Perhaps the most striking, not to say ominous, phrase used by an interpreter of Qoheleth is the “eerie guest” (der unheimliche Gast, the title of the article by H.-P. Müller in ZTK 84 [1987] 440–64). The phrase is taken immediately from M. Heidegger’s description of the philosophy of Nietzsche, who used it to describe Nihilism. Müller raises the question: Has Qoheleth contributed in some way to Nihilism? (442). Like H. D. Preuss, he has also interpreted the God of Ecclesiastics as a distant “god