Immerse: Poets Full Volume - Flipbook - Page 268
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IMMERSE
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POETS
3:16–4:9
happening now has happened before, and what will happen in the future
has happened before, because God makes the same things happen over
and over again.
I also noticed that under the sun there is evil in the courtroom. Yes, even
the courts of law are corrupt! I said to myself, “In due season God will
judge everyone, both good and bad, for all their deeds.”
I also thought about the human condition—how God proves to people
that they are like animals. For people and animals share the same fate—
both breathe and both must die. So people have no real advantage over the
animals. How meaningless! Both go to the same place—they came from
dust and they return to dust. For who can prove that the human spirit goes
up and the spirit of animals goes down into the earth? So I saw that there
is nothing better for people than to be happy in their work. That is our
lot in life. And no one can bring us back to see what happens after we die.
Again, I observed all the oppression that takes place under the sun. I saw
the tears of the oppressed, with no one to comfort them. The oppressors
have great power, and their victims are helpless. So I concluded that the
dead are better off than the living. But most fortunate of all are those who
are not yet born. For they have not seen all the evil that is done under
the sun.
Then I observed that most people are motivated to success because they
envy their neighbors. But this, too, is meaningless—like chasing the wind.
“Fools fold their idle hands,
leading them to ruin.”
And yet,
“Better to have one handful with quietness
than two handfuls with hard work
and chasing the wind.”
I observed yet another example of something meaningless under the sun.
This is the case of a man who is all alone, without a child or a brother, yet
who works hard to gain as much wealth as he can. But then he asks himself,
“Who am I working for? Why am I giving up so much pleasure now?” It is
all so meaningless and depressing.
Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed.
