“I got me servants and maidens, and had servants born in my house; also I had great possessions of great and small cattle above all that were in Jerusalem before me:”
Qohelet's acquisition of servants and slaves, as well as livestock and wealth, rounds out his acquisition of power over persons and nature. The mention of slaves introduces an ethical shadow into the narrative; even as the Preacher accumulates the maximum possible within the social structures of his time, the cost to others and the moral implications remain unexamined and unresolved. This silence about the ethics of slaveholding may itself be significant—vanity encompasses not merely the futility of the master's enjoyment but also the suffering of those enslaved to his purposes.
COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS
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