Ecclesiastes 2 - Introduction

The Few Days of This Life -- Ecclesiastes Two --

Solomon said that life is nothing but vanity. "Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity." (Ecclesiastes 1:2) He had pursued knowledge and learning only to find that it was vain. Knowledge did not give him joy, it only increase his sorrow. In Ecclesiastes two he continued to show the sorrows and vanity of this world.

Solomon had searched for, but he had not found "true happiness." He did not find true happiness in pleasure, laughter nor wine. He realized that the days of the children of men on earth were only a few. What good thing could a man do with his brief earthly life?

Solomon had, (1) built houses and planted vineyards for himself, (2) made himself gardens and parks, (3) planted in them all kinds of fruit trees, (4) made pools from which to water the forest of growing trees, (5) bought male and female slaves, and had slaves that were born in his house, (6) had great possessions of herds and flocks, (7) gathered for himself silver and gold, (8) got both men and women singers, (9) had many concubines, (10) he became great and surpassed all who were before him in Jerusalem, (11) gained much wisdom, (12) did whatever his eyes desired, (13) kept his heart from no pleasure, and (14) found pleasure in all his toil. However, his sad statement was, "Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun."

All the things that Solomon pursued proved insufficient to make a man happy. He said he had thought that there was advantage for the wise person over the fool. But he said; "Yet I perceived that the same event happens to all of them." "What happens to the fool will happen to me also. Why then have I been so very wise?" The wise die just like the fool dies. This led him to say, "I hated life, because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a striving after wind."

Solomon then pondered how far the business and wealth of this world would go towards making men happy. He said he spent his life gaining "stuff" only to leave it to "the man who will come after me." He did not know whether that man would be wise or a fool and yet he would be master of all that Solomon had toiled for. His conclusion was "this also is vanity." "What has a man from all the toil and striving of heart with which he toils beneath the sun? For all his days are full of sorrow and his work is a vexation. Even in the night his heart does not rest. This also is vanity." He said that the best a man can do is eat, drink and enjoy the fruit of his toil because he will leave it all and it will be given to the man of God's choice.