Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Ecclesiastes 12:5

Also [when] they shall be afraid of [that which is] high, and fears [shall be] in the way, and the almond tree shall flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets:

5. also when they shall be afraid of that which is high ] The description becomes more and more enigmatic, possibly, as some have thought, because the special forms of infirmity referred to called for a veil. The first clause, however, is fairly clear if we omit the interpolated “ when.” They (the indefinite plural, with the force of the French on) shall be afraid of a height, or hill. The new form of the sentence, the opening words also, indicate that the picture of the storm has been completed, and that symbolism of another kind comes in. We see, as it were, another slide in the magic lantern of the exhibiter. To be “afraid of a hill” expresses not merely or chiefly the failure of strength of limbs to climb mountains, but the temper that, as we say, makes “mountains out of molehills,” which, like the slothful man of Pro 22:13, sees “a lion in the path.” There are “fears in the way.” Imaginary terrors haunt the aged. Here again we have a parallel in Latin poetry:

“Multa senem circumveniunt incommoda; vel qud

Qurit et inventis miser abstinet, ac timet uti,

Vel qud res omnes timid gelidque ministrat.”

“Many the troubles that attend the old;

For either still he sets his mind on gains

And dares not touch, and fears to use his gains,

Or deals with all things as with chill of fear.”

Horace, Ep. ad Pis. 169 71.

So Aristotle among the characteristics of age notes that the old are (timid and in all things forecasting fears) ( Rhet. ii. 23). The interpreters who carry the idea of a storm through the whole passage explain the passage: “They (the people of the city) shall be afraid of that which is coming from on high,” i.e. of the gathering storm-clouds, but for the reasons above given, that interpretation seems untenable.

and the almond tree shall flourish ] The true meaning is to be found, it is believed, in the significance of the Hebrew name for almond tree ( Sheked = the early waking tree, comp. Jer 1:11), and the enigmatic phrase describes the insomnia which often attends old age. The tree that flourishes there is the tree of Vigilantia or Wakefulness. As might be expected, the discordant interpretations of commentators multiply, and we may record, but only in order to reject them, the more notable of these. (1) The almond blossoms represent the white hairs of age. Those blossoms are, however, pink and not white, and few persons would find a likeness in the two objects thus compared. (2) The verb rendered “shall flourish” has been derived from a root with the meaning “to loathe scorn reject,” and the sentence has been explained either (2) he (the old man) loathes the almond, i.e. has no taste for dainties, or (3) turns away from the almond tree, i.e. has no welcome for the messenger of spring, or (4), with the same sense as (2), “the almond causes loathing.” Anatomical expositors strain their fancies to find in the almond that which answers to (5) the thigh bone, or (6) the vertebral column, or some other part of the body which age affects with weakness. Into the discussion what part best answers to the almond we need not follow them.

and the grasshopper shall be a burden ] The word translated “grasshopper” is one of the many terms used, as in 2Ch 7:13, for insects of the locust class, as in Lev 11:22; Num 13:33; Isa 40:22, where the A. V. has “grasshopper.” It will be noted that in some of these passages (Num 13:33; Isa 40:22) it plays the part of the “mustard seed” of the Gospel parable (Mat 13:31) as the type of that which is the extreme of diminutiveness. And this we can scarcely doubt is its meaning here. “That which is least weighty is a burden to the timidity of age.” Assuming the writer to have come in contact with the forms of Greek life, the words may receive an illustration from its being the common practice of the Athenians to wear a golden grasshopper in their heads as the symbol of their being autochthones, “sprung from the soil.” Such an ornament is to the old man more than he cares to carry, and becomes another symbol of his incapacity to support the least physical or mental burden. As before we note a wide variety of other, but, it is believed, less tenable, explanations. (1) The locust has been looked on as, like the almond, another dainty article of food, which the terror of the storm, or the loss of appetite in age, renders unattractive. Commonly indeed they are said to have been eaten only by the poor, but Aristotle ( Hist. Anim. v. 30) names them as a delicacy, and the Arabs are said to consider them as such now (Ginsburg). Entering once more on the region of anatomical exposition we have the grasshopper taken (2) for the bone of the pelvis which becomes sharp and prominent in age, (3) for the stomach which swells with dropsy, (4) for the ankles swelling from the same cause, and so on through various other members.

and desire shall fail ] The word translated “desire” is not found elsewhere in the Old Testament, and this rendering rests on a somewhat doubtful etymology. The LXX. version, which may be admitted as shewing in what sense the word was taken at a very early date, and with which the Rabbinic use of the word agrees, gives , which the Vulgate reproduces in capparis, i.e. the caper or Capparis spinosa of botanists. It is in favour of this rendering that it preserves the enigmatic symbolism of the two previous clauses, while “desire” simply gives an abstract unfigurative term, out of harmony with the context. Possibly indeed the name was given to the plant as indicating its qualities as a restorative and stimulant (Plutarch, Sympos.; Athenus, Deipnos, ix. p. 405). The pickled capers of modern cookery are the buds of the shrub, but the berries and leaves are reputed to possess the same virtues. Hence one of the Epicures in Athenus ( Deipnos. ix. p. 370) takes (By the caper!) as a favourite oath, just as a modern gourmet might swear by some favourite sauce. So understood the meaning of the passage seems fairly clear. The caper-berry shall fall, i.e. shall no longer rouse the flagging appetite of age. There shall be a longa oblivio of what the man had most delighted in. It would seem indeed from the account of the capparis given by Pliny ( Hist. Nat. xx. 59) that its medicinal virtues were of a very varied character. It was a remedy for paralysis and diseases of the kidneys and the liver, for tooth-ache and ear-ache, for scrofula and phagednic ulcers. The words describe accordingly the infirmity which no drugs, however potent, can cure. It is as when Shakespeare says that “poppy and mandragora” shall fail to minister the “sweet sleep” of yesterday, as when we say of a man in the last stage of decrepitude that “no quinine or phosphorus will help him now.” See the Ideal Biography in the Introduction, ch. iii. So understood the Debater speaks with a scorn like that of Euripides ( Suppl. 1060) of the attempts of the old to revive their flagging desires and avert the approach of death.

, .

“I hate them, those who seek to lengthen life

With baths, and pillows, and quack-doctor’s drugs.”

Substantially most commentators agree in this meaning. The anatomical school, however, identify it, as before, with this or that bodily organ affected by old age, and one writer (Rosenmller) thinks that the point of comparison is found in the fact that the caper-berry as it ripens, bends the stalk with its weight, and then splits open and lets the seeds fall out.

because man goeth to his long home ] Literally, to the house of his eternity, i.e. to his eternal home. The description of the decay of age is followed by that of death as the close of all, and for a time, perhaps to link together the two symbolical descriptions, the language of figurative imagery is dropped. The “eternal home” is, of course, the grave (the phrase is stated by Ginsburg to be in common use among modern Jews), or more probably, Sheol, or Hades, the dwelling-place of the dead. In Tob 3:6 , “the everlasting place” seems used of the felicity of Paradise, and it is, at least, obvious that the thought of immortality, though not prominent, is not excluded here. The term Domus terna appears often on the tombs of Rome in Christian as well as non-Christian inscriptions, probably as equivalent to the “everlasting habitations” of Luk 16:9, and in these cases it clearly connotes more than an “eternal sleep.” An interesting parallel is found in the Assyrian legend of Ishtar, in which Hades is described as the “House of Eternity,” the “House men enter, but cannot depart from; the Road men go to, but cannot return” ( Records of the Past, i. 143).

the mourners go about the streets ] Literally, in the singular, the street or market-place. The words bring before us the most prominent feature of Eastern funerals. The burial-place was always outside the city, and the body was borne on an open bier through the streets and open places of the city, and the hired mourners, men and women, followed with their wailing cries, praising the virtues, or lamenting the death, of the deceased (2Sa 3:31; Jer 22:10; Jer 22:18; Mar 5:38). Sometimes these were short and simple, like the “Ah brother! Ah, sister! Ah, his glory!” of Jer 22:18. Sometimes they developed into elegiac poems like the lamentations of David over Saul and Jonathan (2Sa 1:17-27), and Abner (2Sa 3:32-34). So we have in the Talmud (quoted by Dukes, Rabbin. Blumenlese, pp. 256, 257) examples such as the following, “The palms wave their heads for the just man who was like a palm” “If the fire falls upon the cedar what shall the hyssop on the wall do?” It is obvious that such elegies would often take the form of a figurative description of death, and that which follows in the next verse may well have been an echo from some such elegy.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

High – The powerful and the proud, such persons as an old man in his timidity might shrink from opposing or meeting: or, high ground which old men would avoid ascending.

Fears … in the way – Compare Pro 26:13.

