7 and the dust return to the earth as it was, and the spirit return unto God who gave it.
In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, until thou return to the ground: for out of it wast thou taken. For dust thou art; and unto dust shalt thou return.
His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his purposes perish.
The burden of the word of Jehovah concerning Israel. [Thus] saith Jehovah, who stretcheth out the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him:
And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame, to everlasting contempt.
All go unto one place: all are of the dust, and all return to dust. Who knoweth the spirit of the children of men? Doth it go upwards? and the spirit of the beasts, doth it go downwards to the earth?
If he only thought of himself, [and] gathered unto him his spirit and his breath, All flesh would expire together, and man would return to the dust.
Moreover we have had the fathers of our flesh as chasteners, and we reverenced [them]; shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits, and live?
Thou makest [mortal] man to return to dust, and sayest, Return, children of men.
And king Zedekiah swore secretly unto Jeremiah, saying, [As] Jehovah liveth, that made us this soul, I will not put thee to death, neither will I give thee into the hand of these men that seek thy life.
His bones were full of his youthful strength; but it shall lie down with him in the dust.
How much more them that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed as the moth! From morning to evening are they smitten: without any heeding it, they perish for ever.
Let Jehovah, the God of the spirits of all flesh, set a man over the assembly,
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Ecclesiastes 12
Commentary on Ecclesiastes 12 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 12
The wise and penitent preacher is here closing his sermon; and he closes it, not only like a good orator, but like a good preacher, with that which was likely to make the best impressions and which he wished might be powerful and lasting upon his hearers. Here is,
Ecc 12:1-7
Here is,
Ecc 12:8-12
Solomon is here drawing towards a close, and is loth to part till he has gained his point, and prevailed with his hearers, with his readers, to seek for that satisfaction in God only and in their duty to him which they can never find in the creature.
Ecc 12:13-14
The great enquiry which Solomon prosecutes in this book is, What is that good which the sons of men should do? ch. 2:3. What is the true way to true happiness, the certain means to attain our great end? He had in vain sought it among those things which most men are eager in pursuit of, but here, at length, he has found it, by the help of that discovery which God anciently made to man (Job 28:28), that serious godliness is the only way to true happiness: Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter, the return entered upon the writ of enquiry, the result of this diligent search; you shall have all I have been driving at in two words. He does not say, Do you hear it, but Let us hear it; for preachers must themselves be hearers of that word which they preach to others, must hear it as from God; those are teachers by the halves who teach others and not themselves, Rom. 2:21. Every word of God is pure and precious, but some words are worthy of more special remark, as this; the Masorites begin it with a capital letter, as that Deu. 6:4. Solomon himself puts a nota bene before it, demanding attention in these words, Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Observe here,