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Selected Verse: Ecclesiates 6:3 - Strong Concordance
| Verse |
Translation |
Text |
| Ec 6:3 |
Strong Concordance |
If a man [0376] beget [03205] an hundred [03967] children, and live [02421] many [07227] years [08141], so that the days [03117] of his years [08141] be many [07227], and his soul [05315] be not filled [07646] with good [02896], and also that he have no burial [06900]; I say [0559], that an untimely birth [05309] is better [02896] than he. |
| |
King James |
If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he. |
Summary Of Commentaries Associated With The Selected Verse
| A Commentary, Critical, Practical, and Explanatory on the Old and New Testaments, by Robert Jamieson, A.R. Fausset and David Brown [1882] |
| Even if a man (of this character) have very many (equivalent to "a hundred," Kg2 10:1) children, and not have a "stranger" as his heir (Ecc 6:2), and live long ("days of years" express the brevity of life at its best, Gen 47:9), yet enjoy no real "good" in life, and lie unhonored, without "burial," at death (Kg2 9:26, Kg2 9:35), the embryo is better than he. In the East to be without burial is the greatest degradation. "Better the fruit that drops from the tree before it is ripe than that left to hang on till rotten" [HENRY]. |
| Notes on the Bible, by Albert Barnes, [1834] |
| No burial - For a corpse to lie unburied was a circumstance in itself of special ignominy and dishonor (compare the marginal references). |
| Commentary on the Old Testament, by Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch [1857-78] |
| "If a man begat an hundred, and lived many years, and the amount of the days of his years was great, and his soul satisfied not itself in good, and also he had no grave, then I say: Better than he is the untimely birth." The accentuation of 3a is like that of 2a. The disjunctives follow the Athnach, as at Kg2 23:13, only that there Telisha Gedhola stands for Pazer. Hitzig finds difficulty with the clause לו ... וגם־, and regards it as a marginal gloss to 5a, taken up into the text at a wrong place. But just the unexpected form and the accidental nature, more than the inward necessity of this feature in the figure, leads us to conclude that the author here connects together historical facts, as conjecturally noted above, into one fanciful picture. מאה is obviously to be supplemented by (ובנות) בנים; the Targ. and Midrash make this man to be Cain, Ahab, Haman, and show at least in this that they extend down into the time of the Persian kingdom a spark of historical intelligence. שׁן רבּ interchanges with שׁן הר, Ecc 11:8, as at Neh 11:30. In order to designate the long life emphatically, the author expresses the years particularly in days: "and if it is much which (Heiligst.: multum est quod) the days of his years amount to;" cf. ימי ויּהיוּ, in Gen 5. With venaphsho there follows the reverse side of this long life with many children: (1) his soul satisfies not itself, i.e., has no self-satisfying enjoyment of the good (min, as at Psa 104:13, etc.), i.e., of all the good things which he possesses, - in a word, he is not happy in his life; and (2) an honourable burial is not granted to him, but קב חם, Jer 22:19, which is the contrary of a burial such as becomes a man (the body of Artaxerxes Ochus was thrown to the cats); whereupon Elster rightly remarks that in an honourable burial and an honourable remembrance, good fortune, albeit shaded with sadness, might be seen. But when now, to one so rich in children and so long-lived, neither enjoyment of his good fortune nor even this shaded glory of an honourable burial is allowed, the author cannot otherwise judge than that the untimely birth is better than he. In this section regarding the uncertainty of riches, we have already, Ecc 5:14, fallen on a reminiscence from the Book of Job; it is so much the more probable that here also Job 3:16 has an influence on the formation of the thought. נפל is the foetus which comes lifeless from the mother's womb. |
| Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible, by John Wesley [1754-65] |
| With good - He hath not a contented mind and comfortable enjoyment of his estate. Is better - Which as it never enjoyed the comforts, so it never felt the calamities of life. |
| Adam Clarke Commentary on the Whole Bible - Published 1810-1826 |
| If a man beget a hundred children - If he have the most numerous family and the largest possessions, and is so much attached to his riches that he grudges himself a monument; an abortion in the eye of reason is to be preferred to such a man; himself is contemptible, and his life worthless. The abortion comes in with vanity - baulks expectation, departs in darkness - never opened its eyes upon the light, and its name is covered with darkness - it has no place in the family register, or in the chronicles of Israel. This, that hath neither seen the sun, nor known any thing is preferable to the miser who has his coffers and granaries well furnished, should he have lived a thousand years, and had a hundred children. He has seen - possessed, no good; and he and the abortion go to one place, equally unknown, and wholly forgotten. |
35 And they went [03212] to bury [06912] her: but they found [04672] no more of her than [0518] the skull [01538], and the feet [07272], and the palms [03709] of her hands [03027].
