Can you find a good woman? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
Ecclesiastes 7 ends this way:
25 I turned my heart to know and to search out and to seek wisdom and the scheme of things, and to know the wickedness of folly and the foolishness that is madness. 26 And I find something more bitter than death: the woman whose heart is snares and nets, and whose hands are fetters. He who pleases God escapes her, but the sinner is taken by her. 27 Behold, this is what I found, says the Preacher, while adding one thing to another to find the scheme of things— 28 which my soul has sought repeatedly, but I have not found. One man among a thousand I found, but a woman among all these I have not found. 29 See, this alone I found, that God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes.
Whoa. Is this misogyny? Is the Teacher coming out as a woman-hater?
If so, this would be hard to mesh with Proverbs and Song of Songs both. There is definitely no lack of love for the woman in Song of Songs. Proverbs 5 tells a man to delight in the wife of his youth and drink eagerly of lovemaking with her. Proverbs 18:22 says that he who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord. We all know of the praise of the noble wife in Proverbs 31. Even at places in Ecclesiastes, the Teacher tells a man to enjoy his wife.
Looking closer at the verses, the Teacher is not saying all women are like this, but he has found a woman like this. Does this indicate a tabloid account of a relationship going on behind the scenes where the Teacher speaks of a particularly vile woman? Probably not. If we look at the language, it parallels a woman in the book of Proverbs. Proverbs has two women in it Lady Wisdom and Lady Folly. The Teacher has given a good description of Folly and what happens to those who go her way.
What about that last verse? This is just what the Teacher says is his experience. He found one man in a multitude who could help him, but not a single woman. Considering men were usually the most educated back then, this is not a surprise. Both men and women get knocked down here. Finding someone wise is extremely difficult and finding Wisdom Herself is apparently more so.
Also in all of this, the Teacher asks hard questions. Why is man good? What benefit does he get? Why should he not scheme? He considers being good the better and following wisdom preferable, but he still asks the question. The reason this is a question is as I have been suggesting throughout this, the Teacher is looking at this apart from divine revelation. If all we have is this life, then why not? You only live once so go for all that you can get. Right? The Teacher doesn’t think so, but he struggles to state why that is.
We’ll see what we find on this as we keep going through the book.
In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)