Ecclesiastes 3:20

Easy-to-Read Version

The bodies of people and animals end the same way. They came from the earth, and, in the end, they will go back to the earth.

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
All are going to the same place; all come from dust, and all return to dust.

Hebrew Names Version
All go to one place. All are from the dust, and all turn to dust again.

King James Version
All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.

English Standard Version
All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return.

New American Standard Bible
All go to the same place. All came from the dust and all return to the dust.

New Century Version
Both end up the same way; both came from dust and both will go back to dust.

Amplified Bible
All go to the same place. All came from the dust and all return to the dust.

World English Bible
All go to one place. All are from the dust, and all turn to dust again.

Geneva Bible (1587)
All goe to one place, & all was of the dust, and all shall returne to the dust.

Legacy Standard Bible
All go to the same place. All came from the dust, and all return to the dust.

Berean Standard Bible
All go to one place; all come from dust, and all return to dust.

Contemporary English Version
All living creatures go to the same place. We are made from earth, and we return to the earth.

Complete Jewish Bible
They all go to the same place; they all come from dust, and they all return to dust.

Darby Translation
All go unto one place: all are of the dust, and all return to dust.

George Lamsa Translation
All go to one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.

Good News Translation
They are both going to the same place—the dust. They both came from it; they will both go back to it.

Lexham English Bible
Both go to one place—both came from dust and both return to dust.

Literal Translation
All go to one place; all are of the dust, and all return to the dust.

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
They go all vnto one place, for as they be all of dust, so shal they all turne vnto dust againe.

American Standard Version
All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.

Bible in Basic English
All go to one place, all are of the dust, and all will be turned to dust again.

JPS Old Testament (1917)
All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all return to dust.

King James Version (1611)
All goe vnto one place, all are of the dust, and all turne to dust againe.

Bishop's Bible (1568)
They go all vnto one place: for as they be all of dust, so shall they all turne vnto dust agayne.

Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
All go to one place; all were formed of the dust, and all will return to dust.

English Revised Version
All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
Alle thingis ben suget to vanyte, and alle thingis goen to o place; tho ben maad of erthe, and tho turnen ayen togidere in to erthe.

Update Bible Version
All go to one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.

Webster's Bible Translation
All go to one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.

New English Translation
Both go to the same place, both come from the dust, and to dust both return.

New King James Version
All go to one place: all are from the dust, and all return to dust.

New Living Translation
Both go to the same place—they came from dust and they return to dust.

New Life Bible
All go to the same place. All came from the dust and all return to the dust.

New Revised Standard
All go to one place; all are from the dust, and all turn to dust again.

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
all, go unto one place, - all, came from the dust, and all, return to the dust.

Douay-Rheims Bible
And all things go to one place: of earth they were made, and into earth they return together.

Revised Standard Version
All go to one place; all are from the dust, and all turn to dust again.

Young's Literal Translation
The whole are going unto one place, the whole have been from the dust, and the whole are turning back unto the dust.

New American Standard Bible (1995)
All go to the same place. All came from the dust and all return to the dust.

Contextual Overview

¹⁶ I also saw these things in this life: I saw that the courts should be filled with goodness and fairness, but there is evil there now. ¹⁷ So I said to myself, "God has planned a time for everything, and he has planned a time to judge everything people do. He will judge good people and bad people." ¹⁸ I thought about what people do to each other. And I said to myself, "God wants people to see that they are like animals. ¹⁹ The same thing happens to animals and to people—they die. People and animals have the same ‘breath.' Is a dead animal different from a dead person? It is all so senseless! ²⁰ The bodies of people and animals end the same way. They came from the earth, and, in the end, they will go back to the earth. ²¹ Who knows what happens to a person's spirit? Who knows if a human's spirit goes up to God while an animal's spirit goes down into the ground?" ²² So I saw that the best thing people can do is to enjoy what they do, because that is all they have. Besides, no one can help another person see what will happen in the future.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

go: Ecclesiastes 3:21, Ecclesiastes 6:6, Ecclesiastes 9:10, Genesis 25:8, Genesis 25:17, Numbers 27:13, Job 7:9, Job 17:13, Job 30:24, Psalms 49:14

all are: Genesis 3:19, Job 10:9, Job 10:10, Job 34:15, Psalms 104:29, Daniel 12:2

Reciprocal: Genesis 2:7 - dust 2 Samuel 14:14 - we must Psalms 89:48 - What Ecclesiastes 12:7 - dust Hebrews 9:27 - as

Cross-References

Genesis 2:20
The man gave names to all the tame animals, to all the birds in the air, and to all the wild animals. He saw many animals and birds, but he could not find a companion that was right for him.

