Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Ecclesiastes 10:6

Folly is set in great dignity, and the rich sit in low place.

6. Folly is set in great dignity, and the rich sit in low place ] For “great dignity,” literally great heights. The “rich” here are those who by birth and station are looked on as the natural rulers of mankind. Such men, like the (the “men of ancestral wealth”) of Greek political writers, (Aristot. Rhet. ii. 9; Aesch. Agam. 1043) a wise ruler associates with himself as counsellors. The tyrant, on the other hand, like Louis XI. exalts the baseborn to the place of honour, or like Edward II. or James I. of England, or Henry III. of France, lavishes dignities on his minions. So the writer may have seen Agathoclea and her brother; all-powerful, as mistress and favourite, in the court of Ptolemy Philopator (Justin xxx. 1).

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

The evil of Ecc 10:5 is here specified as that caprice of a king by which an unworthy favorite of low origin is promoted to successive dignities, while a noble person is degraded or neglected.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Folly is set in great dignity; foolish and unworthy persons are frequently advanced by the favour or humour of princes into places of highest trust and dignity, which is a great reproach and mischief to the prince, and a sore calamity to all his people. The rich; wise and worthy men, as is evident, because these are opposed to fools in the former clause; such as are rich in endowments of mind. The ground of the expression may be this, that rich men are capable of all the advantages of men or books for the attainment of wisdom, and therefore are supposed to be wise in some measure.

Sit in low place; neglected and despised, or removed from those high places to which their merits had raised them.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

6. richnot in mere wealth,but in wisdom, as the antithesis to “folly” (for”foolish men”) shows. So Hebrew, rich, equivalent to”liberal,” in a good sense (Isa32:5). Mordecai and Haman (Est 3:1;Est 3:2; Est 6:6-11).

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

Folly is set in great dignity,…. Or “in great heights” q; in high places of honour and truest; even foolish and wicked men; men of poor extraction, of low life, and of mean abilities and capacities; and, which is worse, men vile and vicious, as Doeg the Edomite, Haman the Amalekite, and others;

and the rich sit in low places; men not only of fortune and estates, and above doing mean and little actions, and so more fit for such high places; but men rich in wisdom and knowledge, of large capacities and of great endowments of mind, and so abundantly qualified for posts in the administration of government; and, above all, men rich in grace, fearing God, and hating coveteousness, as rulers ought to be, Ex 18:21; and yet these sometimes are neglected, live in obscurity, who might otherwise be very useful in public life. The Targum interprets this and the following verse of the Israelites in exile and poverty among the Gentiles for their sins; so Jarchi.

q , Sept. “in celsitudinibus amplis”, Piscator, Amama, Gejerus; “in sublimitatibus amplis”, Cocceius; “in altitudinibus magnis”, Rambachius; “in great height”, Broughton.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

“Folly is set on great heights, and the rich must sit in lowliness. I have seen servants upon horses, and princes like servants walking on foot.” The word (with double seghol, Aram. ) is used here instead of those in whom it is personified. Elsewhere a multiplicity of things great, such as , , and the like, is heightened by (cf. e.g., Psa 18:17); here “great heights” are such as are of a high, or the highest degree; rabbim , instead of harabbim , is more appos. than adject. (cf. Gen 43:14; Psa 68:28; Psa 143:10; Jer 2:21), in the sense of “many” ( e.g., Ginsburg: “in many high positions”) it mixes with the poetry of the description dull prose.

(Note: Luzz. reads : “Folly brings many into high places.” The order of the words, however, does not favour this.)

‘Ashirim also is peculiarly used: divites = nobiles (cf. , Isa 32:5), those to whom their family inheritance gives a claim to a high station, who possess the means of training themselves for high offices, which they regard as places of honour, not as sources of gain. Regibus multis , Grotius here remarks, quoting from Sallust and Tacitus, suspecti qui excellunt sive sapientia sive nobilitate aut opibus . Hence it appears that the relation of slaves and princes to each other is suggested; hoc discrimen , says Justin, 41:3, of the Parthians, inter servos liberosque est quod servi pedibus, liberi nonnisi equis incedunt ; this distinction is set aside, princes must walk ‘al – haarets , i.e., beregel ( beraglehem ), and in their stead (Jer 17:25) slaves sit high on horseback, and rule over them (the princes), – an offensive spectacle, Pro 19:10. The eunuch Bagoas, long all-powerful at the Persian Court, is an example of the evil consequences of this reversal of the natural relations of men.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

6. Folly That is, the foolish man.

Great dignity Hebrew, Many high stations. The Roman emperors and the kings of France, as well as eastern rulers, have promoted worthless favourites to the most important offices, leaving the wise and good in obscurity.

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

Ecc 10:6 Folly is set in great dignity, and the rich sit in low place.

Ver. 6. Folly is set in great dignity. ] Sedes prima et vita ima, a these suit not. Dignitas in indigno est ornamentum in luto. Royalty itself, without righteousness, is but eminent dishonour. When a fool is set in dignity, it is, saith one, b as when a handful of hay is set up to give light, which with smoke and smell offendeth all that are near. When as the worthy sit in low place, it is as when a goodly candle (that on a table would give a comfortable and comely light) is put under a bushel.

And the rich in low place, ] i.e., The wise, as appears by the opposition, who, in true account, are the only rich, Jam 2:5 “rich in faith,” 1Ti 6:18 “rich in good works,” Luk 12:21 rich to Godward, who hath highly honoured and advanced them, though vilipended and underrated by men; digni etiam qui ditentur, worthy they are also to be set in highest places, as being drained from the dregs, and sifted from the brans of the common sort of people. Dignity should wait upon desert, as it did here in England, in King Edward VI’s days, that aureum saeculum, in quo honores melioribus dabantur, as Seneca c hath it, that golden age in which honours were bestowed on those that best deserved them. But in case it prove otherwise, as it often doth – the golden bishopric of Carthage fell to the lot of leaden Aurelius, and little Hippo to great St Augustine; Damasus, the scholar, was advanced to the see of Rome when Jerome, his master, ended his days in his cell at Bethlehem – yet virtue is its own competent encouragement, and will rather choose to lie in the dust than to rise by wickedness. Cato said he had rather men should question why he had no statue or monument erected in honour of him, than why he had. The wise historian observed that the statues of Brutus and Cassius, eo praefulgebant quod non visebantur, d were the more glorious and illustrious, because they were not brought out with other images in a solemn procession at the funeral of Germanicus. God pleaseth himself, saith Basil, in beholding a hidden pearl in a disrespected body. e A rich stone is of no less worth when locked up in a wicker casket, than when it is set in a royal diadem.

a Salvian.

b Cartwright.

c Sen. Epist., 91.

d Tacit. Annal.

e Abstrusum in despecto corpore margaritum conspicatus.

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

Folly = a great dullard. Hebrew. sakal, as in verses: Ecc 10:1, Ecc 10:3, Ecc 10:3, Ecc 10:14.

in great dignity = in many high positions.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Folly: Jdg 9:14-20, 1Ki 12:13, 1Ki 12:14, Est 3:1, Psa 12:8, Pro 28:12, Pro 28:28

dignity: Heb. heights

the rich: Jam 2:3-5

Reciprocal: Pro 14:29 – exalteth Ecc 10:17 – when 2Pe 2:10 – to speak

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

10:6 Folly is set in great dignity, and the {e} rich sit in low place.

(e) They who are rich in wisdom and virtue.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes