Ecclesiastes 12:8

Literal Standard Version

Vanity of vanities, said the preacher, the whole [is] vanity.

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
“Absolute futility,” says the Teacher. “Everything is futile.”

Hebrew Names Version
Vanity of vanities, says Kohelet; All is vanity!

King James Version
Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher; all is vanity.

English Standard Version
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher; all is vanity.

New American Standard Bible
"Futility of futilities," says the Preacher, "all is futility!"

New Century Version
Everything is useless! The Teacher says that everything is useless.

Amplified Bible
"Vanity of vanities," says the Preacher. "All [that is done without God's guidance] is vanity (futility)."

World English Bible
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher; All is vanity!

Geneva Bible (1587)
Vanitie of vanities, saieth the Preacher, all is vanitie.

Legacy Standard Bible
"Vanity of vanities," says the Preacher, "all is vanity!"

Berean Standard Bible
"Futility of futilities," says the Teacher. "Everything is futile!"

Contemporary English Version
Nothing makes sense. I have seen it all— nothing makes sense.

Complete Jewish Bible
Pointless! Meaningless! — says Kohelet, Nothing matters at all!

Darby Translation
Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher: all is vanity.

Easy-to-Read Version
Everything is so meaningless. The Teacher says that it is all a waste of time!

George Lamsa Translation
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, all is vanity.

Good News Translation
Useless, useless, said the Philosopher. It is all useless.

Lexham English Bible
"Vanity of vanity!" says the Teacher. "Everything is vanity!"

Literal Translation
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, all is vanity.

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
All is but vanite (sayeth the preacher) all is but playne vanite.

American Standard Version
Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher; all is vanity.

Bible in Basic English
All things are to no purpose, says the Preacher, all is to no purpose.

JPS Old Testament (1917)
Vanity of vanities, saith Koheleth; all is vanity.

King James Version (1611)
Uanitie of vanities (saith the preacher) all is vanitie.

Bishop's Bible (1568)
All is but vanitie (saith the preacher) all is but playne vanitie.

Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
Vanity of vanities, said the Preacher; all is vanity.

English Revised Version
Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher; all is vanity.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
The vanyte of vanytees, seide Ecclesiastes, the vanyte of vanytees, and alle thingis ben vanyte.

Update Bible Version
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher; all is vanity.

Webster's Bible Translation
Vanity of vanities saith the preacher; all [is] vanity.

New English Translation
"Absolutely futile!" laments the Teacher, "All of these things are futile!"

New King James Version
"Vanity of vanities," says the Preacher, "All is vanity."

New Living Translation
"Everything is meaningless," says the Teacher, "completely meaningless."

New Life Bible
"It is of no use," says the Preacher, "It is all for nothing!"

New Revised Standard
Vanity of vanities, says the Teacher; all is vanity.

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Vanity of vanities, saith the Proclaimer, all, is vanity.

Douay-Rheims Bible
Vanity of vanities, said Ecclesiastes, and all things are vanity.

Revised Standard Version
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher; all is vanity.

Young's Literal Translation
Vanity of vanities, said the preacher, the whole [is] vanity.

THE MESSAGE
It's all smoke, nothing but smoke. The Quester says that everything's smoke.

New American Standard Bible (1995)
"Vanity of vanities," says the Preacher, "all is vanity!"

Contextual Overview

⁸Vanity of vanities, said the preacher, the whole [is] vanity.⁹And further, because the preacher was wise, he still taught the people knowledge, and gave ear, and sought out—he made right many allegories. ¹⁰The preacher sought to find out pleasing words, and [that] written [by] the upright—words of truth. ¹¹Words of the wise [are] as the goads, and as nails planted [by] the masters of collections, they have been given by one Shepherd. ¹²And further, from these, my son, be warned; the making of many scrolls has no end, and much study [is] a weariness of the flesh.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Ecclesiastes 1:2, Ecclesiastes 1:14, Ecclesiastes 2:17, Ecclesiastes 4:4, Ecclesiastes 6:12, Ecclesiastes 8:8, Psalms 62:9

Reciprocal: Psalms 39:6 - surely Psalms 78:33 - years Psalms 119:96 - I have seen Psalms 144:4 - Man Proverbs 23:5 - that which Ecclesiastes 7:14 - set Ecclesiastes 7:27 - saith Jeremiah 2:13 - broken cisterns Matthew 13:45 - seeking 1 Corinthians 7:29 - that both 1 Timothy 2:7 - a preacher

Cross-References

Genesis 4:26
And to Seth, to him also a son has been born, and he calls his name Enos; then a beginning was made of preaching in the Name of YHWH.