Genesis 2:23
And the man said, "Finally! One like me, with bones from my bones and a body from my body. She was taken out of a man, so I will call her ‘woman.'"

Genesis 5:29
Lamech named his son Noah. Lamech said, "We work very hard as farmers because God cursed the ground. But Noah will bring us rest."

Genesis 16:11
Then the angel of the Lord said, "Hagar, you are now pregnant, and you will have a son. You will name him Ishmael, because the Lord has heard that you were treated badly.

Genesis 35:18
Rachel died while giving birth to the son. Before dying, she named the boy Benoni. But Jacob called him Benjamin.

Exodus 2:10
The baby grew, and after some time, the woman gave the baby to the king's daughter. The king's daughter accepted the baby as her own son. She named him Moses because she had pulled him from the water.

1 Samuel 1:20
By that time the following year, Hannah had become pregnant and had a son. She named him Samuel. She said, "His name is Samuel because I asked the Lord for him."

Matthew 1:21
She will give birth to a son. You will name him Jesus. Give him that name because he will save his people from their sins."

Matthew 1:23
"The virgin will be pregnant and will give birth to a son. They will name him Immanuel." (Immanuel means "God with us.")

Acts 17:26
God began by making one man, and from him he made all the different people who live everywhere in the world. He decided exactly when and where they would live.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

All go unto one place,.... The earth w from whence they came;

all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again; Adam's body was made of the dust of the earth, and so all his posterity, all of them; in which they agree with beasts, who are made of the dust also; and, when they die, return to it; see Genesis 2:7.

w "Magna parens terra est", Ovid. Metamorph. l. 1. Fab. 7.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

That great anomaly in the moral government of this world, the seemingly unequal distribution of rewards and punishments, will be rectified by God, who has future times and events under His control Ecclesiastes 3:16-17. As for people, they are placed by God, who is their teacher, in a humble condition, even on a level with inferior animals, by death, that great instance of their subjection to vanity Ecclesiastes 3:18-19, which reduces to its original form all that was made of the dust of the ground Ecclesiastes 3:20. And though the destinies of man and beast are different, yet in our present lack of knowledge as to God’s future dealing with our spirits Ecclesiastes 3:21, man finds his portion (see the Ecclesiastes 2:10 note) in such labor and such joy as God assigns to him in his lifetime Ecclesiastes 3:22.

Ecclesiastes 3:16

I saw ... - Rather, I have seen (as in Ecclesiastes 3:10) under the sun the place etc. The place of judgment means the seat of the authorized judge. Compare “the place of the holy” Ecclesiastes 8:10.

Ecclesiastes 3:17

A time there - i. e., a time with God.

Ecclesiastes 3:18

literally, I said in my heart with regard to the sons of men, it is that God may prove them and show them that they are beasts, they themselves. “Showing” is the reading of the Septuagint and Syriac: the present Hebrew text reads “seeing.” The meaning is that the long delay of God’s judgment Ecclesiastes 3:16-17 is calculated to show people that the brevity of their life renders them incapable of following out and understanding His distributive justice.

Ecclesiastes 3:19

That which befalleth the sons of men - literally, the event (happenstance) of the sons of men, i. e., what comes upon them from outside, by virtue of the ordinance of God. See the Ecclesiastes 2:14 note. Death in particular Ecclesiastes 3:2, Ecclesiastes 3:11 is a part of the “work that God doeth.”

Ecclesiastes 3:21

The King James Version of this verse is the only rendering which the Hebrew text, as now pointed, allows. It is in accordance with the best Jewish and many modern interpreters. A slightly different pointing would be requisite to authorize the translation, “Who knows the spirit of the sons of man whether it goes above, and, the spirit of the beast whether it goes down below?” etc., which, though it seems neither necessary nor suitable, is sanctioned by the Septuagint and other versions and by some modern interpreters.

Who knoweth - This expression (used also in Ecclesiastes 2:19; Ecclesiastes 6:12) does not necessarily imply complete and absolute ignorance. In Psalms 90:11, it is applied to what is partially understood: compare similar forms of expression in Proverbs 31:10; Psalms 94:16; Isaiah 53:1. Moreover, it is evident from marginal references that Solomon did not doubt the future existence and destination of the soul. This verse can only be construed as a confession of much ignorance on the subject.

Ecclesiastes 3:22

What shall be after him - i. e., What shall become of the results of his work after he is dead. Compare Ecclesiastes 2:19; Ecclesiastes 6:12.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 20. All go unto one place —

"Man was born

To die, nor aught exceeds in this respect

The vilest brute. Both transient, frail, and vain,

Draw the same breath; alike grow old, decay,

And then expire: both to one grave descend;

There blended lie, to native dust return'd."-C.