Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Ecclesiastes 3:22
Wherefore I perceive that [there is] nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that [is] his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?
22. Wherefore I perceive ] The lesson of a tranquil regulated Epicureanism with its blending of healthy labour and calm enjoyment, is enforced as the conclusion from our ignorance of what comes after death, as before it flowed from the experience of life (ch. Ecc 2:24). Who knows whether we shall even have the power to take cognizance of what passes on earth after we are gone, or what our own state will be, if we continue to exist at all? The feeling was not unknown even to men of a higher faith than the Debater (Psa 30:9; Psa 88:10-12, Isa 38:18).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Ecc 3:22
There is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his own works.
Worldliness: the Epicurean gospel
These words seem to mean that a man had better get all he can, and then enjoy what he has gathered, for that is his share of the worlds good things, and as life is short it is best to spend it as pleasantly as possible. The advice has been often given; it will, I expect, be often given again. We are familiar with it in many forms. Seize the passing day and make it a day of enjoyment. Beauty and brightness, wine and song–make the most of them while you can, for neither you nor they will be long here. This is the sum of many mens idea of life. Whether gross or refined in its outward forms, the idea remains essentially the same. We sometimes speak of it as an Epicurean view, naming it from the Greek philosopher Epicurus. Not that it originated with him, for it is older far; as old, in fact, as human nature. But Epicurus reduced it to a system, gave it form and logical consistency, so as to make it a philosophy. He, too, presented it under its least repulsive features, for he seems to have been personally an estimable man. But nothing, not even genius, can redeem such a mode of thought from reproach, for it is altogether earthly and of the senses. It makes much of the animal element in our nature; ii lives intoxicated with the outward and visible. Yet, for this very reason it has always been popular both in theory and practice, especially in practice. Great numbers have an intense love for the pleasures of sense, though they would shrink from confessing oven to themselves how great a part of their lives these pleasures occupy. But if men have any touch of cultivation, they cannot be content to live the life of unmixed animalism. A sense of dignity, always awakened by thought, protests and rebels. They must take their pleasure with something to qualify its grossness. I know no better type of the class of which I am thinking than King Charles II. No one can compliment the purity of the pleasures in which he indulged. And yet the man of cultivation and refinement flashes out from the very midst of those scenes of revelry. There is an urbanity, a kindliness, a moderation even, which are not without their charms, tie never went to the extremes which injure health and inspire disgust. He was a lover, too, of art and science. If the king spent the evening in banqueting, as he did, he passed the earlier parts of the day in chemical experiments, and other forms of scientific research. Easy in temper, good-natured, self-indulgent, indolent; such is the man. The type of character is common, and it is common partly because it is so popular. Men of such nature are considered good fellows, and treated with boundless indulgence. But these light-hearted men, who seem not so much to sin as to be unconscious of responsibility, are really the poison of social life. They are corrupt and corrupting to others. Of them it is by emphasis true, One sinner destroyeth much good. King Charles lulled the nation into a lazy, voluptuous sleep, the ruin of liberty and progress. And those who, in more private life, repeat his character, will shrink into the shame and remorse of perdition when they are brought face to face with the generous impulses they have blighted, the aspirations they have chocked, and the opening faith and love they have destroyed. Worldliness, however, is a larger fact, and one more widely spread than the conscious pursuit of pleasure. There are men whose lives are most respectable, men at any rate laborious and earnest, whose course is guided at bottom by the Epicurean theory of action. They have a god and a worship whose rites and ceremonies are most exacting. Their deity is money. They worship the power of gold. They hold with Napoleon, that not only every thing but every man has his price, and that there is no door which will not open to a golden key. No doubt there are many facts which suggest such a view and seem to give it support. Money will do many things. It will bring houses, and land, and luxuries. It will secure almost unbounded social influence. And yet there is a limit to its potency. Money is not almighty. Its powers are hedged about by strict limitations. It cannot greatly alter you. The essential self of every man is beyond its sway. Neither can money alter the permanent conditions of well-being. That vice leads to sickness and death, to feebleness of thought and deadened petrifaction of feeling, is a fact which no money can touch. There is a form of worldliness which is even more strange than the love of money. It shows itself in an eager desire for what is called social position. Social display and pretensions are starving bodies and souls, and often plunging men into the vortex of fraudulent crime. Position in society is a good thing, no doubt, but it is not worth having at the price of honour and self-respect. These are different forms assumed