Parallel Bible results for "ecclesiastes 8"

Ecclesiastes 8

New Living Translation NLT

1 How wonderful to be wise, to analyze and interpret things. Wisdom lights up a person’s face, softening its harshness.

2 Obey the king since you vowed to God that you would.

3 Don’t try to avoid doing your duty, and don’t stand with those who plot evil, for the king can do whatever he wants.

4 His command is backed by great power. No one can resist or question it.

5 Those who obey him will not be punished. Those who are wise will find a time and a way to do what is right,

6 for there is a time and a way for everything, even when a person is in trouble.

7 Indeed, how can people avoid what they don’t know is going to happen?

8 None of us can hold back our spirit from departing. None of us has the power to prevent the day of our death. There is no escaping that obligation, that dark battle. And in the face of death, wickedness will certainly not rescue the wicked.

9 I have thought deeply about all that goes on here under the sun, where people have the power to hurt each other.

10 I have seen wicked people buried with honor. Yet they were the very ones who frequented the Temple and are now praised in the same city where they committed their crimes! This, too, is meaningless.

11 When a crime is not punished quickly, people feel it is safe to do wrong.

12 But even though a person sins a hundred times and still lives a long time, I know that those who fear God will be better off.

13 The wicked will not prosper, for they do not fear God. Their days will never grow long like the evening shadows.

14 And this is not all that is meaningless in our world. In this life, good people are often treated as though they were wicked, and wicked people are often treated as though they were good. This is so meaningless!

15 So I recommend having fun, because there is nothing better for people in this world than to eat, drink, and enjoy life. That way they will experience some happiness along with all the hard work God gives them under the sun.

16 In my search for wisdom and in my observation of people’s burdens here on earth, I discovered that there is ceaseless activity, day and night.

17 I realized that no one can discover everything God is doing under the sun. Not even the wisest people discover everything, no matter what they claim.

Hebrew Names Version HNV

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 mitzvah 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 eretz, 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 eretz (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.