Ecclesiastes 1-11

New International Version - UK

² ‘Meaningless! Meaningless!’
    says the Teacher.
‘Utterly meaningless!
    Everything is meaningless.’

³ What do people gain from all their labours
    at which they toil under the sun?
⁴ Generations come and generations go,
    but the earth remains for ever.
⁵ The sun rises and the sun sets,
    and hurries back to where it rises.
⁶ The wind blows to the south
    and turns to the north;
round and round it goes,
    ever returning on its course.
⁷ All streams flow into the sea,
    yet the sea is never full.
To the place the streams come from,
    there they return again.
⁸ All things are wearisome,
    more than one can say.
The eye never has enough of seeing,
    nor the ear its fill of hearing.
⁹ What has been will be again,
    what has been done will be done again;
    there is nothing new under the sun.
¹⁰ Is there anything of which one can say,
    ‘Look! This is something new’?
It was here already, long ago;
    it was here before our time.
¹¹ No one remembers the former generations,
    and even those yet to come
will not be remembered
    by those who follow them.

¹⁵ What is crooked cannot be straightened;
    what is lacking cannot be counted.

¹⁸ For with much wisdom comes much sorrow;
    the more knowledge, the more grief.

¹⁰ I denied myself nothing my eyes desired;
    I refused my heart no pleasure.
My heart took delight in all my labour,
    and this was the reward for all my toil.
¹¹ Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done
    and what I had toiled to achieve,
everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind;
    nothing was gained under the sun.

‘The fate of the fool will overtake me also.
    What then do I gain by being wise?’
I said to myself,
    ‘This too is meaningless.’
¹⁶ For the wise, like the fool, will not be long remembered;
    the days have already come when both have been forgotten.
Like the fool, the wise too must die!

¹⁵ Whatever is has already been,
    and what will be has been before;
    and God will call the past to account.^[d]

in the place of judgment – wickedness was there,
    in the place of justice – wickedness was there.

‘God will bring into judgment
    both the righteous and the wicked,
for there will be a time for every activity,
    a time to judge every deed.’

I saw the tears of the oppressed –
    and they have no comforter;
power was on the side of their oppressors –
    and they have no comforter.
² And I declared that the dead,
    who had already died,
are happier than the living,
    who are still alive.
³ But better than both
    is the one who has never been born,
who has not seen the evil
    that is done under the sun.

⁵ Fools fold their hands
    and ruin themselves.
⁶ Better one handful with tranquillity
    than two handfuls with toil
    and chasing after the wind.

⁸ there was a man all alone;
    he had neither son nor brother.
There was no end to his toil,
    yet his eyes were not content with his wealth.
‘For whom am I toiling,’ he asked,
    ‘and why am I depriving myself of enjoyment?’
This too is meaningless –
    a miserable business!

⁹ Two are better than one,
    because they have a good return for their labour:
¹⁰ if either of them falls down,
    one can help the other up.
But pity anyone who falls
    and has no one to help them up.
¹¹ Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm.
    But how can one keep warm alone?
¹² Though one may be overpowered,
    two can defend themselves.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

² Do not be quick with your mouth,
    do not be hasty in your heart
    to utter anything before God.
God is in heaven
    and you are on earth,
    so let your words be few.
³ A dream comes when there are many cares,
    and many words mark the speech of a fool.

¹⁰ Whoever loves money never has enough;
    whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with their income.
    This too is meaningless.

¹¹ As goods increase,
    so do those who consume them.
And what benefit are they to the owners
    except to feast their eyes on them?

¹² The sleep of a labourer is sweet,
    whether they eat little or much,
but as for the rich, their abundance
    permits them no sleep.

wealth hoarded to the harm of its owners,
¹⁴     or wealth lost through some misfortune,
so that when they have children
    there is nothing left for them to inherit.
¹⁵ Everyone comes naked from their mother’s womb,
    and as everyone comes, so they depart.
They take nothing from their toil
    that they can carry in their hands.

as everyone comes, so they depart,
    and what do they gain,
    since they toil for the wind?
¹⁷ All their days they eat in darkness,
    with great frustration, affliction and anger.

⁷ Everyone’s toil is for their mouth,
    yet their appetite is never satisfied.
⁸ What advantage have the wise over fools?
What do the poor gain
    by knowing how to conduct themselves before others?
⁹ Better what the eye sees
    than the roving of the appetite.
This too is meaningless,
    a chasing after the wind.

¹⁰ Whatever exists has already been named,
    and what humanity is has been known;
no one can contend
    with someone who is stronger.
¹¹ The more the words,
    the less the meaning,
    and how does that profit anyone?

⁷ Extortion turns a wise person into a fool,
    and a bribe corrupts the heart.

⁸ The end of a matter is better than its beginning,
    and patience is better than pride.
⁹ Do not be quickly provoked in your spirit,
    for anger resides in the lap of fools.

¹⁰ Do not say, ‘Why were the old days better than these?’
    For it is not wise to ask such questions.

¹¹ Wisdom, like an inheritance, is a good thing
    and benefits those who see the sun.
¹² Wisdom is a shelter
    as money is a shelter,
but the advantage of knowledge is this:
    wisdom preserves those who have it.

who can straighten
    what he has made crooked?
¹⁴ When times are good, be happy;
    but when times are bad, consider this:
God has made the one
    as well as the other.
Therefore, no one can discover
    anything about their future.

the righteous perishing in their righteousness,
    and the wicked living long in their wickedness.
¹⁶ Do not be over-righteous,
    neither be overwise –
    why destroy yourself?
¹⁷ Do not be overwicked,
    and do not be a fool –
    why die before your time?
¹⁸ It is good to grasp the one
    and not let go of the other.
    Whoever fears God will avoid all extremes.^[g]

¹⁹ Wisdom makes one wise person more powerful
    than ten rulers in a city.

