“The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity. What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun? A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to the place where it rises. The wind blows to the south and goes around to the north; around and around goes the wind, and on its circuits the wind returns. All streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full; to the place where the streams flow, there they flow again. All things are full of weariness; a man cannot utter it; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. 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. Is there a thing of which it is said, “See, this is new”? It has been already in the ages before us. There is no remembrance of former things, nor will there be any remembrance of later things yet to be among those who come after.” Ecclesiastes 1:1-11 ESV
This can read like fatalism if we aren’t careful to understand the context. Later, Koheleth says:
“When I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to see the business that is done on earth, how neither day nor night do one’s eyes see sleep, then I saw all the work of God, that man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun. However much man may toil in seeking, he will not find it out. Even though a wise man claims to know, he cannot find it out.” Ecclesiastes 8:16-17 ESV
To understand what seems like defeatism, self-pity, and cynicism, we must remember to obey the proper logic of Scriptural interpretation: put the whole Bible on top of every verse. Never interpret a verse on its own, but in context of the rest of Scripture, which is to say, and this is the key, in light of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
To that end, we must be disciplined when we read the Scriptures – and especially here in this book. We must see Ecclesiastes as wisdom literature that takes quite seriously the impact and implications of the fall.
“The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.” Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 ESV
Vanity.
The Hebrew word is translated accurately as breath or breeze. In other words, the Preacher is saying that everything here is a puff of smoke, here now, but then gone and forgotten. This isn’t a novel idea in Scripture. Consider:
“When you discipline a man with rebukes for sin, you consume like a moth what is dear to him; surely all mankind is a mere breath! Selah” Psalm 39:11 ESV
“O Lord, what is man that you regard him, or the son of man that you think of him? Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow.” Psalm 144:3-4 ESV
The rest of the book will be a deep dive into the implications of life’s most basic facts – that all men die and, indeed, we are all to encounter frustration. As we’ve said, Ecclesiastes isn’t a depressing book; it’s a book about reality as we’re living it. Salvation through faith alone, in Christ alone, has not altered certain facts as of yet. Death is still in front of us.
“For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.” Romans 8:18-25 ESV
In all of this we keep in mind the fact of Jesus Christ or else we’re prone to think of death and frustration unbiblically. We are here for a short time – painfully short, like grass that withers and the flower that falls, so are we. The word of the Lord abides forever but we have an appointment to keep.
“Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.” Proverbs 31:30 ESV
Joan Collins said that the problem with beauty is that it’s like being born rich and then becoming poor.
What she said there resonates to this day. Plastic surgery is booming because the grave stalks all of us. Even right now, time is having its gentle way with us. The singer/songwriter Stevie Nicks wrote, “The clouds never expect it when it rains…but the sea changes color…but the sea does not change…so with the slow, graceful flow of age…I went forth with an age old desire to please.”
And in all this, through it, we work and toil. The Preacher brings up the weariness, the burden of work and how it’s all so tiring. It’s never done. There’s always more tomorrow. The vacations we look forward to always have a Monday waiting. The context of this is:
“And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”” Genesis 3:17-19 ESV
But, alas, this isn’t the last word because the living Word is.
“and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on his head and put a reed in his right hand. And kneeling before him, they mocked him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they spit on him and took the reed and struck him on the head. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him and led him away to crucify him.” Matthew 27:29-31 ESV
A grave mistake is to read Ecclesiastes and let our mind be clouded by the Arminianism – that is to say, that God is not completely sovereign. In that rendering, we become cynical, fearful, and read the Preacher as saying that “life is merely happening” and there’s nothing we can do about it.
Ecclesiastes isn’t Stoicism. It isn’t saying, “it is what it is…”. It says, “it is what God has made it.”
This is God’s world. We aren’t Stoics. We’re Christians and thus we recognize the wages of sin and the ravages of the curse, but we praise God for His divine plan, His love, and His sovereignty. To forget or diminish God’s sovereignty is to cast oneself into the darkness of utter despair. Warfield said:
“I say that it is more accurate to say that we will not admit that we are controlled. For we are controlled, whether we admit it or not. To imagine that we are not controlled is to imagine that there is no God. For when we say God, we say control. If a single creature which God has made has escaped beyond his control, at the moment that he has done so he has abolished God. A God who could or would make a creature whom he could not or would not control, is no God. The moment he should make such a creature he would, of course, abdicate his throne. The universe he had created would have ceased to be his universe; or rather it would cease to exist — for the universe is held together only by the control of God.”
Depression and meaningless are the logical spiritual consequences of the theological error of personal or “practical” Arminianism. The Bible, and certainly Ecclesiastes, never teaches anything other than God’s total and comprehensive control. Both the reality of Genesis 3 and Christ are, therefore, true.
So, we see that in Christ we have the redemption not only of our souls, but of our work too. And yet we struggle with the reality of living in this present evil age…this age of “not yet and already.” The Kingdom is truly at hand and we live in the new life of the Spirit, infused by all that love of God that saves us, and yet we go to work every day. And we pay our bills. And we fight traffic. We clean the house. The songwriter, John Mellencamp, wrote:
There’s a black man with a black cat
Livin’ in a black neighborhood
He’s got an interstate
Runnin’ through his front yard
You know he thinks that he’s got it so good
And there’s a woman in the kitchen
Cleanin’ up the evenin’ slop
And he looks at her and says, hey darlin’
I can remember when you could stop a clock
Oh, but ain’t that America
For you and me
Ain’t that America
Something to see, baby
Ain’t that America
Home of the free, yeah
Little pink houses
For you and me…
Well, there’s a young man in a t-shirt
Listenin’ to a rockin’ rollin’ station
He’s got greasy hair, greasy smile
He says, Lord this must be my destination
‘Cause they told me when I was younger
Said boy, you’re gonna be president
But just like everything else
Those old crazy dreams
Just kinda came and went
Well, there’s people and more people
What do they know, know, know
Go to work in some high rise
And vacation down at the Gulf of Mexico
Ooh, yeah
And there’s winners and there’s losers
But they ain’t no big deal
‘Cause the simple man, baby
Pays for thrills
The bills the pills that kill
Oh, but ain’t that America…
You see, John saw what Solomon was writing about…all the weariness and boredom and he felt bad. That’s okay. We should feel bad because there’s a lot to feel bad about. But John figured the problem was political and economic. He saw life only “under the sun” and missed, therefore, the context of Genesis 3. The Preacher never denies life’s difficulties and literally comes right out and says how hard it is. But John, like so many of us, fails to see the context. He fails to see Christ in all of it and how the curse from Genesis 3 is still in play and yet Christ has broken that curse so that we live, in faith, already and not yet.
To see all the labor and the vanity as the final word is a fatal mistake because death isn’t the final word. The crown of thorns they twisted on the Lord’s head shows that work’s curse was crucified too! So, it’s true that our labor – for now – is hard sometimes. It’s frustrating and even at times quite evidently meaningless. But Christ! We don’t hope for what we can see. We hope in Christ and can therefore read this parable aright.
““For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money. Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here, I have made two talents more.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’ But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed? Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents. For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’” Matthew 25:14-30 ESV
In all, far from teaching utter meaninglessness, Ecclesiastes, as with the rest of Scripture, shows us that life in a fallen world will indeed include weariness, frustration, boredom…and, yes, death. But over all of that we know that Christ is Lord and that He’s completely sovereign as well as completely loving too. So, we take heart even amidst the clouds and rain.
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