Ecclesiastes 9: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

The Preacher observes that the same fate comes to everyone alike, righteous and wicked, and that no one can tell from what lies ahead whether love or hate is waiting. Because the dead have no share in anything done under the sun, he tells his reader to eat, drink, enjoy life with the wife he loves, and work with full strength while life lasts. He then notes that speed, strength, wisdom, and skill do not guarantee success, since time and chance meet everyone. He closes with a story of a poor wise man who saved a besieged city and was forgotten, and the remark that one sinner destroys much good.

Claim by Claim

1. 9:1
   • The speaker laid all this to heart.
   • The speaker set himself to examine all this.
   • The righteous and the wise and their works are in the hand of God.
   • It is unclear whether what is in God's hand along with the righteous and the wise is their deeds or their servants.
   • No man knows whether love or hatred awaits him.
   • Everything lies before them.
2. 9:2
   • All things happen alike to all.
   • One and the same event comes to the righteous and to the wicked.
   • One and the same event comes to the good and to the clean and to the unclean.
   • One and the same event comes to the one who sacrifices and to the one who does not sacrifice.
   • As it is for the good, so it is for the sinner.
   • As it is for the one who swears an oath, so it is for the one who fears to swear.
3. 9:3
   • This is an evil among all things that are done under the sun.
   • The evil is that one event comes to all.
   • The heart of the sons of men is full of evil.
   • Madness is in their heart while they live.
   • After that they go to the dead.
4. 9:4
   • Whoever is joined to all the living has hope.
   • A living dog is better than a dead lion.
5. 9:5
   • The living know that they will die.
   • The dead know nothing.
   • The dead have no further reward.
   • The memory of the dead is forgotten.
6. 9:6
   • Their love has already perished.
   • Their hatred has already perished.
   • Their envy has already perished.
   • They have no portion ever again in anything that is done under the sun.
7. 9:7
   • The speaker tells the hearer to go and eat his bread with joy.
   • The speaker tells the hearer to drink his wine with a glad heart.
   • God has already accepted the hearer's works.
8. 9:8
   • The hearer's garments are to be white at all times.
   • Oil is not to be lacking on the hearer's head.
9. 9:9
   • The hearer is to see life with the wife he loves.
   • This is to be done all the days of his fleeting life.
   • God has given him those days under the sun.
   • This is to be done all the days of his fleeting life.
   • The wife is his portion in life.
   • The wife is his portion in the labor he labors at under the sun.
10. 9:10
    • Whatever the hearer's hand finds to do, he is to do with his strength.
    • There is no work in Sheol.
    • There is no planning in Sheol.
    • There is no knowledge in Sheol.
    • There is no wisdom in Sheol.
    • The hearer is going to Sheol.
11. 9:11
    • The speaker turned again and saw under the sun.
    • The race is not to the swift.
    • The battle is not to the strong.
    • Bread is not to the wise.
    • Riches are not to the discerning.
    • Favor is not to those with knowledge.
    • Time and chance happen to them all.
12. 9:12
    • Man does not know his time.
    • Fish are taken in a cruel net.
    • Birds are caught in a trap.
    • Like them, the sons of men are ensnared at an evil time.
    • That evil time falls upon them suddenly.
13. 9:13
    • The speaker also saw this instance of wisdom under the sun.
    • It seemed great to him.
14. 9:14
    • There was a small city.
    • The men in it were few.
    • A great king came against it.
    • He surrounded it.
    • He built great siege works against it.
15. 9:15
    • A poor wise man was found in the city.
    • He delivered the city by his wisdom.
    • No one remembered that poor man.
16. 9:16
    • The speaker said that wisdom is better than strength.
    • The poor man's wisdom is despised.
    • The poor man's words are not heard.
17. 9:17
    • The words of the wise, spoken quietly, are heard more than the shout of a ruler among fools.
18. 9:18
    • Wisdom is better than weapons of war.
    • One sinner destroys much good.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

9:1

The last clause is compressed in Hebrew and can be read two ways: that no one knows whether love or hate lies ahead of him in the future, or that no one can tell, from anything he can see, whether God regards him with love or hate. The King James "by all that is before them" leaves both open, as does the rendering.

9:2

"Clean" and "unclean" are ritual terms, not moral or hygienic ones. Under Israel's law, things like contact with a corpse, certain illnesses, or certain foods made a person temporarily unfit to take part in worship until a set procedure restored them. "The one who offers sacrifices and the one who does not" draws a similar line between the religiously observant and the neglectful. A vow was a promise sworn in God's name, so "the one who is afraid to make one" (King James "he that feareth an oath") is the more scrupulous of the pair, avoiding an oath rather than risking breaking it. The "one fate" shared by all these opposites is death.

9:3

"Under the sun" is this writer's own phrase for life here on earth, the part we can actually see. He repeats it again and again through the book.

9:4

In ancient Israel dogs were half-wild scavengers rather than pets, and calling someone a dog was an insult; the lion was the standard image of strength and nobility. The proverb is deliberately jarring: the most despised animal alive is better off than the most admired one dead.

9:5

The word behind "wages" (King James "reward") is the ordinary term for a hired worker's pay, what is still owed to someone for their labor.

9:6

"Share" translates a Hebrew word for an allotted portion, like a share of land or of an inheritance, what is assigned to you and is yours. The same word returns in verse 9.

9:7

Bread here means food in general, a whole meal. Wine was the ordinary drink with meals in that land, the way milk or juice might be now.

9:8

White clothes and oil rubbed on the head were the marks of a festive occasion in the ancient Near East: what you wore and did to go to a feast. Mourners did the opposite, dark or torn clothing and no oil. The instruction is to go through life dressed for a celebration.

9:9

"Brief life" translates the Hebrew word hevel, which the King James renders "vanity" throughout Ecclesiastes. It literally means a breath or a puff of vapor, something fleeting and impossible to get hold of, rather than "pointless" in the modern sense. The Hebrew for "the wife you love" has no definite article and could equally be read "a wife whom you love."

9:10

"The grave" translates Sheol, the Hebrew name for the underworld, the place beneath the earth where the dead were understood to go, everyone alike, without distinction. It is not the later idea of hell as a place of punishment; it is simply the realm of the dead.

9:11

"Chance" translates a Hebrew word meaning an occurrence, something that happens to meet you. It does not carry the modern sense of luck as a force that governs events. Paired with "time," it means the unforeseeable moment that overtakes a person.

9:12

"His time" here means the moment when disaster or death falls on him, not the length of his life. The "cruel net" (King James "evil net") is the net from the fish's point of view: the thing that catches it without warning.

9:14

Siege works (King James "bulwarks") were ramps of earth and timber towers heaped against a city wall so attackers could climb over it or bring battering rams up to it. Building them announced a long, methodical siege that a small town had no realistic way to survive.

9:15

The Hebrew verbs can be read as completed fact: he did save the city, or as unrealised possibility: he could have saved it, had anyone listened. The next verse, where the poor man's words go unheard, keeps both readings live. "No one remembered that poor man" can likewise mean that no one thought of him at the time, or that no one remembered him afterwards.

9:17

The contrast is between words spoken and received calmly, and a ruler shouting to be heard. The Hebrew can mean either "a ruler among fools" or "a ruler of fools."