Genesis 12:12
and it has come to pass that the Egyptians see you, and they have said, This [is] his wife; and they have slain me, and you they keep alive:

Genesis 12:14
And it comes to pass, at the entering of Abram into Egypt, that the Egyptians see the woman that she [is] exceedingly beautiful;

Genesis 12:15
and princes of Pharaoh see her, and praise her to Pharaoh, and the woman is taken [to] Pharaoh's house;

Genesis 12:16
and to Abram he has done good because of her, and he has sheep and oxen, and male donkeys, and menservants, and handmaids, and female donkeys, and camels.

Genesis 13:4
to the place of the altar which he made there at the first, and there Abram preaches in the Name of YHWH.

Genesis 21:33
and [Abraham] plants a tamarisk in Beer-Sheba, and preaches there in the Name of YHWH, the perpetual God;

Genesis 28:19
and he calls the name of that place Bethel, [house of God,] and yet, Luz [is] the name of the city at the first.

Genesis 35:3
and we rise, and go up to Bethel, and I make there an altar to God, who is answering me in the day of my tribulation, and is with me in the way that I have gone."

Joshua 7:2
And Joshua sends men from Jericho to Ai, which [is] near Beth-Aven, on the east of Bethel, and speaks to them, saying, "Go up and spy out the land"; and the men go up and spy Ai,

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher,.... The wise man, or preacher, set out in the beginning of the book with this doctrine, or proposition, which he undertook to prove; and now having proved it by an induction of particulars, instanced in the wisdom, wealth, honours, pleasures, and profit of men, and shown the vanity of them, and that the happiness of men lies not in these things, but in the knowledge and fear of God; he repeats it, and most strongly asserts it, as an undoubted truth beyond all dispute and contradiction, that all things under the sun are not only vain, but vanity itself, extremely vain, vain in the superlative degree;

all [is] vanity; all things in the world are vain; all creatures are subject to vanity; man in every state, and in his best estate, is altogether vanity: this the wise man might with great confidence affirm, after he had shown that not only childhood and youth are vanity, but even old age; the infirmities, sorrows, and distresses of which he had just exposed, and observed that all issue in death, the last end of man, when his body returns to the earth, and his soul to God the giver of it.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

This passage is properly regarded as the Epilogue of the whole book; a kind of apology for the obscurity of many of its sayings. The passage serves therefore to make the book more intelligible and more acceptable.

Here, as in the beginning of the book Ecclesiastes 1:1-2, the Preacher speaks of himself Ecclesiastes 12:8-10 in the third person. He first repeats Ecclesiastes 12:8 the mournful, perplexing theme with which his musings began Ecclesiastes 1:2; and then states the encouraging practical conclusion Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 to which they have led him. It has been pointed out that the Epilogue assumes the identity of the Preacher with the writer of the Book of Proverbs.

Ecclesiastes 12:11

literally, Words of wise men are as goads, and as nails driven in (by) masters of assemblies; they are given from one shepherd: “goads,” because they rouse the hearer and impel him to right actions; “nails” (perhaps tent-spikes), because they remain fixed in the memory: “masters of assemblies” are simply “teachers” or “preachers” (see Ecclesiastes 1:1 note), instructors of such assemblies as Wisdom addresses Proverbs 1:20.

One shepherd - i. e., God, who is the supreme Giver of wisdom Proverbs 2:6, and the chief Shepherd Jeremiah 23:1-4. Compare 1 Corinthians 2:12-13.

Ecclesiastes 12:12

By these - i. e., “By the words of wise men.”

Books - Rather, “Writings.” Probably the proverbs current in the Preacher’s age, including, though not especially indicating, his own.

The Preacher protests against the folly of protracted, unprofitable, meditation.

Ecclesiastes 12:13

literally, “The conclusion of the discourse” (or “word,” = words, Ecclesiastes 1:1), “the whole, let us hear.”

The whole duty of man - Rather, the whole man. To revere God and to obey Him is the whole man, constitutes man’s whole being; that only is conceded to Man; all other things, as this book teaches again and again, are dependent on a Higher Incomprehensible Being.

Ecclesiastes 12:14

Judgment with - Rather, judgment (which shall be held) upon etc.: i. e., an appointed judgment which shall take place in another world, as distinct from that retribution which frequently follows man’s actions in the course of this world, and which is too imperfect (compare Ecclesiastes 2:15; Ecclesiastes 4:1; Ecclesiastes 7:15; Ecclesiastes 9:2, ...) to be described by these expressions. He that is fully convinced that there is no solid happiness to be found in this world, and that there is a world to come wherein God will adjudge people to happiness or misery respectively, as they have made their choice and acted here, must necessarily subscribe to the truth of Solomon’s conclusion, that true religion is the only way to true happiness.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Ecclesiastes 12:8. This affecting and minute description of old age and death is concluded by the author with the same exclamation by which he began this book: O vanity of vanities, saith Koheleth, all is vanity. Now that man, the masterpiece of God's creation, the delegated sovereign of this lower world, is turned to dust, what is there stable or worthy of contemplation besides? ALL - ALL is VANITY!