Eccles. 6:3-6
When I read this passage in Ecclesiastes, I think of Elvis Presley and Howard Hughes. Both men had fame, fortune, women, power, and good looks. As we have learned more about their lives, we see that they were empty, striving after the wind. Elvis was probably the most recognized and famous personality of his day and he apparently worried every day that people would forget him. Howard Hughes spend the last years of his life in seclusion and in a form of luxurious squalor. Is it any wonder that many famous people wind up using drugs, alcohol, etc. just to get by in life. Thank you God for what you have given me.
3 If a man fathers a hundred children and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but his soul is not satisfied with life's good things, and he also has no burial, I say that a stillborn child is better off than he. 4 For it comes in vanity and goes in darkness, and in darkness its name is covered. 5 Moreover, it has not seen the sun or known anything, yet it finds rest rather than he. 6 Even though he should live a thousand years twice over, yet enjoy [1] no good—do not all go to the one place?
- For an Israelite in Solomon's day, what would fathering 100 children signify?
- What would living many years signify?
- How are these external measures of a man's life inaccurate? - From earlier passages, where does the problem of dissatisfaction originate?
- Where does the ability or power to enjoy things come from?
- What is the problem that the man in this passage has? - How does Solomon describe a stillborn child?
- Why does Solomon state that a stillborn baby is better off than the man in this passage?
- Is an empty life, devoid of enjoyment and filled with dissatisfaction, be no better than no life at all? Why or why not? - How does our understanding of heaven, hell, and the overall afterlife differ from that of Solomon and early Israelites?
- If God gives the power to enjoy your lot in life and your human desires are never really satisfied, who should you be trying to please: God or yourself?
- Who do most people try to please?
- What is their fate? Who is better off than them?
When I read this passage in Ecclesiastes, I think of Elvis Presley and Howard Hughes. Both men had fame, fortune, women, power, and good looks. As we have learned more about their lives, we see that they were empty, striving after the wind. Elvis was probably the most recognized and famous personality of his day and he apparently worried every day that people would forget him. Howard Hughes spend the last years of his life in seclusion and in a form of luxurious squalor. Is it any wonder that many famous people wind up using drugs, alcohol, etc. just to get by in life. Thank you God for what you have given me.
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