Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Ecclesiastes 10:15
The labor of the foolish wearieth every one of them, because he knoweth not how to go to the city.
15. The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them ] The word for “labour” as in chap. Ecc 1:3; Gen 41:52; Job 3:3, as with our word “travail,” carries with it the connotation of trouble as well as toil. He labours to no result, for he is destitute of common sense. Not to know “the way to the city” is clearly a proverbial phrase for the crassa ignorantia of the most patent facts of experience that lie within all men’s experience. If a man fails to see that, how will he fare in the difficulties which lead him as into the “bye-ways” of life? We are reminded of the saying, attributed, if I remember rightly, to the Emperor Akbar that “None but a fool is lost on a straight road,” or of Shakespeare’s “The ‘why’ is plain as way to parish Church” ( As You Like It, ii. 7).
he knoweth not how to go to the city ] The words probably imply a reminiscence of a childhood not far from Jerusalem as the city of which the proverb spoke. Isaiah’s description of the road to the restored Jerusalem as being such that “the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein” (Isa 35:8) supplies an interesting parallel. The ingenuity of interpreters has, however, read other meanings into the simple words and “the city” has been taken (1) for the city’s ways and customs, its policy and intrigue which the “fool” does not understand, (2) for the city of God, the new Jerusalem, or some ideal city of the wise, while (3) some, more eccentric than their fellows, have seen in it a hit at the Essenes who, like the Rechabites (Jer 35:7), shunned the life of cities and dwelt in the desert country by the Dead Sea.
Woe to thee, O land, when thy king is a child ] The gnomic temper which we have seen in Ecc 10:7 still continues, and passes from the weaknesses of subjects and popular leaders to those of rulers. It is, of course, probable that the writer had a specific instance in his thoughts, but as the Hebrew word for “child” has a wide range including any age from infancy (Exo 2:6; Jdg 13:5) to manhood (Gen 34:19; 1Ki 3:7), it is not easy to fix the reference. In Isa 3:12 a like word appears to be used of Ahaz. The old school of interpreters saw in it Solomon’s prophetic foresight of the folly of Rehoboam (1Ki 12:1-11). One commentator (Hitzig) connects it, with some plausibility, with the reign of Ptolemy Epiphanes who was but fifteen years of age on his father’s accession to the throne (Justin xxx. 2) and whose government, as described by Justin (“ tribunatus, prefecturas et ducatus mulieres ordinabant ”) resembled that painted by Isaiah (Ecc 3:12), the queen mother Agathoclea (see Note on ch. Ecc 7:26) and her brother being the real rulers. Grtz, adapting the words to his theory of the date of the book takes the word child as = servant, and refers it to the ignoble origin of Herod the Great.
thy princes eat in the morning ] The word “eat” is, of course, equivalent to “feast” or “banquet,” and the kind of life condemned is the profligate luxury which begins the day with revels, instead of giving the morning hours to “sitting in the gate” and doing justice and judgment. Morning revelling was looked upon naturally as the extreme of profligacy. So St Peter repudiates the charge of drunkenness on the ground that it was but “the third hour of the day” i. e. 9 a.m. (Act 2:15). So Cicero ( Philipp. ii. 41) emphasizes the fact “ ab hor terti bibebatur.” So Catullus (xlvii. 5)
“Vos convivia lauta sumtuose
De die facitis.”
“Ye from daybreak onward make
Your sumptuous feasts and revelry.”
So Juvenal ( Sat. i. 49) “ Exsul ab octav Marius bibit ” (“In exile Marius from the eighth hour drinks”). So Isaiah (Ecc 5:11) utters his woe against those that “rise up early in the morning that they may follow strong drink.”
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
The sense is: The fool wearies himself with ineffectual attempts, he has not sufficient knowledge for the transaction of ordinary business.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 15. He knoweth not how to go to the city.] I suppose this to be a proverb: “He knows nothing; he does not know his way to the next village.” He may labour; but for want of judgment he wearies himself to no purpose.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Fools discover their folly, as by their words, of which he hath hitherto spoken, so also by their actions, and by their endless and fruitless endeavours after things which are too high and hard for them. For he is ignorant of those things which are most easy and most necessary for him, as of the way to the great city whither he is going, or obliged by his business to go, which being a great and beaten road, is known even to children and natural fools.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
15. labour . . . wearieth(Isa 55:2; Hab 2:13).
