Ecclesiastes – the author

Traditionally, Ecclesiastes has been attributed to Solomon because of the internal evidence, including the attribution, “the son of David, king in Jerusalem.” (Ecc 1:1) and the author’s wisdom (Ecc 1:12-13) and his wealth (Ecc 2). But, like pretty much everything in the Bible, some folks have challenged this traditional authorship. The most interesting suggestion I’ve seen is that the attribution, “son of David, king in Jerusalem,” is an allusion to the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Interesting, but tenuous.

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Firstly, the author says that he’s basically seen and tried everything under the sun and that it was vanity. Surely, Jesus did not think that his work was in vain. Also, Ecclesiastes 2 says that that author amassed worldly wealth and glory (Ecc 2:4-11), which is contrary to what we know of Jesus from Matthew 4, especially where he explicitly denied worldly glory…

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, "All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me." Then Jesus said to him, "Be gone, Satan! For it is written, "'You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.'" (Mat 4:8-10)

So, I’d say the best bet is to go with the traditional authorship claim for Ecclesiastes – Solomon, Son of David, King at Jerusalem, ca945 BC.