by the gospel of worldliness. In a very intelligible sense it is good news, a veritable gospel to the outward or sensuous man; it has the promise of the life that now is. And we need not deny that the promise is redeemed. Give yourself to the world, and the world will probably give itself to you. You may, if you go heartily for it, have pleasure, or wealth, or social honour. Will you, then, accept this gospel of the worldly life? I do not know. Many of you, I am afraid, will. But to me it seems open to the gravest objections. My intellect and my feelings rise in protest against it. Shall I try and tell you why? First, it is a selfish good which is offered to us after all. Worldliness must be selfish, for it is clear that the pursuit of pleasure only becomes possible when we centre our thoughts on self. How will this affect me? is the one question which every event suggests to thought. Accordingly in its more vulgar forms the worldly life disgusts us by a selfishness which is naked and not ashamed. It recommends us coarsely, to take care of number one, as though number one were not, as it is, about the most worthless thing in the universe of being. Or it sings most untunefully about a little pelf to provide for yourself, with a mean-spirited glorying in its purblind limitation of view. The same spirit, in its more refined forms, speaks with contempt of the herd, and wraps itself in a mantle of supercilious pride. Yet a selfish life is essentially a life of misery. By one of those moral paradoxes which are so strange, and yet so beautiful, the only way to happiness is to give up seeking for it and to seek for something better and higher. Go teach the orphan boy to read, or teach the orphan girl to sew; forget your narrow, restless self; let your heart flow out in sympathy with others, and you have taken one step toward inward peace. He who has no love for others will one day cry in vain for others to love him. For love is life, and those who live without it are dead while they live. I object, further, to the gospel of worldliness that it fails to bring satisfaction to those who follow its rules. This is singularly true. The most discontented, unresting class of men in the world are those who give themselves to the pursuit of pleasure on system. As they grow older, they almost always become cynics, as we say–that is, they sneer and snarl at everything and everybody. The emptiness, the vanity, the sham is in the worldlings heart, and he sees other things through the mist of his own thoughts. Depend upon it there is no satisfaction to be had for men in mere pleasure-hunting. And I will tell you why. There is that in our souls which is related to the Infinite and Eternal. We are thirsting after the water of life, though we know it not. The aching void in the worldlings heart is an indirect testimony to the nobleness of his nature. The prodigal would fain have stayed his hunger with the husks that the swine did eat, but a man cannot live on swines food, and that precisely because he is a man. Oh, sirs, there standeth One among you whom ye know not. His face is so marred more than any man, and His form than the sons of men. And yet, oh, blessed Lord, to whom shall we go but unto Thee? Thou, Thou only, hast the words of eternal life. I object, finally, to the gospel of the world as being irreligious. Religion, or the sense of a boundless destiny, is a fact in the nature of man. It is the mightiest fact in his history also. It has built temples, woven creeds, invented ceremonies, animated heroisms, and written itself in a thousand ways upon all human things. You may try to put it down, but it will be too strong for you. What happens when a power or faculty of our nature is forcibly suppressed? I will tell you; men go mad. The oppressed tendency, like the volcanic fires of the earth, smoulders underground till it gathers ungovernable force, and then bursts forth scattering devastation and death. So it is with mans religious nature. Every attempt to keep it down, however it may succeed for a time, only brings it out in the long run in violent and perverted forms. Men try to live on this world and cannot, and then they Lake to revolution and bloodshed, with the worship of some abstraction of liberty or equality, or else they descend into spiritual idiotcy, and finish by turning tables, and finding mighty revelations in raps upon the floor. The superstition of the day is in near relation to its worldliness. I know only one deliverance from either, and that, thank God, is a deliverance from both. It is found in rational spiritual religion, or, as the apostle expresses it, repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. (J. F. Stevenson, LL. B.)
.
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 22. A man should rejoice in his own works] Do not turn God’s blessings into sin by perverseness and complaining; make the best of life. God will sweeten its bitters to you, if you be faithful. Remember this is the state to prepare for glory; and the evils of life may be so sanctified to you as to work for your good. Though even wretched without, you may be happy within; for God can make all grace to abound towards you. You may be happy if you please; cry to God, who never rejects the prayer of the humble, and gives his Holy Spirit to all them that ask him.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
There is nothing better, to wit, for a mans present satisfaction, and the happiness of this life, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; that he comfortably enjoy what God hath given him, and not disquiet himself with cares about future events. He seems to speak this, not in the person of an epicure, but as his own judgment, which also he declareth, Ecc 2:24; 5:18,19; 8:15.