knoweth not how to go to thecityproverb for ignorance of the most ordinary matters(Ec 10:3); spiritually, theheavenly city (Psa 107:7;Mat 7:13; Mat 7:14).MAURER connects Ec10:15 with the following verses. The labor (vexation) caused bythe foolish (injurious princes, Ec10:4-7) harasses him who “knows not how to go to the city,”to ingratiate himself with them there. English Version issimpler.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
The labour of the foolish wearieth everyone of them,…. The labour of fools, both in speaking and doing, weary those who have any concern with them, and themselves likewise, since all their labour is vain and fruitless;
because he knoweth not how to go to the city; to any city, the road to which is usually broad, and plain and easy to be found, and yet cannot be found by the foolish man; showing, that he that talks of abstruse things, things too high and wonderful for him, which he affects to know, must needs be a stranger to them, since things the most easy to be understood he is ignorant of, and wearies himself to find; or he does not know how to behave himself in a city, among citizens, in a civil and polite manner. The Targum is,
“he learns not to go to the city, where wise men dwell, to learn instruction from it.”
Some interpret it of the city of Jerusalem, where were the temple, sanhedrim, synagogues, schools, c. but it may be better applied to the heavenly city, the New Jerusalem, which fools or wicked men know not the way unto, nor do they seek after it see Ps 107:7; so Alshech interprets it of heaven.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
“The labour of the foolish wearieth him who knoweth not how to go to the city.” If we do not seek to explain: labour such as fools have wearies him (the fool), then we have here such a synallage numeri as at Isa 2:8; Hos 4:8, for from the plur. a transition is made to the distributive or individualizing sing. A greater anomaly is the treatment of the noun as fem. (greater even than the same of the noun pithgam , Ecc 8:11, which admitted of attractional explanation, and, besides, in a foreign word was not strange). Kimchi, Michlol 10 a, supposes that is thought of in the sense of ; impossible, for one does not use such an expression. Hitzig, and with him Hengst., sees the occasion for the synallage in the discordance of the masc. ; but without hesitation we use the expressions , Mic 5:6, , Jos 6:26, and the like. ‘Amal also cannot be here fem. unitatis (Bttch. 657. 4), for it denotes the wearisome striving of fools as a whole and individually. We have thus to suppose that the author has taken the liberty of using ‘amal once as fem. ( vid., on the contrary, Ecc 2:18, Ecc 2:20), as the poet, Pro 4:13, in the introduction of the Book of Proverbs uses musar once as fem., and as the similarly formed is used in two genders. The fool kindles himself up and perplexes himself, as if he could enlighten the world and make it happy, – he who does not even know how to go to the city. Ewald remarks: “Apparently proverbial, viz., to bribe the great lords in the city.” For us who, notwithstanding Ecc 10:16, do not trouble ourselves any more with the tyrants of Ecc 10:4, such thoughts, which do violence to the connection, are unnecessary. Hitzig also, and with him Elst. and Zckl., thinks of the city as the residence of the rulers from whom oppression proceeds, but from whom also help against oppression is to be sought. All this is to be rejected. Not to know how to go to the city, is = not to be able to find the open public street, and, like the Syrians, 2Ki 6:18., to be smitten with blindness. The way to the city is via notissima et tritissima . Rightly Grotius, like Aben Ezra: Multi quaestionibus arduis se faitgant, cum ne obvia quidem norint, quale est iter ad urbem . is vulgar for . In the Greek language also the word has a definite signification, and Athens is called , mostly without the art. But Stamboul, the name of which may seem as an illustration of the proverbial phrase, “not to know how to go to the city,” is = . Grtz finds here an allusion to the Essenes, who avoided the city – habeat sibi !
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
THE FOOL’S INABILITY TO LABOUR
Verse 15 declares the fool lacks the capacity to labor effectively. He is wearied by failed attempts because he has neither the will nor the knowledge for effectual work or business, Ecc 2:14; Ecc 4:5; Ecc 10:2; Ecc 10:18.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
(15) To go to the city.Evidently a proverbial expression; is not able to find his way on a plain road. (Comp. Isa. 35:8.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
15. Labour of the foolish wearieth Not merely the talk, but the acts of the fool. These all work to his injury. Even the ordinary affairs of life are more than he can do well, much more politic and discreet behaviour under a despotic ruler. A road to town is sure to be plain and well beaten, and so are common duties clear and well defined, but some people will blunder in both.
