Ecclesiastes 6
1 There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it is common among men:
I have seen something [else here] on this earth that troubles people.
2 A man to whom God has given riches, wealth, and honor, so that he wants nothing for his soul of all that he desires, yet God gives him not power to eat thereof, but a stranger eats it: this is vanity, and it is an evil disease.
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 an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth 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 comes in with vanity, and departs in darkness, and his name shall be covered with darkness.
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 Moreover he has not seen the sun, nor known any thing: this has more rest than the other.
It does not [live to] see the sun or know anything. But it finds more rest than rich people do [who are alive].
6 Yes, though he live a thousand years twice told, yet has he seen no good: do not all go 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 labor of man is for his mouth, and yet the appetite is not filled.
People work hard to [earn enough money to buy] food to eat [MTY], but [often] they never get enough to eat.
8 For what has the wise more than the fool? what has the poor, that knows to walk before the living?
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 is the sight of the eyes than the wandering of the desire: this is also vanity and vexation 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 That which has been is named already, and it is known that it is man: neither may he contend with him that is mightier than he.
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 Seeing there be many things that increase vanity, what is man the better?
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 For who knows what is good for man in this life, all the days of his vain life which he spends as a shadow? for who can tell a man 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].
