Parallel Bible results for "ecclesiastes 8"

Ecclesiastes 8

Good News Translation GNT

1 Only the wise know what things really mean. Wisdom makes them smile and makes their frowns disappear.

2 Do what the king says, and don't make any rash promises to God.

3 The king can do anything he likes, so depart from his presence; don't stay in such a dangerous place.

4 The king acts with authority, and no one can challenge what he does.

5 As long as you obey his commands, you are safe, and a wise person knows how and when to do it.

6 There is a right time and a right way to do everything, but we know so little!

7 None of us knows what is going to happen, and there is no one to tell us.

8 No one can keep from dying or put off the day of death. That is a battle we cannot escape; we cannot cheat our way out.

9 I saw all this when I thought about the things that are done in this world, a world where some people have power and others have to suffer under them.

10 Yes, I have seen the wicked buried and in their graves, but on the way back from the cemetery people praise them in the very city where they did their evil. It is useless.

11 Why do people commit crimes so readily? Because crime is not punished quickly enough.

12 A sinner may commit a hundred crimes and still live. Oh yes, I know what they say: "If you obey God, everything will be all right,

13 but it will not go well for the wicked. Their life is like a shadow and they will die young, because they do not obey God."

14 But this is nonsense. Look at what happens in the world: sometimes the righteous get the punishment of the wicked, and the wicked get the reward of the righteous. I say it is useless.

15 So I am convinced that we should enjoy ourselves, because the only pleasure we have in this life is eating and drinking and enjoying ourselves. We can at least do this as we labor during the life that God has given us in this world.

16 Whenever I tried to become wise and learn what goes on in the world, I realized that you could stay awake night and day

17 and never be able to understand what God is doing. However hard you try, you will never find out. The wise may claim to know, but they don't.

World English Bible WEB

1 Who is like the wise man? And who knows the interpretation of a thing? A man's wisdom makes his face shine, and the hardness of his face is changed.

2 I say, "Keep the king's command!" because of the oath to God.

3 Don't be hasty to go out of his presence. Don't persist in an evil thing, for he does whatever pleases him,

4 for the king's word is supreme. Who can say to him, "What are you doing?"

5 Whoever keeps the commandment shall not come to harm, and his wise heart will know the time and procedure.

6 For there is a time and procedure for every purpose, although the misery of man is heavy on him.

7 For he doesn't know that which will be; for who can tell him how it will be?

8 There is no man who has power over the spirit to contain the spirit; neither does he have power over the day of death. There is no discharge in war; neither shall wickedness deliver those who practices it.

9 All this have I seen, and applied my mind to every work that is done under the sun. There is a time in which one man has power over another to his hurt.

10 So I saw the wicked buried. Indeed they came also from holiness. They went and were forgotten in the city where they did this. This also is vanity.

11 Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.

12 Though a sinner commits crimes a hundred times, and lives long, yet surely I know that it will be better with those who fear God, who are reverent before him.

13 But it shall not be well with the wicked, neither shall he lengthen days like a shadow; because he doesn't fear God.

14 There is a vanity which is done on the earth, that there are righteous men to whom it happens according to the work of the wicked. Again, there are wicked men to whom it happens according to the work of the righteous. I said that this also is vanity.

15 Then I commended mirth, because a man has no better thing under the sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be joyful: for that will accompany him in his labor all the days of his life which God has given him under the sun.

16 When I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to see the business that is done on the earth (for also there is that neither day nor night sees sleep with his eyes),

17 then I saw all the work of God, that man can't find out the work that is done under the sun, because however much a man labors to seek it out, yet he won't find it. Yes, moreover, though a wise man thinks he can comprehend it, yet he won't be able to find it.