The almond tree – The type of old age. Many modern critics translate The almond shall be despised, i. e., pleasant food shall no longer be relished.

The grasshopper – Rather: the locust. The clause means, heaviness and stiffness shall take the place of that active motion for which the locust is conspicuous.

Desire – literally, the caper-berry; which, eaten as a provocative to appetite, shall fail to take effect on a man whose powers are exhausted.

Long home – literally, eternal (see Ecc 1:4 note) house; mans place in the next world. Without attributing to the author of Ecclesiastes that deep insight into the future life which is shown by the writer of the Epistles to the Corinthians, we may observe that He by whom both writers were inspired sanctions in both books (see 2Co 5:1-6) the use of the same expression eternal house. In 2 Corinthians it means that spiritual body which shall be hereafter; and it is placed, as it is here (see Ecc 12:3), in contrast with that earthly dissolving house which clothes the spirit of man in this world.

Mourners – The singing women who attend funerals for hire (see Mat 9:23).

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Ecc 12:5

The almond-tree shall flourish.

The almond-tree in blossom

In January, Palestine is adorned with the blossoming of the almond-tree. It breathes its life into that winter month as a promise of God sometimes lightens up and sweetens the coldness and desolation of a sorrowing spirit. When the almond-tree was in full bloom, it must have looked like some tree before our window on a winters morning, after a nightfall of snow, when its brightness is almost insufferable, every stem a white and feathery plume. Now you are ready to see the meaning of the text. Solomon was giving a full-length portrait of an aged man. By striking figures of speech, he sets forth his trembling and decrepitude, and then comes to describe the whiteness of his locks by the blossoming of the almond tree. It is the master-touch of the picture, for I see in that one sentence not only the appearance of the hair, but an announcement of the beauty of old age. The white locks of a bad man are but the gathered frosts of the second death, but a hoary head is a crown of glory if it be found in the way of righteousness. There may be no colour in the cheek, no lustre in the eye, no spring in the step, no firmness in the voice, and yet around the head of every old man whose life has been upright and Christian there hovers a glory brighter than ever shook in the white tops of the almond-tree. If the voice quiver, it is because God is changing it into a tone fit for the celestial choral. If the hand tremble, it is because God is unloosing it from worldly disappointments to clasp it on ringing harp and waving palm. If the hair has turned, it is only the grey light of heavens dawn streaming through the scant locks. The falling of this aged Christians staff will be the signal for the heavenly gate to swing open. The scattering of the almond blossoms will only discover the setting of the fruit. (T. De Witt Talmage.)

Because man goeth to his long home.—

Mans long home

Man is on his way to a long home: his lot in his long home will be determined by the manner in which he walks that homeward way; therefore, in his homeward walk he ought to remember his Creator in the days of his youth, and to fear God all his life long. It might be made to run thus: Live wisely that you may die happily. Live obediently unto God in this world that you may live joyfully with God in the next world.

I. The home-going. Man goeth home. He does not enter it by a sudden leap or bound, but he is, as on a journey, continuously progressing nearer and nearer to it. This is life–a constant home-going. There are what we may call years of preparation for the conscious start. When the infant first breathes these mortal airs; when the child is growing in stature and developing in mind and soul, scarcely thinking, or even knowing that, right on before, there lies an eternal destiny; and when the youth is just catching the faint glimmerings of consciousness as to duty and responsibility, and the need for heroic spiritual efforts–then is the time of a silent equipment, physically and morally, for entering on the hard, rough way of the homeward journey. And only at its close is the thought borne in on the soul that life is not to be considered as an automatic, purposeless thing, but is a well-marked and controllable progression which ends somewhere in a long home. When that thought is first clearly and earnestly realized by a boy or girl, then the real conscious start in the home-going is made. It usually happens, if not earlier, when the young people are in their teens. They can, at the very outset, if only they will, bound forward and gain splendid spiritual lengths. They have ardent affections, they have burning enthusiasms, which can go out untrammelled to what is highest and best. They have not yet entangled themselves with evil habits which have to be sternly battled with before they can be flung off. They have not yet come under the burden of lifes many cares, which sometimes make the feet heavy and slow in the heavenward way. Are your eyes dimmer, or your ears duller, or your limbs feebler, or your appetites blunter, or your hair whiter and scantier, or your soul less enthusiastic than in other days? Then, these are the Divine monitors telling that you are not to be always here–that, in your progressive home-going, you are fast ripening for the final exit.

II. The long home. Man goeth to his long home, or, as the Hebrew has it, to his house of eternity. Used by other and earlier writers, this may have been only a synonym for the grave; but more than this was meant by the writer of our text, for in Ecc 12:7 he speaks of the dust returning to the dust as it was, and the spirit returning to God who gave it. So the long home in his mind was, for the body the grave, and for the spirit an existence within the veil. May we not, therefore, think of mans long home as having an outer and an inner court? The outer court is the grave. That is the long home to which our bodies are daily, hourly, going–our poor bodies, which we deck and pamper, and on which we bestow such thought and care. The inner court is within the veil. And back from it, when the spirit enters, there is no returning to these earthly scenes. It is our house of eternity–an eternal home. About that unseen world we know so little that it is not wise to say much.

III. The mourners left behind. When a man enters the long bright home, he receives the Welcome home! of the Saviour and of all the blessed. But his home-going throws a shadow on the earth: it causes an aching void, a bitter lamentation. The mourners go about the street. Rather since they have gone to join in the song of them that feast, ought we not to strive to catch the blessed infection of their celestial joy, and put on festal robes, and sing hymns of triumph over their departure? This is what we would do were the Christian hope and faith sure and strong within us. This is what we are asked to do. Listen, my mourning friends, listen! Your Saviour speaks to you, and says, Your loved ones have but come to their bright long home with Me. Then why make ye this ado, and weep? (T. Young, B. D.)

The eternal house

By some scholars long home is translated enduring house, or perpetual house. It seems to them that the writer looked upon earth as the embodiment of the perishable, and that beyond the earth man passes into the unchangeable. This world is the place where silver cords are loosed; and golden bowls broken, and where the mourners go about the streets; beyond this all these dissolving views cease, and the spirit dwells amid the eternal. Its house is for ever, its love is for ever, its life is like that of God. I shall ask you to think upon this idea of an eternal house for man. Now that science is indirectly assailing this future house–assailing it by placing man among the mere productions of Nature, among the plants and the fishes and the birds–it becomes us all to place as against such a form of science the longings of the mind, and to find in the souls yearnings an antidote to the coldness of materialism. We must array spirit against dust. All that materialism rests upon is an analogy: the tree dies, the insect dies, the bird and the fish die, and therefore man dies and becomes nothing. But spiritualism can summon as good an analogy. It can say God lives. He passes on from age to age, and hence man passes onward parallel with this Maker. This argument assumes only the existence of a God. With that datum all becomes easy, for man sustains a closer resemblance to Deity than to the tree, the bird, the fish. He is an image of God, and hence analogy places man in the Divine class rather than in the mundane class, and makes man a partaker of the long being of Deity rather than of the short career of the vegetable or brute world. The analogy of man and God is as rational as the analogy of man and dust. All we need do in order to escape the annihilation inferred from material philosophy is to place man in the category of spirit, and then claim for him a parallelism with Deity. We shall not, however, argue the question of immortality. We design only to ask our hearts to ponder upon the idea of the eternal house of man, and see how grand it is, and what a bracing atmosphere surrounds it. No one carrying such a mind and soul as man is endowed with has any right to move along through these formative years without enveloping himself in the best possible atmosphere of truth, or of dream at least, if positive truth refuse to come. As invalids flee from low, damp valleys to climb up into mountain air, that their blood may find pure nutriment and flow with new life, so the soul and intellect born into the valley of ignorance should fly from the miasma, and seek mountain heights of belief and hope. There is no one reflection which has so commended the eternal house to me as the thought that this house is transient–painfully, almost unjustly transient. The children of earth are so pitilessly swept away into the tomb, with all their friendships and studies and arts and happiness and longings, that we are plunged into deep wonderment whether there is a God of love and wisdom all around this earth, as close as its atmosphere, and warm as the tropic sunshine. To preserve to us the idea of God comes this idea of the perpetual house, an idea born out of the tears of earth, as a rose out of rain. Almost all that is valuable in this world lies back of its present living souls. The heroes that live are but a handful to the heroes that are gone. All the arts we now enjoy are the fruits of intellects and souls that have gone away. Our state was purchased for us by hands that have dissolved into dust. All the ministers of religion now living are not equal in power to the one Christ who died at Jerusalem eighteen hundred years ago. What has become of this sublime past–this past whose temples of law and art and worship are crumbling by the Nile, and by the great sea, and by the Tiber, and are covered with old ivy in England? There is but one answer worthy of our minds or our hearts: and that is, that this impressive human race has been called not to oblivion, but to its Eternal House. These phenomena of earth, this great past display of intellect and love and learning and wisdom and morals, belong not to the realm of material, but to the realm of the Divine; and hence, as God reaches over ages, and is not subject to decay and annihilation, so He draws His children along after Him to His perpetual mansion. This is the only solution of mans being that does not make reason and morals and education and hope all unmeaning terms, and does not make the human soul a sounding brass full of noise without music. The words of the text, eternal house, not only recall to mind a lost past to be provided for, but they awaken in our mind thoughts about the future. Our earth will some time cease to be habitable by man. As its geologic forms show that it did once at least become uninhabitable, and by perhaps some sudden extinguishment of the sun did become a globe of ice such that the great mammals were frozen to death as they stood; and as at some other epoch this same little globe did all melt and become liquid as a globule of molten iron, so again in the coming centuries it will cease, suddenly or slowly, to be the home of man, and nowhere upon its whole surface will there remain even a Selkirk for its deep solitude. It must be that from a star of such vicissitudes, from a star where death comes in a few years to all, and where it came in thirty-three years to such a being as Jesus Christ, and from which one hundred and fifty times all the dear hearts upon it have been swept away, the Creator is transferring these ephemeral myriads to a more lasting home. There must be, somewhere, a perpetual house, into which we shall all fall when the earthly house of this tabernacle shall be dissolved. (D. Swing.)

