Discovery BoxEcclesiastes 4:13
Context4:13 A poor but wise youth is better than an old and foolish king
who no longer knows how to receive advice.
Ecclesiastes 6:5
Context6:5 though it never saw the light of day 1 nor knew anything, 2
yet it has more rest 3 than that man –
Ecclesiastes 7:22
Context7:22 For you know in your own heart 4
that you also have cursed others many times.
Ecclesiastes 8:7
Context8:7 Surely no one knows the future, 5
and no one can tell another person what will happen. 6
Ecclesiastes 10:15
Context10:15 The toil of a stupid fool 7 wears him out, 8
because he does not even know the way to the city. 9
[6:5] 1 tn Heb “it never saw the sun.”
[6:5] 2 tn The word “anything” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity.
[6:5] 3 sn The Hebrew term translated rest here refers to freedom from toil, anxiety, and misery – part of the miserable misfortune that the miserly man of wealth must endure.
[7:22] 1 tn Heb “your heart knows.”
[8:7] 1 tn Heb “what will be.”
[8:7] 2 tn Heb “Who can tell him what will be?”
[10:15] 1 tn The plural form of הַכְּסִילִים (hakkÿsilim, from כְּסִיל, kÿsil, “fool”) denotes (1) plural of number: referring to several fools or (2) plural of habitual character or plural of intensity (referring to a single person characterized by a habitual or intense quality of foolishness). The latter is favored because the two verbs in 10:15 are both singular in form: “wearies him” (תְּיַגְּעֶנּוּ, tÿyaggÿ’ennu) and “he does [not] know” (לֹא־יָדַע, lo’-yada’); see GKC 440-41 §135.p. The article on הַכְּסִילִים is used in the generic sense.
[10:15] 2 tn This line may be interpreted in one of three ways: (1) “the labor of fools wearies him because he did not know enough to go to a town,” referring to the labor of the peasants who had not been able to find a place in town where life was easier; (2) “the labor of the fools so wearies everyone of them (singular pronoun taken in a distributive sense) so much that he even does not know how to go to town,” that is, he does not even know how to do the easiest thing in the world; (3) “let the labor of fools so weary him that he may not even know how to go to town,” taking the verb as a jussive, describing the foolish man described in 10:12-14. See D. Barthélemy, ed., Preliminary and Interim Report on the Hebrew Old Testament Text Project, 3:592–93.
