Ecclesiastes 2:20

20 Wherefore I left off and my heart renounced labouring anymore under the sun.

Ecclesiastes 2:20 Meaning and Commentary

Ecclesiastes 2:20

Therefore I went about to cause my heart to despair
Of ever finding happiness in anything here below. He "turned about" F25, as the word signifies dropped his severe studies of wisdom, and his eager pursuits of pleasure; and desisted from those toilsome works, in which he had employed himself; and went from one thing to another, and settled and stuck at nothing, on purpose to relax his mind, as the Syriac version renders it; to divest it of all anxious thought and care, and call it off from its vain and fruitless undertakings; and be no more concerned about or thoughtful of all the labour which I took under the sun;
and what will be the consequence and issue of it; but quietly leave all to an all wise disposing Providence; and not seek for happiness in anything under the sun, but in those things that are above it; not in this world, but in the world to come.


FOOTNOTES:

F25 (ytwbow) "versus sum", Montanus; "et ego verti me", Vatablus, Mercerus, Gejerus.

Ecclesiastes 2:20 In-Context

18 Again I hated all my application wherewith I had earnestly laboured under the sun, being like to have an heir after me,
19 Whom I know not whether he will be a wise man or a fool, and he shall have rule over all my labours with which I have laboured and been solicitous: and is there anything so vain?
20 Wherefore I left off and my heart renounced labouring anymore under the sun.
21 For when a man laboureth in wisdom, and knowledge, and carefulness, he leaveth what he hath gotten to an idle man: so this also is vanity, and a great evil.
22 For what profit shall a man have of all his labour, and vexation of spirit, with which he hath been tormented under the sun?
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