Ecclesiastes 1:6 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Ecclesiastes 1:6
The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits.
wind · definite article + noun, common feminine singular absolute
goeth
הוֹלֵךְ֙ho.leKh
H1980
to walk (in a great variety of applications · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
south
דָּר֔וֹםda.Rom
H1864
the south · noun, common masculine singular absolute
about
וְסוֹבֵ֖בve.so.Vev
H5437
to revolve · conjunction + verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
north
צָפ֑וֹןtza.Fon
H6828
properly · noun, common feminine singular absolute
continually
הוֹלֵ֣ךְho.Lekh
H1980
to walk (in a great variety of applications · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
wind
הָרֽוּחַha.Ru.ach
H7307
wind · definite article + noun, common feminine singular absolute
again
שָׁ֥בshav
H7725
to turn back (hence · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
circuits
סְבִיבֹתָ֖יוse.vi.vo.Tav
H5439
(as noun) a circle · noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
John 3:8 The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is ever…
Ecclesiastes 11:5 As thou knowest not what is the way of the spirit, nor how the bones do grow in the womb of her that is with child: even so thou knowest not…
Job 37:9 Out of the south cometh the whirlwind: and cold out of the north.
Job 37:17 How thy garments are warm, when he quieteth the earth by the south wind?
Psalms 107:25 For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof.
Psalms 107:29 He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still.
Jonah 1:4 But the LORD sent out a great wind into the sea, and there was a mighty tempest in the sea, so that the ship was like to be broken.
Matthew 7:24 Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Ecclesiastes 1:4-8
To prove the vanity of all things under the sun, and their insufficiency to make us happy, Solomon here shows, 1. That the time of our enjoyment of these things is very short, and only while we accomplish as a hireling his day. We continue in the world but for one generation, which is continually passing away to make room for another, and we are passing with it. Our worldly possessions we very lately had from others, and must very shortly leave to others, and therefore to us they are vanity; they can be no more substantial than that life which is the substratum of them, and that is but a vapour, which appears for a little while and then vanishes away. While the stream of mankind is continual…
according to his circuits--that is, it returns afresh to its former circuits, however many be its previous veerings about. The north and south winds are the two prevailing winds in Palestine and Egypt.
John Gill on Ecclesiastes 1:6
The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north,.... The word "wind" is not in this clause in the original text, but is taken from the next, and so may be rendered, "it goeth towards the south", &c. that is, the sun (x) before mentioned, which as to its diurnal and nocturnal course in the daytime goes towards the south, and in the night towards the north; and as to its annual course before the winter solstice it goes to the south, and before the summer solstice to the north, as interpreters observe. And the Targum not only interprets this clause, but even the whole verse, of the sun, paraphrasing the whole thus,
"it goes all the side of the south in the daytime, and goes r…
"It goeth to the south, and turneth to the north; the wind goeth ever circling, and the wind returneth again on its circuits." Thus designedly the verse is long-drawn and monotonous. It gives the impression of weariness. שׁב may be 3rd pret. with the force of an abstract present, but the relation is here different from that in 5a, where the rising, setting, and returning stand together, and the two former lie backwards indeed against the latter; here, on the contrary, the circling motion and the return to a new beginning stand together on the same line; שׁב is thus a part., as the Syr. translates it. The participles represent continuance in motion. In Ecc 1:4 the subjects stand foremost, bec…
The Church Fathers
According to the narrative he calls the sun wind, due to the speed of its movement.
"It goes to the South and rotates to the North; turning, revolving, the wind goes and returns upon its circuits." From this we are able to believe that the sun approaches the meridian quarter in the time of winter, and in the summer is near to the Great Bear, and does not commence its movements in the equinox of autumn, but when the west wind is blowing in the time of spring, when all things give birth. But he actually says "turning, revolving, the wind goes and returns upon its circuits" as if he calls the sun itself a breath, like an animal that breathes and lives, completing its annual orbit in its course, just like the poet Vergil says: "Meanwhile the sun flies around the great year" [Aeneid 3.284] and elsewhere [Vergil Georg. 2. 402.] "and the year flies through its own footsteps" or that bright sphere of the moon and Titan's star: "The breath nourishes within: and the intelligence stirs the whole mass infused through the limbs, and mingles itself with the mighty body" [Vergil Aeneid, 6. 726-7.]. He is not speaking about the annual course of the sun, but its daily path. For it proceeds sidelong and towards the North, and thus turns to the East. Another meaning of this verse is: when the sun moves to the South it is closer to the Earth; when it moves to the North it is raised to higher orbits. Perhaps therefore it moves to those parts, which are compressed together by the cold of atmospheric disturbances, and of winter. Severe heat indeed blazes out from the North above the Earth, and that sun is closer to righteousness than those men who in fact live in the Northern region, and who are deprived of summer's heat. The sun then moves far away and turns by its circuits to the place whence it set out. For when it has subdued all things to it and illuminated all things with its rays, let there be the first restoration and "God may be all in all". [I Cor. 15, 28.] Symmachus interpreted this phrase saying, 'it goes to the meridian, and turns around to the North; turning the wind goes, and the wind returns by those routes by which it had come around'.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Circuit — The apparent diurnal revolution of the sun round the earth (Ps. 19:6), and the changes of the wind (Eccl. 1:6). In Job 22:14, “in the circuit of heaven” (R.V. marg., “on the vault of heaven”) means…
Covetousness · General scriptures concerning — General scriptures concerning
Judgment · ACCORDING TO OPPORTUNITY AND WORKS — ACCORDING TO OPPORTUNITY AND WORKS
Meteorology And Celestial Phenomena · 9:7;26:7,8,11;27:20,21;28:24-27;29:19;36:27-33;37:6-22;38:8-11,22,24-29,31-35,37; — 9:7;26:7,8,11;27:20,21;28:24-27;29:19;36:27-33;37:6-22;38:8-11,22,24-29,31-35,37;
Wind, The · Variable nature of — Variable nature of
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Generations come and go, and individual lives seem to pass away without significance.
Rashi on Ecclesiastes 1:6
The wind. The sun’s desire,27Ordinarily רוח means wind, but because the “sun” is the subject of this verse, Rashi defines רוח as “desire” or “will,” i.e., the sun’s desire. (Sifsei Chachomim) talent in O.F., as in, “toward wherever there was the will הָרוּחַ to go.”28Yechezkeil 1:12.
And upon its circuits [the wind] returns. Also tomorrow, the entire circuit and encircling that it went around yesterday, it encircles and goes around today.29The expression הולך [goes] is used for moving toward the south [symbolic of wisdom] and סובב [goes round, circles] is used for moving toward the north [symbolic of wealth]. הולך denotes going without purpose whereas סובב implies a determined action. Kohel…