In dismissing now the character of the fool, of which this book has said so much, it may be said that the amount of space allowed to it in this brief essay is justified by the sad frequency of the character itself. “There be,” says Carlyle, “twenty-seven millions of people in these islands, [Great Britain and Ireland,] most of them Fools.” The fool with Koheleth is not so much lacking in intellect as full of moral perversity. For this the cure revealed is the grace of the Great Physician. This grace, affecting the heart, renovates by degrees the whole nature, and the fool becomes a new man in Christ.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
The Importance Of Listening To The Right Person ( Ecc 10:15-17 ).
Ecc 10:15
‘The effort of fools wearies every one of them, for he does not know how to go to the city.’
‘Them’ is those who listen to him. If we seek advice from a fool, we should not be surprised if we do not get to our destination, or achieve what we are seeking to achieve. Those who seek his advice will be worn down by his explanations and will never get anywhere. For the fool never knows the way to anything important.
‘He does not know how to go to the city.’ This was probably a well known saying indicating ignorance and incompetence.
Ecc 10:16
‘Woe to you, O land, when your king is a child, and your princes feast in the morning.’
It is sad for a land if it has an immature leader and his advisers make merry when they should be dealing with the country’s affairs.
Ecc 10:17
‘Happy are you, O land, when your king is the son of nobles, and your princes feast at the right time, for strength and not for drunkenness.’
In contrast with the previous land this one has a nobler king and advisers who feast at the right time, and in order to strengthen themselves rather than in order to become drunk. The main point behind both is that the motives and behaviour of those in authority should be considered to ensure the right leaders are in power, those who will care for the country and not for themselves.
The Danger Of Sloth And Idleness (Ecc 10:18).
Ecc 10:18
‘By failing to act (slothfulness) the roof sinks inwards, and through idleness of the hands the house leaks.’
This is the negative of the proverb, ‘ a stitch in time, saves nine.’ The failure to act in time often brings disaster, and often it is through laziness. The lazy person cannot be trusted to look after anything important. If we do not look after our property correctly and maintain it properly in time, then we cannot expect the roof to keep us dry.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Ecc 10:15. The labour of the foolish, &c. He will weary himself with foolish labour, not knowing how to go to the city. From the 10th to this verse, Solomon proceeds to shew that such a choice as that mentioned on Ecc 10:7 answers no purpose; as he who employs unfit ministers makes the government heavier to himself, instead of getting any ease, which is the natural design of appointing ministers, or subordinate instruments of government. This is again made out from proverbial sentences, the meaning and application of which to the subject in hand deserves a more particular explanation. The defect of a blunt axe may be in some measure supplied by the strength, and more by the skill of the workman; but it will certainly require greater efforts than would be necessary if that tool had a sharp edge, Ecc 10:10. Likewise the business of the government must be much more difficult for the prince himself, let him be ever so capable, when he makes use of ignorant ministers. Again; it is not enough for a man in place to do no harm; he must do good. Why should the state be at the charge of maintaining a charmer, if that officer, through either neglect or incapacity, does not prevent serpents from being hurtful? Ecc 10:11. Men who have been bred to public affairs are used to speak in such a manner as to ingratiate themselves with the hearers; but he whose education was never intended to fit him for public business will rather make himself unacceptable by his speeches, and involve in his own ruin the affairs with which he is charged, Ecc 10:12. In a council he may talk a great deal at random; but as he has no knowledge in history, nor experience of his own, no one can make him sensible of the bad consequences which are likely to be the result of his measures. If his intentions be right, he will take a great deal of trouble to do good; but all to no purpose, Ecc 10:13-14. He will weary himself, like a man who wants to go to a town, the road to which he is not acquainted with. Wherefore he foolishly walks on, without knowing whether he advances toward his journey’s end, or goes astray from it, Ecc 10:15.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Ecc 10:15 The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them, because he knoweth not how to go to the city.
