Longman first provides an extensive introduction to Ecclesiastes, exploring such background matters as authorship, language, genre, structure, literary style, and the books theological message. He argues that the author of Ecclesiastes is not Solomon, as has been traditionally thought, but a writer who adopts a Solomonic persona. In the verse-by-verse commentary that follows, Longman helps clarify the confusing, sometimes contradictory message of Ecclesiastes by showing that the book should be divided into three sections a prologue (1:1-11), Qohelets autobiographical speech (1:1212:7), and an epilogue (12:8-14) and that the frame narrative provided by prologue and epilogue is the key to understanding the message of the book as a whole.
Ecclesiastes is one of the most fascinating and hauntingly familiar books of the Old Testament. The sentiments of the main speaker of the book, a person given the name Qohelet, sound incredibly modern. Expressing the uncertainty and anxieties of our own age, he is driven by the question, Where can we find meaning in the world?