׁ, and kishgagah the unfolding of this subject. Hitzig also remarks: "as [wie ein] an error, instead of which we have: in respect to [um einen] an error;" for he confounds things incongruous. Hitz., however, rightly recognises, as also Kleinert, the כ as Caph veritatis, which measures the concrete with the idea. Isaiah 13:6 , compares the individual with the general which therein comes to view, Ezekiel 26:10 ; Nehemiah 7:2 ; cf. 2 Samuel 9:8 . Koheleth saw an evil under the sun; something which was like an error, appeared to him altogether like an error which proceedeth from the ruler. If we could translate שׁיּ by quod exiit, then כ would be the usual Caph similitudinis; but since it must be translated by quod exit, וגו כשׁ places the observed fact under a comprehensive generality: it had the nature of an error proceeding from the ruler.

If this is correct, it is so much the less to be assumed that by השׁלּיט God is to be understood ( Daniel 5:21 ), as Jerome was taught by his Hebraeus: quod putent homines in hac inaequalitate rerum illum non juste et ut aequum est judicare. It is a governor in a state that is meant, by whom an error might easily be committed, and only too frequently is committed, in the promotion of degradation of persons. But since the world, with its wonderful division of high and low, appears like as it were an error proceeding from the Most High, there certainly falls a shadow on the providence of God Himself, the Governor of the world; but yet not so immediately that the subject of discourse is an "error" of God, which would be a saying more than irreverent. יּצא equals יּצה is the metaplastic form for יּצאה or יּצאת (for which at Deuteronomy 28:57 incorrectly יּצת), not an error of transcription, as Olsh. supposes; vid., to the contrary. מלּפני (Symm. ἐξ ἔμπροστηεν) with יצא is the old usus loq. There now follows a sketch of the perverted world.