1 I said in my heart, `Pray, come, I try thee with mirth, and look thou on gladness;' and lo, even it `is' vanity.
`As much as she did glorify herself and did revel, so much torment and sorrow give to her, because in her heart she saith, I sit a queen, and a widow I am not, and sorrow I shall not see; because of this, in one day, shall come her plagues, death, and sorrow, and famine; and in fire she shall be utterly burned, because strong `is' the Lord God who is judging her;
and they say each one to his neighbour, `Give help, let us make bricks, and burn `them' thoroughly:' and the brick is to them for stone, and the bitumen hath been to them for mortar. And they say, `Give help, let us build for ourselves a city and tower, and its head in the heavens, and make for ourselves a name, lest we be scattered over the face of all the earth.'
I said in my heart, `The righteous and the wicked doth God judge, for a time `is' to every matter and for every work there.' I said in my heart concerning the matter of the sons of man that God might cleanse them, so as to see that they themselves `are' beasts.
I -- I spake with my heart, saying, `I, lo, I have magnified and added wisdom above every one who hath been before me at Jerusalem, and my heart hath seen abundantly wisdom and knowledge. And I give my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I have known that even this `is' vexation of spirit;
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Ecclesiastes 2
Commentary on Ecclesiastes 2 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 2
Solomon having pronounced all vanity, and particularly knowledge and learning, which he was so far from giving himself joy of that he found the increase of it did but increase his sorrow, in this chapter he goes on to show what reason he has to be tired of this world, and with what little reason most men are fond of it.
Ecc 2:1-11
Solomon here, in pursuit of the summum bonum-the felicity of man, adjourns out of his study, his library, his elaboratory, his council-chamber, where he had in vain sought for it, into the park and the playhouse, his garden and his summer-house; he exchanges the company of the philosophers and grave senators for that of the wits and gallants, and the beaux-esprits, of his court, to try if he could find true satisfaction and happiness among them. Here he takes a great step downward, from the noble pleasures of the intellect to the brutal ones of sense; yet, if he resolve to make a thorough trial, he must knock at this door, because here a great part of mankind imagine they have found that which he was in quest of.
Ecc 2:12-16
Solomon having tried what satisfaction was to be had in learning first, and then in the pleasures of sense, and having also put both together, here compares them one with another and passes a judgment upon them.
Ecc 2:17-26
Business is a thing that wise men have pleasure in. They are in their element when they are in their business, and complain if they be out of business. They may sometimes be tired with their business, but they are not weary of it, nor willing to leave it off. Here therefore one would expect to have found the good that men should do, but Solomon tried this too; after a contemplative life and a voluptuous life, he betook himself to an active life, and found no more satisfaction in it than in the other; still it is all vanity and vexation of spirit, of which he gives an account in these verses, where observe,