Week 9

8/10/2025

Summer 2025

• Central Passage: Ecclesiastes...The Vanity of Life Under the Sun

• Check out the Middle School Sunday School Resources page for other books of the Bible resources. Note: the Ecclesiastes handout will be available eventually.

Introduction

            In 1946, Albert Camus’s The Stranger was translated into English. As a high schooler, I remember wrestling with the philosophical absurdism of the book. Every teenager of yesterday likely experienced some form of existential questioning. Absurdism supplies the bleak answer that human life is meaningless, and action is pointless.^[1] Meursault, the protagonist of The Stranger, is an exaggerated character detached from all meaning and purpose. When his girlfriend asks him to get married, he responds, “I said I didn’t mind; if she was keen on it, we’d get married.” He also murders a man with no regret. He exemplifies a purposeless existence. Christians should not take Camus’ philosophy as gospel truth^[2] —we ought to recoil at Meursault. We can and should wrestle with the questions he raises concerning meaning and purpose in a seemingly absurd world.^[3] However, long before Camus lived, the book of Ecclesiastes raised similar questions about meaning and purpose in a fallen creation.

The Vanity of Life Under the Sun

            Ecclesiastes, often attributed to Solomon,^[4] focuses on the vanity (or emptiness) of life under the sun. While some believe life under the sun refers to life without God, it actually refers to all life in a fallen world. Life under the sun often seems to be tedious, fruitless, empty, and even meaningless. Everything under the sun (all creation) has been affected by sin in this way. Paul says as much in Romans 8:20-22, using the same Greek word translated as “futility” that the Greek translation of the Old Testament (Septuagint/LXX) uses for “vanity” all throughout Ecclesiastes. Thus, just as Proverbs makes universal wisdom claims for all people, regardless of whether they belong to the covenant with God through Moses, Ecclesiastes is also wisdom for all people. The central idea is that all is vanity/empty. This Hebrew adjective refers to vapor or breath, i.e. something that is here one moment and gone the next. Similarly, the word also conveys something uncontrollable, just like wind/vapor. This supports the author’s repeated phrase, “This also is vanity and a striving after wind.” Thus, the existential problem is that our lives under the sun, in a fallen creation, appear to be absurd, as if we are striving after the wind with our brief, inconsequential existence. We strive to control the uncontrollable and to understand what is incomprehensible by human wisdom. God directs all things toward their purpose/goal (telos), and we can never hope to have his full perspective. Hoping otherwise would be striving after the wind. Though we know that there is purpose, we can rarely discern every action or event’s full purpose. This repeated “under the sun” phrase ought to cue us to focus our gaze on God, who is not under the sun and knows the point to our seemingly absurd lives.

The Vanity of Work, Wisdom, and All Other Pursuits

            Therefore, the narrator first examines work; we toil and labor for a lifetime only to yield nothing of lasting profit. Accomplishments are wasted after death, and legacies are forgotten. Accumulated wealth can be prodigally spent and lost after one generation. Our work seems ultimately absurd and fruitless. Second, growing in wisdom only increases sorrow. Proverbs makes normative claims that sowing wisdom reaps peace and goodness.^[5] Godly wisdom resulting from the fear of the Lord is indeed more valuable than any other treasure, yet life under the sun is frustrating and tedious, for both believers and unbelievers. Wisdom will never unlock the mysteries only known to God (though the great mystery of the gospel has been revealed), nor will it remove us from living under the sun. Third, the author addresses all other pursuits in life that are equally vain. Pursuing pleasure (hedonism), hard work, wisdom, gaining wealth, meaningful relationships, and religious significance are similarly striving after the wind.

Interpreting Ecclesiastes

            The primary difficulty most people encounter with the book of Ecclesiastes pertains to how much of it we should accept as true. The author says some things that seem to be at odds with the wisdom of Proverbs. How can he be so cynical about gaining wisdom (Eccl 1:12-18; 2:12-17) and working hard (Eccl 1:3-11; 2:18-26)? Chapter seven in particular is challenging. He concedes that wisdom does have its advantages, but he then claims that becoming too righteous and wise can be a man’s destruction (Eccl 7:15-16). In this way, Ecclesiastes serves as the flipside of Proverbs’ wisdom. Though Proverbs reveals that God has ordered His creation to function according to His wisdom, a fallen world does not secure blessings of righteousness and wisdom. The author of Ecclesiastes maintains that in life under the sun, even wisdom and righteousness cannot secure the blessing that they ought to. Thus, while not refuting the wisdom of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes sobers us to the reality that life under the sun appears to be vanity. In his limited under-the-sun experience, the author has witnessed wise, righteous people die young while wicked fools prosper.

However, his point should focus our attention on serving the God who is not under the sun as we are. One commentator said that the author “was a believer who sought to destroy people’s confidence in their own efforts, their own abilities, their own righteousness, and to direct them to faith in God as the only possible basis for meaning, value, and significance to life ‘under the sun.’” Though Christ has come once and His death and resurrection have ushered us into the last days before the Lord’s Day, when God’s future kingdom is invading our present reality, we still need to deal with living in a frustrating, seemingly absurd fallen world. We need not prematurely claim victory when sin and death still subject creation to futility. We must not fool ourselves into believing that the perceived results of our actions can inform us of a proper way of life. We cannot assume that there are no consequences for foolish living, yet we also cannot expect righteous, godly living to guarantee immediately perceptible prosperity. We still labor, suffer, grieve, rejoice, and gain wisdom until Jesus returns. There are times of blessing and sorrow, but in all things, we serve God in recognition that He progresses all of creation toward its proper end. Life is not absurd (though it may seem to be from our perspective) when God is creation’s providential caretaker. I once had a teacher who summarized the teaching of Ecclesiastes in three points: (1) recognize that even the best things in life have a negative side; (2) enjoy life, but don’t expect too much from it; and (3) the ultimate good in life is to fear God and keep His commandments. Disciples of Christ entrust the end results of wise living to God, knowing that all things work together for the good of those who love God, with good being defined as His people being conformed to the image of His Son (Romans 8:28-29)

Sources

Croteau, David A., and Gary E. Yates. Urban Legends of the Old Testament: 40 Common Misconceptions. Nashville: B&H Academic, 2019.

Estes, Daniel J. Handbook on the Wisdom Books and Psalms. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005.

Merrill, Eugene H., Mark F. Rooker, and Michael A Grisanti. The Word and the World: An Introduction to the Old Testament.

Ryken, Leland. “Christian Guides to the Classics: The Stranger.” The Gospel Coalition. https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/course/christian-guides-classics-stranger/#introduction