Skip to main content
ecclesiastes 5:12-17

Explore the Bible Online

Ecclesiastes 5:12-17

King James Version (KJV)

“In our prayers we talk to God, in our Bible study God talks to us, and we had better let God do most of the talking.”

— D.L. Moody

Scripture focus

12. The sleep of a labouring man [is] sweet, whether he eat little or much: but the abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep. 13. There is a sore evil [which] I have seen under the sun, [namely], riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt. 14. But those riches perish by evil travail: and he begetteth a son, and [there is] nothing in his hand. 15. As he came forth of his mother’s womb, naked shall he return to go as he came, and shall take nothing of his labour, which he may carry away in his hand. 16. And this also [is] a sore evil, [that] in all points as he came, so shall he go: and what profit hath he that hath laboured for the wind? 17. All his days also he eateth in darkness, and [he hath] much sorrow and wrath with his sickness.

Ecclesiastes 5:12-17 — KJV

Commentary

Commentary on Ecclesiastes 5:12

Theological / Devotional

Labouring man. Denoting specifically, a farmer, a tiller of the soil. The word thus translated is, however, also used of servants in general, also, of those who serve God. A day of physical work is excellent preparation for a night of refreshing sleep.

Not suffer him to sleep. The responsibility of caring for riches often proves troublesome and robs a man of rest to the extent of causing ill-health and nervous collapse.

By SdaBc