3 If a man beget a hundred [sons], and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, but his soul be not filled with good, and also he have no burial, I say an untimely birth is better than he.
and more fortunate than both is he who hath not yet been, who hath not seen the evil work that is done under the sun.
Or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants that have not seen the light.
And they went to bury her; but they found no more of her than the skull, and the feet, and the palms of the hands.
but thou art cast out of thy grave like an abominable branch, covered with the slain -- those thrust through with the sword, that go down to the stones of the pit: like a carcase trodden under foot. Thou shalt not be joined with them in burial; for thou hast destroyed thy land, hast slain thy people. Of the seed of evildoers no mention shall be made for ever.
And Jacob said to Pharaoh, The days of the years of my sojourning are a hundred and thirty years. Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life, and they do not attain to the days of the years of the life of my fathers, in the days of their sojourning.
Children's children are the crown of old men; and the glory of children are their fathers.
The Son of man goes indeed, according as it is written concerning him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of man is delivered up; it were good for that man if he had not been born.
and they shall spread them out to the sun and to the moon and to all the host of the heavens, which they have loved, and which they have served, and after which they have walked, and which they have sought, and which they have worshipped: they shall not be gathered, nor be buried; they shall be for dung upon the face of the ground.
All his days also he eateth in darkness, and hath much vexation, and sickness, and irritation. Behold what I have seen good and comely: [it is] to eat and to drink, and to enjoy good in all his labour wherewith [man] laboureth under the sun, all the days of his life which God hath given him: for that is his portion. Every man also to whom God hath given riches and wealth, and power to eat thereof, and to take his portion and to rejoice in his labour: that is a gift of God.
As arrows in the hand of a mighty man, so are the children of youth. Happy is the man that hath filled his quiver with them. They shall not be ashamed when they speak with enemies in the gate.
Let them be as a snail that melteth as it passeth away; [like] the untimely birth of a woman, let them not see the sun.
And the king commanded it so to be done: and the decree was given at Shushan; and they hanged Haman's ten sons. And the Jews that were in Shushan gathered themselves together on the fourteenth day also of the month Adar, and slew three hundred men at Shushan; but they laid not their hand on the prey.
So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. And the king's wrath was appeased.
And Haman told them of the glory of his riches, and the multitude of his children, and all wherein the king had promoted him, and how he had advanced him above the princes and servants of the king.
and of all my sons, (for Jehovah has given me many sons,) he has chosen Solomon my son to sit upon the throne of the kingdom of Jehovah over Israel.
Now Ahab had seventy sons in Samaria. And Jehu wrote letters, and sent to Samaria, to the princes of Jizreel, to the elders, and to Ahab's guardians, saying,
And Eli blessed Elkanah and his wife, and said, Jehovah give thee seed of this woman for the loan which is lent to Jehovah. And they went to their own home. So Jehovah visited Hannah, and she conceived, and bore three sons and two daughters. And the boy Samuel grew before Jehovah.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Ecclesiastes 6
Commentary on Ecclesiastes 6 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 6
Ec 6:1-12.
1. common—or else more literally,—"great upon man," falls heavily upon man.
2. for his soul—that is, his enjoyment.
God giveth him not power to eat—This distinguishes him from the "rich" man in Ec 5:19. "God hath given" distinguishes him also from the man who got his wealth by "oppression" (Ec 5:8, 10).
stranger—those not akin, nay, even hostile to him (Jer 51:51; La 5:2; Ho 7:9). 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" (Ec 2:26), who has found favor in God's sight.
3. Even if a man (of this character) have very many (equivalent to "a hundred," 2Ki 10:1) children, and not have a "stranger" as his heir (Ec 6:2), and live long ("days of years" express the brevity of life at its best, Ge 47:9), yet enjoy no real "good" in life, and lie unhonored, without "burial," at death (2Ki 9:26, 35), the embryo is better than he. In the East to be without burial is the greatest degradation. "Better the fruit that drops from the tree before it is ripe than that left to hang on till rotten" [Henry].
4. he—rather "it," "the untimely birth." So "its," not "his name."
with vanity—to no purpose; a type of the driftless existence of him who makes riches the chief good.
darkness—of the abortive; a type of the unhonored death and dark future beyond the grave of the avaricious.
5. this—yet "it has more rest than" the toiling, gloomy miser.
6. If the miser's length of "life" be thought to raise him above the abortive, Solomon answers that long life, without enjoying real good, is but lengthened misery, and riches cannot exempt him from going whither "all go." He is fit neither for life, nor death, nor eternity.
7. man—rather, "the man," namely, the miser (Ec 6:3-6). For not all men labor for the mouth, that is, for selfish gratification.
appetite—Hebrew, "the soul." The insatiability of the desire prevents that which is the only end proposed in toils, namely, self-gratification; "the man" thus gets no "good" out of his wealth (Ec 6:3).
8. For—"However" [Maurer]. The "for" means (in contrast to the insatiability of the miser), For what else is the advantage which the wise man hath above the fool?"
What—advantage, that is, superiority, above him who knows not how to walk uprightly
hath the poor who knoweth to walk before the living?—that is, to use and enjoy life aright (Ec 5:18, 19), a cheerful, thankful, godly "walk" (Ps 116:9).
9. Answer to the question in Ec 6:8. This is the advantage:
Better is the sight of the eyes—the wise man's godly enjoyment of present seen blessings
than the (fool's) wandering—literally, walking (Ps 73:9), of the desire, that is, vague, insatiable desires for what he has not (Ec 6:7; Heb 13:5).
this—restless wandering of desire, and not enjoying contentedly the present (1Ti 6:6, 8).
10. Part II begins here. Since man's toils are vain, what is the chief good? (Ec 6:12). The answer is contained in the rest of the book.
That which hath been—man's various circumstances
is named already—not only has existed, Ec 1:9; 3:15, but has received its just name, "vanity," long ago,
and it is known that it—vanity
is man—Hebrew, "Adam," equivalent to man "of red dust," as his Creator appropriately named him from his frailty.
neither may he contend, &c.—(Ro 9:20).
11. "Seeing" that man cannot escape from the "vanity," which by God's "mighty" will is inherent in earthly things, and cannot call in question God's wisdom in these dispensations (equivalent to "contend," &c.),
what is man the better—of these vain things as regards the chief good? None whatever.
12. For who knoweth, &c.—The ungodly know not what is really "good" during life, nor "what shall be after them," that is, what will be the event of their undertakings (Ec 3:22; 8:7). The godly might be tempted to "contend with God" (Ec 6:10) as to His dispensations; but they cannot fully know the wise purposes served by them now and hereafter. Their sufferings from the oppressors are more really good for them than cloudless prosperity; sinners are being allowed to fill up their measure of guilt. Retribution in part vindicates God's ways even now. The judgment shall make all clear. In Ec 7:1-29, he states what is good, in answer to this verse.