That is his portion; this is the benefit of his labours; he hath no more than he useth, for what he leaveth behind him is not his, but another mans.
Who shall bring him to see what shall be after him? when once he is dead he shall never return into this life to see into whose hands his estate falls, and how it is either used or abused; nor is he at all concerned in those matters.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
22. (Compare Ecc 3:12;Ecc 5:18). Inculcating a thankfulenjoyment of God’s gifts, and a cheerful discharge of man’s duties,founded on fear of God; not as the sensualist (Ec11:9); not as the anxious money-seeker (Ecc 2:23;Ecc 5:10-17).
his portionin thepresent life. If it were made his main portion, it would be”vanity” (Ecc 2:1;Luk 16:25).
for who, c.Ourignorance as to the future, which is God’s “time” (Ec3:11), should lead us to use the present time in the best senseand leave the future to His infinite wisdom (Mat 6:20Mat 6:25; Mat 6:31-34).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Wherefore I perceive that [there is] nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his own works,…. The Targum is, “in his good works”; not as justifying him before God, but as vindicating him before men, from unjust censures and charges: rather the sense is, that this is the wise man’s conclusion, and this his sentiment, upon the whole; that there is nothing better for a man, than cheerfully to enjoy the fruit of his labours; to eat and drink in moderation, freely, joyfully, and thankfully; and make use of his riches, power, and authority, for his own good, the good of his family for the present, and the good of his fellow creatures; see Ec 2:21;
for that [is] his portion; what is allotted to him, and thus enjoyed, is a very good one, and for which he has reason to be thankful;
for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him? to see who shall succeed him, and what use they will make of what he leaves them; he shall never return after death to see anything of this kind, nor shall any acquaint him with it; he shall not be able to know when he is dead what shall befall his sons, whether they will prosper or rio, so Jarchi; wherefore it is best for him to enjoy his substance himself in a comfortable way, and be beneficial to others, and not oppressive to them. The Midrash illustrates it thus,
“who shall bring David to see what Solomon did? and who shall bring Solomon to see what Rehoboam did?”
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
“Thus I then saw that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his works, for that is his portion; for who can bring him to this, that he gains an insight into that which shall be after him?” Hengstenberg, who has decided against the interrog. signification of the twice-repeated in Ecc 3:21, now also explains … , not: What shall become of him after it (his death)? but: What further shall be done after the state in which he now finds himself? Zckler, although rightly understanding both as well as (after him = when he will be separated, or separates from this life, Ecc 7:14; Ecc 9:3; cf. Gen 24:67), yet proceeds on that explanation of Hengstenberg’s, and gives it the rendering: how things shall be on the earth after his departure. But (1) for this thought, as Ecc 6:12 shows, the author had a more suitable form of expression; (2) this thought, after the author has, Ecc 3:21, explained it as uncertain whether the spirit of a man in the act of death takes a different path from that of a beast, is altogether aside from the subject, and it is only an apologetic tendency not yet fully vanquished which here constrains him. The chain of thought is however this: How it will be with the spirit of a man when he dies, who knows? What will be after death is thus withdrawn from human knowledge. Thus it is best to enjoy the present, since we connect together (Ecc 2:24) labour and enjoyment mediated thereby. This joy of a man in his work – i.e., as Ecc 5:18: which flows from his work as a fountain, and accompanies him in it (Ecc 8:15) – is his portion, i.e., the best which he has of life in this world. Instead of , the punctuation is , because is a kindred idea; vid.’ regarding under Ecc 2:22. And is sued, because it is not so much to be said of the living, that he cannot foresee how it shall be with him when he dies, as that he can gain no glimpse into that world because it is an object that has for him no fixity.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
22. Wherefore Seeing, then, that man’s hold is only upon the present, and no one can reveal to him the future, what is left but to enjoy the present, getting from it all the good which it can yield? The point of view now reached is certainly very gloomy and discouraging. It is not, be it remembered, the conclusion of the whole matter. The writer is now not far from the state of mind in which Hamlet utters his sad and beautiful soliloquy: he discusses “the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to,” “the law’s delay,” “to grunt and sweat under a weary life,” with no comfort from any thing after death, that “undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns;” only that Koheleth, instead of being goaded to desperation, takes the wiser counsel of courageous endurance, and cheerful enjoyment of what good so sad a state may yet contain.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Ecc 3:22. Wherefore I perceive, &c. Lastly, I perceived that there is nothing better in the labour of man, than that he should receive pleasure from it; because this is his portion: for who shall bring him back to enjoy what shall be hereafter? This verse contains the third corollary. Since it is not given to men to see what happens after their death, much less to enjoy it, the portion allotted to them by God Almighty can be nothing else in this world than present enjoyment. Consequently we must look to a future life for that enjoyment which is durable, which is eternal.
