a day (as the warm hours) · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
eateth
יֹאכֵ֑לyo.Khel
H398
to eat (literally or figuratively) · verb, qal imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
darkness
בַּחֹ֣שֶׁךְba.Cho.shekh
H2822
the dark · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
much
הַרְבֵּ֖הhar.Beh
H7235
to increase (in whatever respect) · verb, hiphil infinitive absolute
sorrow
וְכָעַ֥סve.kha.'As
H3707
to trouble · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
wrath
וָקָֽצֶףva.Ka.tzef
H7110
a splinter (as chipped off) · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular absolute
sickness
וְחָלְי֥וֹve.chal.Yo
H2483
malady · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular 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
Psalms 127:2 It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.
Genesis 3:17 And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying…
1 Kings 17:12 And she said, As the LORD thy God liveth, I have not a cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse: and, behold, I…
2 Kings 1:2 And Ahaziah fell down through a lattice in his upper chamber that was in Samaria, and was sick: and he sent messengers, and said unto them,…
2 Kings 1:6 And they said unto him, There came a man up to meet us, and said unto us, Go, turn again unto the king that sent you, and say unto him, Thus…
2 Kings 5:27 The leprosy therefore of Naaman shall cleave unto thee, and unto thy seed for ever. And he went out from his presence a leper as white as sn…
2 Chronicles 16:10-12 Then Asa was wroth with the seer, and put him in a prison house; for he was in a rage with him because of this thing. And Asa oppressed some…
2 Chronicles 24:24-25 For the army of the Syrians came with a small company of men, and the LORD delivered a very great host into their hand, because they had for…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Ecclesiastes 5:9-17
Solomon had shown the vanity of pleasure, gaiety, and fine works, of honour, power, and royal dignity; and there is many a covetous worldling that will agree with him, and speak as slightly as he does of these things; but money, he thinks, is a substantial thing, and if he can but have enough of that he is happy. This is the mistake which Solomon attacks, and attempts to rectify, in these verses; he shows that there is as much vanity in great riches, and the lust of the eye about them, as there is in the lusts of the flesh and the pride of life, and a man can make himself no more happy by hoarding an estate than by spending it.
I. He grants that the products of the earth, for the support and…
eateth--appropriately put for "liveth" in general, as connected with Ecc 5:11-12, Ecc 5:18.
darkness--opposed to "light (joy) of countenance" (Ecc 8:1; Pro 16:15).
wrath--fretfulness, literally, "His sorrow is much, and his infirmity (of body) and wrath."
John Gill on Ecclesiastes 5:17
All his days also he eateth in darkness,.... To all that has been said is added another evil, that attends such whose hearts are inordinately set on riches; that all their days, throughout the whole of their lives, they live a most uncomfortable life; for eating is here put for their whole manner of living: such not only eat coarse bread, and very mean food of any sort, but wear sordid apparel, and live in a poor cottage, in a very obscure and miserable manner. Aben Ezra understands it literally of the night, to which time such a man defers eating, that he might lose no time in his labour; and that it might not be seen what sort of food he eats, and how sparingly, and that others might not e…
"Also all his life long he eateth in darkness and grieveth himself much, and oh for his sorrow and hatred!" We might place Ecc 5:16 under the regimen of the שׁ of שׁיע of Ecc 5:15; but the Heb. style prefers the self-dependent form of sentences to that which is governed. The expression Ecc 5:16 has something strange. This strangeness disappears if, with Ewald and Heiligst., after the lxx and Jerome, for יאכל we read ואכל: καὶ ἐν πένθει; Bttch. prefers ואפל, "and in darkness." Or also, if we read ילך for יאכל; thus the Midrash here, and several codd. by Kennicott; but the Targ., Syr., and Masora read יאכל. Hitzig gets rid of that which is strange in this passage by taking כּל־ימיו as accus…
The Church Fathers
"So what I have seen to be good is that it is suitable to eat and drink and enjoy pleasure with all one's labour that he toils beneath the sun during the brief span of his life that God has given him, for that is his lot. Furthermore, every man to whom God has given riches and possessions and has given him the power to enjoy them, possess his share and be happy in his work: this is the gift of God. For he shall remember that the days of his life are not many, while God provides him with the joy of his heart." This is in comparison to him, who consumes his wealth in the darkness of his worries, and carries those things which are about to die throughout the great tedium of his life, and says that that man is better, who enjoys what he has. For here there is but a small desire of enjoyment, but there in the latter indeed there is a great magnitude of worries. He also gives the reasons why the gift of God is to be able to enjoy riches. Since "he will not remember much of the days of his life". For God turns him to the happiness of his heart's desire: he will not be sad, he will not be worried by thought, since he is led away by happiness and desire for present things. But it is better understood as according to the apostle [Cf I Cor. 10, 2-4.], seen as spiritual food and spiritual drink which is given by God and I understood to see goodness in all of his toil, since we are only able to consider true good things with great toil and enthusiasm. For what is permitted to be good, though, until Christ appears in our life, is not yet openly considered good. And therefore God will not remember much of the days of our life. We should also note that here "perispasmos" is used in a better way, in the place of the occupation of the spirit and true happiness.
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
Darkness · Illustrative of: Heavy afflictions — Illustrative of: Heavy afflictions
Riches · General scriptures concerning — General scriptures concerning
Sickness · The wicked: Have much sorrow, with — The wicked: Have much sorrow, with
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).
Working simply to gain possessions is like working for the wind; it leads to being frustrated, discouraged, and angry.
Rashi on Ecclesiastes 5:17
For one to eat and drink and to enjoy the good. To engage in Torah [study],22Rashi is consistent with the Midrash Aggadah he cited in 8:15 below, “that all mention of ‘eating and drinking’ in Koheles refers only to the study of Torah.” which is a good doctrine; but he should not accumulate much wealth, rather he should rejoice with the portion given him, for that is his portion.
