Qoheleth builds his statement around the key verb “find.” It is used six times in three verses. There are some things that he could find out; there are others he could not.

Behold, this is what I found: the introductory Behold is not the regularly-used particle but the imperative of the verb “see.” This is the verb Qoheleth uses each time he refers to his search and enquiry into things. Here, then, he calls readers to pay close attention to what he found. We can convey its sense as “Look carefully,” “Consider,” or perhaps even “Let’s take a close look at.” This in many instances in Qoheleth reaches back to summarize what he discussed in the previous verses. However, in this case it points forward to what he is about to share with his readers; it introduces a new topic. What I found describes the conclusion he reached, so “discover” or “find out” (Good News Translation) are also possible translations.

Says the Preacher: refer to comments on 1.1 for rendering the term Preacher.

Adding one thing to another is in Hebrew a noun phrase “one to one.” It has the sense of the steady accumulation of information, the assembling of facts, in his attempt to construct a complete picture. Hence Good News Translation “little by little.”

To find the sum shows the purpose of the investigation. He hopes that he can discover more about the real world so that his conclusions and the advice based on them will be reliable and valid. It is the whole picture, a fuller understanding of life that is expressed by the word sum. See comments on this word in verse 25. Many languages will have an idiomatic expression to match this Hebrew form.

For translation of this part of the verse:

• Consider what I found [or, discovered], says Qoheleth. I added one thing to another in order to discover what the full picture was.

Which my mind has sought repeatedly is a relative clause referring back to the “sum of things.” Good News Translation “I have looked for other answers” uses the English present perfect to express the idea of an ongoing search, so it does not render repeatedly literally. Additionally, by using the term “other” it could be taken to mean that Qoheleth was looking for answers other than those he already had. In fact it seems that he had none at all at this point.

On the verb sought see comments on verse 25. It summarizes the work of the wise person. While an imperfect verb indicates this ongoing search for information, here there is a different verb form, a perfect verb combined with the Hebrew word “still” or “yet.” It marks repeated past action, hence New English Bible “after searching long.” “I kept seeking continually” is another possibility. The subject of the verb “search” is the unusual word nafshi, from nefesh, rendered by Revised Standard Version as my mind. “Heart” is the term normally found in this book, but perhaps Qoheleth is suggesting here that it was more than an academic pursuit, because the root carries also the sense of longing or yearning. By using nefesh “life” Qoheleth is saying that his whole being was caught up in the search for meaning as in 4.8. Thus translators can substitute “I” or use an expression such as “searched with my whole being [or, my whole heart; or, everything I have].”

What Qoheleth came to realize as a result of his investigations was that the full picture, the “sum of things,” was not attainable. Life’s experiences do not always “add up.” The wise person can seek diligently to understand all that happens, but those answers are never complete or even adequate. This is far from saying that we can know nothing; rather, our knowledge is always partial.

Translation possibilities here are:

• I longed to get a full picture of things, but I couldn’t take it all in.

• I gave my whole life over to discovering the answer, but I found that I could not understand everything [or, could only understand in part].

The last part of this verse is difficult to interpret. It says literally “One man (ʾadam) among a thousand I have found, but woman among all of these I have not found.” The first and most basic question to ask is whether man and woman are used figuratively here, as we believed was true for the use of “woman” in verse 26. There we understood “woman” to mean “that woman, folly.” However, nothing in this context supports a similar view of the term here. If it did, then we would presumably have to interpret man as a metaphor for “wisdom.” We accept that here man and woman both have their literal meanings. Having reached that conclusion, we then need to determine what kind of man and what kind of woman Qoheleth is speaking about. Many versions modify man and woman here by inserting “upright,” “righteous,” or “that I could respect” (Good News Translation). This is done under the influence of the following verse: “God has created people [ʾadam] upright,” meaning they are pleasing to him. However, if we accept this interpretation from context, we encounter a serious problem: is Qoheleth saying that there are very few righteous men, but even fewer righteous women? On the surface this appears to be the case, but we will make another suggestion for interpretation below.

Another problem is in finding an answer to the question, Who are all these? The form of the saying seems to suggest perhaps that Qoheleth looked among one thousand people. From this selection he found only one righteous man and no righteous women. If this is the meaning, then it means that both the man and the woman are not so very different, for a ratio of one in a thousand is hardly more significant than none at all. On the numeral thousand, we should keep in mind the fact that this generally denotes a large number, even the totality, rather than being an exact figure. By contrast one refers to the least significant number.

There is another possible approach to this phrase, and that is that Qoheleth is quoting a well-known saying; he is using it to introduce his observation in verse 29. This view is supported by the fact that the saying is a very general one, unconnected with the context apart from its shared vocabulary. The quote refers to finding one person out of a thousand. Verse 29 talks about the “one thing” Qoheleth has found in his search, the “one thing” that he could be sure of. The view we recommend here is that Qoheleth quotes a proverb, to which he then adds his personal conclusion. This style is in keeping with that found in other passages; it also is consistent with the context. Qoheleth is not on a search for a particular person, or a particular kind of person, but on a search for truths about this world.

We suggest translating the latter part of verse 28 rather literally and, if possible, indicating that a quote is being made. This can be done by enclosing it in quotation marks or by adding “[As] they say….” In this way, verse 29 flows quite naturally from what comes before it:

• With my whole being I kept on searching,
but I didn’t find the explanation to things.
They say, “I found one man in a thousand,
but among all these, I didn’t find one woman.”
But the one thing I did find is this….

Taking this approach, Qoheleth’s references to women here and in verse 26 are seen to be literary features of the text and not moral evaluations of women. The quotation indicates that the search for meaning and explanation found something, even though it may not seem very significant.

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 .