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Ecclesiastes 6

6 Sadly, I have also observed the opposite happen to people during their lives. This lamentable part of life is deeply distressing and difficult to accept. 2 God sometimes makes people so immensely wealthy and well-respected that they have everything that they could want. Yet, sometimes God does not allow these people to enjoy those good things that their wealth provides. Instead, someone outside their family acquires their wealth and enjoys it fully. Yet, even still, money remains as fleeting and insubstantial as the fading mist of my breath. It is gut-wrenching and lamentable that this can happen to people.

3 Someone could, hypothetically, father innumerable children and live an extraordinarily long life. No matter how long his life might be—even if he were to go on living forever—if he never allows himself to enjoy the wonderful parts of his remarkable life, I would consider the life of a baby who dies when it is still in its mother's womb to be more desirable than this man's miserable life. 4 True, this unfortunate baby's life was as fleeting and brief as the fading mist of breath, and it died in the dark of its mother's womb, never having seen the light of the sun. The baby's parents were never able to name their child before it died, so that the child's brief life will be only a sad memory in the future. 5 The stillborn baby did not even live to experience life outside of its mother's womb, under the light of the sun. Yet neither did it have to feel the burden of understanding just how difficult life can be. So, despite how awful its brief life was, the stillborn baby ultimately found more peace and contentment during its life than that miserably successful man. 6 His life would not improve even if, miraculously, that man were to go on living for two thousand years. He, like every human being, only ever endured the painful parts of life, but he never enjoyed the good parts of his remarkable life. Truthfully, the man's life will come to an end just as inevitably as the stillborn baby's, and both of them eventually experience death—just like every human being. 7 It is like people say:

“Everyone works hard merely to satiate their appetites,

but no one ever truly satisfies their deepest and most desperate cravings.”

8 Consider this: Living wisely does not seem any more able than living foolishly to keep a person from suffering and inevitably dying. In the same way, knowing how to conduct oneself wisely and successfully does not seem to substantially lengthen or improve the life of someone who is poor. 9 It is like people also say:

“It is better to enjoy the things that one already has

than to allow one's never-ending, impulsive desire to inform one's decisions.”

10 Before anything happens, God has already declared what it should be. It is evident to everyone that human beings are merely mortal. So, it is pointless to complain to God about the parts of life that we dislike. Humans are not all-powerful or all-knowing, like God is! 11 It sometimes seems as if our complaints about life only produce more words that are as fleeting and insubstantial as the fading mist of my breath. This does not appear to benefit anyone. 12 Certainly, I wonder whether anyone can truly know what he ought to do during his limited lifetime. People live for only a short time, and their lives seem as fleeting and insubstantial as the fading mist of one's breath. Indeed, God has designed human life so that it lasts only briefly, just like a passing shadow. Moreover, God seems to want human beings to be ignorant about what might happen to them tomorrow.

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