5 And he is in fear of that which is high, and danger is in the road, and the tree is white with flower, and the least thing is a weight, and desire is at an end, because man goes to his last resting-place, and those who are sorrowing are in the streets;
If I am waiting for the underworld as my house, if I have made my bed in the dark;
For I am certain that you will send me back to death, and to the meeting-place ordered for all living.
This is what the Lord of armies has said: Take thought and send for the weeping women, so that they may come; and send for the wise women, so that they may come: Let them quickly make cries of sorrow for us, so that drops may be flowing from our eyes till they are streaming with water. For a sound of weeping goes up from Zion, a cry, How has destruction come on us? we are overcome with shame because we have gone away from our land; he has sent us out from our house. But even now, give ear to the word of the Lord, O you women; let your ears be open to the word of his mouth, training your daughters to give cries of sorrow, everyone teaching her neighbour a song of grief.
The grey head is a crown of glory, if it is seen in the way of righteousness.
Whatever comes to your hand to do with all your power, do it because there is no work, or thought, or knowledge, or wisdom in the place of the dead to which you are going.
And they came to the house of the ruler of the Synagogue; and he saw people running this way and that, and weeping and crying loudly. And when he had gone in, he said to them, Why are you making such a noise and weeping? The child is not dead, but sleeping.
Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Jeremiah, what do you see? And I said, I see a branch of an almond-tree.
And he said, I will not let my son go down with you; for his brother is dead and he is all I have: if evil overtakes him on the journey, then through you will my grey head go down to the underworld in sorrow.
The glory of young men is their strength, and the honour of old men is their grey hairs.
For he sees that wise men come to their end, and foolish persons of low behaviour come to destruction together, letting their wealth go to others. The place of the dead is their house for ever, and their resting-place through all generations; those who come after them give their names to their lands. But man, like the animals, does not go on for ever; he comes to an end like the beasts. This is the way of the foolish; their silver is for those who come after them, and their children get the pleasure of their gold. (Selah.) Death will give them their food like sheep; the underworld is their fate and they will go down into it; their flesh is food for worms; their form is wasted away; the underworld is their resting-place for ever.
With us are men who are grey-haired and full of years, much older than your father.
And the forty days needed for making the body ready went by: and there was weeping for him among the Egyptians for seventy days. And when the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph said to the servants of Pharaoh, If now you have love for me, say these words to Pharaoh: My father made me take an oath, saying, When I am dead, put me to rest in the place I have made ready for myself in the land of Canaan. So now let me go and put my father in his last resting-place, and I will come back again. And Pharaoh said, Go up and put your father to rest, as you gave your oath to him. So Joseph went up to put his father in his last resting-place; and with him went all the servants of Pharaoh, and the chief men of his house and all the chiefs of the land of Egypt, And all the family of Joseph, and his brothers and his father's people: only their little ones and their flocks and herds they did not take with them from the land of Goshen. And carriages went up with him and horsemen, a great army. And they came to the grain-floor of Atad on the other side of Jordan, and there they gave the last honours to Jacob, with great and bitter sorrow, weeping for their father for seven days.
When he sees that the boy is not with us, he will come to his death, and our father's grey head will go down in sorrow to the underworld.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Ecclesiastes 12
Commentary on Ecclesiastes 12 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 12
The wise and penitent preacher is here closing his sermon; and he closes it, not only like a good orator, but like a good preacher, with that which was likely to make the best impressions and which he wished might be powerful and lasting upon his hearers. Here is,
Ecc 12:1-7
Here is,
Ecc 12:8-12
Solomon is here drawing towards a close, and is loth to part till he has gained his point, and prevailed with his hearers, with his readers, to seek for that satisfaction in God only and in their duty to him which they can never find in the creature.
Ecc 12:13-14
The great enquiry which Solomon prosecutes in this book is, What is that good which the sons of men should do? ch. 2:3. What is the true way to true happiness, the certain means to attain our great end? He had in vain sought it among those things which most men are eager in pursuit of, but here, at length, he has found it, by the help of that discovery which God anciently made to man (Job 28:28), that serious godliness is the only way to true happiness: Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter, the return entered upon the writ of enquiry, the result of this diligent search; you shall have all I have been driving at in two words. He does not say, Do you hear it, but Let us hear it; for preachers must themselves be hearers of that word which they preach to others, must hear it as from God; those are teachers by the halves who teach others and not themselves, Rom. 2:21. Every word of God is pure and precious, but some words are worthy of more special remark, as this; the Masorites begin it with a capital letter, as that Deu. 6:4. Solomon himself puts a nota bene before it, demanding attention in these words, Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Observe here,