Ecclesiastes 6:1 There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it is common among men: 2 A man to whom God has given riches and wealth and honor, so that he lacks nothing for himself of all he desires; yet God does not give him power to eat of it, but a foreigner consumes it. This is vanity, and it is an evil affliction. 3 If a man begets a hundred children and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but his soul is not satisfied with goodness, or indeed he has no burial, I say that a stillborn child is better than he-- 4 for it comes in vanity and departs in darkness, and its name is covered with darkness. 5 Though it has not seen the sun or known anything, this has more rest than that man, 6 even if he lives a thousand years twice--but has not seen goodness. Do not all go to one place?
“’There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it is common among men.’ That which appears to be good is discovered, after all, to be a great evil.” (Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary) “Wealth, which seems, on a superficial look, so great a good, often is found, on closer examination, to be a great evil.” (Jamieson, Fausset, Brown) It is not necessarily a sign of covenant with Israel's God. All have temporal gifts from Him.
“’A man to whom God has given riches and wealth and honor, so that he lacks nothing for himself of all he desires; yet God does not give him power to eat of it,’ the Targum supplies, “because of his sin.”— “But a foreigner consumes it,’ that is a Gentile— “those not akin,‘… He seems to have it in his ‘power’ to do as he will with his wealth, but an unseen power gives him up to his own avarice. God wills that he should toil for ‘a stranger’…, who has found favour in God's sight.” (Jamieson, Fausset, Brown) “’This is vanity, and it is an evil affliction.’ (2)
This is the result of the curse. “‘If a man begets a hundred children,’ As Ahab did half a hundred, after that God had threatened to cut off all his house, as it were in contempt of the divine threatening.” (Trapp)—"thus not having a ‘stranger’ as his heir [as righteous Abraham supposed]. — “’and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many.’ The phrase hints that at best man's years are but days, short and soon gone.” (Jamieson, Fausset, Brown)— “‘but his soul is not satisfied with goodness.’ He “does not enjoy the good things he has; has no pleasure nor satisfaction in the temporal good things of life, has not the comfort of them, and is always uneasy, because he has not more of them; and especially if his soul is not filled with spiritual good things…” (Gill) "The seat of the malady is within.” (Sutcliffe)
“For the high appreciation, in the old covenant, of the blessing of many children, comp. Genesis 24:60.” (Lange) “They blessed Rebekah and said to her, ‘May you, our sister, Become thousands of ten thousands, and may your descendants possess the gate of those who hate them." (Gen. 24:60) They looked for the Seed of the Woman to crush the head of the serpent.
“‘or indeed he has no burial,’ a “special ignominy and dishonor.” (Barnes) “If a man has committed a sin deserving of death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain overnight on the tree, but you shall surely bury him that day, so that you do not defile the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance; for he who is hanged is accursed of God.” (Deut. 21:22-23) “And the king of Ai he hanged on a tree until evening. And as soon as the sun was down, Joshua commanded that they should take his corpse down from the tree, cast it at the entrance of the gate of the city, and raise over it a great heap of stones that remains to this day.” (Josh 8:29) He did the same with the five other kings in Joshua 10:22-27. Leaving the heathen kings unburied would have defiled the land.
The covenant allusion of Genesis 15 with Abraham "was dead carcasses being left to be devoured by beasts and birds, instead of meeting with honorable burial in the ancestral graves (i.e. 1 Kings 13:22; Isaiah 14:18-23). Thus David says to his giant foe, ‘I will give the carcasses of the host of the Philistines this day unto the fowls of the air, and to the wild beasts of the earth’ (1 Sam 17:46); and about Jehoiakim it was denounced that he should not be lamented when he died: ‘He shall be buried with the burial of an ass, drawn and cast forth beyond the gates of Jerusalem’ (Jeremiah 22:18, Jeremiah 22:19).” (The Pulpit Commentaries)
“'I say that a stillborn child is better than he. (3) For it [the child] comes in vanity and departs in darkness, and its name is covered with darkness.' (4) The child may be named or not but the question is the type of person they would have been. Wise Solomon says, "Though it [the child] has not seen the sun or known anything, this has more rest than that man, even if he lives a thousand years twice--but has not seen goodness.’ That child shall have entered into the rest that God has for his people. This child and all “little innocents” who die before the age of accountability can rest in peace for they have a part lot or portion with Israel.
“Do not all go to one place?’ or the realm of the dead is bound to receive all men without exception.”(Kretzmann) “It is a sad, sorrowful picture, yet every word of it is true as to man’s existence. With all his long life and all it brings, riches and power, his soul has not the fill it needs, that which satisfies. His life ends at last and then there is the one place--the region of the unknown, the Sheol, where they all go.” (Gaebelein) From that earthly grave or Sheol— “And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, some to shame and everlasting contempt.” (Daniel 12:2; Acts 24:15) The everlasting contempt will not be experience by the dead. It will be had by the Lord for Israel's dead enemies— those destroyed, after the Judgment, who have no inheritance in the antitype of New Jerusalem.
Eccl 6:7 All the labor of man is for his mouth, and yet the soul is not satisfied. 8 For what more has the wise man than the fool? What does the poor man have, who knows how to walk before the living? 9 Better is the sight of the eyes than the wandering of desire. This also is vanity and grasping for the wind. 10 Whatever one is, he has been named already, for it is known that he is man; and he cannot contend with Him who is mightier than he.