On death

I. Consider the death of indifferent persons; if any can be called indifferent to whom we are so nearly allied as brethren by nature, and brethren in mortality. When we observe the funerals that pass along the streets, or when we walk along the monuments of death, the first thing that naturally strikes us is the undistinguishing blow with which that common enemy levels all. One day, we see carried along the coffin of the smiling infant; the flower just nipped as it began to blossom in the parents view; and the next day, we behold a young man, or young woman, of blooming form and promising hopes, laid in an untimely grave. While the funeral is attended by a numerous, unconcerned company, who are discoursing to one another about the news of the day, or the ordinary affairs of life, let our thoughts rather follow to the house of mourning, and represent to themselves what is going on there. There, we should see a disconsolats family, sitting in silent grief, thinking of the sad breach that is made in their little society; and, with tears in their eyes, looking to the chamber that is now left vacant, and to every memorial that presents itself of their departed friend. By such attention to the woes of others, the selfish hardness of our hearts will be gradually softened, and melted down into humanity.

II. Consider the death of our friends. Then, indeed, is the time to weep. Let not; a false idea of fortitude, or mistaken conceptions of religious duty, be employed to restrain the bursting emotion. Let the heart seek its relief in the free effusion of just and natural sorrow. It is becoming in every one to show, on such occasions, that he feels as a man ought to feel. At the same time, let moderation temper the grief of a good man and a Christian. He must not sorrow like those who have no hope. They whom we have loved still live, though not present to us. They are only removed into a different mansion in the house of the common Father. In due time, we hope to be associated with them in these blissful habitations. Until this season of reunion arrive, no principle of religion discourages our holding correspondence of affection with them by means of faith and hope. Meanwhile, let us respect the virtues and cherish the memory of the deceased. Let their little failings be now forgotten. Let us dwell on what was amiable in their character, imitate their worth, and trace their steps. Moreover, let the remembrance of the friends whom we have lest strengthen our affection to those that remain. The narrower the circle becomes of those we love, let us draw the closer together. But they are not only our friends who die. Our enemies also must go to their long home.

III. Consider how we ought to be affected, when they from whom suspicions have alienated, or rivalry has divided us; they with whom we have long contended, or by whom we imagine ourselves to have suffered wrong, are laid, or about to be laid, in the grave. How inconsiderable then appear those broils in which we have been long involved, those contests and feuds which we thought were to last for ever! The awful moment that now terminals them makes us feel their vanity. Let the anticipation of such sentiments serve now to correct the inveteracy of prejudice, to cool the heat of anger, to allay the fierceness of resentment. When a few suns more have rolled over our heads, friends and foes shall have retreated together; and their love and their hatred be equally buried. Let our few days, then, be spent in peace. While we are all journeying onwards to death, let us rather bear one anothers burdens, than harass one another by the way. Let us smooth and cheer the road as much as we can, rather than fill the valley of our pilgrimage with the hateful monuments of our contention and strife. (H. Blair, D. D.)

Our long home

I. Examine the term applied here to describe the grave–the long home. We are not to look down into the earth, but up at the skies. Above the grave we may discern the glory.

II. What an added and intensified interest belongs to those whom we have known when they pass away from us into the long home, thus equipped.

1. There was the process of the spirit disentangling itself from the body.

2. There was the new consciousness of the spirit, freed from the limitations of the flesh, and really entering the new world.

3. As we think upon the long home we cannot but remember that we too must finish with this world and die.

4. We, toe, must be judged, our conduct and character will be examined by the Infallible Judge.

5. We, too, must prepare. We may well consider whether the preparation is really made, and whether it is continually enlarged and perfected. (Alfred Norris.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 5. When they shall be afraid of that which is high]

10. Being so feeble, they are afraid to trust themselves to ascend steps, stairs, c., without help. And when they look upwards, their heads turn giddy, and they are ready to fall.

11. Fears shall be in the way] They dare not walk out, lest they should meet some danger, which they have not strength to repel, nor agility to escape. A second childishness has taken place-apprehensions, fears, terrors, and weakness.

12. The almond tree shall flourish] yenaets, not flourish, but fall off. The hair begins to change, first gray, then white it having no longer that supply of nutritive juices which it once had, this animal vegetable withers and falls off. The almond tree, having white flowers, is a fit emblem of a hoary head; or as Hasselquist says, who observed the tree in full flower in Judea, “like an old man with his white locks.”

13. The grasshopper shall be a burden] Even such an inconsiderable thing as a locust, or a very small insect, shall be deemed burdensome, their strength is so exceedingly diminished. In cases of the gout, especially in old men, the shadow of a person passing by puts them to acute pain! How much less can they bear the smallest pressure! But probably the words refer to the man himself, who, bent at the loins, and his arms hanging down, exhibits some caricature of the animal in question. The poor grasshopper has become a burden to himself. Another interpretation has been given of the grasshopper; but I pass it by as impertinent and contemptible; such commentators appear as if they wished to render the text ridiculous.

14. Desire shall fail] Both relish and appetite for food, even the most delicate, that to which they were formerly so much attached, now fails. The teeth are no longer able to masticate the food, or have all dropped out; the stomach no longer able to digest any thing; and, as the body is no longer capable of receiving nourishment, appetite and relish necessarily fail.

15. Because man goeth to his long home] el beith olamo, “to the house of his age;” the place destined to receive him, when the whole race or course of life shall be finished; for olam takes in the whole course or duration of a thing; if applied to a dispensation, such as the LAW, it takes in its whole duration; to the life of man, it takes in the whole life; to time, it includes its whole compass; to eternity, it expresses its infinite duration. So old age terminates the olam, the complete duration of human life; and when life is no longer desired, and nutrition ceases, the olam of man is terminated. My old MS. Bible translates it, The hous of his everlastingness.

16. He is just departing into the invisible world; and this is known by the mourners going about the streets, the long hollow groans and throat rattlings which proceed from him; the sure prognostications of the extreme debility and speedy cessation of those essential animal functions next mentioned.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

They shall be afraid; the passion of fear is observed to be most incident to old men, of which divers reasons may be given.

Of that which is high; either,

1. Of high things, lest they should fall upon them. Or rather,

2. Of high places, of going up hills or stairs, which is very irksome to them, because of their weakness, and weariness, ar, d giddiness, and danger, or dread of falling. And this clause, together with the next, may be rendered thus, and that agreeably to the Hebrew text,

Also they shall be afraid and terrified (two words expressing the same thing, which is very frequent in the Hebrew) of that which is high in the way. When they walk abroad, they will dread to go up any high or steep places.

And fears shall be in the way, lest as they are walking, they should stumble, or fall, or be thrust down, or some infirmity or mischief should befall them.

The almond tree shall flourish; their heads shall be as full of grey hairs as the almond tree is of white flowers. Such metaphors are not unusual in other authors. Hence Sophocles calls a grey or hoary head flowery, and again, covered with white flowers.

