Eclesiastes 3
Didymus the Blind · Comentário Patrístico (catena)
Eclesiastes 3:4
Since weeping has different meanings, laughing needs to be understood accordingly; for weeping does not have only one meaning, nor does laughing. And since laughing is split in two meanings—sometimes praiseworthy, sometimes reprehensible—even weeping must be seen in this way, so that praiseworthy laughing corresponds to praiseworthy weeping and the same with reprehensible laughing and weeping.Often, thus, a life which is prone more to lust than to the love of God is laughing in such a way that the laughter itself is made into a god. And as some consider their stomachs divine and others consider them mammon, so a third person who loves entertainment and wants to be witty and so on, builds altars for laughter by making it divine so that he sacrifices to it. One sacrifices to it if one teaches what is suitable for laughing or what excites laughter. That kind of laughter is reprehensible. It is blissful to abandon this kind of laughter and to devote one's self to the weeping opposed to it. This is what the virtuous one was striving for when he said, "Every night I flood my bed with tears; I drench my couch with my weeping." There is, however, also a praiseworthy laughter. It is said that God "will yet fill your mouth with laughter"—with (of course) praiseworthy laughter. This corresponds to the fruit of the Spirit, which is joy, for "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace." Laughter, therefore, that corresponds with joy is praiseworthy. Any weeping that is opposed to this kind of laughter and to the condition that opposes the joy of the Holy Spirit is reprehensible. That kind of weeping did not help Jerusalem. … And why was that so? It is because it did not repent at the time when it should have repented, but after it was too late.… Now, we want to look for the spiritual meaning: The ascetical life, which is appropriate for pious people, is called weeping; the uninhibited life, however, which is prone more to lust than to the love of God, is laughter. Those who weep in this life will laugh later on, so that they are even blessed: "Blessed are you who weep now." … But those who have laughed here, because they lived prone more to lust than to the love of God, will weep, after the punishment that will follow, so that the following is said to them: "There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Those, however, who here greatly weep out of repentance pray to God with the words: "You have fed them with the bread of tears, and given them tears to drink in full measure." — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 71:4
Eclesiastes 3:5
In the literal sense the following is said: The law prescribes that Israel's judges have to investigate the behavior of the people; and if someone was found to have done prohibited things, he was to be convicted to be stoned.…Now, we relate the verse to rebuke instead of stoning. The wise teacher knows whom he has to rebuke and whom not, and in a certain way he throws the rebuke like stones in order to dissuade the rebuked from a bad way of life. If the person improves through the rebuke, the rebuke is gathered in and no more stones are thrown against him. Paul indicates this when he says, "Convince, rebuke and encourage!" By rebuking and convincing he was throwing stones. After seeing the one who was rebuked improve, he encourages and gathers the stones together. The following is meant: There is a time to punish and a time not to punish. — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 73:22
Eclesiastes 3:5
"A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing." In the literal sense this means men who live together with their wives have a time when they get together with them and a time when they do not.… When it is time for prayer, when it is a day on which one has to remain clean and send up prayers, one has to avoid embraces. When the days of prayer are over, they come together and embrace.…According to a superficial explanation, but perhaps also against it, the following remark is valid. "The appointed time has grown short," Paul writes; "from now on, let even those who have wives be as though they had none." He says, Since time has grown short and humankind has increased to a large number, it is not necessary any more to increase it; one has to cease.… When it was necessary that humankind increase, it was a time to embrace. But after the population had become numerous and the begetting of the faithful spread, one needed to avoid embracing.… In the spiritual sense this is the meaning: Some have acquired God's wisdom as a wife, like the one who says, "I became enamored of her beauty" and took her home as a spouse. About her it is said: "She will honor you if you embrace her." Then wisdom embraces the wise by communicating to him her character, and the wise man embraces her. When therefore this wife is with a person from whom she can beget insight and thoughts and works of insight—for "wisdom begets insight for a man"—then it is the time to embrace. This time, however, is not interrupted by breaks. One can always embrace wisdom. This time is eternal. — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 75:4
Eclesiastes 3:6
