What Does “Vanity of Vanities” Mean? A Review of a New Book on Ecclesiastes
The author of the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes makes some pretty wild statements. He asks rhetorically, “What happens to the fool will happen to me also. Why then have I been so very wise?” implying wisdom benefits nothing.
In another place, he says, “Man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity.” Later in the book, he writes, “Be not overly righteous . . . . Be not overly wicked” (Eccles. 2:15; 3:19; 7:17–18). Wait—what?
When we consider the biblical story and the good news of God redeeming all of creation through the person of Jesus, perhaps the wildest statement of all could be the opening statement of the book: “Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity” (Eccles. 1:2).
How could anything be vanity—or meaningless—if God is redeeming all things?
I don’t actually believe these statements from the book, when rightly understood in their context, are as wild as they seem at first blush. As there is a season for everything, so there is a context for everything—especially when interpreting passages from the Bible.
But what context helps us make sense of Ecclesiastes? How should a Christian benefit from a book that can seem so full of cynicism in one place (6:1–6) and hedonism in another (2:10)?
Back in April of this year, Russell Meek, a friend of mine, released a book to help Christians understand Ecclesiastes. Dr. Meek teaches Old Testament and specializes in Ecclesiastes. His new book is called Ecclesiastes and the Search for Meaning in an Upside-Down World.
The big questions about the meaning of life and the many other questions addressed by Ecclesiastes have never been theoretical for Meek. He writes in the preface of his struggles with substance abuse and later in the book about his troubled childhood and lousy relationship with his father. “I started using drugs when I was around twelve years old, just after grandmother died,” he writes on the opening page, adding, “and that way of facing life stayed with me for a long, long time.”
Later in life, while getting a master’s degree, a mentor helped Meek see Ecclesiastes in a new light. “I started to study Ecclesiastes because I thought I had found in it a kindred spirit who, like me, had thrown up his hands and given up on faith and life and, who had accepted the meaninglessness of these on planet Earth.” Instead, Meek found in the book a “path through life that doesn’t involve the bottom of a pill bottle.”
Meek’s book is a short book, less than one hundred pages. In the first chapter, Meek explores the overlap of words used in Ecclesiastes with other books in the Bible, especially the overlap with the book of Genesis. In the second chapter, Meek argues that the author of Ecclesiastes wants readers to understand the Hebrew word for vanity (hebel) in the context of the Genesis story of Cain and Abel. The word hebel, by the way, being the same word for the name Abel (Hebel in Hebrew). In the third and final chapter, he explores the ending of Ecclesiastes and the emphasis on fearing God and enjoying his gifts.
To be fair, I think Meek’s book is a peculiar, even odd, mashup of a powerful, personal memoir and a technical commentary. He writes about losing his father, the sins of racism, and substance abuse; he also writes about Hebrew words most of us don’t know and essays in theological journals we’ve never read. I told Russ I felt this way when I read an early copy of the book a year and a half ago. However, I don’t really mind the genre blend. In fact, I like it. I was helped by both aspects of the book—his personal testimony and the technical commentary—to better understand what God has for his people in the book of Ecclesiastes. In some ways, Meek’s book has parity with the mashup of Ecclesiastes itself: personal reflections interspersed with philosophical reflections.
Our church is considering preaching through Ecclesiastes next year during Lent. Rereading Meek’s book this summer certainly got me more excited (not less) to preach Ecclesiastes to our people and apply God’s wisdom to our lives. Ecclesiastes exalts the words “given by one Shepherd,” meaning the words given by God, and warns readers to “beware of anything beyond these” (12:12–13). While we should prioritize God’s Word above all other words, I believe Russ’s book about Ecclesiastes will increase your desire to do just that, to “fear God and keep his commandments, for,” as Ecclesiastes concludes, “this is the whole duty of man” (12:13).
* Photo by Daoudi Aissa on Unsplash