REFLECTIONS.1st, In a variety of particulars he proceeds to confirm the general truth, that to every thing there is a season.
1. There is a time to be born, and a time to die: every one who is born to natural life, must pass through death: What an argument to animate us to a secure, a happy resurrection!
2. A time to plant; either a tree; or an immortal soul, by the ministry of the word; or a nation, by divine Providence; and a time to pluck up that which is planted; either the tree which is past bearing, or fruitless; or the soul, when its work is done, and it is ripe for glory; or when twice dead, and fuel for the flames of hell; or a nation, when the measure of its iniquities is full, Jer 18:7-10.
3. A time to kill; by divine judgments, or the sword of war, or the sentence of the civil magistrate; and a time to heal, when the affairs of a kingdom, which seemed hastening to ruin, are retrieved.
4. A time to break down; the strength of the body, or the prosperity of a family or nation; and a time to build up: When our private affairs seem most desperate, and the church of God reduced to the most abject state, Jehovah can, as of old, revive the stones of his temple, out of the dust, and bring his faithful ones to prosperity and glory.
5. A time to weep and mourn; when our own, our friends, or the church’s afflictions, call forth our tears; and a time to laugh and dance, when God, bestowing prosperity on our bodies and souls, and on his Zion, requires us to serve him with gladness of heart.
6. A time to cast away stones; when proud palaces and wicked cities are levelled to the ground; and a time to gather stones together, when God raiseth the poor from the dust, and giveth them cities to dwell in.
7. A time to embrace; with conjugal affection, the wife of our bosom, or with warm affection the friend of our heart: and a time to refrain; by choice, for a season, to give ourselves to prayer, see 1Co 7:3-5.; or by necessity, when separated from those who are dear to us, through business, or in times of trouble and persecution.
8. A time to get; when God’s providence blesses, and we enjoy the most favourable opportunities of enriching ourselves with temporal or spiritual good things; and a time to lose, when unforeseen events deprive us of our worldly substance.
9. A time to keep; when our increasing families call for an increasing provision, or when in peace we are permitted to enjoy our possessions; and a time to cast away, when by God’s gift our abundance enables us to supply the wants of the poor; or, for the testimony of a good conscience, we are called upon to suffer the loss of all things.
10. A time to rend; our garments, in token of deep mourning, or in detestation of some atrocious wickedness; and a time to sew, when the cause of our sorrow is removed.
11. A time to keep silence; under afflictive providences, dumb before God, not daring to utter a murmuring word; or in the presence of the wicked, when sometimes it is best to restrain even from God’s word, nor cast our pearls before swine: and a time to speak, when duty calls for our boldness in the cause of God and truth, and true prudence dictates the fit season and proper manner.
12. A time to love; when faithful friendship and mutual regard engage our affections; and a time to hate, when those who behave unsuitably forfeit our regard, and oblige us to treat them with distance, and shun their company.
13. A time of war; in a just cause, when a nation’s wrongs cannot be otherwise redressed; or during our whole lives, whilst our spiritual warfare lasts; and a time of peace, when the end for which the war was undertaken is answered; or at death, when the faithful believer will enter into eternal rest and peace.
Finally, As the inference from this view of the mutable and changing state of the things in which we are engaged, he concludes the unprofitableness and vanity of all our pursuits.No possession is sure to us for an hour; and, instead of expecting our happiness in any creature, we should regard these labours rather as a part of the curse denounced on the first man’s sin, and that God designs, as the word signifies, to afflict and humble us thereby. Note; (1.) This world is not our rest: it was never designed to be so. Man is born in it to sorrow and trouble, as the sparks fly upwards. (2.) Our curse of labour may be made eventually our mercy, as it prevents us from that idleness which would be highly dangerous to our souls, and serves to excite greater longings after that better world, where there remaineth a rest for the people of God.
2nd, In all the changes and vicissitudes that we meet with in this vain world, God’s suffering, permissive, or appointing will must be continually regarded.
