Study Desk

So I hated life because the work done under the sun is grievous to me. For everything is vanity and chasing wind!

So I hated all my toil with which I have toiled under the sun, for I must leave it behind to someone who will be after me.

So I began to despair of all the toil with which I toiled under the sun.

So I realized that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice and enjoy themselves during their lives.

I know everything God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, and nothing can be taken from it, for God so acts that humans might stand in awe before him.

So I said to myself, "God will surely judge the righteous and the wicked, for he has appointed a time of judgment for every deed and every work."

So I concluded that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy the fruit of his labor, for this is his lot in life. For no one knows what will happen in the future.

So I deemed the dead who have already died more fortunate than the living who are still alive.

The fool refuses to work with his hands, so he has nothing to eat except his own skin!

Do not let your mouth lead your flesh into sin, and do not tell the messenger that it was a mistake. Why anger God at your words, so that he destroys the work of your hands?

When prosperity increases, those who consume it increase. So its owner gains nothing, except to see his wealth before it is spent.

This also is a grievous illness. Exactly as he came, so he will go. What profit does he gain for all his toil for the wind?

God gives a man wealth, possessions, and honor, so that he lacks nothing his heart desires; yet God does not enable him to enjoy it—instead someone else ends up enjoying it. This is vanity—indeed, it is a grievous ill!

Even if a man fathers a hundred children and lives many years so that the days of his years are many, if his heart is not satisfied with his prosperity and he does not receive a proper burial, I deem the stillborn better than him.

So do the wise really have an advantage over fools? Can the poor really gain anything by knowing how to act in front of others?

Like the sound of thorns under a pot, so also the laughter of fools. This also is vanity!

In the day of prosperity, rejoice! But in the day of adversity, consider! For God made one in place of another so that mortals cannot find out what will happen in the future.

Surely no one knows what will be, so who can tell anyone what will happen?

Just as no one can control the wind to restrain the wind, so also no one can control the day of his death. Just as no one is discharged in time of war, so wickedness will not deliver the wicked.

Meanwhile, I saw the wicked being honorably buried, but those who came and went from the holy place were forgotten in the city, even though they had done so. This also is vanity!