Ecclesiastes 12:5

12:1-7 We should remember our sins against our Creator, repent, and seek forgiveness. We should remember our duties, and set about them, looking to him for grace and strength. This should be done early, while the body is strong, and the spirits active. When a man has the pain of reviewing a misspent life, his not having given up sin and worldly vanities till he is forced to say, I have no pleasure in them, renders his sincerity very questionable. Then follows a figurative description of old age and its infirmities, which has some difficulties; but the meaning is plain, to show how uncomfortable, generally, the days of old age are. As the four verses, 2-5, are a figurative description of the infirmities that usually accompany old age, ver. 6 notices the circumstances which take place in the hour of death. If sin had not entered into the world, these infirmities would not have been known. Surely then the aged should reflect on the evil of sin.

Ecclesiastes 12:5 . When they shall be afraid, &c. — The passion of fear is observed to be most incident to old men, of which divers reasons may be given. Of that which is high — Of high things, lest they should fall upon them; or of high places, as of going up hills or stairs, which is very irksome to them, because of their weakness, weariness, giddiness, and danger, or dread of falling. And fears shall be in the way — Lest, as they are walking, they should stumble, or fall, or be thrust down, or some infirmity or evil should befall them. And the almond-tree shall flourish — Their heads shall be as full of gray hairs as the almond-tree is of white flowers. And the grasshopper shall be a burden — If it accidentally light upon them. They cannot endure the least burden, being indeed a burden to themselves. And desire shall fail — Of meats, and drinks, and music, and other delights, which are vehemently desired by men in their youth. Because man goeth — Is travelling toward it, and every day nearer to it. To his long home — From this place of his pilgrimage into the grave, from whence he must never return into this world, and into the state of the future life, which is unchangeable and everlasting. And mourners go about the streets — Accompany the corpse through the streets to the grave.

(5) The old man is beset with terrors; terrors from on high, terrors on the way: all in which he had taken delight before, has charms for him no longer; the almond causes loathing (for so may be translated the word rendered “flourished” in our version); the locust, in the East a favourite article of food, is now burdensome; the caper berry (translated “desire” in our version) fails; for man is going to his everlasting house, &c

Also when they shall be afraid of that which is {k} high, and fears shall be in the {l} way, and the almond tree shall {m} flourish, and the {n} grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets: (k) To climb high because of their weakness, or they stoop down as though they were afraid lest anything should hide them. (l) They will tremble as they go, as though they were afraid. (m) Their head will be as white as the blossoms of an almond tree. (n) They will be able to bear nothing.

High - The powerful and the proud, such persons as an old man in his timidity might shrink from opposing or meeting: or, high ground which old men would avoid ascending. Fears ... in the way - Compare Proverbs 26:13. The almond tree - The type of old age. Many modern critics translate "The almond shall be despised," i. e., pleasant food shall no longer be relished. The grasshopper - Rather: "the locust." The clause means, heaviness and stiffness shall take the place of that active motion for which the locust is conspicuous. Desire - literally, the caper-berry; which, eaten as a provocative to appetite, shall fail to take effect on a man whose powers are exhausted. Long home - literally, "eternal (see Ecclesiastes 1:4 note) house;" man's place in the next world. Without attributing to the author of Ecclesiastes that deep insight into the future life which is shown by the writer of the Epistles to the Corinthians, we may observe that He by whom both writers were inspired sanctions in both books (see 2 Corinthians 5:1-6) the use of the same expression "eternal house." In 2 Corinthians means that spiritual body which shall be hereafter; and it is placed, as it is here (see Ecclesiastes 12:3), in contrast with that earthly dissolving house which clothes the spirit of man in this world. Mourners - The singing women who attend funerals for hire (see Matthew 9:23).

5. that which is high—The old are afraid of ascending a hill. fears … in the way—Even on the level highway they are full of fears of falling, &c. almond … flourish—In the East the hair is mostly dark. The white head of the old among the dark-haired is like an almond tree, with its white blossoms, among the dark trees around [Holden]. The almond tree flowers on a leafless stock in winter (answering to old age, in which all the powers are dormant), while the other trees are flowerless. Gesenius takes the Hebrew for flourishes from a different root, casts off; when the old man loses his gray hairs, as the almond tree casts its white flowers. grasshoppers—the dry, shrivelled, old man, his backbone sticking out, his knees projecting forwards, his arms backwards, his head down, and the apophyses enlarged, is like that insect. Hence arose the fable, that Tithonus in very old age was changed into a grasshopper [Parkhurst]. "The locust raises itself to fly"; the old man about to leave the body is like a locust when it is assuming its winged form, and is about to fly [Maurer]. a burden—namely, to himself. desire shall fail—satisfaction shall be abolished. For "desire," Vulgate has "the caper tree," provocative of lust; not so well. long home—(Job 16:22; 17:13). mourners—(Jer 9:17-20), hired for the occasion (Mt 9:23).