The grasshopper shall be a burden, if it doth accidentally hop up and rest upon them. They cannot endure the least burden, being indeed a burden to themselves. But the words may be, and are by others, rendered, the locust (as the ancient interpreters and many others render it; or, as ours and some others, the grasshopper, which comes to the same thing; for these two sorts of insects are much of the same nature and shape) shall be a burden to itself. And by the locust or grasshopper may be understood, either,

1. The old man himself, who bears some resemblance to it; in shape, by reason of the bones sticking out; in the constitution of the body, which is dry and withering; and in the legs and arms, which are slender, the flesh being consumed. Or,

2. The back, which fitly follows after the head, upon which the almond tree flourished, in which the strength of the body lay, and which formerly was able to bear great burdens, but now, through its weakness and crookedness, is a burden too heavy for itself. And some of the Jewish and other interpreters understand this word, which others render locust or grasshopper, to be some part of the body, either the back-bone, or the head of the thigh bone, or the ankle-bone, any of which may well be said to be heavy or burdensome to itself, when it moves slowly and listlessly, and not without difficulty and trouble. Desire, to wit, of meats, and drinks, and music, and other carnal delights, which are vehemently desired by men in the heat of their youth, but are unsavoury to old men; of which see an instance 2Sa 19:35. It is true, the former expressions are metaphorical, but the two next following are proper, and to be understood literally; and so may this clause also.

Man goeth, is travelling towards it, and every day nearer to it than other,

to his long home; from this place of his pilgrimage into the grave, from whence he must never return into this world, and into the state and place of the future life, which is unchangeable and everlasting.

The mourners; either such as were hired to that end, of whom See Poole “Jer 9:17“; See Poole “Mat 9:23“, See Poole “Mat 11:17“, or true mourners, near relations, and dear friends, accompany the dead corpse through the streets to the grave.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

5. that which is highThe oldare afraid of ascending a hill.

fears . . . in the wayEvenon the level highway they are full of fears of falling, c.

almond . . . flourishInthe East the hair is mostly dark. The white head of the oldamong the dark-haired is like an almond tree, with its whiteblossoms, among the dark trees around [HOLDEN].The almond tree flowers on a leafless stock in winter(answering to old age, in which all the powers are dormant),while the other trees are flowerless. GESENIUStakes the Hebrew for flourishes from a different root,casts off when the old man loses his gray hairs, as thealmond tree casts its white flowers.

grasshoppersthe dry,shrivelled, old man, his backbone sticking out, his knees projectingforwards, his arms backwards, his head down, and the apophysesenlarged, is like that insect. Hence arose the fable, that Tithonusin very old age was changed into a grasshopper [PARKHURST].”The locust raises itself to fly”; the old man aboutto leave the body is like a locust when it is assuming its wingedform, and is about to fly [MAURER].

a burdennamely, tohimself.

desire shallfailsatisfaction shall be abolished. For “desire,”Vulgate has “the caper tree,” provocative of lust;not so well.

long home (Job 16:22;Job 17:13).

mourners (Jer9:17-20), hired for the occasion (Mt9:23).

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

Also when they shall be afraid of [that which is] high,…. Not of the most high God, before whose tribunal they must shortly appear, as some; but rather of high places, as high hills, mountains, towers, c. which aged persons are afraid to go up, because of the feebleness and weakness of their limbs, their difficulty of breathing, and the dizziness of their heads

and fears [shall be] in the way; they do not care: to go abroad, being afraid of every little stone that lies in the way, lest they should stumble at it, and fall: some understand this of their fears of spirits, good or bad; but the former sense is best;

and the almond tree shall flourish; which most interpret of the hoary head, which looks like an almond tree in blossom; and which, as it comes soon in the spring, whence it has its name of haste in the Hebrew language; see Jer 1:11; and is a sure sign of its near approach; so gray hairs, or the hoary head, sometimes appear very soon and unexpected, and are a sure indication of the approach of old age; which Cicero h calls “aetas praecipitata”,

“age that comes hastily on;”

though the hoary head, like the almond tree, looks very beautiful, and is venerable, especially if found in the way of righteousness,

Le 19:32;

and the grasshopper shall be a burden; meaning either, should a grasshopper, which is very light, leap upon an aged person, it would give him pain, the least burden being uneasy to him; or, should he eat one of these creatures, the locusts being a sort of food in Judea, it would not sit well, on his stomach: or the grasshopper, being a crumpled and lean creature, may describe an old man; his legs and arms emaciated, and his shoulders, back, and lips, crumpled up and bunching out; and the locust of this name has a bunch on its backbone, like a camel i: Bochart k says, that the head of the thigh, or the hip bone, by the Arabians, is called “chagaba”, the word here used for a locust or grasshopper; which part of the body is of principal use in walking, and found very troublesome and difficult to move in old men; and Aben Ezra interprets it of the thigh: the almond tree, by the Rabbins, as Jarchi says, is interpreted of the hip bone, which stands out in old age: and the Targum, of this and the preceding clause, is,

“and the top of thy backbone shall bunch out, through leanness, like the almond; and the ankles of thy feet shall be swelled.”

Some, as Ben Melech observes, understand it of the genital member, and of coitus, slighted and rejected, because of the weakness of the body; all desires of that kind being gone, as follows;

and desire shall fail; the appetite, for food, for bodily pleasures, and carnal delights; and particularly for venery, all the parts of the body for such uses being weakened, The Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Arabic versions, render it, “the caper tree shall be dissipated”, or “vanish”, or “[its fruit] shall shrink”; so Dr. Smith, who understands it of the decrease of the fluids, as he does the former clause of the solid parts of the body; and the berries of this tree are said to excite both appetite and lust l: and so Munster m interprets the word of the berries of the caper tree;

because man goeth to his long home; the grave, as the Targum, the house appointed for living, where he must lie till the resurrection morn; his eternal house, as Cicero calls it n; and so it may be rendered here, “the house of the world”, common to all the world, where all mankind go: or, “to the house of his world” o; whether of bliss or woe, according as his state and character be, good or bad: Theognis p calls it the dark house of “hades”, or the invisible state; and then this must be understood with respect to his separate soul, and the mansion of it; and Alshech says, every righteous man has a mansion to himself; see Joh 14:2;

and the mourners go about the streets; the relations of the deceased; or those that go to their houses to comfort them; or the mourning men and women, hired for that purpose.

h Fam. Epist. l. 11. Ep. 58. i R. Sol. Urbin. Ohel Moed, fol. 83. 1. k Hierozoic. par. 2. l. 4. c. 8. col. 494. l Avicenna spud Schindler. Lexic. col. 10. m Dictionar. Chaldaic. p. 13. n Tusculan. Quaest. l. 2. prope finem. o “ad domum seculi sui”, Pagninus. Montanus, Vatablus, Mercerus. p v. 1008. vid. v. 244.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

Ecc 12:5

From this his repugnance to singing, and music, and all loud noises, progress in the description is made to the difficulty such aged men have in motion: “Also they are afraid of that which is high; and there are all kinds of fearful things in the way … .” The description moves forward in a series of independent sentences; that to which it was subordinate in Ecc 12:3, and still also in Ecc 12:4, is now lost sight of. In the main it is rightly explained by the Talm., and with it the Midrash: “Even a little hillock appears to him like a high mountain; and if he has to go on a journey, he meets something that terrifies him;” the Targ. has adopted the second part of this explanation. (falsely referred by the Targ. to the time lying far back in the past) is understood neut.; cf. 1Sa 16:7. Such decrepid old men are afraid of ( , not videbunt, as the lxx, Symm., Ar., and the Venet. translate, who seem to have had before them the defective ) a height, – it alarms them as something unsurmountable, because their breath and their limbs fail them when they attempt it; and hathhhattim (plur. of the intensifying form of hat, consternatio, Job 41:25), i.e., all kinds of formidines (not formido , Ewald, 179 a, Bttch. 762, for the plur. is as in salsilloth , ‘aph’appim , etc., thought of as such), meet them in the way. As the sluggard says: there is a lion in the way, and under this pretence remains slothfully at home, Pro 24:13; Pro 22:13, so old men do not venture out; for to them a damp road appears like a very morass; a gravelly path, as full of neck-breaking hillocks; an undulating path, as fearfully steep and precipitous; that which is not shaded, as oppressively hot and exhausting-they want strength and courage to overcome difficulties, and their anxiety pictures out dangers before them where there are none.

