Names, Vanity, and the Good Death

"We all received of his fullness" (John 10:10). Regarding 6:8, what surplus is there for the wise man over the fool? Because the poor man knows how to go toward the life that is coming: "I am the life" (John 10:10).

Regarding 6:9, a good vision of the eyes is better than one passing by with the soul, and this too is vanity and the choice of the spirit. The good one follows the knowledge of God rather than the one following the desires of the soul; or rather, the knowledge of God is better than perishable pleasure. According to Symmachus: it is better to look toward what is coming than to rejoice in what is present.

However, vanity, the evil distraction, and the choice of the spirit do not apply to all those in the chapter; they apply to trivial things, but not to praiseworthy things. I say this because vanity, distraction, and the choice of the spirit do not apply to every instance in the chapter, in which some praiseworthy things are also contained; for the poor man's vanity is not the one going toward the life, but rather the one who has lived a thousand years' descent and has not seen goodness. Nor is the good vision of the eyes vanity again, but the one passing by with the soul.

Regarding 6:10, if something has become, its name has already been called, and it has been known that it is a man, and he will not be able to be judged with the strong against himself. Regarding 6:11, for these are many words multiplying vanity. What is extra for man? Regarding 6:12, for who knows what is good for man in life, the number of days of his life of vanity, and he made them in shadows? For who will announce to man what will be behind him under the sun, and how it will be, and who will announce it to him?

Of the names, some are of the bodily nature, and others are of the incorporeal; and the names of the bodily nature signify the quality of each thing, which consists of size, color, and shape; but the names of the incorporeal declare the logical state of each, whether being praiseworthy or trivial. But the former names are simply assigned to things, while the latter are not simply so; for they depend on choice. For it is within one's own power to flow toward virtue and to be deemed worthy of the knowledge that leads to it.

Whether an angel or archangel or throne or dominion, or to rush toward evil and be filled with the ignorance which makes him a demon or Satan or some other ruler of this darkness. If anything, he says, has happened according to the time of the creator, the name received a sign of his state, and the man also received the name of the dwelling of his state.

Let the man not say, he says: 'For whose sake am I joined to such a body, and why have I not become an angel, unless indeed there is favoritism with God or we have not become masters of ourselves?' For such words multiply vanity. And how does the creature say to the Creator: 'Why did you make me thus?' Or how does he answer God? But let him cease from these words, and let him do those things contributing to virtue and knowledge, as much as is in this shadowy age, regarding all these things as vain and a shadow, and as if the things of this life will be covered after the departure.

A good name is better than fine oil, and the day of death is better than the day of birth (Eccl 7:1). Names are not good or bad by their own nature; for they are composed of various letters, and no single letter is good or bad; but being applied to good things they are called good, and to evil things, evil. There, therefore, the good name signifies a good thing; yet Solomon says that nothing of the things that happen is good, except virtue and the knowledge of God.

But the oil now signifies luxury, which to those who live in luxury seems to be good. For that which is good by nature is called good, such as virtue, but to some, such as gold and silver. Thus also the rich man received his good things in his life, 'and Lazarus likewise the bad things' (Luke 16:20). But that oil is taken instead of luxury, David shows, saying concerning men that 'from the fruit of their grain and wine and oil they were filled' (Ps 65:13).

If the praiseworthy death, through which the righteous die with Christ, is fit to dissolve the soul from evil and ignorance, so again the birth opposed to this death joins the soul to evil and ignorance; therefore such a death is preferable to such a birth. To go in a good way to the house of mourning.