1 Who is smart enough
to explain everything?
Wisdom makes you cheerful
and gives you a smile.
Obey the King
2 If you promised God that you would be loyal to the king, I advise you to keep that promise. 3 Don't quickly oppose the king or argue when he has already made up his mind. 4 The king's word is law. No one can ask him, “Why are you doing this?” 5 If you obey the king, you will stay out of trouble. So be wise and learn what to do and when to do it. 6 Life is hard, but there is a time and a place for everything, 7 though no one can tell the future. 8 We cannot control the wind or determine the day of our death. There is no escape in time of war, and no one can hide behind evil. 9 I noticed all this and thought seriously about what goes on in the world. Why does one person have the power to hurt another?
Who Can Understand the Ways of God?
10 I saw the wicked buried with honor, but God's people had to leave the holy city and were forgotten. None of this makes sense. 11 When we see criminals commit crime after crime without being punished, it makes us want to start a life of crime. 12 They commit hundreds of crimes and live a long time, in spite of the saying:
Everyone who lives right
and respects God
will prosper,
13 but no one who sins
and rejects God
will prosper or live very long.
14 There is something else that doesn't make sense to me. Good citizens are treated as criminals, while criminals are honored as though they were good citizens. 15 So I think we should get as much out of life as we possibly can. There is nothing better than to enjoy our food and drink and have a good time. Then we can make it through this troublesome life that God has given us here on earth.
16 Day and night I went without sleep, trying to understand what goes on in this world. 17 I saw everything God does, and I realized no one can really understand what happens. We may be very wise, but no matter how much we try or how much we claim to know, we cannot understand it all.
1 Who is as the wise man? and who knoweth the interpretation of a thing? the wisedome of a man doth make his face to shine: and the strength of his face shalbe changed. 2 I aduertise thee to take heede to ye mouth of the King, and to the worde of the othe of God. 3 Haste not to goe forth of his sight: stand not in an euill thing: for he will doe whatsoeuer pleaseth him. 4 Where the word of ye King is, there is power, and who shall say vnto him, What doest thou? 5 He that keepeth the commandement, shall knowe none euill thing, and the heart of the wise shall knowe the time and iudgement. 6 For to euery purpose there is a time and iudgement, because the miserie of man is great vpon him. 7 For he knoweth not that which shalbe: for who can tell him when it shalbe? 8 Man is not lorde ouer the spirit to retaine the spirite: neither hath hee power in the day of death, nor deliuerance in the battell, neither shall wickednesse deliuer the possessers thereof. 9 All this haue I seene, and haue giuen mine heart to euery worke, which is wrought vnder the sunne, and I sawe a time that man ruleth ouer man to his owne hurt. 10 And likewise I sawe the wicked buried, and they returned, and they that came from the holy place, were yet forgotten in the citie where they had done right: this also is vanitie. 11 Because sentence against an euill worke is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the children of men is fully set in them to doe euill. 12 Though a sinner doe euill an hundreth times, and God prolongeth his dayes, yet I knowe that it shalbe well with them that feare the Lord, and doe reuerence before him. 13 But it shall not be well to the wicked, neither shall he prolong his dayes: he shall be like a shadowe, because he feareth not before God. 14 There is a vanitie, which is done vpon the earth, that there be righteous men to whom it commeth according to the worke of the wicked: and there be wicked men to whom it commeth according to the worke of the iust: I thought also that this is vanitie. 15 And I praysed ioy: for there is no goodnesse to man vnder the sunne, saue to eate and to drinke and to reioyce: for this is adioyned to his labour, the dayes of his life that God hath giuen him vnder the sunne. 16 When I applied mine heart to knowe wisedome, and to behold the busines that is done on earth, that neither day nor night the eyes of man take sleepe, 17 Then I behelde the whole worke of God, that man cannot finde out ye worke that is wrought vnder the sunne: for the which man laboureth to seeke it, and cannot finde it: yea, and though the wise man thinke to knowe it, he cannot finde it.