Ver. 15. The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them. ] While he laboureth in vain, and maketh much ado to little purpose. He meddleth in many things, and so createth himself many crosses; he will needs be full of business, and so must needs be full of trouble, since he wants wit to manage the one and improve the other. “Thou art wearied in the greatness of thy way.” Isa 57:10 And again, “Thou art wearied in the multitude of thy counsels,” Isa 47:13 saith God to such as had “wearied him also with their iniquities, and made him to serve with their sins.” Isa 43:24 Yea, even then, when they think they have done him very good service. Thus Paul, before his conversion, persecuted the saints so eagerly, and was so mad upon it, as himself speaketh, Act 26:11 that, like a tired wolf, wearied in worrying the flock, he lay panting as it were for breath; and when he could do no more, yet “breathed out threatenings.” Act 9:1 Thus Bonner would work himself windless almost in buffeting the martyrs, and whipping them with rods, as he did Mr Bartlet Green, Mr Rough, and many others. a So the philosophers wearied themselves and their followers in their wild disquisitions after, and discourses of tile chief happiness; which, because it lay not in their walk, therefore ab itinere regio deviantes ad illam metropolim non potuerunt pervenire, saith Cassian; wandering from the King of heaven’s highway, they could never be able to get to that metropolitan city, called Jehovahshammah, or “the Lord is there.” Eze 48:35 “They wandered in the wilderness in a solitary way; they found no city to dwell in.” Psa 107:4 Fools many times beat their, wings much, as if they would fly far and high, but with the bustard, b they cannot rise above the earth; or if they do, they are soon pulled down again by the devil to feed upon the worst of excrements, as the lapwing doth, though it hath a coronet on the head, and is therefore fifty made a hieroglyphic of infelicity. c
a Acts and Mon. 1684, 1843.
b A genus of birds ( Otis ) presenting affinities both to the Cursores and the Grallatores or waders; remarkable for their great size and running powers. The great bustard ( Otis tarda ) is the largest European bird, and was formerly common in England, though now extinct, or found only as a rare visitant.
c Pierius.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Ecclesiastes
THE WAY TO THE CITY
Ecc 10:15
On the surface this seems to be merely a piece of homely, practical sagacity, conjoined with one of the bitter things which Ecclesiastes is fond of saying about those whom he calls ‘fools.’ It seems to repeat, under another metaphor, the same idea which has been presented in a previous verse, where we read: ‘If the iron be blunt, and he do not whet the edge, then must he put to more strength; but wisdom is profitable to direct.’ That is to say, skill is better than strength; brain saves muscle; better sharpen your axe than put yourself into a perspiration, hitting fierce blows with a blunt one. The prerogative of wisdom is to guide brute force. And so in my text the same general idea comes under another figure. Immense effort may end in nothing but tired feet if the traveller does not know his road. A man lost in the woods may run till he drops, and find himself at night in the place from which he started in the morning. The path must be known, and the aim clear, if any good is to come of effort.
That phrase, ‘how to go to the city,’ seems to be a kind of proverbial comparison for anything that is very plain and conspicuous, just as our forefathers used to say about any obvious truth, that it was ‘as plain as the road to London town.’ The road to the capital is sure to be a well-marked one, and he must be a fool indeed who cannot see that. So our text, though on the surface, as I say, is simply a sarcasm and a piece of homely, practical sagacity, yet, like almost all the sayings in this Book of Ecclesiastes, it has a deeper meaning than appears on the surface; and may be applied in higher and more important directions. It carries with it large truths, and enshrines in a vivid metaphor bitter experiences which, I suppose, we can all confirm.
I. We consider, first, the toil that tires.
Let us begin at the bottom. For instance, take a man who has avowedly flung aside the restraints of right and wrong and conscience, and does things habitually that he knows to be wrong. Every sin is a blunder as well as a crime. No man who aims at an end through the smoke of hell gets the end that he aims at. Or if he does, he gets something that takes all the gilt off the gingerbread, and all the sweetness out of the success. They put a very evil-tasting ingredient into spirits of wine to prevent its being drunk. The cup that sin reaches to a man, though the wine moveth itself aright and is very pleasant to look at before being tasted, cheats with methylated spirits. Men and women take more pains and trouble to damn themselves than ever they do to have their souls saved. The end of all work, which begins with tossing conscience on one side, is simply this-’The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them.’
Take a step higher-a respectable, well-to-do Manchester man, successful in business. He has made it his aim to build up a large concern, and has succeeded. He has a fine house, carriages, greenhouses; he has ‘J.P.’ to his name; he stands high in credit and on Change. His name is one that gives respectability to anything that it is connected with. Has he ‘come to the city’? Has he got what he thought he would get when he began his career? He has succeeded in his immediate and smaller purpose; has that immediate and smaller purpose succeeded in bringing him what he thought it would bring him? Or has he fallen a victim to those-
‘juggling fiends . . .
