Here’s the book that sets me free—but depresses the bejabbers out of others
A lot of people have a favorite Old Testament book. Some prefer the origin stories of Genesis. Many memorize the ancient poetry of Psalms. Others feel drawn to the common-sense wisdom of Proverbs. Some swear by the soaring prophecies of Isaiah.
My own favorite book of the Hebrew Bible is Ecclesiastes, which I refer to occasionally here. I don’t know anybody else who claims it as their favorite, so my choice is unusual and perhaps unique.
From time to time, I’ve tried teaching Ecclesiastes systematically at church. Generally, after the first session three or four people go out forthwith and ask their doctor to double their dosage of Prozac. I’m teaching it again now, with better-than-usual results. Nobody has upped their anti-depressants. Yet.
But what others find depressing about Ecclesiastes strikes me as clear-eyed, candid and freeing.
According to tradition, the book was written 3,000 years ago by King Solomon, reputed to be the wisest of biblical kings. (Disclaimer: nearly all such traditions are disputed among scholars, but I, not being a scholar, incline toward convention.)
In Ecclesiastes, Solomon presents himself as a lifelong seeker and innovator of all things pleasurable: philosophy, wealth, stunning public works, sexual exploits.
There’s nothing that pleases the soul or sates the senses he hasn’t tried. He’s enjoyed great success in all those pursuits, too. It’s not as if he’s failed. He’s now the smartest, the richest—you name it, he’s That Guy.
What he’s discovered is that none of those things has given him more than a fleeting distraction from his profound sense of emptiness and isolation. Nothing he’s achieved has provided him any transcendent meaning.
Each pursuit has turned at last into a fool’s errand. There was no substance to any of it.
“Everything is meaningless, utterly meaningless!” he cries.
Existence is a mystery nobody has figured out, he says. The world keeps on spinning endlessly. You’re born, you struggle, you live your allotted years, you die. Maybe you achieve something remarkable—but even then you still die and are forgotten, like the generations before you. Your no-account children waste the treasures you’ve left them.
This is in the Bible, but it’s not some praise-God-and-pray-more-and-you’ll-be-fine treatise. Solomon even advises us not to become terribly religious. That’s a trap, too:
“Do not be excessively righteous, and do not be overly wise. Why should you ruin yourself? Do not be excessively wicked, and do not be foolish. Why should you die before your time? It is good that you grasp one thing while not letting go of the other.”
In other words, shoot for a reasonable middle ground—not too religious, not egregiously sinful, not too brilliant, not slack-jawed stupid.
The good news is, Solomon does offer a solution for the despair he describes.
It’s this: quit striving and straining and hording and climbing. Quit deluding yourself into thinking you’re going to change human nature or reform the world. Quit lying to yourself that a bigger house or a more attractive spouse will make you content.
Instead, enjoy what you’ve been given. Keep your heart open for the small, daily satisfactions that are all around you instead of trying to create some grand heroic gesture.
“To enjoy your work and accept your lot in life—this is indeed a gift from God,” he says.
Love your spouse and children and job, he continues. Have a delicious meal and a good bottle of wine. Not much else matters, but these things do matter, at least for today.
If you’re still with me here, gentle readers, I assure you I can understand why, on the surface, Ecclesiastes sounds depressing.
But I find it liberating and even, in its own back-handed way, joyous. It’s brought me comfort times without number. It puts our lot as humans into a healthy perspective.
My experience is that things rarely turn out as I’ve planned. There are tons of disappointments. Even when something does go well, when it goes even better than I’d dreamed, when I find myself on the very top of the heap, the euphoria only lasts about 15 minutes.
Solomon reminds me to release all that self-imposed baggage—the worries, the crazy ambitions, the trophies—and remember that in 50 years none of it will matter to anyone anyhow. It’s all passing away even as it’s happening, and I’m passing away with it.
Instead of fretting, fuming and preening, then, I can take my wife out for a steak dinner, and while we’re out run my son’s house by to hug on the grandkids and then finally head home to watch a movie or read a good book.
That’s it. That’s a more satisfying life than King Solomon led. That’s the pinnacle of success amid a world of misery.
Paul Prather is pastor of Bethesda Church near Mount Sterling, Ky. You can email him at pratpd@yahoo.com.
This story was originally published January 6, 2022 at 9:05 AM.