26 Surely I have seen [07200] yesterday [0570] the blood [01818] of Naboth [05022], and the blood [01818] of his sons [01121], saith [05002] the LORD [03068]; and I will requite [07999] thee in this plat [02513], saith [05002] the LORD [03068]. Now therefore take [05375] and cast [07993] him into the plat [02513] of ground, according to the word [01697] of the LORD [03068].
9 And Jacob [03290] said [0559] unto Pharaoh [06547], The days [03117] of the years [08141] of my pilgrimage [04033] are an hundred [03967] and thirty [07970] years [08141]: few [04592] and evil [07451] have the days [03117] of the years [08141] of my life [02416] been, and have not attained [05381] unto the days [03117] of the years [08141] of the life [02416] of my fathers [01] in the days [03117] of their pilgrimage [04033].
2 A man [0376] to whom God [0430] hath given [05414] riches [06239], wealth [05233], and honour [03519], so that he wanteth [02638] nothing for his soul [05315] of all that he desireth [0183], yet God [0430] giveth him not power [07980] to eat [0398] thereof, but a stranger [0376] [05237] eateth [0398] it: this is vanity [01892], and it is an evil [07451] disease [02483].
1 And Ahab [0256] had seventy [07657] sons [01121] in Samaria [08111]. And Jehu [03058] wrote [03789] letters [05612], and sent [07971] to Samaria [08111], unto the rulers [08269] of Jezreel [03157], to the elders [02205], and to them that brought up [0539] Ahab's [0256] children, saying [0559],
16 Or as an hidden [02934] untimely birth [05309] I had not been; as infants [05768] which never saw [07200] light [0216].
14 But those riches [06239] perish [06] by evil [07451] travail [06045]: and he begetteth [03205] a son [01121], and there is nothing [03972] in his hand [03027].
19 He shall be buried [06912] with the burial [06900] of an ass [02543], drawn [05498] and cast forth [07993] beyond [01973] the gates [08179] of Jerusalem [03389].
13 He watereth [08248] the hills [02022] from his chambers [05944]: the earth [0776] is satisfied [07646] with the fruit [06529] of thy works [04639].
30 Zanoah [02182], Adullam [05725], and in their villages [02691], at Lachish [03923], and the fields [07704] thereof, at Azekah [05825], and in the villages [01323] thereof. And they dwelt [02583] from Beersheba [0884] unto the valley [01516] of Hinnom [02011].
8 But if a man [0120] live [02421] many [07235] years [08141], and rejoice [08055] in them all; yet let him remember [02142] the days [03117] of darkness [02822]; for they shall be many [07235]. All that cometh [0935] is vanity [01892].
13 And the high places [01116] that were before [06440] Jerusalem [03389], which were on the right hand [03225] of the mount [02022] of corruption [04889], which Solomon [08010] the king [04428] of Israel [03478] had builded [01129] for Ashtoreth [06253] the abomination [08251] of the Zidonians [06722], and for Chemosh [03645] the abomination [08251] of the Moabites [04124], and for Milcom [04445] the abomination [08441] of the children [01121] of Ammon [05983], did the king [04428] defile [02930].