IS QOHELETH AN UNRELIABLE NARRATOR IN ECCLESIASTES?

 The term “unreliable narrator” refers to the putative author of a literary work, usually told in the first person, whose words cannot be taken at face value. The narrator may not be fully trustworthy due to his or her purposeful misleading of the reader, not being acquainted with the full truth of events they are reporting, having limited self-awareness, wish fulfillment on their part, supernatural elements, or actual insanity.

Examples of books, short stories, or even essays that might be said to fall in this category include: Poe's “The Tell-Tale Heart,” Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Golding's Pincher Martin, Bierce's “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” James' “The Turn of the Screw,” Twain's Huckleberry Finn, and Ellis' American Psycho. One could even include the essay “A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift since what he proposes in it (that starving Irish families should sell their young children to wealthy Englishmen to use as food) is not meant to be taken seriously.

But are there any unreliable narrators in the Bible?

One might think of the Book of Job since he and his four friends cannot be trusted to tell the whole truth most of the time due to their limited knowledge. However, none of them is the actual narrator in the story. The voice of the narrator is only heard briefly at the start and end of the book.

Then there are the writing prophets who are given words from God to say. And here we come a little closer to unreliable narrators in that often it appears that they did not understand the full import of the information they were given to relay to others. As we are told in I Peter 1:10-12, “The prophets who prophesied of the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired about this salvation: they inquired what person or time was indicated by the Spirit of Christ within them when predicting the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glory. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things which have now been announced to you by those who preached the good news to you through the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.” (RSV) See also Hebrews 11:39-40 and Matthew 13:17 // Luke 10:24.

There are also the various visions that OT and NT prophets were given by God. One could say that the prophets were perhaps unreliable in accurately reporting the supernatural pictures they saw or, more likely, they had only a limited understanding of the meaning behind the visions. Just look at Daniel's response to a revelation of God in 7:28 and 8:27.

The Psalmists represent another category of unreliable narrators, but only in the sense that their words are highly emotional and personal. Although we cannot always take their words at face value, we can certainly agree that they are being “honest to God” in communicating their emotional state at the time of the writing. I am thinking of both dubious statements (“My God, why hast thou forsaken me!” – Psalm 22:1) and sentiments such as “Happy shall be he who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock!” – Psalm 137:9.

Finally, we come to Ecclesiastes, the most likely example an unreliable narrator in the Bible. Consider the interpretive options concerning this book:

    1. It was written by Solomon reflecting the great wisdom God bestowed on him.

    2. It was written by Solomon in his later, cynical years when he had begun to turn away from God and toward idols.

    3. It was written by an anonymous narrator (Qoheleth, i.e. the teacher) who assumed the persona of King Solomon for literary reasons. But if this is the case, we also need to know whether it reflects Solomon's thoughts in (a) his earlier or (b) later years.

    4. There are actually two voices speaking in the book: one is a cynical narrator who has given up on finding any truth, and the second is represented in passages at the end of each section (such as 2:24-25; 3:22; 5:18-20, etc.), where someone else adds his own sentiments in order to counteract the main narrator's unorthodox thinking.

    5. The narrator, whoever he may be, is just presenting what the dire situation would be if there were no God, but only what is “under the sun.”

You may note that except for possibilities #1 and 3a, in none of the other eventualities are we intended to implicitly believe in the truth of all that is said in Ecclesiastes.