Ecclesiastes2chapter 2

Ecclesiastes 2:1-2

I will prove thee with mirth: The Preacher turns from thought to a planned trial, announcing his own experiment: mirth and pleasure tested on purpose, prove thee with mirth, with the verdict against them filed before the trial even finishes its course. Laughter he calls mad and mirth a question with no answer, what doeth it, since delight taken as its own end cannot say what it has accomplished. Bridges reads the phrase as royal self-command, the king ordering his own heart into the experiment the way he ordered every other resource at his disposal.

Ecclesiastes 2:3-6

to give myself unto wine: The wine test follows the same design, the Preacher giving himself unto wine while acquainting mine heart with wisdom, so that indulgence never runs without a sober witness inside it. From wine he moves to building: houses raised, vineyards planted, gardens and orchards set with every kind of fruit tree, and pools of water dug to feed the young trees, each project chosen and finished by his own hand. Gill reads the string of first-person verbs, I made, I planted, I builded, as the record of a man leaving nothing untried before he files his report. The scale answers any objection that the experiment was run half-heartedly.

Ecclesiastes 2:7-8

I got me servants and maidens: The household and treasury complete the inventory: servants bought and born in the house, herds beyond any before him in Jerusalem, silver and gold gathered with the treasure of kings and provinces, and singers, men and women, added for the ear as the rest were added for the hand. Clarke notes the peculiar treasure of kings as tribute or royal collections such as only a monarch of Solomon's rank could assemble. Every category of wealth Scripture elsewhere names as blessing is present here at its fullest extent, which is what makes the coming verdict weigh as it does.

Ecclesiastes 2:9-11

increased more than all that were before me: The Preacher records his own superiority, greater and increased more than all that were before him in Jerusalem, with wisdom still standing beside the wealth rather than lost in it. He withheld his heart from no joy his eyes desired, and took his labour as its own reward, my heart rejoiced in all my labour. Then the ledger closes: all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun, the exact verdict the whole experiment was built to test. Henry reads the finding as final because the tester was uniquely qualified to run it, a king with unmatched means denied himself nothing and still filed a loss.

Ecclesiastes 2:12-14

to behold wisdom, and madness, and folly: The Preacher turns to weigh wisdom against madness and folly directly, granting at once that wisdom excelleth folly as far as light excelleth darkness, an advantage he never withdraws even after the larger verdict against him. The wise man's eyes are in his head while the fool walks in darkness, sight set against blindness in this life. But he perceived also that one event happeneth to them all, wise and foolish meeting the same end, and the bench reads the observation as honest rather than despairing, the death that levels every account still under the sun. Delitzsch takes the relative advantage of wisdom and the shared mortality as two findings held together, neither one erasing the other.

Ecclesiastes 2:15-17

why was I then more wise: The finding turns personal: as it happeneth to the fool, so it happeneth even to me, and why was I then more wise, the king's own advantage collapsing under the same death that takes the fool. No remembrance of the wise outlasts the fool's either, since the days to come shall all be forgotten and both alike simply die. Therefore I hated life is the Preacher's own word for the discovery, grief filed under the sun where the work he built brings him grief rather than rest. Bridges reads the hatred as directed at life's disappointed expectation, not at life itself or at the Giver of it.

Ecclesiastes 2:18-21

unto the man that shall be after me: A second grief follows the first: all the labour is left unto the man that shall be after me, and who knoweth whether he shall be a wise man or a fool holding what took a lifetime to gather. Verse 21 widens the complaint to any case where a man labours in wisdom and knowledge and skill only to leave the whole as a portion to one who never laboured for it. The Preacher names it plainly, this also is vanity and a great evil, the sharpest language the chapter uses against any single finding. Wesley reads the grief as inheritance itself put to the test and failing it, effort and reward coming apart at the point where a man can no longer watch.

Ecclesiastes 2:22-23

of the vexation of his heart: The Preacher totals the account: what hath man of all his labour and of the vexation of his heart wherein he hath laboured under the sun, the ledger asking what remains once toil is set against what it produced. All his days are sorrows and his travail grief, and even at night his heart taketh not rest, the exhaustion following the worker home. Gill reads the two verses as the summary of the whole experiment's cost before the chapter turns to name what it did find worth keeping.

Ecclesiastes 2:24-26

that he should eat and drink: The chapter's one durable finding arrives, that a man should eat and drink and make his soul enjoy good in his labour, the first of four times the refrain returns in the book, filed as a gift from the hand of God rather than a resignation forced by the failed experiment. Verse 25 grounds the claim in the Preacher's own case, who can eat or hasten to enjoyment more than I, the man with every means testifying that enjoyment is God's grant alongside labour, not labour's own product. Verse 26 divides the gift by the receiver, wisdom and knowledge and joy given to the man good in God's sight, travail given to the sinner who gathers and heaps up only to hand it over, and even that arrangement the Preacher still calls vanity and vexation of spirit. Bridges reads the refrain as the book's positive doctrine standing already in chapter two, received gift rather than the resignation a first reading might suspect.