Paraphrase of Ecclesiastes · §2.2 · Gregory Thaumaturgus

Wisdom, folly and the emptiness of toil

Solomon weighs wisdom against folly, comes to hate the toil spent on empty things, and finds the true goods in wisdom from God.

So, weighing together the goods of wisdom and the evils of folly, I would rightly admire, and greatly, any man who has been carried along without reason and then takes hold of himself and turns back to what he ought (Ecclesiastes 2:12). For the gap between good sense and folly is wide; the difference between them is as great as between day and night (Ecclesiastes 2:13). The one who has chosen virtue is like a man who sees each thing clearly and looks upward, and who makes his journey in the brightest daylight; but the one entangled in wickedness is like a man straying in every kind of error, as on a moonless night, blind to what lies before him and cut off by the darkness from the things around him (Ecclesiastes 2:14).

Yet when I considered how the end of each of these two lives differs, I found no difference; and since I had made myself a companion of fools, I shall receive the wages of folly (Ecclesiastes 2:14-15). For what good is there in those clever arguments, or what profit in many words, when streams of idle talk pour out as from the spring of folly (Ecclesiastes 2:15)? Yet the wise man and the fool have nothing in common, neither in how people remember them nor in how God repays them (Ecclesiastes 2:16). Human affairs still seem to be beginning when their end already overtakes them all. But the wise man never shares the same end as the senseless.

So I came to hate my whole life, spent as it was on empty things, which I passed melting away over earthly toils (Ecclesiastes 2:17). For, in short, everything I labored over so painfully was the work of thoughtless impulse; and someone else will inherit it, whether wise or foolish, the cheerless fruit of my labors (Ecclesiastes 2:18-19). But when I had set these things aside and thrown them away, the goods truly set before a human being came into view: the knowledge of wisdom and the gaining of courage (Ecclesiastes 2:20-21).

But if someone has not cared for these, and has been swept away by other things, such a man has chosen evil instead of good, pursued wickedness instead of kindness, and toil instead of rest (Ecclesiastes 2:22). He is dragged about by troubles of every kind, held in their grip night and day without end, by the pressing labors of the body and the ceaseless cares of the soul, while his heart writhes within him over strange things (Ecclesiastes 2:23). For the perfect good does not rest in eating and drinking, even though food certainly comes to human beings from God (Ecclesiastes 2:24-25); for nothing given to us for our preservation lies outside His providence. But the good man, having received wisdom from God, has received heavenly joy; while the wicked man, driven by evils sent from God and sick with greed, is eager to heap up much, and hurries to cast reproach, before the Master of all, on the man whom God has honored, holding out useless gifts, having made deceitful and empty things the pursuits of his own wretched soul (Ecclesiastes 2:26).

