Ecclesiastes 2:12-26
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The World of Intellect and the Lack of
It
12. So I
turned to consider wisdom and madness and folly. For what can the man do who
comes after the king? Only what has already been done.
13. Then I
saw that there is more gain in wisdom than in folly, as there is more gain in
light than in darkness.
14. The wise
person has his eyes in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. And yet I
perceived that the same event happens to all of them.
15. Then I
said in my heart, "What happens to the fool will happen to me also. Why
then have I been so very wise?" And I said in my heart that this also is
vanity.
16. For of
the wise as of the fool there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the
days to come all will have been long forgotten. How the wise dies just like the
fool!
17. So I
hated life, because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is
vanity and a striving after wind.
We turn with the preacher, as he takes the whole field of
wisdom, including knowledge and the intellect, into consideration. At the other
end of the spectrum is the lack of wisdom, a state of insanity and foolishness.
First, he takes into account something which he has already presented to us,
which is the law of basic sameness; nothing is new under the sun. He sees that
the following king, regardless of his intellectual efforts, cannot bring about
anything that can really be called progress. He will come back to this
principle in verse 18.
Ecclesiastes 2:1-11
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Chapter 2
The Vanity of Self-Indulgence
1. I said in my heart, "Come now, I will test you with
pleasure; enjoy yourself." But behold, this also was vanity.
2. I said of laughter, "It is mad," and of pleasure,
"What use is it?"
3. I searched with my heart how to cheer my body with wine—my
heart still guiding me with wisdom—and how to lay hold on folly, till I might
see what was good for the children of man to do under heaven during the few
days of their life.
4. I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for
myself.
5. I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds
of fruit trees.
6. I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing
trees.
7. I bought male and female slaves, and had slaves who were born in
my house. I had also great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who
had been before me in Jerusalem.
8. I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of
kings and provinces. I got singers, both men and women, and many concubines,
the delight of the sons of man.
9. So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in
Jerusalem. Also my wisdom remained with me.
10. And whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I kept my
heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure in all my toil, and this
was my reward for all my toil.
11. Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had
expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and
there was nothing to be gained under the sun.
Solomon’s power, fame and
riches and the experience gained by living in their glory are what gave him
exceptional qualifications to present his perspective on human existence. His arguments
are basic, powerful and incontrovertible, but the average person can find
little, by which he can relate to this ancient king. He was endowed with unique
gifts and in chapter one, he recounted his devotion and pursuit of more wisdom
and knowledge. His conclusion is that his efforts brought no true satisfaction;
it was striving after wind, he confessed.
However, as we begin chapter
2, King Solomon takes up projects, pleasure, laughter, diversion and entertainment. I
submit that in this area, we can find common ground. I think that everyone of us have had times in
our lives, when we have spoken to our souls, “I have some free time and a
little money to spend. Come now, I will
test you with pleasure; enjoy yourself."
Ecclesiastes 1:8-18
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Nothing is new; nothing satisfies
8. All things are full of
weariness; a man cannot utter it; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the
ear filled with hearing.
9. What has been is what will be,
and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the
sun.
10. Is there a thing of which it is
said, "See, this is new"? It has been already in the ages before
us.
11. There is no remembrance of
former things, nor will there be any remembrance of later things yet to be
among those who come after.
I wonder if a person can
understand the insufficiency of human language, if he has not studied the
Bible. Because the Scripture is devoted to an attempt to put spiritual,
heavenly thoughts and matters into earthly languages, we continually see in it, the limitations of man's communication. I need not belabor the obvious, but only to clarify, what the
preacher means, when he says, “A man
cannot utter it”, I offer a few examples. Who can put the love of God into
words? Who can express or comprehend eternity or infinity? Of course, above all
else, who can describe Almighty God and His uniqueness, the incomprehensible
trinity and the endless wonder of omnipresence and omniscience. All this goes
far beyond expression.
Ecclesiastes 1:1-7
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The Vanity of Life on Earth from an individual
perfectly qualified to write of it
Chapter 1
1.
The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.
2.
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity.
3.
What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?
Liberal minds pervert society in
general, along with its politics and religion. I am convinced that they enter
the world of religion, prepared and energized by the devil to be his advocates
and disrupt the quest of the one seeking for truth. They have no part or parcel
with the things of God. They ignore His ways and attempt to fit their mindset
into a sphere that is completely opposite the one, in which they live. They
exist in the realm of twisted human logic and reasoning, rather than in the
kingdom of healthy faith.
As they try to date the book of
Daniel much later than when it actually was written and attribute the
authorship to someone, living between the Old and New Testaments, so they
meddle with the book of Ecclesiastes. They allege also that it was written at a
much later date by someone other than King Solomon. These claims are easily
refuted by good theologians, who take the text at face value, giving credit to
the claims of the authors and the setting, in time and place, which they
designate. To do otherwise is to tamper with divine inspiration.
Ecclesiastes... Introduction
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I have to
say that I´m sorry for having neglected this blog over the past weeks and I
haven´t written anything new. What I intend to do for the rest of these summer
months is present, beginning today, an expository study on the book of
Ecclesiastes. I hope, in October, to write about Revelation. If possible, I want
to have this study finished by then.
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