Ecclesiastes 3

Ecclesiastes 3:1

C. The Vanity of the Cycle of Life and Death (Chap. 3)3:1 As a research student of life and of human behavior, Solomon observed that there is a predetermined season for everything and a fixed time for every happening. This means that God has programmed every activity into a gigantic computer, and, as Hispanics say, “Que sere1, sere1”: What will be, will be! It also means that history is filled with cyclical patterns, and these recur with unchangeable regularity. So man is locked into a pattern of behavior which is determined by certain inflexible laws or principles. He is a slave to fatalism’s clock and calendar. In verses 1-8, the Preacher enumerates twenty-eight activities which are probably intended to symbolize the whole round of life. This is suggested by the number twenty-eight, which is the number of the world (four) multiplied by the number of completeness (seven). The list is made up of opposites. Fourteen are positives and fourteen negatives. In some ways, they seem to cancel out each other so that the net result is zero. 3:2 There is a time to be born. The person himself has no control over this, and even the parents must wait out the nine months which form the normal birth cycle. There is also a time to die. Man’s allotted span is seventy years, according to Psa_90:10, but even apart from that, it seems that death is a predetermined appointment that must be kept. It is true that God foreknows the terminus of our life on earth, but for the Christian this is neither morbid nor fatalistic. We know that we are immortal until our work is done. And though death is a possibility, it is not a certainty. The blessed hope of Christ’s return inspires the believer to look for the Savior rather than the mortician. As the preacher Peter Pell put it so colorfully, “I’m not waiting for the undertakerI’m waiting for the uppertaker!” A time to plant, and a time to pluck what is planted. With these words, Solomon seems to cover the entire field of agriculture, linked closely as it is with the seasons of the year (Gen_8:22). Failure to observe these seasons in planting and harvesting can only spell disaster. 3:3 A time to kill, and a time to heal. Bible commentators go to great lengths to explain that this cannot refer to murder but only to warfare, capital punishment, or self-defense. But we must remember that Solomon’s observations were based on his knowledge under the sun. Without divine revelation, it seemed to him that life was either a slaughterhouse or a hospital, a battlefield or a first-aid station. A time to break down, and a time to build up. First the wrecking crew appears to demolish buildings that are outdated and no longer serviceable, then the builders move in to erect modern complexes and rehabilitate the area of blight. 3:4 A time to weep, and a time to laugh. Life seems to alternate between tragedy and comedy. Now it wears the black mask of the tragedian, then the painted face of the clown. A time to mourn, and a time to dance. The funeral procession passes by with its mourners wailing in grief. But before long, these same people are dancing at a wedding reception, quickly removed from their recent sorrow. 3:5 A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones. Taken at face value, this means that there is a time to clear land for cultivation (Isa_5:2), then to gather the stones for building houses, walls, or other projects. If we take the words figuratively, as most modern commentators do, there may be a reference to the marriage act. Thus, TEV paraphrases, “The time for having sex and the time for not having it.” A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing. In the realm of the affections, there is a time for involvement and a time for withdrawal. There is a time when love is pure and a time when it is illicit. 3:6 A time to gain, and a time to lose. This makes us think of business cycles with their fluctuating profits and losses. First the markets are bullish with income soaring. Then they become bearish, and companies find themselves in the red. A time to keep, and a time to throw away. Most housewives are familiar with this curious pattern. For months or even years, they stash things away in closets, basements, and attics. Then in a burst of housecleaning zeal, they clear them out and call some local charity to cart the gathered items away. 3:7 A time to tear, and a time to sew. Could Solomon have been thinking of the constant changes in clothing fashions? Some noted fashion designer dictates a new trend, and all over the world, hems are let out or shortened. Today the fashions are daring and attention-getting. Tomorrow they revert to the quaint styles of grandmother’s day. A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. The time to keep silence is when we are criticized unjustly, when we are tempted to criticize others, or to say things that are untrue, unkind, or unedifying. Because Moses spoke unadvisedly with his lips, he was barred from entering the promised land (Num_20:10; Psa_106:33). The time to speak is when some great principle or cause is at stake. Mordecai advised Esther that the time had come for her to speak (Est_4:13-14). And he could have added, with Dante, “The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who remain neutral in a time of great moral crisis.” 3:8 A time to love, and a time to hate. We must not try to force these words into a Christian context. Solomon was not speaking as a Christian but as a man of the world. It seemed to him that human behavior fluctuated between periods of love and periods of hate. A time of war, and a time of peace. What is history if it is not the record of cruel, mindless wars, interspersed with short terms of peace? 3:9 The question lingering in Solomon’s mind was, “What lasting gain has the worker for all his toil?” For every constructive activity there is a destructive one. For every plus a minus. The fourteen positive works are cancelled out by fourteen negatives. So the mathematical formula of life is fourteen minus fourteen equals zero. Man has nothing but a zero at the end of it all. 3:10 Solomon had conducted an exhaustive survey of all the activities, employments, and pursuits that God has given to man to occupy his time. He has just given us a catalog of these in verses 2-8. 