Elegant expression, deep and satisfying meaning—these were the goals of Qoheleth’s work as a thinker, a teacher, writer and collector of wisdom. The editor of Qoheleth’s writing acknowledges that fact.

The Preacher: refer to comments on 1.1.

Sought well describes Qoheleth’s attitude to his work. He used the term himself in 7.25, 28. We convey this commitment in a translation like “Qoheleth’s goal was to…,” “He was determined to…,” or more literally, “He tried hard to….”

To find pleasing words underlines Qoheleth’s search for “words that would bring pleasure.” The term “pleasure” occurs in 5.3; 12.1. It has a secondary meaning, “matter,” “thing,” but that is probably not suitable here. The sense seems to be “words that would give pleasure [to the listener]”—presumably because they were well phrased and elegant. Many languages will use a term like “sweet,” showing they are well spoken, though not necessarily easy to accept. When Good News Translation says they were “comforting,” this may be misleading, because to give comfort is not the point of the sage’s instruction. Rather he sets out to challenge and stir.

And uprightly he wrote words of truth: the initial conjunction may be contrastive, so we can say “but…” (Good News Translation). This makes clear that Qoheleth did not sacrifice content for the sake of elegance. He wrote is a Hebrew passive form with active meaning. Qoheleth was known for his honesty; he wrote uprightly, faithfully representing the truth as he saw it. He did not shrink from facing honestly the situations he encountered, and he attempted to derive sensible advice from them. Many languages may use a term related to “right,” or “straight,” to convey this meaning. New English Bible suggests “plainly.”

Words of truth are possible only if they reflect the real situations people have to deal with, and then give proper advice. They are words that contain the truth and so can be trusted. New English Bible catches the meaning with its “what he wrote was the honest truth.” In Pro 23.23 truth is used as a parallel to wisdom; such words are always just and right.

In some languages it may be redundant to express both uprightly and words of truth. If this is the case the two ideas can be combined: “When he wrote, he told the truth straightforwardly.” Or we can follow the New English Bible example above and turn the adverb “uprightly” into an adjective describing the words rather than how they were written.

Models for translation of the whole verse are:

• Qoheleth’s goal was to find words that would please, but when he wrote, he told the truth honestly.

• The Preacher sought hard to find pleasing words, but he always told the truth.

Quoted with permission from Ogden, Graham S. and Zogbo, Lynell. A Handbook on the Book of Ecclesiates. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .