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Easy-to-Read Version
Ecclesiastes 11:1
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Send your bread on the surface of the water,
Cast your bread on the waters; For you shall find it after many days.
Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.
Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.
Cast your bread on the surface of the waters, for you will find it after many days.
Invest what you have, because after a while you will get a return.
Cast your bread on the surface of the waters, [be diligently active, make thoughtful decisions], for you will find it after many days.
Cast your bread on the waters; For you shall find it after many days.
Cast thy bread vpon the waters: for after many daies thou shalt finde it.
Cast your bread on the surface of the waters, for you will find it after many days.
Cast your bread upon the waters, for after many days you will find it again.
Be generous, and someday you will be rewarded.
Send your resources out over the seas; eventually you will reap a return.
Cast thy bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it after many days.
CAST your bread upon the waters; for you shall find it after many days.
Invest your money in foreign trade, and one of these days you will make a profit.
Send out your bread on the water, for in many days you will find it.
Send out your bread on the face of the waters, for you shall find it in many days.
Sende thy vytayles ouer the waters, and so shalt thou fynde the after many yeares.
Cast thy bread upon the waters; for thou shalt find it after many days.
Put out your bread on the face of the waters; for after a long time it will come back to you again.
Cast thy bread upon the waters, for thou shalt find it after many days.
Cast thy bread vpon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many dayes.
Lay thy bread vpon wette faces, and so shalt thou finde it after many dayes.
Send forth thy bread upon the face of the water: for thou shalt find it after many days.
Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.
Sende thi breed on watris passynge forth, for aftir many tymes thou schalt fynde it.
Cast your bread on the waters; for you shall find it after many days.
Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.
Send your grain overseas, for after many days you will get a return.
Cast your bread upon the waters, For you will find it after many days.
Send your grain across the seas, and in time, profits will flow back to you.
Throw your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.
Send out your bread upon the waters, for after many days you will get it back.
Cast thy bread-corn, upon the face of the waters, - for, after many days, shalt thou find it:
Cast thy bread upon the running waters: for after a long time thou shalt find it again.
Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.
Send forth thy bread on the face of the waters, For in the multitude of the days thou dost find it.
Be generous: Invest in acts of charity. Charity yields high returns.
Cast your bread on the surface of the waters, for you will find it after many days.
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
Cast: That is, says Bp. Lowth, "Sow thy seed or corn on the face of the waters;" in plain terms, sow without any hope of a harvest: do good even to them on whom your benefactions seem thrown away. Dr. Jebb has well illustrated it by the following passages: Vain are the favours done to vicious men;
Not vainer tis to sow the foaming deep.
The deep no pleasant harvest shall afford
Nor will the wicked ever make return. "To befriend the wicked is like sowing in the sea.
These, indeed, invert this precept;
Nor is it extraordinary that they should. "The one, frail human power alone produced,
The other, God."
thy bread: Deuteronomy 15:7-11, Proverbs 11:24, Proverbs 11:25, Proverbs 22:9, Isaiah 32:8
waters: Heb. face of the waters, Isaiah 32:20
for: Ecclesiastes 11:6, Deuteronomy 15:10, Psalms 41:1, Psalms 41:2, Psalms 126:5, Psalms 126:6, Proverbs 11:18, Proverbs 19:17, Matthew 10:13, Matthew 10:42, Matthew 25:40, Luke 14:14, 2 Corinthians 9:6, Galatians 6:8-10, Hebrews 6:10
Reciprocal: Leviticus 19:25 - General 1 Samuel 25:11 - give it 2 Samuel 17:29 - The people 2 Chronicles 18:14 - Go ye up Psalms 112:9 - dispersed Proverbs 3:10 - General Proverbs 13:7 - that maketh himself poor Proverbs 14:21 - he that hath Proverbs 31:20 - she reacheth Ecclesiastes 3:6 - and a time to cast Isaiah 58:7 - to deal Ezekiel 18:16 - but hath Matthew 5:42 - General Matthew 25:17 - he also Matthew 25:35 - I was an Luke 6:38 - and it Luke 11:41 - rather Luke 16:9 - Make Acts 2:45 - parted Acts 11:29 - to send Romans 12:8 - giveth 1 Timothy 6:18 - ready
Cross-References
At that time there will be five cities in Egypt where people speak Hebrew. One of these cities will be named "Destruction City." The people in these cities will promise to follow the Lord All-Powerful.
Then I will change people from other nations so that they can speak the language clearly and call out the name of the Lord . They will all worship me together, shoulder to shoulder, as one people.
A large crowd came together because they heard the noise. They were surprised because, as the apostles were speaking, everyone heard in their own language.
Gill's Notes on the Bible
Cast thy bread upon the waters,.... As the wise man had often suggested that nothing was better for a man than to enjoy the good of his labour himself, he here advises to let others, the poor, have a share with him; and as he had directed in the preceding chapter how men should behave towards their superiors, he here instructs them what notice they should take of their inferiors; and as he had cautioned against luxury and intemperance, he here guards against tenacity and covetousness, and exhorts to beneficence and liberality: that which is to be given is "bread", which is put for all the necessaries of life, food and raiment; or money that answers all things, what may be a supply of wants, a support of persons in distress; what is useful, profitable, and beneficial; not stones or scorpions, or what will be useless or harmful: and it must be "thy" bread, a man's own; not independent of God who gives it him; but not another's, what he owes another, or has fraudulently obtained; but what he has got by his own labour, or he is through divine Providence in lawful possession of; hence alms in the Hebrew language is called "righteousness": and it must be such bread as is convenient and fit for a man himself, such as he himself and his family eat of, and this he must cast, it must be a man's own act, and a voluntary one; his bread must not be taken and forced from him; it must be given freely, and in such a manner as not to be expected again; and bountifully and plentifully, as a man casts seed into the earth; but here it is said to be "upon the waters"; bread is to be given to such as are in distress and affliction, that have waters of a full cup wrung out unto them, whose faces are watered with tears, and foul with weeping, from whom nothing is to be expected again, who can make no returns; so that what is given thorn seems to be cast away and lost, like what is thrown into a river, or into the midst of the sea; and even it is to be given to such who prove ungrateful and unthankful, and on whom no mark or impression of the kindness is made and left, no more than upon water; yea, it is to be given to strangers never seen before nor after, like gliding water; so the Vulgate Latin version renders it, "passing waters": or else to such who may be compared to well watered ground, or "moist ground", as Mr. Broughton renders it; where the seed cast will grow up again, and bring forth fruit, and redound to the advantage of the sower, as what is given to the poor does; they are a good soil to sow upon, especially Christ's poor, who are partakers of his living water, grace; see Isaiah 32:20; though it may be the multitude of persons to whom alms is to be given are here intended, which are sometimes signified by waters, Revelation 17:15; as Ecclesiastes 11:2 seems to explain it. The Targum is,
"reach out the bread of thy sustenance to the poor that go in ships upon the thee of the water;''
and some think the speech is borrowed from navigation, and is an allusion to merchants who send their goods beyond sea, and have a large return for them;
for thou shalt find it after many days; not the identical bread itself, but the fruit and reward of such beneficence; which they shall have unexpectedly, or after long waiting, as the husbandman for his seed; it suggests that such persons should live long, as liberal persons oftentimes do, and increase in their worldly substance; and if they should not live to reap the advantage of their liberality, yet their posterity will, as the seed of Jonathan did for the kindness he showed to David: or, however, if they find it not again in temporal things, yet in spirituals; and shall be recompensed in the resurrection of the just, and to all eternity. So the Targum,
"for after the time of many days, then thou shall find the reward of it in this world (so it is in the king's Bible), and in the world to come;''
see Luke 12:12. Jarchi instances in Jethro. Noldius p renders it "within many days", even before many days are at an end; for seed sown by waters in hot climates soon sprung up, and produced fruit; see
Daniel 11:20.
p Ebr. Concord. Partic. p. 155. No. 704.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
The verse means: “Show hospitality, even though the corresponding return of hospitality to you may seem improbable; nevertheless, be hospitable in faith.” Compare Luke 14:13-14; Hebrews 13:2. Some interpreters (not unreasonably) understand by “bread” the seed from the produce of which bread is made. Seed cast upon the fertile soil flooded by the early rains would be returned to the sower in autumn with large increase.
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
CHAPTER XI
Give alms to all, 1-4.
The works of God unknown to man, 5.
Diligence necessary, 6.
Prosperity frequently succeeded by adversity, 7, 8.
There will be a day of judgment, 9, 10.
NOTES ON CHAP. XI
Verse Ecclesiastes 11:1. Cast thy bread upon the waters — An allusion to the sowing of rice; which was sown upon muddy ground, or ground covered with water, and trodden in by the feet of cattle: it thus took root, and grew, and was found after many days in a plentiful harvest. Give alms to the poor, and it will be as seed sown in good ground. God will cause thee afterwards to receive it with abundant increase. The Targum understands it of giving bread to poor sailors. The Vulgate and my old Bible have the same idea. Send thi brede upon men passing waters.