Greek

Συλλογισάμενος οὖν τά τε σοφίας ἀγαθά, καὶ τὰ ἀφροσύνης κακά, εἰκότως ἂν ἱκανῶς θαυμάζοιμι ἄνδρα τοιοῦτον, ὅς τις φερόμενος ἀλόγως· ἔπειτα ἑαυτοῦ λαβόμενος, εἰς τὸ δέον ἐπιστρέψει. Φρονήσεως γὰρ καὶ ἀφροσύνης πολὺ τὸ μέσον, διαφορὰ δὲ ἀμφοῖν τοσαύτη, ὅση περ ἡμέρας πρὸς νύκτα. Ἔοικε τοίνυν, ὁ μὲν ἀρετὴν ᾑρημένος, τρανῶς τε ἕκαστα καὶ ἄνω βλέποντι· τῆς τε ἑαυτοῦ πορείας, λαμπροτάτου φέγγους καιρῷ πεποιημένῳ· ὁ δ᾽ αὖ κακίᾳ ἐμπεπλεγμένος, καὶ πλάνῃ παντοίᾳ ὡς ἐν σκοτομήνῃ πλανωμένῳ, τυφλός τε ὢν τὴν πρόσοψιν, καὶ ὑπὸ τοῦ σκότους τῶν πραγμάτων ἀφῃρημένος. Τέλος δὲ ἐπινοήσας ἑκατέρου τῶν βίων τούτων ἐγὼ τὸ διάφορον, εὗρον οὐδέν, καὶ ὡς κοινωνὸν ἀφρόνων ἐμαυτὸν καταστήσας, τὰ τῆς ἀφροσύνης ἐπίχειρα δέξομαι. Τί γὰρ ἢ τῶν σοφισμάτων ἐκείνων ἀγαθόν, ἢ ποία ὄνησις τῶν πολλῶν λόγων, ὅπου γε τὰ φλυαρίας ῥεύματα, ὥσπερ ἐκ πηγῆς ὁρμᾶται τῆς ἀφροσύνης; Σοφῷ δὲ καὶ ἄφρονι κοινὸν οὐδέν, οὐ κατὰ ἀνθρώπων μνήμην, οὐ κατὰ Θεοῦ ἀμοιβήν. Τῶν δ᾽ ἐν ἀνθρώποις πραγμάτων, ἔτι ἄρχεσθαι δοκούντων, ἤδη τὸ τέλος ἐπιλαμβάνει ἁπάντων. Σοφὸς δὲ οὐδέποτε ἀσυνέτῳ τοῦ αὐτοῦ κοινωνεῖ τέλους. Ἐμίσησα τοίνυν καὶ τὸν σύμπαντά μου βίον, τὸν ἐν τοῖς ματαίοις ἀναλωθέντα, ὃν διήγαγον τοῖς περὶ γῆν πόνοις προστετηκώς. Ὡς γὰρ συνελόντι φάναι, πάντα μοι λυπηρῶς ἐκμεμόχθηται ὁρμῆς ἀλογίστου γενόμενα ποιήματα· καὶ διαδέξεταί τις αὐτὰ ἕτερος, εἴτε σοφός, εἴτε ἠλίθιος, τὰς ψυχρὰς τῶν ἐμῶν καμάτων ἐπικαρπίας. Ἀπολαβομένῳ δέ μοι ταῦτα καὶ ἀπορρίψαντι, κατεφάνη τὰ τῷ ὄντι ἀγαθὰ προκείμενα ἀνθρώπῳ, σοφίας τε γνῶσις, καὶ κτῆσις ἀνδρείας. Εἰ δέ τις τούτων μὲν οὐκ ἐφρόντισεν, ἑτέρων δὲ ἐπτόηται, ὁ τοιοῦτος εἵλετο μὲν πονηρὰ ἀντὶ ἀγαθῶν, μετῆλθε δὲ κακίαν ἀντὶ χρηστότητος, καὶ μόχθον ἀνθ᾽ ἡσυχίας, ταράχοις ποικίλοις περιελκόμενος, νύκτωρ τε καὶ μεθ᾽ ἡμέραν συνεχόμενος ἀεί, σώματός τε ἐπείγουσι καμάτοις, καὶ ψυχῆς φροντίσιν ἀδιαλείπτοις, σφαδαζούσης αὐτῷ τῆς καρδίας, ἀλλοκότων ἕνεκα πραγμάτων. Οὐ γὰρ τὸ τέλειον ἀγαθὸν περὶ βρῶσίν τε καὶ πόσιν ἱζάνει· εἰ καὶ μάλιστα ἐκ Θεοῦ ἀνθρώποις γίνονται αἱ τροφαί· οὐδὲν γὰρ τῶν πρὸς σωτηρίαν ἡμῖν δεδομένων ἔξω τῆς αὐτοῦ ὑπάρχει προνοίας. Ἀλλ᾽ ὁ μὲν ἀγαθὸς ἀνήρ, σοφίας ἐκ Θεοῦ τυχών, εὐφροσύνης ἔτυχεν οὐρανίου· ὁ δ᾽ αὖ πονηρός, θεηλάτοις ἐλαυνόμενος κακοῖς, πλεονεξίαν νοσῶν, πολλά τε ἀθροῖσαι σπουδάζει, καὶ τὸν ὑπὸ Θεοῦ τετιμημένον ἐναντίον τοῦ πάντων Δεσπότου ὀνειδίσαι σπεύδει, δῶρα προτείνων ἄχρηστα, δολερά τε ὁμοῦ καὶ μάταια τῆς ἑαυτοῦ ἀθλίας ψυχῆς σπουδάσματα πεποιημένος.

