Ecclesiastes 2:23

Christian Standard Bible ®

For all his days are filled with grief, and his occupation is sorrowful; even at night, his mind does not rest. This too is futile.

Parallel Translations

Hebrew Names Version
For all his days are sorrows, and his travail is grief; yes, even in the night his heart takes no rest. This also is vanity.

King James Version
For all his days are sorrows, and his travail grief; yea, his heart taketh not rest in the night. This is also vanity.

English Standard Version
For all his days are full of sorrow, and his work is a vexation. Even in the night his heart does not rest. This also is vanity.

New American Standard Bible
Because all his days his activity is painful and irritating; even at night his mind does not rest. This too is futility.

New Century Version
All of their lives their work is full of pain and sorrow, and even at night their minds don't rest. This is also useless.

Amplified Bible
For all his days his work is painful and sorrowful; even at night his mind does not rest. This too is vanity (worthless).

World English Bible
For all his days are sorrows, and his travail is grief; yes, even in the night his heart takes no rest. This also is vanity.

Geneva Bible (1587)
For all his dayes are sorowes, and his trauaile griefe: his heart also taketh not rest in the night: which also is vanitie.

Legacy Standard Bible
Because all his days his endeavor is painful and vexing; even at night his heart does not lie down. This too is vanity.

Berean Standard Bible
Indeed, all his days are filled with grief, and his task is sorrowful; even at night, his mind does not rest. This too is futile.

Contemporary English Version
Our bodies ache during the day, and work is torture. Then at night our thoughts are troubled. It just doesn't make sense.

Complete Jewish Bible
His whole life is one of pain, and his work is full of stress; even at night his mind gets no rest. This too is pointless.

Darby Translation
For all his days are sorrows, and his travail vexation: even in the night his heart taketh no rest. This also is vanity.

Easy-to-Read Version
Throughout their life, they have pain, frustrations, and hard work. Even at night, a person's mind does not rest. This is also senseless.

George Lamsa Translation
For all his days are full of sorrows, and his travail is grief; yea, even in the night his heart takes no rest. This also is vanity.

Good News Translation
As long as you live, everything you do brings nothing but worry and heartache. Even at night your mind can't rest. It is all useless.

Lexham English Bible
All his days are painful, his labor brings grief, and his heart cannot rest at night. This also is vanity!

Literal Translation
For all his days are pains, and his task is grief; his heart does not even take rest in the night. Even this also is vanity.

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
but heuynesse, sorowe & disquyetnes all ye dayes of his life? In so moch that his herte can not rest in the night. Is not this also a vayne thinge?

American Standard Version
For all his days are but sorrows, and his travail is grief; yea, even in the night his heart taketh no rest. This also is vanity.

Bible in Basic English
All his days are sorrow, and his work is full of grief. Even in the night his heart has no rest. This again is to no purpose.

JPS Old Testament (1917)
For all his days are pains, and his occupation vexation; yea, even in the night his heart taketh not rest. This also is vanity.

King James Version (1611)
For all his dayes are sorrowes, and his traueile, griefe; yea his heart taketh not rest in the night. This is also vanitie.

Bishop's Bible (1568)
But heauinesse, sorowe, and disquietnesse all the dayes of his life? Insomuch that his heart can not rest in the nyght: This is also a vayne thyng.

Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
For all his days are days of sorrows, and vexation of spirit is his; in the night also his heart rests not. This is also vanity.

English Revised Version
For all his days are but sorrows, and his travail is grief; yea, even in the night his heart taketh no rest. This also is vanity.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Alle hise daies ben ful of sorewis and meschefs, and bi nyyt he restith not in soule; and whether this is not vanyte?

Update Bible Version
For all his days are [but] sorrows, and his travail is grief; yes, even in the night his heart takes no rest. This also is vanity.

Webster's Bible Translation
For all his days [are] sorrows, and his labor grief; yes, his heart taketh not rest in the night. This is also vanity.

New English Translation
For all day long his work produces pain and frustration, and even at night his mind cannot relax! This also is futile!