“‘All the labor of man is for his mouth,'- speech- "'and yet the soul,’ put for the whole person, “‘is not satisfied.’ (7) A natural man never knows if he will get the eternal prize. “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God,” (Matt 4:4) “What man needs is not anything ‘under the sun’ but that which is ‘from above the sun.’” (Arno Gaebelein) “Life itself is a rat-race that makes no sense at all." [The Bible Speaks Today] --> And man is quick to speak. "His mouth, not his mind, is in control.” (Coffman Commentary)
“’For what more has the wise man than the fool? What does the poor man have, who knows how to walk before the living?’ [8] Apart from God, ‘homo sapiens’ (the wise one, as he calls himself) would be more appropriately named if he had called himself `homo ignoramus.'! Apart from God [and knowledge He imparts], mankind has no more [knowledge of the] future than the ichthyosaurus or the dinosaur. More and more our wretched human family is claiming for itself the scriptural designation that must be applied to unbelievers, namely, ‘The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God' (Psalms 14:1 and Psalm 53:1).’” (Coffman Commentary)
“’Better is the sight of the eyes than the wandering of desire.’ A thing pleasant before the eyes is preferable to a future which exists only in the desire”(Barnes) — from transient man’s standpoint. "This also is vanity and grasping for the wind.’ (9) “’Whatever one is, he has been named already’— Long ago his name was given by God, that is “Adam.” “Thus the sense of the v. is, ’From the beginning man’s nature has corresponded to his bodily frame. He is known as man (Adam), because he was made out of the earth (Heb. Adamah), and he must accept his position: cp. Isaiah 45:9; Romans 9:20.” (Dummelow's Commentary)— “‘for it is known that he is man; and he cannot contend with Him who is mightier than he,’ (10) that is, the LORD God of Israel. “And so it is written, ‘The first man Adam became a living being.’ The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.’ However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward the spiritual. The first man was of the earth, made of dust; the second Man is the Lord from heaven. As was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust; and as is the heavenly Man, so also are those who are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man.” (1 Cor 15:45-49)
In fact, it is true in our generation. “God knows the beginning of every man (Isa 46:9-2 Sam 24), also his name and character... His name, his identity, is given to him by God (cf. Isa 40:26). Giving a name to someone or something means that someone has the authority to do so... A name expresses the nature of something (Gen 2:19).” (G. de Koning)
Eccl 5:11 Since there are many things that increase vanity, how is man the better? 12 For who knows what is good for man in life, all the days of his vain life which he passes like a shadow? Who can tell a man what will happen after him under the sun?
“‘Since there are many things' The noun rendered ‘things’ (dabar) may equally mean ‘words;’ and it is a question which signification is most appropriate here. The Septuagint has λόγοι πολλοί, 'many words.' So the Vulgate. (John Gill)— "'how is man the better [for contending with God].' (11) “The dispute..., דּין, takes place in words... As that wrestling or contending against God's decision and providence is vain and worthless, nothing else remains for man but to be submissive, and to acknowledge his limitation by the fear of God; thus there are also many words which only increase yet more the multitude of vanities already existing in this world, for, because they are resultless, they bring no advantage for man.“ (Keil and Delitzsch)
The prophet said, “Woe unto him who strives with his Maker!” (Isa 45:9) "'For who knows what is good for man in life, all the days of his vain life which he passes like a shadow? Who can tell a man what will happen after him under the sun?' (11) As his angry brother approached, a man named Jacob wrestled with God. “Then Jacob was left alone; and a Man”— the eternal Word, the Son of God— “wrestled with him until the breaking of day.’ (Gen 32:24) He did not contend with words as the preacher warned against. "We are told by Hosea 12:4, how Jacob wrestled with him; he wept and made supplication: prayers and tears were his weapons. It was... a spiritual wrestling, by vigorous faith and holy desire; and this circumstance shows that the person with whom he wrestled was not a created angel, but the Angel of the covenant; for surely he would not pray and make supplication to a creature. Indeed, in the passage just referred to, Hosea terms him Jehovah, God of hosts...” (Benson Commentary)
“So He [the Lord] said to him, ‘What is your name?’ He said, “Jacob.”[Supplanter] And He said, “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel [Prince with God]; for you have struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed.” (Gen 32:27-28) “He won a great spiritual victory. He learned to triumph through defeat and to be strong through weakness. Emptied of self and of confidence in his own cleverness, he confessed he was Jacob, a supplanter, a 'con man.' God then changed his name to Israel (variously translated as 'God rules,' 'one who strives with God,' or 'a prince of God').” (Believer's Bible Commentary) "Not until a man has rid himself of all pretension, and taken refuge in mere unembellished existence, can he gain that peace of mind which is the foundation of human happiness.” (Schopenhauer)
“Our life upon earth is to be reckoned by days. It is fleeting and uncertain, and with little in it... to be depended on. Let us return to God, trust in his mercy through Jesus Christ, and submit to his will. Then soon shall we glide through this vexatious world, and find ourselves in that happy place, where there is fulness of joy and pleasures for evermore.” (Matthew Henry)
Comments