Ecc 12:5

The allegory is now continued in individual independent figures: “And the almond tree is in blossom.” The Talm. explains of the haunch-bone projecting (from leanness); the Midrash, of the bones of the vertebral column, conceived of as incorruptible and as that round which will take place the future restoration of the human body, – probably the cross bone, os sacrum ,

(Note: The Jewish opinion of the incorruptible continuance of this bone may be connected with the designation os sacrum ; the meaning of this is controverted, vid., Hyrtl’s Anatomie, 124.)

inserted between the two thigh bones of the pelvis as a pointed wedge; cf. Jerome in his Comm.: quidam sacram spinam interpretantur quod decrescentibus natium cornibus spina accrescat et floreat ; is an Old Heb., Aram., and Arab. name of the almond tree and the almond nut ( vid., under Gen 30:37), and this, perhaps, is the reason of this identification of the emblematic with (the os sacrum , or vertebra magna ) of the spine. The Targ. follows the Midrash in translating: the (the top of the spine) will protrude from leanness like an almond tree (viz., from which the leaves have been stripped). In these purely arbitrary interpretations nothing is correct but (1) that is understood not of the almond fruit, but of the almond tree, as also at Jer 1:11 (the rod of an almond tree); (2) that (notwithstanding that these interpreters had it before them unpointed) is interpreted, as also by the lxx, Syr., Jerome, and the Venet., in the sense of blossoming, or the bursting out of blossoms by means of the opening up of the buds. Many interpreters understand of almond fruit (Winzer, Ewald, Ginsb., Rdiger, etc.), for they derive from , as Aben Ezra had already done, and explain by: fastidit amygdalam ( nucem ), or fastidium creat amygdala . But (1) for ( Hiph. of , to disdain, to treat scornfully) is a change of vowels unexampled; we must, with such an explanation, read either , fastiditur (Gaab), or ; (2) almond nuts, indeed, belong to the more noble productions of the land and the delicacies, Gen 43:11, but dainties, , at the same time they are not, so that it would be appropriate to exemplify the blunted sensation of taste in the old man, by saying that he no more cracks and eats almonds. The explanation of Hitzig, who reads , and interprets the almond tree as at Son 7:9 the palm, to denote a woman, for he translates: the almond tree refuses (viz., the old man), we set aside as too ingenious; and we leave to those interpreters who derive from , and understand

(Note: Abulwald understands and sexually, and glosses the latter by jundub (the locust), which in Arab. is a figure of suffering and patience.)

of the glans penis (Bttch., Frst, and several older interpreters), to follow their own foul and repulsive criticism. is an incorrect reading for , as at Hos 10:14, for , and, in Prov., for (Gesen. 73. 4); and besides, as at Son 6:11, , regular Hiph. of ( , Lam 4:15), to move tremblingly (vibrate), to glisten, blossom (cf. , to flee, and , Assyr. nisannu , the flower-month). Thus deriving this verbal form, Ewald, and with him Heiligst., interprets the blossoming almond tree as a figure of the winter of life: “it is as if the almond tree blossomed, which in the midst of winter has already blossoms on its dry, leafless stem.” But the blossoms of the almond tree are rather, after Num 17:2-8, a figure of special life-strength, and we must thus, thrown back to from (to flourish), rather explain, with Furrer (in Schenkel’s B. L.), as similarly Herzf.: the almond tree refuses, i.e., ceases, to blossom; the winter of old age is followed by no spring; or also, as Dale and Taylor: the almond tree repels, i.e., the old man has no longer a joyful welcome for this messenger of spring. But his general thought has already found expression in Ecc 12:2; the blossoming almond tree must be here an emblem of a more special relation. Hengst. supposes that “the juniper tree (for this is the proper meaning of ) is in bloom” is = sleeplessness in full blossom stands by the old man; but that would be a meaningless expression. Nothing is more natural than that the blossoming almond tree is intended to denote the same as is indicated by the phrase of the Latin poet: Intempestivi funduntur vertice cani (Luther, Geiger, Grot., Vaih., Luzz., Gurlitt, Tyler, Bullock, etc.).

It has been objected that the almond blossoms are not pure white, but according to the variety, they are pale-red, or also white; so that Thomson, in his beautiful Land and the Book, can with right say: “The almond tree is the type of old age whose hair is white;” and why? “The white blossoms completely cover the whole tree.” Besides, Bauer (1732) has already remarked that the almond blossoms, at first tinged with red, when they are ready to fall off become white as snow; with which may be compared a clause cited by Ewald from Bodenstedt’s A Thousand and One Days in the Orient: “The white blossoms fall from the almond trees like snow-flakes.” Accordingly, Dchsel is right when he explains, after the example of Zckler: “the almond tree with its reddish flower in late winter, which strews the ground with its blossoms, which have gradually become white like snow-flakes, is an emblem of the winter of old age with its falling silvery hair.”

Ecc 12:5

From the change in the colour of the hair, the allegory now proceeds to the impairing of the elasticity of the highs and of their power of bearing a load, the malum coxae senile (in a wider than the usual pathological sense): “And the grasshopper ( i.e., locust, , Samar. = , Lev 11:22) becomes a burden.” Many interpreters (Merc., Dderl., Gaab, Winz., Gesen., Winer, Dale) find in these words the meaning that locust-food, or that the chirping of grasshoppers, is burdensome to him (the old man); but even supposing that it may at once be assumed that he was a keen aeridophagus (locusts, steeped in butter, are like crabs (shrimps) spread on slices of butter and bread), or that he had formerly a particular delight in the chirping of the , which the ancients number among singing birds (cf. Taylor, l.c.), and that he has now no longer any joy in the song of the , although it is regarded as soothing and tending to lull to rest, and an Anacreon could in his old days even sing his , – yet these two interpretations are impossible, because may mean to burden and to move with difficulty, but not “to become burdensome.” For the same reason, nothing is more absurd than the explanation of Kimchi and Gurlitt: Even a grasshopper, this small insect, burdens him; for which Zckl., more naturally: the hopping and chirping of the grasshopper is burdensome to him; as we say, The fly on the wall annoys him. Also Ewald and Heiligstedt’s interpretation: “it is as if the locust raised itself to fly, breaking and stripping off its old husk,” as inadmissible; for can mean se portare laboriose , but not ad evolandum eniti ; the comparison (Arab.) tahmmal gains the meaning of hurry onwards, to proceed on an even way, like the Hebr. , to take upon the shoulder; it properly means, to burden oneself, i.e., to take on one’s back in order to get away; but the grasshopper coming out of its case carries away with it nothing but itself. For us, such interpretations – to which particularly, the advocates of the several hypotheses of a storm, night, and mourning, are constrained – are already set aside by this, that according to the allegory , must also signify something characteristic of the body of an old man. The lxx, Jerome, and Ar. translate: the locust becomes fat; the Syr.: it grows. It is true, indeed, that great corpulence, or also a morbid dropsical swelling of the belly ( ascites ), is one of the symptoms of advanced old age; but supposing that the (voracious) locust might be en emblem of a corpulent man, yet means neither to become fat nor to grow. But because the locust in reality suggests the idea of a corpulent man, the figure cannot at the same time be intended to mean that the old man is like a skeleton, consisting as it were of nothing but skin and bone (Lyra, Luther, Bauer, Dathe); the resemblance of a locust to the back-bone and its joints (Glassius, Khler, Vaih.) is not in view; only the position of the locusts’s feet for leaping admits the comparison of the prominent scapulae (shoulder-blades); but shoulder-blades ( scapulae alatae ), angular and standing out from the chest, are characteristics of a consumptive, not of a senile habit. Also we must cease, with Hitz., Bttch., Luzz., and Gratz, to understand the figure as denoting the to be now impotent; for relaxation and shrinking do not agree with hctbl, which suggests something burdensome by being weighty.

The Midrash interprets by “ankles,” and the Targ. translates accordingly: the ankles ( , from the Pers. ustuwar , firm) of thy feet will swell-unsuitably, for “ankles” affords no point of comparison with locusts, and they have no resemblance to their springing feet. The Talm., glossing by “these are the buttocks” ( nates ) (cf. Arab. ‘ajab , the os coccygis , Syn. ‘ajuz , as the Talm. interchanges with ), is on the right track. There is nothing, indeed, more probably than that is a figure of the coxa , the hinder region of the pelvis, where the lower part of the body balances itself in the hip-joint, and the motion of standing up and going receives its impulse and direction by the muscular strength there concentrated. This part of the body may be called the locust, because it includes in itself the mechanism which the two-membered foot for springing, placed at an acute angle, presents in the locust. Referred to this coxa , the loins, has its most appropriate meaning: the marrow disappears from the bones, elasticity from the muscles, the cartilage and oily substance from the joints, and, as a consequence, the middle of the body drags itself along with difficulty; or: it is with difficulty moved along ( Hithpa. as pass., like Ecc 8:10); it is stiff, particularly in the morning, and the old man is accustomed to swing his arms backwards, and to push himself on as it were from behind. In favour of this interpretation (but not deciding it) is the accord of with = (by which the os coccygis is designated as the cuckoo’s bone). Also the verbal stem (Arab.) jahab supplies an analogous name: not jahab , which denotes the air passage (but not, as Knobel supposes, the breath itself; for the verb signifies to separate, to form a partition, Mish. ), but (Arab.) jahabat , already compared by Bochart, which denotes the point (dual), the two points or projections of the two hip-bones ( vid., Lane’s Lex.), which, together with the os sacrum lying between, form the ring of the pelvis.

