Verse 10
It is further said of Koheleth, that he put forth efforts not only to find words of a pleasant form, but, above all, of exact truth: “Koheleth strove to find words of pleasantness, and, written in sincerity, words of truth.” The unconnected beginning biqqesh Koheleth is like dibbarti ani, Ecc 1:16, etc., in the book itself. Three objects follow limtso. But Hitz. reads the inf. absol. וכתוב instead of וכתוּב, and translates: to find pleasing words, and correctly to write words of truth. Such a continuance of the inf. const. by the inf. absol. is possible; 1Sa 25:26, 1Sa 25:31. But why should וכתוב not be the continuance of the finite (Aq., Syr.), as e.g., at Ecc 8:9, and that in the nearest adverbial sense: et scribendo quidem sincere verba veritatis, i.e., he strove, according to his best knowledge and conscience, to write true words, at the same time also to find out pleasing words; thus sought to connect truth as to the matter with beauty as to the manner? Vechathuv needs no modification in its form. But it is not to be translated: and that which was right was written by him; for the ellipsis is inadmissible, and כתוב מן is not correct Heb. Rightly the lxx, καὶ γεγραμμένον εὐθύτητος. כּתוּב signifies “written,” and may also, as the name of the Hagiographa כּתוּבים shows, signify “a writing;” kakathuvah, 2Ch 30:5, is = “in accordance with the writing;” and belo kǎkathuv, 2Ch 30:18, “contrary to the writing;” in the post-bibl. the phrase אמר הכּתוּב = ἡ γραφὴ λέγει, is used. The objection made by Ginsburg, that kathuv never means, as kethav does, “a writing,” is thus nugatory. However, we do not at all here need this subst. meaning, וכתוב is neut. particip., and ישׁר certainly not the genit., as the lxx renders (reading וּכתוּב), but also not the nom. of the subj. (Hoelem.), but, since ישׁר is the designation of a mode of thought and of a relation, the accus. of manner, like veyashar, Psa 119:18; emeth, Psa 132:11; emunah, Psa 119:75. Regarding the common use of such an accus. of the nearer definition in the passive part., vid., Ewald, §284c. The asyndeton vechathuv yosher divre emeth is like that at Ecc 10:1, mehhochmah michvod. That which follows limtso we interpret as its threefold object. Thus it is said that Koheleth directed his effort towards an attractive form (cf. avne-hephets, Isa 54:12); but, before all, towards the truth, both subjectively (ישׁר) and objectively (אמת), of that which was formulated and expressed in writing.
Verse 11
From the words of Koheleth the author comes to the words of the wise man in general; so that what he says of the latter finds its application to himself and his book: “Words of the wise are as like goads, and like fastened nails which are put together