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About this text

Gregory Thaumaturgus retells the whole of Ecclesiastes in Solomon's voice: human affairs are empty, pleasure and wealth never satisfy, and the book ends with its charge to fear God and keep His commandments, for every person will be judged. A fresh English translation from the Greek.

Gregory Thaumaturgus (c. 213–c. 270) wrote this paraphrase of Ecclesiastes for the whole Church of God. He was a third-century Christian bishop, born in Neocaesarea in Pontus to a wealthy pagan family and originally named Theodore.

The work is a paraphrase, not a commentary, presenting the teaching of Ecclesiastes in Gregory's own Greek. Gregory speaks in his own voice when he says he is addressing the Church and has given these matters sufficient thought.

A reader will meet Solomon, King David, and Gregory himself. The argument is that all human affairs and pursuits are empty and useless, because people are defeated by temporal things and refuse to look above the stars with the noble eye of the soul. Human life wears away like winter torrents pouring into the boundless deep. What God has established remains fixed, but human words and deeds have no measure, and idle talk brings no profit. Nothing new ever happens; what seems new was already known to the ancients, and both past and present fade into oblivion. The paraphrase then follows Ecclesiastes to its end: Solomon tries wisdom, pleasure and great works and finds them empty, weighs wisdom against folly, tells how he once reasoned that the righteous and the wicked meet the same end and rejects it, and closes with the charge to fear God and keep His commandments, for every person will be judged. The work paraphrases Ecclesiastes, so readers should use the Septuagint book name and numbering, cited as Ecclesiastes (LXX).

English translated from the Greek of the MGR / Documenta Catholica Omnia transcription (TLG 2063.006, from PG 10), read from its page images. From Ecclesiastes 1:13 to the end, each passage was also checked against the Greek and Latin columns of the Opera omnia print (Paris, 1622). The older Ante-Nicene Fathers English was used only as a sense check for the opening section.

Printed text used

Translated from MGR / Documenta Catholica Omnia concordance (Greek · Whole work)
Translated from Greek of the opening section (Greek · Ecclesiastes 1:1-12)
Also checked Opera omnia, Greek and Latin (Paris: Sonnius, Morel and Cramoisy, 1622), page images (Greek and Latin · Ecclesiastes 1:13 to the end)

Where the prints differ

Section 5.1 (Ecclesiastes 5:8) — The transcription brackets οὐ as an editor's supplement; the 1622 print has it as text ('there is no need to wonder'), and the English follows the 1622 print.
Section 5.2 (Ecclesiastes 5:10) — The transcription's χόρος is read as κόρος ('fill, satiety') with the 1622 print.
Section 7.1 (Ecclesiastes 6:12) — The transcription's πλέοντι is read as πλέον τι ('anything more') with the 1622 print.
Section 10.2 (Ecclesiastes 10:9) — The transcription prints ἀλλὰ μή with the editor's conjecture μήν; the English follows μήν ('Moreover'), as the 1622 Latin does.
Section 12.2 (Ecclesiastes 12:8) — The transcription's ἂ is read as the relative ἃ ('what I said before'), as the 1622 Latin requires.
Chapters 6-12 — Small typing and accent errors in the transcription are corrected from the 1622 print.

We have not yet re-checked this work against its source. We made this study translation with AI help. No scholar has yet certified it as faithful and complete. Open Greek on any section to see the source text. It is not a critical edition.

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