Before the good things were found (for example, the knowledge of truth), people were in ignorance. For them it was the time of losing. But this time was preceded by the time of seeking; for when some one seeks the good, the time has come to lose what in his case had been before the good. Likewise people lived according to the law before Christ's life on earth, and they looked for the letter. But when the "Sun of righteousness" rose and truth finally had come, the time also had come to lose the letter and to supersede it.This is how one can sometimes lose in a good way. The Savior in the Gospel says: "Those who want to save their soul will lose it, and those who lose their soul will find it." One [can also] understand this as referring to martyrdom and to the time of persecution: Those who want to save their soul on the day of judgment and at the time of reward must lose it by offering themselves up to death; to lose the soul here means death, the dying for truth in martyrdom. — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 77:18
Eclesiastes 3:8
If powers, forces, rulers of the world of darkness and evil spirits tempt us, we are not supposed to take issue with them or make peace with them, but we must fight them. But when we have subdued them and are given power "to tread on snakes and scorpions," then it is a time for peace. Thus, first the devil has to be crushed under the feet of the saints. When it is time for war, one has to tread on "all the power of the enemy." But when we have broken them down, we can live in enduring peace, our thinking is free from confusion, and we have a time for peace. — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 81:21
Eclesiastes 3:8
Every soul has a reprehensible companion and a praiseworthy one: the bridegroom, which is the Logos, and the adulterer, which is the devil. If the devil is present, one should not give him room; one should not let him in, as Judas did. This kind of companion needs to be hated. But a "time to love" has come when the true bridegroom is present. He is worthy of love, so much so that one of the saints has said, "My love has been crucified." But love is intensified desire. Further, we have a commandment to love our enemies and to approach those who hate us in such a way that we even send a prayer to heaven for them. Insofar as we desire that they be helped and do not want ourselves to be troubled by hostility, we love our enemies; but insofar as we do not imitate them and do not accept the same things or want to be enemies as they want to be, we hate them. — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 81:4
Eclesiastes 3:13
Whoever eats in a way that he takes his stomach to be God does not find anything good in eating and drinking, but rather ungodliness: "Such people do not serve our Lord Christ but their own stomach." — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 86:2
Eclesiastes 3:14
In the spiritual and higher sense one can also say the following: The invisible things are God's creations in the real sense. They are eternal. The timely and visible things are secondary and accidental and created for the sake of the eternal ones. These visible things have come into being for the sake of humankind, which by nature is invisible regarding the soul and the inner being. The visible things cannot primarily be called God's creations. God certainly has created them, but for the purpose of other things. — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 87:6
Eclesiastes 3:14
God has made creation so that human beings, through an outward picture of the greatness and beauty of created things, might [understand] that God exists. He himself manages the cosmos and looks after it so that we—while the whole cosmos is orderly guided by one commander and provider and ruler and charioteer and king—get the outward picture that there is someone who rules the cosmos. When you see a ship which is piloted and holds its course, you perceive the idea of a helmsman even if he is not visible. And if you see a chariot which travels orderly, you get the idea of a charioteer. Likewise the Creator is known by his works and the order of his providence. — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 88:29
Eclesiastes 3:19
Animals are mortal beings without reason, angels are immortal beings with reason, human beings are mortal beings with reason. Regarding mortality the human being is grouped together with beings without reason. Regarding reason [the human being] is grouped together with the immortal beings, since angels also have reason. Regarding its senses … the human being is of the same kind as the beings without reason. But the human being is receptive to something to which no other mortal being is receptive: its soul can become perfect, as far as this can be achieved, and become like God, as far as it is possible.…Thus, when he says that "the fate of humans and the fate of animals is the same," he does not mean what happens to reason but what happens to the outward body.… The general judgment which enacts promises and punishments does not judge what human beings have in common with animals but what humans have in common with angels. As humans can be led into the kingdom of heaven and remain in heaven, so it is with angels; and as humans can be judged, so can angels be judged.… If one investigates the nature of death, then the death of animals is not like the death of humans. Human death divides the soul from the body, and after the division the soul remains. But the death of animals destroys soul and body, since they have been created simultaneously. — COMMENTARY ON ECCLESIASTES 99:1