Ecclesiastes 5:8-20 - Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible

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Bible Comments

Concerning Despotism and Wealth.

Ecclesiastes 5:8 f. The oppression and injustice that one sees (in an Oriental satrapy) are not to be wondered at when we remember the graded hierarchy of officials who are all eager simply to enrich themselves. There is no reference to God; read, One high official is watching over another, and there are higher ones (perhaps the king) over them. Yet on the whole a king, especially if he take an interest in agriculture, is an advantage to a country. So we may interpret the extremely difficult Ecclesiastes 5:9 (cf. mg.).

Ecclesiastes 5:10 ff. The avaricious man is always poor; though his wealth increases he lacks satisfaction, enlarged income means enlarged expense, any gain that he has is outward and therefore unreal. And with wealth comes worry and sleeplessness, from which the humble toiler is free. Not only so, but disaster may overtake the wealth won at the cost of health and comfort; some unlucky adventure, e.g. a shipwreck or a marauding raid, may render him and the son for whom he has been saving, penniless. With Ecclesiastes 5:15 cf. Job 1:21; 1 Timothy 6:7. All the rich man's toil has yielded nothing more than wind (cf. Proverbs 11:29; Isaiah 26:18).

Ecclesiastes 5:17 may refer to the days succeeding the calamity or to the inner meaning of the days preceding it.

Ecclesiastes 5:18-20. It is far better to enjoy life as one goes along (cf. Ecclesiastes 2:24; Ecclesiastes 9:7), getting the best out of each day, than to be miserly. After all, it is God that giveth us all things richly to enjoy (1 Timothy 6:17), and if God thus occupies a man with the joy of his heart (so read Ecclesiastes 5:20 b), he will not brood over the swiftness of his passing days.

Related Commentaries of Ecclesiastes 5:8

Ecclesiastes 5:8-20

8 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.

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

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

11 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?

12 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.

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

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

15 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.

16 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?

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

18 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.

19 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.

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