More is now said about the fool and his words. Everything he says is foolish. This sense is given by the contrasting terms beginning and end. Just as he did in the “time” poem in chapter 3, Qoheleth uses the opposing terms to include everything lying between those two extremes.

The beginning of the words of his mouth: in conjunction with the term end in the second half of the verse, Qoheleth is saying “from the beginning to the end,” or “every single thing he utters.” This is clearer in New Revised Standard Version (similarly Revised English Bible), which has used verbal phrases in place of noun phrases: “The words … begin in … and their talk ends in….”

On the phrase words of his mouth, see comments on verse 12 above.

Is foolishness describes the content of what the fool says. We may wish to use a term like “nonsense” to convey this sense (New English Bible does this). This is more forceful and to the point than Good News Translation “silly talk.”

And the end of his talk: we have already noted that the word end forms the second element in the expression that embraces everything the fool says. Mouth appears here in the Hebrew text as it does in the first half of the verse, but Revised Standard Version translates it as talk. Obviously this repetition is significant, and it can be preserved in the translation if it is effective. Otherwise, since it is a figure, it can be rendered as in Revised Standard Version or by another similar expression (“what he says”).

Is wicked madness: already we are familiar with the use of the adjective wicked raʿah as “foolish” or “stupid.” Here it adds force to the noun madness (see comments on this term in 1.17) and runs parallel to foolishness. Something like “utter foolishness” conveys the sense well.

In translating this verse we have two options. One is to retain the structure of two balanced sayings. This is what most translations do. A second option is to form one saying in which everything the fool says is pronounced as worthless; for instance,

• From beginning to end, a fool’s speech is utter folly.

• Everything a fool says, from beginning to end, is utterly ridiculous.

We can also use a verbal clause and say:

• A fool’s talk begins and ends as utter nonsense.

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 .