Ecc 12:5

From the weakening of the power of motion, the allegory passes on to the decay of sensual desires, and of the organs appertaining thereto: “And the caper-berry fails … .” The meaning “caper” for is evidence by the lxx ( , Arab. alkabar ), the Syr., and Jerome ( capparis ), and this rendering is confirmed by the Mishnic , which in contradistinction to , i.e., the tender branches, and , i.e., the rind of fruit, signifies the berry-like flower-buds of the caper bush,

(Note: The caper-bush is called in the Mish. , and is celebrated, Beza 25 a, cf. Shabbath 30 b (where, according to J. S. Bloch’s supposition, the disciple who meets Gamaliel is the Apostle Paul), on account of its unconquerable life-power, its quick development of fruit, and manifold products. The caper-tree is planted, says Berachoth 36a, “with a view to its branches;” the eatable branches or twigs here meant are called ( ). Another name for the caper-tree is , Demai i. 1, Berachoth 36 a, 40 b; and another name for the bud of the caper-blossom is , Berachoth 36b (cf. Aruch, under the words aviyonoth and tselaph ).)

according to Buxtorf. This Talm. word, it is true, is pointed ; but that makes no difference, for is related to merely as making the word emphatic, probably to distinguish the name of the caper from the fem. of the adj. , which signifies avida, egena. But in the main they are both one; for that may designate “desire” (Abulwald:

(Note: In his Dictionary of Roots ( kitab el – utsul ), edited by Neubauer, Oxford 1873-4.)

aliradat ; Parchon: ; Venet.: ; Luther: alle Lust ), or “neediness,” “poverty” (the Syr. in its second translation of this clause), is impossible, because the form would be unexampled and incomprehensible; only the desiring soul, or the desiring, craving member ( vid., Kimchi), could be so named. But now the caper is no named, which even to this day is used to give to food a more piquant taste (cf. Plutarch’s Sympos. vi. qu. 2). It is also said that the caper is a means of exciting sexual desire ( aphrodisiacum ); and there are examples of its use for this purpose from the Middle Ages, indeed, but none from the records of antiquity; Pliny, Hist. Nat. xx. 14 (59), knew nothing of it, although he speaks at length of the uses and effects of the capparis . The Talm. explains by , the Midrash by , the Targ. by , interpreting the word directly without reference to the caper in this sense. If haaviyonah thus denotes the caper, we have not thence to conclude that it incites to sexual love, and still less are we, with the Jewish interpreters, whom Bttch. follows, to understand the word of the membrum virile itself; the Arab. name for the caper, ‘itar , which is compared by Grtz, which has an obscene meaning, designates also other aromatic plants. We shall proceed so much the more securely if we turn away from the idea of sexual impulse and hold by the idea of the impulse of self-preservation, namely, appetite for food, since (from , the root-meaning of which, “to desire,” is undoubted

(Note: Vid., Fried. Delitzsch’s Indogerman.-Sem. Stud. I p. 62f. Also the Arab. aby in the language of the Negd means nothing else.))

denotes a poor man, as one who desires that which is indispensable to the support of life; the caper is accordingly called aviyonah , as being appetitiva , i.e., exciting to appetite for food, and the meaning will not be that the old man is like a caper-berry which, when fully ripe, bursts its husks and scatters its seed (Rosenm., Winer in his R. W., Ewald, Taylor, etc.), as also the lxx, Symm. ( , i.e., as Jerome translates it, et dissolvetur spiritus fortitudo , perhaps , the strength or elasticity of the spirit), and Jerome understand the figure; but since it is to be presupposed that the name of the caper, in itself significant, will also be significant for the figure: capparis est irrita sive vim suam non exerit ( as inwardly trans. Hiph. of , to break in pieces, frustrate), i.e., even such means of excitement as capers, these appetite-berries, are unable to stimulate the dormant and phlegmatic stomach of the old man (thus e.g., Bullock). Hitzig, indeed, maintains that the cessation of the enjoyment of love in old age is not to be overlooked; but (1) the use of artificial means for stimulating this natural impulse in an old man, who is here described simply as such, without reference to his previous life and its moral state, would make him a sensualist; and (2) moral statistics show that with the decay of the body lust does not always (although this would be in accordance with nature, Gen 17:17; Rom 4:19) expire; moreover, the author of the Book of Koheleth is no Juvenal or Martial, to take pleasure, like many of his interpreters, in exhibiting the res venereae .

Ecc 12:5

And in view of the clause following, the ceasing from nourishment as the last symptom of the certain approach of death is more appropriate than the cessation from sexual desire: “For,” thus the author continues after this description of the enfeebled condition of the hoary old man, “man goeth to his everlasting habitation, and the mourners go about the streets.” One has to observe that the antequam of the memento Creatoris tui in diebus junvetutis tuae is continued in Ecc 12:6 and Ecc 12:7. The words ‘ad asher lo are thrice repeated. The chief group in the description is subordinated to the second ‘ad asher lo ; this relation is syntactically indicated also in Ecc 12:4 by the subjective form , and continues logically in Ecc 12:5, although without any grammatical sign, for and are indicative. Accordingly the clause with , Ecc 12:5, will not be definitive; considerately the accentuation does not begin a new verse with : the symptoms of marasmus already spoken of are here explained by this, that man is on his way to the grave, and, as we say, has already one foot in it. The part. is also here not so much the expression of the fut. instans ( iturus est ), like Ecc 9:10, as of the present (Venet.: ); cf. Gen 15:2, where also these two possible renderings stand in question. “Everlasting house” is the name for the grave of the dead, according to Diodorus Sic. i. 51, also among the Egyptians, and on old Lat. monuments also the expression domus aeterna is found ( vid., Knobel); the comfortless designation, which corresponds

(Note: The Syr. renders beth ‘olam by domus laboris sui , which is perhaps to be understood after Job 3:17.)

to the as yet darkened idea of Hades, remained with the Jews in spite of the hope of the resurrection they had meanwhile received; cf. Tob. 3:6; Sanhedrin 19 a, “the churchyard of Husal ;” “to be a churchyard” ( beth ‘olam ); “at the door of the churchyard” ( beth ‘olam ), Vajikra rabba, c. 12. Cf. Assyr. bit ‘idii = of the under-world (Bab.-Assyr. Epic, “Hllenfahrt der Istar,” i. 4).

The clause following means that mourners already go about the streets (cf. , Son 3:3, and Pil. Son 3:2; Psa 59:7) expecting the death of the dying. We would say: the undertaker tarries in the neighbourhood of the house to be at hand, and to offer his services. For hassophdim are here, as Knobel, Winz., and others rightly explain, the mourners, saphdanin ( sophdanin ), hired for the purpose of playing the mourning music (with the horn , Mod katan 27 b, or flute, , at the least with two, Kethuboth 46 b; cf. Lat. siticines ) and of singing the lament for the dead, qui conducti plorant in funere (Horace, Poet. 433), along with whom were mourning women, (Lat. praeficae ) (cf. Buxtorf’s Lex. Talm. col. 1524 s.), – a custom which existed from remote antiquity, according to 2Sa 3:31; Jer 34:5. The Talm. contains several such lamentations for the dead, as e.g., that of a “mourner” ( ) for R. Abina: “The palms wave their heads for the palm-like just man,” etc.; and of the famed “mourner” Bar-Kippuk on the same occasion: “If the fire falls upon the cedar, what shall the hyssop of the walls do?” etc. ( Mod katan 25 b)

(Note: Given in full in Wiss. Kunst Judenth. p. 230ff. Regarding the lament for the dead among the Haurans, vid., Wetzstein’s treatise on the Syrian Threshing-Table in Bastian’s Zeitsch. fr Ethnologie, 1873.)

– many of the were accordingly elegiac poets. This section of Ecc 12:5 does not refer to the funeral itself, for the procession of the mourners about the bier ought in that case to have been more distinctly expressed; and that they walked about in the streets before the funeral (Isa 15:3) was not a custom, so far as we know. They formed a component part of the procession following the bier to the grave in Judea, as Shabbath 153 a remarks with reference to this passage, and in Galilee going before it; to mourn over the death, to reverse it, if possible, was not the business of these mourners, but of the relatives (Hitz.), who were thus not merely called . The Targ. translates: “and the angels will go about, who demand an account of thee, like the mourning singers who go about the streets, to record what account of thee is to be given.” It is unnecessary to change into ( intar scribarum ). According to the idea of the Targumist, the sophdim go about to collect materials for the lament for the dead. The dirge was not always very scrupulously formed; wherefore it is said in Berachoth 26 a, “as is the estimate of the dead that is given, so is the estimate of the mourners (singers and orators at the funeral), and of those who respond to their words.” It is most natural to see the object of the mourners going about in their desire to be on the spot when death takes place.

(Note: The Arab. funeral dirge furnishes at once an illustration of “and the mourners go about the streets.” What Wetzstein wrote to me ought not, I believe, to be kept from the reader: “In Damascus the men certainly take part in the dirge; they go about the reservoir in the court of the house along with the mourning women, and behave themselves like women; but this does not take place in the villages. But whether the ‘going about the streets’ might seem as an evidence that in old times in the towns, as now in the villages, the menassa (bed of state) was placed with the mourning tent in the open street without, is a question. If this were the case, the sophdim might appear publicly; only I would then understand by the word not hired mourners, but the relatives of the dead.” But then , as at Psa 26:6 , ought to have been joined to as the object of the going about.)

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

(5) The old man is beset with terrors; terrors from on high, terrors on the way: all in which he had taken delight before, has charms for him no longer; the almond causes loathing (for so may be translated the word rendered flourished in our version); the locust, in the East a favourite article of food, is now burdensome; the caper berry (translated desire in our version) fails; for man is going to his everlasting house, &c

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

5. They The man himself; expressed in the plural because his various parts and powers have been personified as so many individuals.

Afraid of the high In youth the man could look down from the high tower and not be dizzy; he could mount the cliff and not be exhausted. His brain and legs are now too weak; and he dreads all heights. Nay, fears of exposures to accidents, foes, or atmospheric miasms, are in the plain and level way.

The almond tree shall flourish This “almond tree” has been supposed to refer to the grey hairs of the aged; but the almond does not blossom white but pink coloured. Modern scholars render the words, The almond shall disgust; that is, as an edible, because the toothless old man can no longer masticate it.

The grasshopper (rather locust) shall be a burden Usually understood as a hyperbole expressive of extreme bodily weakness; the old man can scarce carry a grasshopper. But the locust was an article of food; and the meaning seems to be, that it will be too heavy a burden on the stomach for his digestion.

Desire The appetites, especially the sexual. But scholars render the phrase, The kappar shall fail to stimulate. The kappar, or caper-sauce, used to rouse the system, shall be ineffective. Tonics, appetizers, and even medicines shall cease to affect the body so nearly lifeless.

Because All these decays take place “because” man is a fading, dying being.

Goeth The continuous permanent present to express a permanent continuous fact. Man is ever growing old and going to the grave.

Long home Literally, his eternal “home,” in contrast with earth, his temporal “home.” Where that “home” is, Ecc 12:7 declares; the dust to the grave and the spirit to God. Yet these are one “home” in eternity; and none the less so because judgment (Ecc 12:14) shall within that “home” change the locality, and unite “dust” and “spirit” in final retribtution. As regularly as the corpse goeth to the grave, the mourners (perhaps in funeral procession) go, or wind, about the streets.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘Yes they will be afraid of what is high, and terrors are in the way, and the almond tree will blossom, and the grasshopper will be a burden, and the desire will fail, because man goes to his everlasting home, and the mourners go about the streets.’

As people age heights can become a problem, especially as their sense of balance worsens and they, and others, become afraid that they will misjudge distances and fall over the edge. Travelling becomes a nightmare, both because of stumbling weakness, and their own defencelessness against both man and wild beast. The blossoming of the almond tree refers to their whitened hair, which will be like an almond tree in blossom. The grasshopper represents what is small compared with others (Num 13:33; Isa 40:22). Even a grasshopper will be too heavy a burden to bear. ‘The desire will fail’ may refer to the fact that the private parts will no longer expand and react to women, or work efficiently in giving relief. They are simply limp and listless, as he is on the way to his everlasting home.

‘Because man goes to his everlasting home, and the mourners go about the streets.’

The thought here is finally of death. This is the final end. Man goes to his everlasting home, while the mourners parade around the streets, wailing because he has gone.

But the mention of the ‘everlasting home’ is interesting and significant in the light of what he had said earlier. God has previously been seen as having brought home to man His own everlastingness which is in man’s heart (Ecc 3:11), and in Ecc 12:10 there is now no doubt in his mind, in contrast with Ecc 3:21, that man’s ‘spirit’ returns to God, Who gave it to Him when He made him in His image (Gen 2:7 with Gen 1:26-27) thus making him ‘one of us’. And in Ecc 12:14 every work is to be brought into judgment, even though he has previously acknowledged that this does not happen in this life (Ecc 9:2-3; Ecc 4:1; Ecc 8:12-13; Ecc 9:11). Thus the conclusion had to be that it must happen in God’s everlastingness, which adds meaning to the idea of his going to his everlasting home as not signifying the grave, but a life beyond.

It would probably be an error to suggest that this is definitely a clear statement of everlasting life beyond the grave. But it does seem that there is reference here to the fact that the writer has come to his final conclusion that somehow those who die are connected with God’s everlastingness, whether for good or bad. For he knows that somehow in God’s everlastingness every work will be brought into judgment (Ecc 12:14). That somehow man’s spirit is re-absorbed into God’s everlastingness (Ecc 12:7). That somehow man goes home.

So we may see that in the Preacher’s view Man’s death and entry into his everlasting home somehow brings him into contact with God’s everlastingness. Compare the similar hope, and yet vagueness in Psa 16:10-11; Psa 17:15; Psa 23:6. It is one of those mysteries of His everlastingness that man cannot fathom (Ecc 3:11), but it offers hope, although finally having to be left with God. As we have suggested it is the faith of the Psalmists when they were absorbed with God. ‘In your presence is fullness of joy, and at your right hand are pleasures for evermore’ (Psa 16:10-11); ‘As for me I will behold your face in righteousness, I will be satisfied when I awake with your likeness’ (Psa 17:15); ‘I will dwell in the house of Yahweh for ever’ (Psa 23:6); ‘in your light we will see light – they (the workers of iniquity) are thrust down and will not be able to rise’ (Psa 36:8-9 compare with 12); ‘God will redeem my being from the power of the grave, for He will receive me’ (Psa 49:15); ‘You will guide me with your counsel and afterwards receive me to glory’ (Psa 73:24-25); ‘If I make my bed in the grave, behold, you are there’ (Psa 139:8); ‘If I say surely the darkness will overwhelm me, and the light about me will be night, even the darkness does not hide from you, but the night shines as the day, the darkness and the light are both alike to you’ (Psa 139:11-12); ‘Lead me in the everlasting way’ (Psa 139:24); not clear doctrine, but a certainty of soul that God will not abandon them to the grave, but will draw them to Himself.

Thus in these words and in Ecc 12:7 The Speaker breaks free from the futility of all things into the everlastingness of God.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Ecc 12:5. Also when they shall be afraid, &c. They shall be afraid even of distant objects, nay, of the scare-crow, set on the way-side; the sex shall be neglected, and the grasshopper shall become a burden, and desire shall fail; for the man is going to his everlasting home, and the mourners are walking about the court, ready for his burial. These alterations of the version are from Mr. Desvoeux; who observes, that though interpreters are divided concerning the application of several particulars in this poetical description of old age, they all agree in the meaning of the first allegory, whereby the outward form of our body is represented as a house, and our limbs either as servants to whom several employments are devised, or as parts of the building. Thus, says he, I think every one allows that the arms and hands are the keepers or guards, to ward off danger; the knees and legs, which support the weight of the whole fabric, are the strong men, and the eyes are the spies or scouts which look out of the window, Ecc 12:3. Then, to complete the picture of the outward appearance of an old man, the falling-in of his lips is represented as the shutting up of a double gate; Ecc 12:4. Thus far I agree with them, and even farther: for I have no doubt but that the teeth are signified by the grinding-maids, as I call them, after the LXX and Saint Jerome, or the grinding-stones, as some will have it; but I prefer the former, not only because it is most agreeable to the original word, but because the ancients had only hand-mills, at which none but women worked; a custom which, we learn from Dr. Shaw, still prevails among those nations which have retained the ancient manners. The next difference likewise chiefly concerns the image rather than the main sense; for several interpreters, led by the context, observe, that the mouth was represented by what is called the streets in the received version, and in mine the inner court. Now the street, being a passage open through and through, does no way resemble a hollow vessel; that resemblance might rather be found in a market-place, surrounded with high buildings, with but a few outlets, hardly perceivable in comparison of the surrounding sides. Accordingly the LXX have rendered it ; but it is plain that the original word shuk, means more properly that part of the house which by its form mostly resembled both a market-place, and a bowl. Such was the inner court, which Varro calls cava, or cavum aedium, Pliny cavaedium, and Tully impluvium; and we learn from Dr. Shaw, that there was such a court in all the eastern houses. The shutting up of the double gate towards the inner court, is represented as either the occasion of, or being occasioned by, or a circumstance that happens at the same time with, another accident; for the original, at the lowering of the voice of the grinding-maid, may equally bear these three constructions; and there is none but may have a proper application to the subject understood by that allegory; for, since it is allowed on all hands that the teeth are meant by the last of these words, because they are the instruments wherewith we grind our victuals, there can be no difficulty in applying the former, either to the broken set of teeth which an old man has remaining in his mouth, or to the gum which must perform the office of teeth, or rather to the tongue which bears a considerable part in the act of mastication, and might on that very account be called the grinding-maid by way of eminence. Now the sinking of an old man’s lips into his mouth not only happens at the time with, but is owing to, the want of his teeth; whereby the operation of chewing is rendered imperfect. On the other hand, the close compression of the lips may serve partly to drown the disagreeable noise of his chewing with his gums instead of his teeth. As for the literal sense of the image, I think the construction whereby the two facts are connected in point of time is the less subject to difficulties, because it requires no knowledge of ancient usages and customs; for any one sees that the time of shutting up the gate must be about the same hour that the necessary work is finished, or when the night is drawing near.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

