Ecclesiastes5chapter 5

"Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God." Worshippers entered the temple courts barefoot or with washed feet, and the phrase means watch your step in the most literal way. "Be more ready to hear, than to give the sacrifice of fools" ranks listening above the offering — in a building whose entire daily business was offerings.

The vow warning is legal. Under the Law a vow was binding once spoken; a man could dedicate an animal, a sum, or a period of service, and the sanctuary could hold him to it and set a redemption price. "Neither say thou before the angel, that it was an error" describes a man trying to talk his way out in front of the temple official who has come to collect.

"If thou seest the oppression of the poor… marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth." The picture is a chain of officials, each one watching and taxing the one below, which is exactly how ancient provincial administration worked — governors over districts, officers under them, each taking a cut.

"The profit of the earth is for all: the king himself is served by the field." No matter how many layers of officials there are, the food comes out of the ground. That is a farmer's sentence in a king's book.

"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." A man working in a field all day slept hard on a mat. A man with stored wealth in a house without locks or banks lay awake thinking about it.