---
id: solomon
recordStatus: draft
liveStatus: new
type: person
title: Solomon
titleEn: Solomon
titleRu: Соломон
nameAlternatives:
  - name: "the Preacher (Ecclesiastes)"
    type: alias
    language: en
description: "King of Israel in the Bible, to whom church tradition ascribes the Book of Ecclesiastes; quoted and named eighteen times in A Confession (1879–82)."
birthDate: ""
birthDateOldStyle: ""
birthDateApproximate: true
deathDate: ""
deathDateOldStyle: ""
deathDateApproximate: true
birthPlace: ""
deathPlace: ""
nationality: ""
roles:
  - author read by Tolstoy
occupation:
  - king
relationToTolstoy: ""
relationshipDescription: "Named in A Confession as the speaker of Ecclesiastes, which Tolstoy quotes at length."
periodOfContact:
  from: ""
  to: ""
  notes: ""
synopsis: ""
relatedWorks:
  -
    id: confession
    role: quoted author
relatedArticles:
  - leo-tolstoy
  - arthur-schopenhauer
  - socrates
  - buddha
themes:
  - philosophy and the question of life
  - the Bible
identifiers:
  wikidata: Q37085
  viaf: ""
  lccn: ""
  bnf: ""
fieldSources:
  birthDate:
    -
      sourceId: jubilee-edition
      volume: "23"
      page: "533"
      notes: "Commentary note 26: church tradition places him in the 11th–10th centuries BC. No exact dates."
---

Solomon (<span lang="ru">Соломон</span>) is the king of Israel in the Bible to whom church tradition ascribes the Book of Ecclesiastes, and who is placed in the 11th–10th centuries BC. The PSS commentary adds that biblical criticism finds no grounds for the ascription and that the real author is unknown.[^1]

## In A Confession

In [[A Confession]] (<span lang="ru">Исповедь</span>, 1879–82) "Solomon" means the speaker of Ecclesiastes. Tolstoy himself keeps the doubt open: "So said Solomon, or whoever wrote those words" (VI.17).[^2] The name comes eighteen times, more than any other, and is usually paired with [[Arthur Schopenhauer]]. The plan on the cover of the first draft already has "Solomon, Schopenhauer."[^3]

- **Chapter VI.** Solomon is one of the four, with [[Socrates]], Schopenhauer and the [[Buddha]], who give the same answer to the question of life (VI.10). The long quotation in VI.14–16 is taken from chapters 1, 2 and 9 of Ecclesiastes.[^4] VI.24 gives his answer in short: "All that is in the world — folly and wisdom and riches and poverty and mirth and grief — is vanity and emptiness. Man dies and nothing is left of him. And that is stupid."[^5]
- **Chapter VII.** Solomon gives the words for the second way out, epicureanism (VII.5–7), from chapters 8 and 9 of Ecclesiastes.[^6] Those who take that way forget "that not everyone can have a thousand wives and palaces like Solomon", and that "the accident that has today made me a Solomon may tomorrow make me a Solomon's slave" (VII.8).[^7] The fourth way, which Tolstoy took, is "to live like Solomon and Schopenhauer" (VII.11).
- **Chapters VIII–IX.** "I and Solomon and Schopenhauer had stated the question so truly and exactly that nothing else was possible" (VIII.3); the reply "strictly expressed, as it is by the Brahmins and by Solomon and Schopenhauer" is only "0 equals 0" (IX.7); "my position with Schopenhauer and Solomon … was stupid" (IX.22).
- **Chapter X.** The faith of his own circle might serve "for some distraction for a repentant Solomon on his deathbed", but not for the majority, who are called "to create life" (X.8).[^8] It was not that he, Solomon and Schopenhauer had not killed themselves that convinced him faith exists, but that the milliards "have borne Solomon and us on the current of their lives" (X.8).

## The translation

Maude notes that Tolstoy's version of Ecclesiastes differs in places from the English Authorized and Revised versions, and that he followed Tolstoy's text.[^9]

## Open questions

- Maude's note cites a letter to [[Afanasy Fet]] for Tolstoy's view that "The Authorized English version [of Ecclesiastes] is bad". The letter is not among the dive's extracts and should be found in the PSS.

## Dive provenance

- [1879-1882-a-confession](../works/non-fiction/personal-papers/1879-1882-a-confession/index.md) — the text of A Confession (PSS 23:1–59) and its commentary (PSS 23:515–537); Maude's note 8; Johan's reader notes of 10 October 2026 asked for this page.

[^1]: <span lang="ru">«Церковная традиция приписывает книгу Соломону, царю израильскому, жившему в XI—X веках до н. э. Библейская критика находит, что приписывать это сочинение Соломону нет никаких оснований. Действительный автор его неизвестен»</span> (PSS 23:533, commentary, note 26). English: ours.

[^2]: <span lang="ru">«Так говорит Соломон или тот, кто писал эти слова»</span> (PSS 23:25, ch. VI). English: Maude.

[^3]: <span lang="ru">«Оглядываюсь на сверстных. Соломон, Шопенгауэр»</span> (PSS 23:519, commentary, the plan on the cover of the first draft). English: ours.

[^4]: <span lang="ru">«Выдержки взяты из 1, 2 и 9 глав „Книги Екклезиаста, или Проповедника“»</span> (PSS 23:533, commentary, note 26). English: ours.

[^5]: <span lang="ru">«Всё в мире — и глупость и мудрость, и богатство и нищета, и веселье и горе — всё суета и пустяки. Человек умрет, и ничего не останется. И это глупо», говорит Соломон</span> (PSS 23:26, ch. VI). English: Maude.

[^6]: <span lang="ru">«Выдержки взяты из 8 и 9 глав „Книги Екклезиаста“»</span> (PSS 23:533, commentary, note 27). English: ours.

[^7]: <span lang="ru">«всем нельзя иметь 1000 женщин и дворцов, как Соломон»</span>; <span lang="ru">«та случайность, которая нынче сделала меня Соломоном, завтра может сделать меня рабом Соломона»</span> (PSS 23:28, ch. VII). English: Maude.

[^8]: <span lang="ru">«эта вера годится, может быть, хоть не для утешения, а для некоторого рассеяния раскаивающемуся Соломону на смертном одре, но она не может годиться для огромного большинства человечества, которое призвано не потешаться, пользуясь трудами других, а творить жизнь»</span> (PSS 23:39, ch. X). English: Maude.

[^9]: Maude's note 8 to VI.17, in the Maude reader edition.