Ecclesiastes Chapter Nine, What Awaits

Ecclesiastes 9:1 For I considered all this in my heart, so that I could declare it all: that the righteous and the wise and their works are in the hand of God. People know neither love nor hatred by anything they see before them.

Chapter nine continues the thoughts the preacher is forming regarding the work of God and the labor of man from the previous chapter. In the concluding verses, he asserts that he applied his heart to understand, only to ascertain that God’s work is beyond man’s comprehension. Though even the greatest men search to understand, it will always remain beyond him. This culminates with the declaration of verse 1, stating that the preacher considered all of this in his heart.

The idea of considering in his heart or applying his heart (from Ecclesiastes 8:16) implies deep meditation. Not Eastern meditation, mind you. There is a distinct and profound difference. Eastern meditation tends to gravitate toward the concept of emptying oneself of thoughts; so that meditation is a trance-like state with as little cognitive, willful thought as possible. Conversely, Biblical meditation is the opposite in execution and effect. In the Psalms you occasionally read the Hebrew term Selah, such as in Psalm 20:3. The term is employed 75 times in the OT, nearly every single instance in the book of Psalms. The idea behind its expression is to pause and consider what has been said. Haste makes waste, especially in light of reading Scripture. We want to develop a slow, reasonable, even methodical way of searching God’s word. We pause and think about what has been said, how it applies to the overall themes of Scripture and how we may apply it in our lives.

Biblical meditation encourages ponderance of God’s word and its application. For that the reader requires patient understanding and a desire to permit the Holy Spirit to explain His word as we read through the Bible, connecting the great themes within. This is akin to what the preacher is referring to when he speaks about considering in his heart. Furthermore, he does so in order to declare all that he has acquired by wisdom, observation, and deduction. What has the preacher ultimately reached in terms of understanding?

First, he couples together the righteous and the wise. This makes sense. Only the wise (as Scripture defines wisdom) may be righteous. Why? Because the Bible makes it clear that enduring wisdom, or genuine, godly wisdom only descends from above, given by God. “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned,” 1 Corinthians 2:14. In the previous verse Paul explains to the Corinthian church that the wisdom he imparts is, “not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches,” 1 Corinthians 2:13. The natural man (a euphemism for the unsaved man) possesses what may be called natural wisdom, or the wisdom of this world. They cannot possess godly wisdom until one is saved, his spirit reborn by the Spirit of God and made new. This is why the preacher says the righteous (someone justified by God through faith) is tantamount to one of the wise. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge,” Proverbs 1:7.

Of such people he adduces that their works are in God’s hands. Indeed, the whole of their lives and ultimate destiny are in God’s hands, since the righteous are His children. “The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms,” Deuteronomy 33:27. God exists forever, and His support for His saints, represented by His arms, never expires. He never tires, or lets go. We are His, and He is ours.

The latter portion of the verse proves a little more difficult. The ESV renders this passage, “Whether it is love or hate, man does not know; both are before him.” The NIV concludes the verse by stating, “but no one knows whether love or hate awaits them.” The Septuagint is rendered, “yea, there is no man that knows either love or hatred, though all are before their face.” The idea here seems to be a lack of discrimination when it comes to discerning what is, or what is coming. Verse 2 corroborates this concept by continuing the thought: “All things come alike to all,” Ecclesiastes 9:2. Without delving too deeply here, the preacher continues to hammer home the notion that men will experience love or hate indiscriminately on earth, as it seems to be the nature of human existence under the sun. This he acknowledges, even while he notes that the righteous will be in God’s hands.

The preacher considered it with the intention of declaring all. Part of what he declared happened to be that people will not be certain what awaits them in life, and with what intent it is brought into their life. Though man may see, he does not know. We have a limited and flawed glimpse of the brief future. Simply by looking down the street I may see things to come, quite literally. But the stranger walking by, or the passengers in a car, I know nothing of them, though I see them. People always act, interact, and react with intent, no matter how ridiculous or difficult the intent may be for the recipient or observer to comprehend it. This passage and its larger meaning leads directly into a morbid passage that begins with verse 2, which we will discuss in due time, God willing.