That palter with us in a double sense;
That keep the word of promise to the ear,
And break it to the hope?’
I need not remind you of the wonderful variety of metaphor under which that threadbare thought, which yet it is so hard for us to believe and make operative in our lives, is represented to us in Scripture. Just let me recall one or two of them in the briefest way. ‘Why do ye spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which profiteth not?’ ‘They have hewn for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water.’ ‘Their webs shall not become garments.’ That may want a word of explanation. The metaphor is this. You are all like spiders spinning carefully and diligently your web. There is not substance enough in it to make a coat out of. You will never cover yourselves with the product of your own brains or your own efforts. There is no clothing in the spider’s webs of a godless life.
Ah! brother, all these earthly aims which some of my friends listening to me now have for the sole aims of their lives, are as foolish and as inadequate to accomplish that which is sought for by them, as it would be to seek to quench raging thirst by lifting to the lips a golden cup that is empty. Some of us have a whole sideboard full of such, and vary our pursuits according to inclination and task. Some of us have only one such, but they are all empty, and the lip is parched after the cup has been lifted to it as it was before.
II. And so, consider now, secondly, the foolish ignorance that makes the toil tiresome.
There is nothing more tragical than the absence, in the great bulk of men, of anything like deliberate, definite views as to their aim in life, and the course to be taken to secure it. There are two things obviously necessary for success in any enterprise. One is, that there shall be the most definite and clear conception of what is aimed at; and the other, that there shall be a wisely considered plan to get at it. Unless there be these, if you go at random, running a little way for a moment in this direction, and then heading about and going in the other, you cannot expect to get to the goal.
Now, what I want to ask some of my friends here is, Did you ever give ten deliberate minutes to try to face for yourselves, and put into plain words, what you are living for, and how you mean to secure it? Of course I know that you have given thought and planning in plenty to the nearer aims, without which material life cannot be lived at all. I do not suppose that anybody here is chargeable with not having thought enough about how to get on in business, or in their chosen walk of life. It is not that kind of aim which I mean at all; but it is a point beyond it that I want to press upon you. You are like men who would carefully victual a ship and take the best information for their guide as to what course to lie, and had never thought what they were going to do when they got to the port. So you say, ‘I am going to be such-and-such a thing.’ Well, what then? ‘Well, I am going to lay myself out for success.’ Be it commercial, be it intellectual, be it social, be it in the sphere of the affections, or whatever it may be. Well, what then? ‘Well, then I am going to advance in material prosperity, I hope, or in wisdom, or to be surrounded by loving faces of children and those that are dear to me.’ What then? ‘Then I am going to die.’ What then?
It is not till you get to that last question, and have faced it and answered it, that you can be said to have taken the whole sweep of the circumstances into view, and regulated your course according to the dictates of common sense and right reason. And a terribly large number of us live with careful adaptation of means to ends in regard of all the smaller and more immediately to be realised aims of life, but have never faced the larger question which reduces all these smaller aims to insignificance. The simple child’s interrogation which in the well-known ballad ripped the tinsel off the skeleton, and showed war in its hideousness, strips many of your lives of all pretence to be reasonable. ‘What good came of it at the last?’ Can you answer the question that the infant lips asked, and say, ‘This good will come of it at last. That I shall have God for my own, and Jesus Christ in my heart’?
Brother! if I could only get you to this point, that you would take half an hour now to think over what you ought to be, and to ask yourself whether your aims in life correspond to what your aims should be, I should have done more than I am afraid I shall do with some of you. The naturalist can tell when he picks up a skeleton something of the habits and the element of the creature to which it belonged. If it has a hollow sternum he knows it is meant to fly. On your nature is impressed unmistakably that your destiny is not to creep, but to soar. Not in vain does the Westminster Catechism lay the foundation of everything in this, the prime question for all men, ‘What is the chief end of man?’ Ask that, and do not rest till you have answered it.