3:11 He concluded that God has made everything beautiful in its time, or, better, that there is an appropriate time for each activity. He is not so much thinking here of the beauty of God’s creation as the fact that every action has its own designated time, and that in its time it is eminently fitting. Also God has put eternity in man’s mind. Though living in a world of time, man has intimations of eternity. Instinctively he thinks of “forever,” and though he cannot understand the concept, he realizes that beyond this life there is the possibility of a shoreless ocean of time. Yet God’s works and ways are inscrutable to man. There is no way in which we can solve the riddle of creation, providence, or the consummation of the universe, apart from revelation. In spite of the enormous advances of human knowledge, we still see through a glass darkly. Very often we have to confess with a sigh, “How little we know of Him!” 3:12 Because man’s life is governed by certain inexorable laws and because all his activities seem to leave him where he started, Solomon decides that the best policy is to be happy and enjoy life as much as possible. 3:13 He did not mean that life should be an orgy of drunkenness, dissipation, and debauchery, but that it is the gift of God for man to enjoy his food and drink and find what pleasure he can in his daily work. It is a low view of life, and completely sub-Christian in its outlook, but we must continually remember that Solomon’s viewpoint here was thoroughly earthbound. 3:14 He did accurately perceive that God’s decrees are immutable. What God has decided will stand and man cannot alter it, either by addition or subtraction. It is foolish for creatures to fight against the arrangements of their Creator. Much better to respect Him and submit to His control. 3:15 Current events are merely a replay of what has happened previously, and nothing will happen in the future but what has already been. God arranges everything on a recurring basis so that things will happen over and over again. He brings back again what is past and thus history repeats itself. The expression “God requires an account of what is past” is often used to press home the fact that past sins must be accounted for by unbelievers. While this is true, it is hardly the force of this passage. Here God is rather seen as recalling past events to form another cycle of history. T. S. Eliot confirms Solomon’s sentiments: And what is there to conquer . . . has already been discovered Once or twice or several times . . . There is only the fight to recover what has been lost And found and lost again and again. 3:16 Among other things that pained the Preacher were injustice and wickedness. He found crookedness in the law courts where justice should be dispensed and dishonesty in government circles where righteousness should be practiced. 3:17 These inequalities of life led him to believe that there has to be a time when God will judge men, when the wrongs of earth will be made right. Solomon does not say explicitly that this will be in the next life, but it is a foregone conclusion since so many inequities are unrequited in this world. His conclusion mirrors a common emotion in the hearts of righteous people. Decency and fairness demand a time when accounts are settled and when the right is vindicated. 3:18 In the closing verses of chapter 3, the Preacher turns to the subject of death, and sees it as the grim spoilsport, ending all man’s best ambitions, endeavors, and pleasures. He views it exactly as we would if we did not have the Bible to enlighten us. Notice that he introduces his views with the words, “I said in my heart.” It is not a question of what God revealed to him but of what he concluded in his own mind. It is his own reasoning under the sun. Therefore, this is not a passage from which we can build an adequate doctrine of death and the hereafter. And yet this is precisely what many of the false cults have done. They use these verses to support their erroneous teachings of soul-sleep and the annihilation of the wicked dead. Actually a careful study of the passage will show that Solomon was not advocating either of these views. Basically what he is saying is that God tests man through his short life on earth to show him how frail and transient he isjust like animals. But is he saying that man is no better than an animal? 3:19 No, the point is not that man is an animal, but that in one respect, he has no advantage over an animal. As death comes to animals, so it comes to man. All have one breath, and at the time of death, that breath is cut off. So life is as empty for man as for the lower orders of creation. 3:20 All share a common end in the grave. They are both going to the same placethe dust. They both came from it; they will both go back to it. Of course, this assumes that the body is all there is to human life. But we know that this is not true. The body is only the tent in which the person lives. But Solomon could not be expected to know the full truth of the future state. 3:21 Solomon’s ignorance as to what happens at the time of death is evident from his question, “Who knows the spirit of the sons of men, which goes upward, and the spirit of the animal, which goes down to the earth?” This must not be taken as a doctrinal fact. It is human questioning, not divine certainty. From the NT, we know that the spirit and soul of the believer go to be with Christ at the time of death (2Co_5:8; Phi_1:23), and his body goes to the grave (Act_8:2). The spirit and soul of the unbeliever go to Hades, and his body goes to the grave (Luk_16:22b-23). When Christ comes into the air, the bodies of those who have died in faith will be raised in glorified form and reunited with the spirit and soul (Phi_3:20-21; 1Th_4:16-17). The bodies of the unbelieving dead will be raised at the Great White Throne Judgment, reunited with the spirit and soul, then cast into the lake of fire (Rev_20:12-14). Strictly speaking, animals have body and soul but no spirit. Nothing is said in the Bible concerning life after death for animals. 3:22 From what he knew about death, and also from what he didn’t know, Solomon figures that the best thing a man can do is enjoy his daily activities. That, after all, is his lot in life, and he might as well cooperate with the inevitable. He should find satisfaction in accepting what cannot be changed. But above all, he should enjoy life as it comes to him, because no one can tell him what will happen on earth after he has passed on.