the Week of Proper 12 / Ordinary 17
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THE MESSAGE
Ecclesiastes 4:2
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So I commended the dead, who have already died, more than the living, who are still alive.
Therefore I praised the dead who have been long dead more than the living who are yet alive.
Wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive.
And I thought the dead who are already dead more fortunate than the living who are still alive.
So I congratulated the dead who are already dead, more than the living who are still living.
I decided that the dead are better off than the living.
So I congratulated and thought more fortunate are those who are already dead than the living who are still living.
Therefore I praised the dead who have been long dead more than the living who are yet alive.
Wherefore I praysed the dead which now are dead, aboue the liuing, which are yet aliue.
So I lauded the dead who are already dead more than the living who are still living.
So I admired the dead, who had already died, above the living, who are still alive.
I said to myself, "The dead are better off than the living.
So I considered the dead happier, because they were already dead, than the living, who must still live their lives;
Then I praised the dead who are already dead more than the living who are yet alive;
I decided that it is better for those who have died than for those who are still alive.
Wherefore I praised the dead who are already dead more than the living who are still alive.
I envy those who are dead and gone; they are better off than those who are still alive.
So I deemed the dead who have already died more fortunate than the living who are still alive.
And I commended the dead who already have died, more than the living who are alive until now.
Wherfore I iudged those that are deed, to be more happie then soch as be alyue:
Wherefore I praised the dead that have been long dead more than the living that are yet alive;
So my praise was for the dead who have gone to their death, more than for the living who still have life.
Wherefore I praised the dead that are already dead more than the living that are yet alive;
Wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead, more then the liuing which are yet aliue.
Wherfore I iudged those that are dead, to be more happy then those that be alyue?
and I praised all the dead that had already died more than the living, as many as are alive until now.
Wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive;
And Y preiside more deed men than lyuynge men;
Therefore I praised the dead that have been long dead more than the living that are yet alive;
Wherefore I praised the dead who are already dead more than the living who are yet alive.
So I considered those who are dead and gone more fortunate than those who are still alive.
Therefore I praised the dead who were already dead, More than the living who are still alive.
So I concluded that the dead are better off than the living.
So I thought that those who are already dead are better off than those who are still living.
And I thought the dead, who have already died, more fortunate than the living, who are still alive;
So, I, pronounced happy the dead, who were, already, dead, - more than the living, who were living, still;
And I praised the dead rather than the living:
And I thought the dead who are already dead more fortunate than the living who are still alive;
And I am praising the dead who have already died above the living who are yet alive.
So I congratulated the dead who are already dead more than the living who are still living.
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
Ecclesiastes 2:17, Ecclesiastes 9:4-6, Job 3:17-21
Reciprocal: Ecclesiastes 7:1 - the day Jeremiah 22:10 - Weep ye Revelation 14:13 - Blessed
Cross-References
So God expelled them from the Garden of Eden and sent them to work the ground, the same dirt out of which they'd been made. He threw them out of the garden and stationed angel-cherubim and a revolving sword of fire east of it, guarding the path to the Tree-of-Life.
Adam slept with his wife again. She had a son whom she named Seth. She said, "God has given me another child in place of Abel whom Cain killed." And then Seth had a son whom he named Enosh. That's when men and women began praying and worshiping in the name of God .
Noah, a farmer, was the first to plant a vineyard. He drank from its wine, got drunk and passed out, naked in his tent. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw that his father was naked and told his two brothers who were outside the tent. Shem and Japheth took a cloak, held it between them from their shoulders, walked backward and covered their father's nakedness, keeping their faces turned away so they did not see their father's exposed body.
Moses was shepherding the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. He led the flock to the west end of the wilderness and came to the mountain of God, Horeb. The angel of God appeared to him in flames of fire blazing out of the middle of a bush. He looked. The bush was blazing away but it didn't burn up.
Don't you see that children are God 's best gift? the fruit of the womb his generous legacy? Like a warrior's fistful of arrows are the children of a vigorous youth. Oh, how blessed are you parents, with your quivers full of children! Your enemies don't stand a chance against you; you'll sweep them right off your doorstep.
We must not be like Cain, who joined the Evil One and then killed his brother. And why did he kill him? Because he was deep in the practice of evil, while the acts of his brother were righteous. So don't be surprised, friends, when the world hates you. This has been going on a long time.
Gill's Notes on the Bible
Wherefore I praised the dead, which are already dead,.... Truly and properly so; not in a figurative sense, as dead sinners, men dead in trespasses and sins; nor carnal professors, that have a name to live, and are dead; nor in a civil sense, such as are in calamity and distress, as the Jews in captivity, or in any affliction, which is sometimes called death: but such who are dead in a literal and natural sense, really and thoroughly dead; not who may and will certainly die, but who are dead already and in their graves, and not all these; not the wicked dead, who are in hell, in everlasting torments; but the righteous dead, who are taken away from the evil to come, and are free from all the oppressions of their enemies, sin, Satan, and the world. The Targum is,
"I praised those that lie down or are asleep, who, behold, are now dead;''
a figure by which death is often expressed, both in the Old and New Testament; sleep being, as the poet a says, the image of death; and a great likeness there is between them; Homer b calls sleep and death twins. The same paraphrase adds,
"and see not the vengeance which comes upon the world after their death;''
see Isaiah 57:1. The wise man did not make panegyrics or encomiums on those persons, but he pronounced them happy; he judged them in his own mind to be so; and to be much
more happy
than the living which are yet alive: that live under the oppression of others; that live in this world in trouble until now, as the Targum; of whom it is as much as it can be said that they are alive; they are just alive, and that is all; they are as it were between life and death. This is generally understood as spoken according to human sense, and the judgment of the flesh, without any regard to the glory and happiness of the future state; that the dead must be preferred to the living, when the quiet of the one, and the misery of the other, are observed; and which sense receives confirmation from Ecclesiastes 4:3: otherwise it is a great truth, that the righteous dead, who die in Christ and are with him, are much more happy than living saints; since they are freed from sin; are out of the reach of Satan's temptations; are no more liable to darkness and desertions; are freed from all doubts and fears; cease from all their labours, toil, and trouble; and are delivered from all afflictions, persecutions, and oppressions; which is not the case of living saints: and besides, the joys which they possess, the company they are always in, and the work they are employed about, give them infinitely the preference to all on earth; see Revelation 14:13.
a "Stulte, quid est semnus gelidae nisi mortis imago?" Ovid. Plato in Ciceron. Tuscul. Quaest. l. 1. c. 58. b Iliad. 16. v. 672, 682. Vid. Pausan. Laconica, sive l. 3. p. 195.
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
Verse Ecclesiastes 4:2. Wherefore I praised the dead — I considered those happy who had escaped from the pilgrimage of life to the place where the wicked cease from troubling, and where the weary are at rest.