²⁰ Indeed, there is no one on earth who is righteous,
    no one who does what is right and never sins.

²¹ Do not pay attention to every word people say,
    or you may hear your servant cursing you –
²² for you know in your heart
    that many times you yourself have cursed others.

‘I am determined to be wise’–
    but this was beyond me.
²⁴ Whatever exists is far off and most profound –
    who can discover it?
²⁵ So I turned my mind to understand,
    to investigate and to search out wisdom and the scheme of things
and to understand the stupidity of wickedness
    and the madness of folly.

²⁶ I find more bitter than death
    the woman who is a snare,
whose heart is a trap
    and whose hands are chains.
The man who pleases God will escape her,
    but the sinner she will ensnare.

‘Adding one thing to another to discover the scheme of things –
²⁸     while I was still searching
    but not finding –
I found one upright man among a thousand,
    but not one upright woman among them all.
²⁹ This only have I found:
    God created mankind upright,
    but they have gone in search of many schemes.’

8 Who is like the wise?
    Who knows the explanation of things?
A person’s wisdom brightens their face
    and changes its hard appearance.

⁵ Whoever obeys his command will come to no harm,
    and the wise heart will know the proper time and procedure.
⁶ For there is a proper time and procedure for every matter,
    though a person may be weighed down by misery.

⁷ Since no one knows the future,
    who can tell someone else what is to come?
⁸ As no one has power over the wind to contain it,
    so^[i] no one has power over the time of their death.
As no one is discharged in time of war,
    so wickedness will not release those who practise it.

As it is with the good,
    so with the sinful;
as it is with those who take oaths,
    so with those who are afraid to take them.

⁵ For the living know that they will die,
    but the dead know nothing;
they have no further reward,
    and even their name is forgotten.
⁶ Their love, their hate
    and their jealousy have long since vanished;
never again will they have a part
    in anything that happens under the sun.

The race is not to the swift
    or the battle to the strong,
nor does food come to the wise
    or wealth to the brilliant
    or favour to the learned;
but time and chance happen to them all.

As fish are caught in a cruel net,
    or birds are taken in a snare,
so people are trapped by evil times
    that fall unexpectedly upon them.

¹⁷ The quiet words of the wise are more to be heeded
    than the shouts of a ruler of fools.
¹⁸ Wisdom is better than weapons of war,
    but one sinner destroys much good.

10 As dead flies give perfume a bad smell,
    so a little folly outweighs wisdom and honour.
² The heart of the wise inclines to the right,
    but the heart of the fool to the left.
³ Even as fools walk along the road,
    they lack sense
    and show everyone how stupid they are.
⁴ If a ruler’s anger rises against you,
    do not leave your post;
    calmness can lay great offences to rest.

⁵ There is an evil I have seen under the sun,
    the sort of error that arises from a ruler:
⁶ fools are put in many high positions,
    while the rich occupy the low ones.
⁷ I have seen slaves on horseback,
    while princes go on foot like slaves.

⁸ Whoever digs a pit may fall into it;
    whoever breaks through a wall may be bitten by a snake.
⁹ Whoever quarries stones may be injured by them;
    whoever splits logs may be endangered by them.

¹⁰ If the axe is dull
    and its edge unsharpened,
more strength is needed,
    but skill will bring success.

¹¹ If a snake bites before it is charmed,
    the charmer receives no fee.

¹² Words from the mouth of the wise are gracious,
    but fools are consumed by their own lips.
¹³ At the beginning their words are folly;
    at the end they are wicked madness –
¹⁴     and fools multiply words.

No one knows what is coming –
    who can tell someone else what will happen after them?

¹⁵ The toil of fools wearies them;
    they do not know the way to town.

¹⁶ Woe to the land whose king was a servant^[n]
    and whose princes feast in the morning.
¹⁷ Blessed is the land whose king is of noble birth
    and whose princes eat at a proper time –
    for strength and not for drunkenness.

¹⁸ Through laziness, the rafters sag;
    because of idle hands, the house leaks.

¹⁹ A feast is made for laughter,
    wine makes life merry,
    and money is the answer for everything.

²⁰ Do not revile the king even in your thoughts,
    or curse the rich in your bedroom,
because a bird in the sky may carry your words,
    and a bird on the wing may report what you say.

³ If clouds are full of water,
    they pour rain on the earth.
Whether a tree falls to the south or to the north,
    in the place where it falls, there it will lie.
⁴ Whoever watches the wind will not plant;
    whoever looks at the clouds will not reap.

⁵ As you do not know the path of the wind,
    or how the body is formed^[o] in a mother’s womb,
so you cannot understand the work of God,
    the Maker of all things.

⁶ Sow your seed in the morning,
    and at evening let your hands not be idle,
for you do not know which will succeed,
    whether this or that,
    or whether both will do equally well.

⁹ You who are young, be happy while you are young,
    and let your heart give you joy in the days of your youth.
Follow the ways of your heart
    and whatever your eyes see,
but know that for all these things
    God will bring you into judgment.
¹⁰ So then, banish anxiety from your heart
    and cast off the troubles of your body,
    for youth and vigour are meaningless.