New King James Version
For all his days are sorrowful, and his work burdensome; even in the night his heart takes no rest. This also is vanity.

New Living Translation
Their days of labor are filled with pain and grief; even at night their minds cannot rest. It is all meaningless.

New Life Bible
For his work brings pain and sorrow all his days. Even during the night his mind does not rest. This also is for nothing.

New Revised Standard
For all their days are full of pain, and their work is a vexation; even at night their minds do not rest. This also is vanity.

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
For, all his days, are pains, and, vexatious, is his employment, even in the night, his heart lieth not down, - even this, was, vanity.

Douay-Rheims Bible
All his days are full of sorrows and miseries, even in the night he doth not rest in mind: and is not this vanity?

Revised Standard Version
For all his days are full of pain, and his work is a vexation; even in the night his mind does not rest. This also is vanity.

Young's Literal Translation
For all his days are sorrows, and his travail sadness; even at night his heart hath not lain down; this also [is] vanity.

New American Standard Bible (1995)
Because all his days his task is painful and grievous; even at night his mind does not rest. This too is vanity.

Contextual Overview

¹⁷Therefore, I hated life because the work that was done under the sun was distressing to me. For everything is futile and a pursuit of the wind. ¹⁸I hated all my work that I labored at under the sun because I must leave it to the one who comes after me. ¹⁹And who knows whether he will be wise or a fool? Yet he will take over all my work that I labored at skillfully under the sun. This too is futile. ²⁰So I began to give myself over to despair concerning all my work that I had labored at under the sun. ²¹When there is a person whose work was done with wisdom, knowledge, and skill, and he must give his portion to a person who has not worked for it, this too is futile and a great wrong. ²²For what does a person get with all his work and all his efforts that he labors at under the sun? ²³For all his days are filled with grief, and his occupation is sorrowful; even at night, his mind does not rest. This too is futile.²⁴There is nothing better for a person than to eat, drink, and enjoy his work. I have seen that even this is from God’s hand, ²⁵because who can eat and who can enjoy life apart from him? ²⁶For to the person who is pleasing in his sight, he gives wisdom, knowledge, and joy; but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and accumulating in order to give to the one who is pleasing in God’s sight. This too is futile and a pursuit of the wind.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

all: Genesis 47:9, Job 5:7, Job 14:1, Psalms 90:7-10, Psalms 90:15, Psalms 127:2

his heart: Ecclesiastes 5:12, Esther 6:1, Job 7:13, Job 7:14, Psalms 6:6, Psalms 6:7, Psalms 32:4, Psalms 77:2-4, Daniel 6:18, Acts 14:22

Reciprocal: Genesis 3:17 - in sorrow Ecclesiastes 1:2 - General Ecclesiastes 3:9 - General Ecclesiastes 4:8 - it is Ecclesiastes 5:16 - a sore Ecclesiastes 6:9 - this Ecclesiastes 7:15 - have I Ecclesiastes 8:16 - there is that Matthew 11:28 - all

Cross-References

Genesis 2:8
The Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he placed the man he had formed.

Genesis 2:9
The Lord God caused to grow out of the ground every tree pleasing in appearance and good for food, including the tree of life in the middle of the garden, as well as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Genesis 29:14
Laban said to him, “Yes, you are my own flesh and blood.”

Judges 9:2
“Please speak in the hearing of all the citizens of Shechem, ‘Is it better for you that seventy men, all the sons of Jerubbaal, rule over you or that one man rule over you?’ Remember that I am your own flesh and blood.”

2 Samuel 5:1
All the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron and said, “Here we are, your own flesh and blood.

2 Samuel 19:13
And tell Amasa, ‘Aren’t you my flesh and blood? May God punish me and do so severely if you don’t become commander of my army from now on instead of Joab!’”