1. We must rest assured, that he doth all things well. He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: all the variety in nature, and the turns of Providence, however some things may seem to us undesirable, disjointed, useless, or afflictive, yet are connected in the greatest beauty and harmony, and conspire together to advance God’s glory, and to promote the good of those who love him. He hath set the world in their heart; expanded the volume of nature for our observation; yet, such is the darkness of our fallen minds, that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end. We know at best but in part, and the shallow line of human reason cannot fathom the abyss of his providences. But whatever veil now covers the deep things of God, it will shortly be done away: though we know not now, the faithful shall know hereafter, and for ever admire and adore, the perfection, excellence, and beauty of all his works and ways in creation, providence, and grace, and not a flaw to be found.
2. We must cheerfully acquiesce in our state, whatever it be, and set ourselves diligently to discharge the duties thereof.
[1.] To rejoice in our portion, whether it be less or more, knowing that it exceeds all that we deserve: not sordidly covetous, through fear of future want, to spare what we at present need, but eat and drink what God hath given. And this also must come from his gift, who only can bestow on us the heart to enjoy the good of our labour, without which we may be discontented, unthankful, and pine in the midst of plenty.
[2.] To do good in this life. The time is short, and we should give the greater diligence to improve it; employ the portion which God bestows, in all those works of faith, and labours of love, which our relations in life, the household of faith, and the necessitous in general, call for at our hands; and this is the way to do good to ourselves; for what is thus laid out will turn to our best account hereafter.
[3.] To submit entirely to the divine disposals, and that because necessity is laid upon us. Whatever God doeth, it shall be for ever: to quarrel with his dispensation, is but to kick against the pricks. His determinations cannot be reversed or altered: nor should we wish it, if we knew the wisdom and goodness of all his works and ways. Nothing can be put to it, for his work is perfect; nor any thing taken from it; there is nothing superfluous, or unnecessary, but the whole complete in excellence; so that it is our highest interest, as well as duty, to say, Thy will be done.
[4.] To fear God; all his dispensations of providence and grace being designed to affect our souls with greater reverence of his majesty, to engage us to trust him in every emergency, to fear offending, to be solicitous to please him, and to quicken us in the more diligent use of every means of grace, that we may be enabled for all he doth command, and prepared for whatever he hath prepared for us.
[5.] To acknowledge the steadiness and uniformity of the divine government. The ordinances of heaven, the sun, moon, and stars, perform the same revolutions; the events of providence are exactly similar; that which hath been, is now. Nor may we think the world fuller of crosses or of sin than formerly: that which is to be, hath already been: the same changes will still mark the rolling years; and God requireth that which is past, repeats what he had done before. Let us not, therefore, think our lot hard, or our trials uncommon: in adversity, hope for such a change as Job experienced; in prosperity, rejoice with trembling; and in every state remember the solemn account of our behaviour in it, which we must one day make. This is wisdom.
3rdly, A wicked as well as vain world is this in which we live, and, because of wickedness, made subject to vanity. Left destitute of the fear of God, the whole would be a scene of misery and wretchedness; and it had been preferable to have been a beast, rather than a man.
1. The world is full of oppression: even in the seat of judgment, where righteousness should influence every decree, iniquity often reigns. This Solomon had remarked in his observations on other nations, and perhaps, notwithstanding all his care, could not expel from his own dominions.
2. However judgment may be perverted by men, there is a day coming, when all shall be revised, and justice ministered to every man according to truth; when God will vindicate the cause of the righteous, and condemn the wicked; and the unjust judges must be called to a terrible account for their unrighteous decrees. The time is advancing; it is near: let such as are oppressed with wrong patiently wait for it: the eternal Judge standeth before the door.
3. God, in all his dispensations towards the sons of men in their present state, designs to manifest them; either to separate them, the righteous from the wicked, or, that they might clear God, as the word may be rendered, whose ways are all equal, but ours unequal; (for we have only ourselves to blame;) or, to shew us what a creature man is when left to himself, even like the beasts, stupid, untractable, cruel, and brutish in his appetites. Men and beasts are liable to the same disorders, accidents, and calamities, and are supported by the same providential care. They have the same animal life, preserved by the breath which passes through their nostrils; they lie down together in the dust; (and man, alike subject to vanity, knows no pre-eminence there;) the same putrid corpses, and returning to the same earth from whence they came. Nor is there any visible difference after death concerning their spirits; for, though by the light of revelation we are told that man is immortal; that his soul returns to God to be judged, and receive his eternal doom; yet, who knoweth this? It is not the object of our senses; and I question, whether the reason of fallen man would ever have come to the knowledge of his own immortality, unassisted by traditionary revelation or the scriptures: certain it is, however, that multitudes consider not the difference; they live and die as the beasts that perish.