They shall be afraid; the passion of fear is observed to be most incident to old men, of which divers reasons may be given. Of that which is high; either, 1. Of high things, lest they should fall upon them. Or rather, 2. Of high places, of going up hills or stairs, which is very irksome to them, because of their weakness, and weariness, ar, d giddiness, and danger, or dread of falling. And this clause, together with the next, may be rendered thus, and that agreeably to the Hebrew text, Also they shall be afraid and terrified (two words expressing the same thing, which is very frequent in the Hebrew) of that which is high in the way . When they walk abroad, they will dread to go up any high or steep places. And fears shall be in the way, lest as they are walking, they should stumble, or fall, or be thrust down, or some infirmity or mischief should befall them. The almond tree shall flourish; their heads shall be as full of grey hairs as the almond tree is of white flowers. Such metaphors are not unusual in other authors. Hence Sophocles calls a grey or hoary head flowery , and again, covered with white flowers . The grasshopper shall be a burden, if it doth accidentally hop up and rest upon them. They cannot endure the least burden, being indeed a burden to themselves.

But the words may be, and are by others, rendered, the locust (as the ancient interpreters and many others render it; or, as ours and some others, the grasshopper , which comes to the same thing; for these two sorts of insects are much of the same nature and shape) shall be a burden to itself . And by the locust or grasshopper may be understood, either, 1. The old man himself, who bears some resemblance to it; in shape, by reason of the bones sticking out; in the constitution of the body, which is dry and withering; and in the legs and arms, which are slender, the flesh being consumed. Or, 2. The back, which fitly follows after the head, upon which the almond tree flourished, in which the strength of the body lay, and which formerly was able to bear great burdens, but now, through its weakness and crookedness, is a burden too heavy for itself. And some of the Jewish and other interpreters understand this word, which others render locust or grasshopper , to be some part of the body, either the back-bone , or the head of the thigh bone , or the ankle-bone , any of which may well be said to be heavy or burdensome to itself, when it moves slowly and listlessly, and not without difficulty and trouble. Desire , to wit, of meats, and drinks, and music, and other carnal delights, which are vehemently desired by men in the heat of their youth, but are unsavoury to old men; of which see an instance 2 Samuel 19:35 .

5 . also when they shall be afraid of that which is high ] The description becomes more and more enigmatic, possibly, as some have thought, because the special forms of infirmity referred to called for a veil. The first clause, however, is fairly clear if we omit the interpolated “ when .” They (the indefinite plural, with the force of the French on ) shall be afraid of a height, or hill. The new form of the sentence, the opening words also, indicate that the picture of the storm has been completed, and that symbolism of another kind comes in. We see, as it were, another slide in the magic lantern of the exhibiter. To be “afraid of a hill” expresses not merely or chiefly the failure of strength of limbs to climb mountains, but the temper that, as we say, makes “mountains out of molehills,” which, like the slothful man of Proverbs 22:13 , sees “a lion in the path.” There are “fears in the way.” Imaginary terrors haunt the aged. Here again we have a parallel in Latin poetry: “Multa senem circumveniunt incommoda; vel quòd Quærit et inventis miser abstinet, ac timet uti, Vel quòd res omnes timidè gelidèque ministrat.” “Many the troubles that attend the old; For either still he sets his mind on gains And dares not touch, and fears to use his gains, Or deals with all things as with chill of fear.” Horace, Ep. ad Pis. 169–71. So Aristotle among the characteristics of age notes that the old are δειλοὶ καὶ πάντα προφοβητικοὶ (timid and in all things forecasting fears) ( Rhet . ii. 23)

. The interpreters who carry the idea of a storm through the whole passage explain the passage: “They (the people of the city) shall be afraid of that which is coming from on high,” i.e. of the gathering storm-clouds, but for the reasons above given, that interpretation seems untenable. and the almond tree shall flourish ] The true meaning is to be found, it is believed, in the significance of the Hebrew name for almond tree ( Sheked = the early waking tree, comp. Jeremiah 1:11 ), and the enigmatic phrase describes the insomnia which often attends old age. The tree that flourishes there is the tree of Vigilantia or Wakefulness. As might be expected, the discordant interpretations of commentators multiply, and we may record, but only in order to reject them, the more notable of these. (1) The almond blossoms represent the white hairs of age.