Then there is another idea connected with this ignorance of my text-viz. that it is the result of folly. Now the words ‘folly’ and ‘foolish’ and ‘foolishness,’ and their opposites, ‘wisdom’ and ‘wise,’ in this Book of Ecclesiastes, as in the Book of Proverbs, do not mean merely dull stupidity intellectually, which is a thing for which a man is to be pitied rather than to be blamed, but they always carry besides the idea of intellectual defect, also the idea of moral obliquity. ‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom’; and, conversely, the absence of that fear is the foundation of that which this writer stigmatises as ‘folly’ He is not merely sneering at men with small brains and little judgments. There may be plenty of us who are so, and yet are wise unto salvation and possessed of a far higher wisdom than that of this world. But he tells us that so strangely intertwined are the intellectual and moral parts of our nature, that wheresoever there is the obscuration of the latter there is sure to be the perversion of the former, and the man knows not ‘how to go to the city’ because he is ‘foolish.’
That is to say, you go wrong in your judgment about your conduct because you have gone wrong morally. And your blunders about life, and your ignorance of its true end and aim, and your mistakes as to how to secure happiness and blessedness, are your own faults, and are owing to the aversion of your nature from that which is highest and noblest, even God and His service. Therefore you are not only to be pitied because you are out of the road, but to be blamed because you have darkened the eyes of your mind by loving the darkness rather than the light. And you ‘do not know how to go to the city,’ because you do not want to go to the city, and would rather huddle here in the wilderness, and live upon its poor supplies, than pass within the golden gates. My brethren! the folly which blinds a man to his true aim and mission in life is a folly which has in it the darker aspect of sin, and is punishable as such.
III. Lastly, note the plain path which the foolish miss.
The principles of moral conduct are trite and obvious. It is plain that it is better to be good than bad. It is better to be unselfish than selfish. It is better not to live for things that perish, seeing that we are going to last for ever. It is better not to make the flesh our master here, seeing that the spirit will have to live without the flesh some day. It is better to get into training for the world to coma, seeing that we are all drifting thither. All these things are plain and obvious.
Man’s destiny for God is unmistakable. ‘Whose image and superscription hath it?’ said Christ about the coin. ‘Caesar’s!’ ‘Then give it to Caesar.’ Whose image and superscription hath my heart, this restless heart of mine, this spirit that wanders on through space and time, homeless and comfortless, until it can grasp the Eternal? Who are you meant for? God! And every fibre of your nature has a voice to say so to you if you listen to it. So, then, a godless life such as some of you, my hearers, are contentedly living, ignores facts that are most patent to every man’s experience. And while before you, huge ‘as a mountain, open, palpable,’ are the commonplaces and undeniable verities which declare that every man who is not a God-fearing man is a fool, you admit them all, and, bowing your heads in reverence, let them all go over you and produce no effect.
The road is clearer than ever since Jesus Christ came. He has shown us the city, for He has brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel. He has shown us the road, for His life is the pattern of all that men ought to aim at and to be. The motto of the eternal Son of God, if I may venture upon such a metaphor, is like the motto of the heir-apparent of the English throne, ‘I serve.’ Lo! ‘I come to do Thy will’-and that is the only word which will make a human life peaceful and strong and beautiful. In the presence of His radiant and solitary perfection, men no longer need to wonder, What is the ideal to which conduct and character should be conformed? And Jesus Christ has come to make it possible to go to the city, by that cross on which He bore the burden of all sin, and takes away the sin of the world, and by that Spirit of life which He will impart to our weakness, and which makes our sluggish feet run in the way of His commandments, and not be weary, and walk and not faint.
Take that dear Lord for your revelation of duty, for your Pattern of conduct, for the forgiveness of your sins, for the Inspirer with power to do His will, and then you will see stretching before you, high up above the surrounding desert, so that no lion nor ravenous beast shall go up there, the highway on which the ransomed of the Lord shall walk, ‘and the wayfaring man, though a fool, shall not err therein.’ ‘Blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may enter in through the gates into the City.’
Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren
labour = toil.
foolish. Hebrew. kesil, as in Ecc 10:2 and Ecc 10:12; not sakal, as in verses: Ecc 10:3, Ecc 10:6, Ecc 10:13, Ecc 3:14.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
labour: Ecc 10:3, Ecc 10:10, Isa 44:12-17, Isa 47:12, Isa 47:13, Isa 55:2, Isa 57:1, Hab 2:6, Mat 11:28-30
because: Psa 107:4, Psa 107:7, Isa 35:8-10, Jer 50:4, Jer 50:5
Reciprocal: Gen 19:11 – that they Job 39:16 – her labour Luk 13:24 – for
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
10:15 The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them, because he knoweth not how to go to the {g} city.
(g) The ignorance and beastliness of the wicked is such that they know not common things, and yet will discuss high matters.