Gill's Notes on the Bible

For all his days [are] sorrows, and his travail grief,.... All his days are full of sorrows, of a variety of them; and all his affairs and transactions of life are attended with grief and trouble; not only the days of old age are evil ones, in which he can take no pleasure; or those times which exceed the common age of man, when he is got to fourscore years or more, and when his strength is labour and sorrow; but even all his days, be they fewer or more, from his youth upward, are all evil and full of trouble, Genesis 47:9;

yea, his heart taketh not rest in the night; which is appointed for rest and ease; and when laid down on his bed for it, as the word signifies; yet, either through an eager desire of getting wealth, or through anxious and distressing cares for the keeping it when gotten, he cannot sleep quietly and comfortably, his carking cares and anxious thoughts keep him waking; or, if he sleeps, his mind is distressed with dreams and frightful apprehensions of things, so that his sleep is not sweet and refreshing to him.

This is also vanity; or one of the vanities which belong to human life.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Solomon having found that wisdom and folly agree in being subject to vanity, now contrasts one with the other Ecclesiastes 2:13. Both are brought under vanity by events Ecclesiastes 2:14 which come on the wise man and the feel alike from without - death and oblivion Ecclesiastes 2:16, uncertainty Ecclesiastes 2:19, disappointment Ecclesiastes 2:21 - all happening by an external law beyond human control. Amidst this vanity, the good (see Ecclesiastes 2:10 note) that accrues to man, is the pleasure felt Ecclesiastes 2:24-26 in receiving God’s gifts, and in working with and for them.

Ecclesiastes 2:12

What can the man do ... - i. e., “What is any man - in this study of wisdom and folly - after one like me, who, from my position, have had such special advantages (see Ecclesiastes 1:16, and compare Ecclesiastes 2:25) for carrying it on? That which man did of old he can but do again: he is not likely to add to the result of my researches, nor even to equal them.” Some hold that the “man” is a reference to Solomon’s successor - not in his inquiries, but in his kingdom, i. e., Jeroboam.

Ecclesiastes 2:14

Event - Or, “hap” Ruth 2:3. The verb from which it is derived seems in this book to refer especially to death. The word does not mean chance (compare Ecclesiastes 9:1-2), independent of the ordering of Divine Providence: the Gentile notion of “mere chance,” or “blind fate,” is never once contemplated by the writer of this book, and it would be inconsistent with his tenets of the unlimited power and activity of God.

Ecclesiastes 2:16

Seeing that ... - Compare Ecclesiastes 1:11. Some render, “as in time past, so in days to come, all will be forgotten;” others, “because in the days to come all will have been long before forgotten.”

Ecclesiastes 2:17

I hated life - Compare this expression, extorted from Solomon by the perception of the vanity of his wisdom and greatness, with Romans 8:22-23. The words of Moses Numbers 11:15, and of Job Job 3:21; Job 6:9, are scarcely less forcible. With some people, this feeling is a powerful motive to conversion Luke 14:26.

Ecclesiastes 2:19

Labour - Compare Ecclesiastes 2:4-8.

Ecclesiastes 2:20

I went about - i. e., I turned from one course of action to another.

Ecclesiastes 2:23

Are sorrows ... grief - Rather, sorrows and grief are his toil. See Ecclesiastes 1:13.

Ecclesiastes 2:24

Nothing better for a man, than that ... - literally, no good in man that etc. The one joy of working or receiving, which, though it be transitory, a man recognizes as a real good, even that is not in the power of man to secure for himself: that good is the gift of God.

Ecclesiastes 2:26

The doctrine of retribution, or, the revealed fact that God is the moral Governor of the world, is here stated for the first time (compare Ecclesiastes 3:15, Ecclesiastes 3:17 ff) in this book.

This also is vanity - Not only the travail of the sinner. Even the best gifts of God, wisdom, knowledge, and joy, so far as they are given in this life, are not permanent, and are not always (see Ecclesiastes 9:11) efficacious for the purpose for which they appear to be given.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 23. His days are sorrows — What a picture of human life where the heart is not filled with the peace and love of God! All his days are sorrows; all his labours griefs; all his nights restless; for he has no portion but merely what earth can give; and that is embittered by the labour of acquisition, and the disappointment in the using.

This is also vanity. — Emptiness of good and substantial misery.