ALL IS VANITY 1-11. The writer describes himself. He declares that all things are transitory and without result, whether they be the works or the life of man, or the natural forces of heat, air, and water. Language cannot do justice to nature's wearisome sameness. The oblivion which overtakes all.... [ Continue Reading ]
PREACHER] see Intro. §§ 1, 2.... [ Continue Reading ]
VANITY OF VANITIES] lit.'breath of breaths'; the form of expression being a Hebrew way of indicating the superlative degree. Of all fleeting things existence is the most fleeting. The same figure is used in Psalms 62:9; Psalms 144:4 of the brevity of man's life. The word VANITY, occurring thirty-eig... [ Continue Reading ]
WHAT PROFIT] Man toils; but even granting that he gains some tangible result, he cannot retain.... [ Continue Reading ]
THE EARTH ABIDETH] Man is so far from being lord of the earth, that it survives ever fresh generations of its inhabitants, and so by contrast brings out more clearly the brevity of their existence.... [ Continue Reading ]
HASTETH TO HIS PLACE] The sun, on the supposition of his apparent motion across the heavens from E. to W. by day, returns eastward beneath the earth by night.... [ Continue Reading ]
THE WIND, etc.] We may render more closely thus: 'Going toward the south, and circling toward the north; circling, circling goeth the wind, and on its circlings returneth the wind.' The sameness involved in the constant renewal of its changes of direction is brought out by the wording. The 'circling... [ Continue Reading ]
UNTO THE PLACE] The writer supposes that the salt water percolates by underground fissures, getting rid of its salt on the way, and so through hidden channels returns to the sources whence it had set out.... [ Continue Reading ]
ALL THINGS _are_ FULL OF LABOUR] RM 'all words are' too 'feeble' to set forth the case, so vast is the subject.... [ Continue Reading ]
THE THING] History has been repeating itself from all time, and will do so evermore. 10, 11. IS THERE] He calls on any one who may doubt his word to point to something which is really new. The only reason that events strike us as new is because that which has been is swept into oblivion. Previous g... [ Continue Reading ]
WAS KING] see Intro. § 2.... [ Continue Reading ]
MY HEART] We should say my 'mind,' but the heart was considered by the Jews to be the seat of the intellectual powers as well as of the emotions. ALL _things_] the different ways that men work, and their hopes and fears in so doing; their circumstances, pains, pleasures, feelings, aims. Perhaps, he... [ Continue Reading ]
VEXATION OF SPIRIT] RV 'striving after wind': cp. Hosea 12:1. The satisfaction that might have been expected from these studies is not to be attained. Air itself is not more elusive to the grasp.... [ Continue Reading ]
CROOKED] for the phrase here cp. Isaiah 40:4. The world is disordered, and there is no cure discoverable. NUMBERED] The required numbers are lacking, which were needed to make up the sum of human action, and no amount of skill in arithmetic can supply the deficiency.... [ Continue Reading ]
GREAT ESTATE] RV 'Lo, I have gotten me great wisdom above all,' etc. (omitting 'am come to great estate and'). He has had exceptional advantages in gaining wisdom, and has made the most of his opportunities. Yet even so he has failed. What hope, then, can there be that others will solve the problem... [ Continue Reading ]
AND FOLLY] He tries whether the study of folly may perchance give him some grasp of its opposite, viz. wisdom. But this too only serves to confirm him in his general conclusion. VEXATION OF SPIRIT] see on Ecclesiastes 1:14.... [ Continue Reading ]
MUCH GRIEF] Sir Isaac Newton spoke of himself as a child picking up a few pebbles on the shore of the wide sea of knowledge. So the more the veil is lifted, the wider is seen to be the extent of that which is still unknown. Bodily and mental exhaustion, sleepless and futile endeavour—this is the pic... [ Continue Reading ]