Behind | Workbook: Solomonic Authorship of Ecclesiastes

Grab your Workbook Journal!

[Record your answers in the workbook provided at the beginning of this course.]

Because Wisdom Literature is often made up of compilations of various kinds of text that lack the continuity of more narrative books, the question of authorship is especially complicated. Passages like 1 Kings 4:30, which tells us that “Solomon’s wisdom was greater than the wisdom of all the people of the East, and greater than all the wisdom of Egypt,” have contributed to traditional views in Judaism and Christianity that Solomon was the author of Ecclesiastes. While this may have been the case, it remains a complicated issue. Read the opening passage of this book again. 

The words of the Teacher, son of David, king in Jerusalem. 
Ecclesiastes 1:1 (NIV)

6. Who does it identify as author?

Not only does it not give us a name, it doesn’t tell us who wrote the book. It says that these are the words of the “Teacher,” but it doesn’t say who recorded these words, or even if they were recorded by the Teacher’s request. Another potential problem with assuming Solomon’s authorship is the portrait we’re given of the end of Solomon’s life and reign in 1 Kings 11. 

7. Read 1 Kings 11:1-13. Explain why this description of Solomon might conflict with the “Teacher” identified with Ecclesiastes.