Ecclesiastes 5

Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear, than to give the sacrifice of fools: for they consider not that they do evil.

Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter any thing before God: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore let thy words be few.

For a dream cometh through the multitude of business; and a fool’s voice is known by multitude of words.

When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it; for he hath no pleasure in fools: pay that which thou hast vowed.

Better is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay.

Suffer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin; neither say thou before the angel, that it was an error: wherefore should God be angry at thy voice, and destroy the work of thine hands?

For in the multitude of dreams and many words there are also divers vanities: but fear thou God.

If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth; and there be higher than they.

Moreover the profit of the earth is for all: the king himself is served by the field.

He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance with increase: this is also vanity.

When goods increase, they are increased that eat them: and what good is there to the owners thereof, saving the beholding of them with their eyes?

The sleep of a labouring man is sweet, whether he eat little or much: but the abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep.

There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun, namely, riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt.

But those riches perish by evil travail: and he begetteth a son, and there is nothing in his hand.

As he came forth of his mother’s womb, naked shall he return to go as he came, and shall take nothing of his labour, which he may carry away in his hand.

And this also is a sore evil, that in all points as he came, so shall he go: and what profit hath he that hath laboured for the wind?

All his days also he eateth in darkness, and he hath much sorrow and wrath with his sickness.

Behold that which I have seen: it is good and comely for one to eat and to drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labour that he taketh under the sun all the days of his life, which God giveth him: for it is his portion.

Every man also to whom God hath given riches and wealth, and hath given him power to eat thereof, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labour; this is the gift of God.

For he shall not much remember the days of his life; because God answereth him in the joy of his heart.

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Ecclesiastes 5:13

“There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun, namely, riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt.”

Study Summary

Qohelet's observation of a grievous evil: wealth hoarded and destroyed through misfortune, leaving the owner with nothing to give to his heir, illustrates how wealth fails to secure the future. The sudden loss of accumulated fortune, whether through economic disaster, theft, or other calamity, renders the entire effort to accumulate futile. This verse implies that the fundamental vulnerability of all possessions to loss makes wealth-hoarding particularly futile; one cannot actually secure through accumulation.

Community Reflections

Ruth Kim (test user)7h ago

Transformation through the Word — Ecclesiastes 5

We bring nothing; He provides everything.. God is faithful in every circumstance.. Reading the Psalms alongside this gives a fuller picture of what the author was experiencing — both the anguish and the hope.. What a reminder that God's ways are not our ways. God is faithful in every circumstance.. God is faithful in every circumstance.. God is faithful in every circumstance.. God meets us exactly where we are — broken, uncertain, yet chosen. We bring nothing; He provides everything.. This is one of those passages that reads differently in every season of life. What a reminder that God's ways are not our ways. God is faithful in every circumstance.. The Hebrew word used here carries a richness that English can't fully capture. God is faithful in every circumstance.. God is faithful in every circumstance.. God is faithful in every circumstance.. God is faithful in every circumstance.. God is faithful…

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