Why are you depressed, O my soul? Why are you upset? Wait for God! For I will again give thanks to my God for his saving intervention.

Why are you depressed, O my soul? Why are you upset? Wait for God! For I will again give thanks to my God for his saving intervention.

I will listen to what God the Lord says. For he will make peace with his people, his faithful followers. Yet they must not return to their foolish ways.

What exists now is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing truly new on earth.

Next, I decided to consider wisdom, as well as foolish behavior and ideas. For what more can the king’s successor do than what the king has already done?

Whatever has happened was foreordained, and what happens to a person was also foreknown. It is useless for him to argue with God about his fate because God is more powerful than he is.

Do not say, “Why were the old days better than these days?” for it is not wise to ask that.

yet a fool keeps on babbling. No one knows what will happen; who can tell him what will happen in the future?

Divide your merchandise among seven or even eight investments, for you do not know what calamity may happen on earth.

The Beloved to the Maidens: O maidens of Jerusalem, I command you – If you find my beloved, what will you tell him? Tell him that I am lovesick!

The Lover to His Beloved: (7:1) Turn, turn, O Perfect One! Turn, turn, that I may stare at you! The Beloved to Her Lover: Why do you gaze upon the Perfect One like the dance of the Mahanaim?

The Lover to His Beloved: (7:2) How beautiful are your sandaled feet, O nobleman’s daughter! The curves of your thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a master craftsman.

What more can I do for my vineyard beyond what I have already done? When I waited for it to produce edible grapes, why did it produce sour ones instead?

But where, oh where, are your wise men? Let them tell you, let them find out what the Lord who commands armies has planned for Egypt.

‘What right do you have to be here? What relatives do you have buried here? Why do you chisel out a tomb for yourself here? He chisels out his burial site in an elevated place, he carves out his tomb on a cliff.

Isaiah asked, “What have they seen in your palace?” Hezekiah replied, “They have seen everything in my palace. I showed them everything in my treasuries.”

A voice says, “Cry out!” Another asks, “What should I cry out?” The first voice responds: “All people are like grass, and all their promises are like the flowers in the field.

“Let them produce evidence! Let them tell us what will happen! Tell us about your earlier predictive oracles, so we may examine them and see how they were fulfilled. Or decree for us some future events!

One who argues with his creator is in grave danger, one who is like a mere shard among the other shards on the ground! The clay should not say to the potter, “What in the world are you doing? Your work lacks skill!”

How delightful it is to see approaching over the mountains the feet of a messenger who announces peace, a messenger who brings good news, who announces deliverance, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!”