Ecclesiastes 6

Qoheleth describes another heavy sorrow: a man given everything yet unable to enjoy it. Even long life and many children mean nothing without satisfaction. He ends by showing that desire, words and human wisdom cannot tell us what is truly good, or what lies ahead.

Ecclesiastes 6:1-2

The Preacher names a bitter sorrow he has seen. God gives a man riches, wealth and honor, everything his heart wants, yet withholds the power to enjoy them, and a stranger enjoys them instead. Enjoyment is God’s gift, not something wealth can guarantee.

BSA: enjoy (“eat, partake of”): The word is the plain one for eating, picturing enjoyment as taking in and being nourished by what one owns. affliction (“sickness, disease”): Having wealth without enjoying it is called an illness, a real sickness of life.

See also: Ecclesiastes 5:19; Luke 12:20.

Ecclesiastes 6:3

Even a hundred children and a very long life count for nothing if the man never finds satisfaction and is not even given a proper burial. The Preacher says a stillborn child is better off. This is a stark way to show that mere quantity of years cannot make a life good.

BSA: stillborn child (“an untimely birth, a miscarriage”): The child came out before its time, never having lived, and is still counted more fortunate than this joyless man.

Ecclesiastes 6:4-5

The stillborn child comes in emptiness, goes in darkness and is never even named. Yet it never saw the sun or knew any trouble, so it has more rest than the man who toiled and never enjoyed. The Preacher is not belittling life, but exposing how bitter a joyless life is.

BSA: rest (“quietness, peace”): The child is spared all the restless striving that wears the man down.

Ecclesiastes 6:6

Even if the man lived two thousand years, without enjoying good things it would be pointless. Everyone, rich or poor, long-lived or short, goes to the same place in the end. Length of life cannot rescue a life that has no joy.

BSA: same place (“one location, the grave”): Death is the common destination that levels everyone.

See also: Ecclesiastes 3:20.

Ecclesiastes 6:7

People work to feed themselves, yet hunger returns and is never settled for good. Human desire always runs ahead of what we have. The verse shows that labor, however hard, cannot by itself fill the deepest need of the person.

BSA: appetite (“soul”): The word is nephesh, the whole living person, so the hunger runs deeper than the stomach.

Hebrew: נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, H5315) — “soul, life, living being, appetite.” The same word means the whole person and the person’s hunger. Here it shows that our craving goes deeper than food and is never filled by earthly things.

See also: Isaiah 55:2.

Ecclesiastes 6:8

The Preacher asks what real advantage the wise have over fools, or the poor man who knows how to get along with others. In the matter of lasting satisfaction, neither seems to come out ahead. Wisdom has value, but it cannot make us finally secure.

BSA: advantage (“benefit”): The question is about real profit left over at the end, not momentary gain.

See also: Ecclesiastes 2:15-16.

Ecclesiastes 6:9

It is better to enjoy what is before your eyes than to let desire wander after what you do not have. Contentment with the present gift is wiser than restless craving. Constant longing is itself chasing the wind.

BSA: wandering (“going, roaming”): Desire is pictured as something that drifts here and there and never settles. desire (“longing, craving, the soul’s deep yearning”): The word is again nephesh, the inner appetite that is never fully satisfied.

See also: 1 Timothy 6:6-8; Philippians 4:11.

Ecclesiastes 6:10

Everything that exists has already been named, and what a man is has long been known. No human being can argue with One stronger than himself. Many Christians read this as an appeal to humble acceptance of God’s sovereign rule over our lives.

BSA: named (“given a name, designated”): In Hebrew thought, to name something is to define it and rule over it, so God has set the shape of all things. stronger (“mightier, more powerful”): The one mightier is God, with whom no one can win a dispute.

See also: Romans 9:20; Job 9:32.

Ecclesiastes 6:11

More words only add more emptiness. Endless arguing and talking about life’s puzzles does not make us any better off. Nothing we can say changes what God has ordained, so the verse invites humility rather than more speech.

BSA: futility (“vanity, emptiness”): The word is hebel, a breath or vapor, meaning that piling up words leaves only more vapor.

See also: Ecclesiastes 5:2-3.

Ecclesiastes 6:12

Who knows what is truly good for us in our brief days, which pass like a shadow? And who can tell us what will happen after we are gone? The chapter ends with human limits, quietly pointing us to trust God, who does know.

BSA: shadow (“dark area, shade”): Life is like a shadow that moves across the ground and soon disappears.

See also: James 4:14; Psalm 144:4.