Ecclesiastes 6
1 There is also another evil, which I have seen under the sun, and that frequent among men:
I have seen something [else here] on this earth that troubles people.
2 A man to whom God hath given riches, and substance, and honour, and his soul wanteth nothing of all that he desireth: yet God doth not give him power to eat thereof, but a stranger shall eat it up. This is vanity and a great misery.
God enables some people to get a lot of money and possessions and to be honored; they have everything [LIT] that they want. But God [sometimes] does not allow them to continue to enjoy those things. Someone else gets them and enjoys them. That seems senseless and unfair.
3 If a man beget a hundred children, and live many years, and attain to a great age, and his soul make no use of the goods of his substance, and he be without burial: of this man I pronounce, that the untimely born is better than he.
Someone might have 100 children and live for many years. But if he is not able to enjoy the things that he has acquired, and if he is not buried [properly after he dies], [I say that] a child that is dead when it is born is more fortunate.
4 For he came in vain, and goeth to darkness, and his name shall be wholly forgotten.
That dead baby’s birth is meaningless; it does not even have a name. It goes directly to the place where there is only darkness.
5 He hath not seen the sun, nor known the distance of good and evil:
It does not [live to] see the sun or know anything. But it finds more rest than rich people do [who are alive].
6 Although he lived two thousand years, and hath not enjoyed good things: do not all make haste to one place?
Even if people could live for 2,000 years, if they do not enjoy the things that God gives to them, [it would have been better for them never to have been born]. [All people who live a long time] certainly [RHQ] all go to the same place— [to the grave].
7 All the labour of man is for his mouth, but his soul shall not be filled.
People work hard to [earn enough money to buy] food to eat [MTY], but [often] they never get enough to eat.
8 What hath the wise man more than the fool? and what the poor man, but to go thither, where there is life?
So it seems that [RHQ] wise people do not receive more lasting benefits than foolish people do. And it seems that [RHQ] poor people do not benefit from knowing how to conduct their lives.
9 Better it is to see what thou mayst desire, than to desire that which thou canst not know. But this also is vanity, and presumption of spirit.
It is better to enjoy the things that we already have [MTY] than to constantly want more things; continually wanting more things is [senseless], [like] the wind.
10 He that shall be, his name is already called: and it is known, that he is man, and cannot contend in judgment with him that is stronger than himself.
All the things that exist [on the earth] have been given names. And everyone knows what people are like, [so] it is useless to argue with someone (OR, with God) who is stronger than we are.
11 There are many words that have much vanity in disputing.
The more [that we] talk, the more [often we say things that are] senseless, so it certainly does not [RHQ] benefit us to talk a lot.
12 What needeth a man to seek things that are above him, whereas he knoweth not what is profitable for him in his life, in all the days of his pilgrimage, and the time that passeth like a shadow? Or who can tell him what shall be after him under the sun?
We live for only a short time; we disappear like [SIM] a shadow disappears [in the sunlight]. No one [RHQ] knows what is best for us while we are alive, and no one [RHQ] knows what will happen to us after we die [EUP].