Ecc 12:5 Also [when] they shall be afraid of [that which is] high, and fears [shall be] in the way, and the almond tree shall flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets:

Ver. 5. Also when they shall be afraid of that which is high. ] Hillocks or little stones standing up, whereat they may stumble, as being unsteady and unwieldy. High ascents also they shun, as being short winded; neither can they look down without danger of falling, their heads being as weak as their hams. Let them therefore pray for a guard of angels, putting that promise into suit. Psa 91:11 Let them also keep within God’s precincts, as ever they expect his protection; and then, though old Eli fell, and never rose again, yet when they fall they shall arise, for the Lord puts under his hand. Psa 37:24 Contrition may be in their way, but attrition shall not. Let them fear God, and they need not fear any other person or thing whatsoever.

And the almond tree shall flourish. ] The hair shall grow hoary, those church yard flowers shall put forth. The almond tree blossoms in January, while it is yet winter, and the fruit is ripe in March. a Old age shall snow white hairs upon their heads. Let them see that they be “found in the way of righteousness.”

And the grasshopper shall be a burden. ] Every light matter shall oppress them, who are already a burden to themselves, being full of gout, and other swellings of the legs, which the Septuagint and Vulgate point at here, when they render it, impinguabiter locusta, – The locusts shall be made fat. Let them wait upon the Lord, as that “old disciple Mnason” Act 21:16 did, and then they shall “renew their strength, mount up as eagles, run, and not be weary, walk, and not faint,” even then, when “the youth shall faint and be weary, and the young men utterly fall.” Isa 40:30-31

And desire shall fail. ] “The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life.” 1Jn 2:15 And this Cicero reckons among the commodities and benefits of old age, quod hominem a libidinis estu, velut a tyranno quodem liberet, – that it frees a man from the fire of lust. b It should be so doubtless, an old letcher being little less than a monster. What so monstrous as to behold green apples on a tree in winter? and what so indecent as to see the sins of youth prevailing in times of age among old decrepit goats? that they should be capering after capparis ( ), the fruit of capers, as the Septuagint and Vulgate render it here.

Because man goeth to his long home. ] Heb., To his old home – scil., to the dust from whence he was taken; or to “the house of his eternity” – that is, the grave (that house of all living), where he shall lie long, till the resurrection. Tremellius renders it, in domum saeculi sui – to the house of his generation, where he and all his contemporaries meet. Cajetan, in demure mundi sui – into the house of his world; that which the world provides for him, as nature at first provided for him the house of the womb. Toward this home of his the old man is now on gait, having one foot in the grave already. He sits and sings with Job, “My spirit is spent, my days are extinct, the graves are ready for me.” Job 17:1

And the mourners go about the streets. ] The proverb is, Senex bos non lugetur, – An old man dies unlamented. But not so the good old man. Great moaning was made for old Jacob, Moses, Aaron, Samuel. The Romans took the death of old Augustus so heavily, that they wished he had either never been born or never died. Those, indeed, that live wickedly die wishedly. But godly men are worthily lamented, and ought to be so. Isa 57:1 This is one of the dues of the dead, so it be done aright. But they were hard bestead that were fain to hire mourners; that as midwives brought their friends into the world, so those widows should carry them out of it. See Job 3:8 Jer 9:17 .

a Plin., lib. xvi. cap. 25.

b .

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

afraid: i.e. of ascending heights.

high = lofty, elevated.

fears shall be in the way: i.e. apprehensions of danger in journeying.

almond tree shall flourish: i.e. grey hairs shall grow scanty, or drop off, not “almond nuts be rejected”; for the teeth and eating have already been dealt with in Ecc 12:3.

grasshopper, or locust.

shall be a burden = shall become burdensome: i.e. as to weight.

desire shall fail. “Desire” = Hebrew = the caperberry. Here the Authorized Version beautifully renders the figure of speech (as a version should do), while the Revised Version renders it literally (as a translation too often does). The Figure of speech is Metalepsis: i.e. a double Metonymy (App-6), by which (1) the “caperberry” is put for the condiment made from it, and then (2) thecondiment is put for the appetite produced by it. And further, since, because of its shape, as well as from the notion that it was supposed to create sexual desire, all that is intended by the figure is included in the rendering “desire shall fail”.

man. Hebrew. ‘ddam (with Art). App-14. See note on Ecc 1:13.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

the almond: Gen 42:38, Gen 44:29, Gen 44:31, Lev 19:32, Job 15:10, Psa 71:18, Pro 16:31, Pro 20:29, Isa 46:4, Jer 1:11

because: Ecc 9:10, Job 17:13, Job 30:23, Psa 49:10-14, Heb 9:27

the mourners: Gen 50:3-10, Jer 9:17-20, Mar 5:38, Mar 5:39

Reciprocal: Gen 5:5 – and he died Gen 23:4 – burying place Gen 23:19 – General Gen 35:29 – Isaac Gen 50:5 – bury me Gen 50:24 – I die Exo 37:20 – almonds Jos 23:14 – I am going 2Ch 35:25 – all the singing Job 3:19 – The small Job 14:12 – So man Job 16:22 – whence Isa 14:18 – house Zec 1:5 – General

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Ecc 12:5. When they shall be afraid, &c. The passion of fear is observed to be most incident to old men, of which divers reasons may be given. Of that which is high Of high things, lest they should fall upon them; or of high places, as of going up hills or stairs, which is very irksome to them, because of their weakness, weariness, giddiness, and danger, or dread of falling. And fears shall be in the way Lest, as they are walking, they should stumble, or fall, or be thrust down, or some infirmity or evil should befall them. And the almond-tree shall flourish Their heads shall be as full of gray hairs as the almond-tree is of white flowers. And the grasshopper shall be a burden If it accidentally light upon them. They cannot endure the least burden, being indeed a burden to themselves. And desire shall fail Of meats, and drinks, and music, and other delights, which are vehemently desired by men in their youth. Because man goeth Is travelling toward it, and every day nearer to it. To his long home

From this place of his pilgrimage into the grave, from whence he must never return into this world, and into the state of the future life, which is unchangeable and everlasting. And mourners go about the streets Accompany the corpse through the streets to the grave.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

12:5 Also [when] they shall be afraid of [that which is] {k} high, and fears [shall be] in the {l} way, and the almond tree shall {m} flourish, and the {n} grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets:

(k) To climb high because of their weakness, or they stoop down as though they were afraid lest anything should hide them.

(l) They will tremble as they go, as though they were afraid.

(m) Their head will be as white as the blossoms of an almond tree.

(n) They will be able to bear nothing.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

Aged individuals become more fearful of heights, traffic, and travel. The "almond tree" blossoms white like the hair of an old person. An elderly person is less sprightly in his or her movements. The "caperberry," apparently an appetite stimulant, not an aphrodisiac, [Note: Delitzsch, p. 417.] is a poor translation that the Septuagint introduced. The text should read "and desire fails," which gives the same meaning. Man’s "dark house" (rather than "eternal home") is a reference to the grave-Sheol. [Note: For reasons why "dark house" is the preferable translation of the Hebrew bet olam, see Ronald F. Youngblood, "Qoheleth’s ’Dark House’ (Ecclesiastes 12:5)," in A Tribute to Gleason Archer, pp. 211-27, also reprinted in Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 29:4 (December 1986), pp. 397-410.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)