4. The conclusion that he draws from these observations is, that, since such is man’s present state of wretchedness and vanity, his highest wisdom is to make the best use he can of what he now possesses, for that is his portion; and since he must quickly leave the earth, and all the things therein, and knows not how his successors may prove, he should wisely lay out his substance as is most comfortable to himself, most to God’s glory, and most beneficial to mankind. The whole may teach us, (1.) A very humbling lesson of our present state, and how little reason we have to be proud of any bodily accomplishments, when the putrid carcase of a beast shall be shortly just as amiable. (2.) Since it is in our souls that the great difference lies, to make the concerns of them our greatest care. It is a trivial consideration how we fare in time; the grand object is, to secure our well-being in eternity.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
REFLECTIONS
MY, soul! learn from the solemn observations of the Preacher to enquire, whether in the times and seasons which he saith there are to every purpose under heaven, thou hast found the time of the new birth, and the time of a real death unto sin and a life unto righteousness? Hast thou known the time of the Lord’s planting thee in grace, and thy reaping in mercy? Hast thou marked the season, when the Holy Ghost killed in thee the lusts of the flesh, and taught thee to crucify the affections of it by his power? Are the strong holds of sin broken down, and is the spiritual life of grace in Jesus built up? Hath the Lord given to thee holy seasons of mourning for sin, and refreshing recoveries, by the blood and righteousness of Christ, to make thine heart leap for joy? See, my soul, whether these things are in thy evidences of the new life, and thou hast truly found those changes in the times, and seasons, of a dying world, which is hastening away, and which mark not the life of the ungodly, in their purposes under heaven.
And! blessed Jesus teach me when I see the place of judgment among men, and behold the oppression of thy people often there; teach me to look beyond this state of things, and contemplate thy righteous administration. The time is hastening, when thou wilt come to judge the world in righteousness, and minister true judgment unto the people. At thy tribunal, every cause will be reheard. By thine unerring sentence, true judgment will be administered. And while the unpardoned transgressors may meditate terror for the prospect of this great day, do thou, my soul, hail the Lord’s approach with joy. Yes! righteous Lord, thou wilt come to plead the cause of thine injured people, and to deliver them that are oppressed with wrong. Lift up thine head, O my soul, and frequently meditate thy Lord’s coming. Jesus will assuredly manifest himself in that day to all his people as their brother, while he is their judge; and he who is now their Redeemer, will be their portion and glory forever. Amen.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Ecc 3:22 Wherefore I perceive that [there is] nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that [is] his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?
Ver. 22. Wherefore I perceive. ] He resumeth his assertion, Ecc 3:13 and concludeth. See Ecc 2:24 .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
better. See note on Ecc 2:24. Compare Ecc 11:9.
portion = share, as in Ecc 2:10, i.e. in the present life.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
nothing: Ecc 3:11, Ecc 3:12, Ecc 2:10, Ecc 2:11, Ecc 2:24, Ecc 5:18-20, Ecc 8:15, Ecc 9:7-9, Ecc 11:9, Deu 12:7, Deu 12:18, Deu 26:10, Deu 26:11, Deu 28:47, Rom 12:11, Rom 12:12, Phi 4:4, Phi 4:5
who: Ecc 6:12, Ecc 8:7, Ecc 9:12, Ecc 10:14, Job 14:21, Dan 12:9, Dan 12:10, Dan 12:13, Mat 6:34
Reciprocal: Ecc 2:19 – who knoweth Ecc 9:9 – for
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Ecc 3:22. I perceive there is nothing better For a mans present satisfaction, and the happiness of this life; than that a man should rejoice in his own works That he should comfortably enjoy what God hath given him, and not disquiet himself with cares about future events. He seems to speak this not in the person of an epicure, but as his own judgment, which also he declares, Ecc 2:24; Ecc 5:18-19; Ecc 8:15. For that is his portion This is the benefit of his labours: he hath no more than he uses, for what he leaves behind him is not his, but another mans. For who shall bring him to see, &c. When once he is dead he shall never return to see into whose hands his estate falls, and how it is either used or abused; nor is he at all concerned in those matters.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
3:22 Wherefore I perceive that [there is] nothing better, than that a man should {l} rejoice in his own works; for that [is] his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?
(l) By the often repetition of this sentence as in Ecc 2:24; Ecc 3:12; Ecc 3:22; Ecc 5:17; Ecc 8:15 he declares that man by reason can comprehend nothing better in this life than to use the gifts of God soberly and comfortably: for to know further, is a special gift of God revealed by his Spirit.