Chapter 2:2 Mirth (gladness), pleasure, laughter and even wine. He even said that ‘laughter’ was madness and accomplished nothing. The word ‘laughter’ indicates superficial fun. ‘Mirth’ is probably more thoughtful and joyful. You may know my views on wine and alcohol (my book ‘Alcohol thriller or killer’) and I’m not going to go into that subject, save to say, that Solomon will tell you “It doesn’t work”. Solomon says that he even searched his heart, not just a casual drink but a deep seated searching as to how to gratify his flesh with wine and concludes that it was folly.
He also tries to find satisfaction and fulfilment in property and fine buildings, beautiful gardens, silver and gold, musical instruments, singers, servants (2:4,7,8), fine luxurious things (2:8) These were not casual passing things but involved planning and effort on his part in preparing gardens, having flocks, taking on servants and amassing riches, taking taxes to fill his treasury, and having musical instruments of all kinds (we make do with radio, mobile phone, MP3 players etc but he had the real thing – a full orchestra!). He made his works great – even improving his environment (to use an ‘in-word’).
These are described as things ‘under the sun’, things of the world. All are vanity, worthless, like grasping for the wind which we could never take hold of. It seemed that every part of life suffered from this emptiness (vanity of vanities). Jesus expressed a similar thought, “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” (Mark 8:36)
Solomon concludes that he became great and excelled more than all who were before him in Jerusalem (v9). I don’t think that he was being proud, just stating the obvious. He had become renowned across the nations for his wisdom and why not? Remember God had given him his wisdom and there is none greater than that.
Remember that because Solomon asked for wisdom and not riches, God gave him everything else in addition so he could have whatever he wanted and he did (v9-11). He also enjoyed his work and the fruits of it (his reward from all his labour). However, he still saw that it was all meaningless and had no profit. It seems that Solomon probably becomes a backslider – denoted by the number of times he refers to “I” – count how many times in chapter 2 (33). “Then I looked upon all the works that my hands had done, and on the labour in which I had toiled; And indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 2:11). His conclusion was all to do with ‘I’ and it was utterly meaningless.
Verses 12-17 bring us to the certainty of death and that he can take nothing with him. Who will succeed him and what profit will one achieve? Solomon is searching again for wisdom, madness and folly. What’s new? Seems that he is becoming somewhat morose. He’s already told us that there is nothing new under the sun so a king is in no different situation to anyone else, prince or pauper, the same event happens to them all: Whether a fool or a king who was the wisest of all, they all die. He even asks the question, why he was more wise? The wise dies as does the fool, they all die, there is no difference. No one remembers a wise person or a fool and all that is now will be forgotten in the future. Solomon came to even hate life because all that was done to achieve satisfaction in life was worthless and grasping for the wind.
As we said before, one could be excused for thinking that life is not worth living and we should simply give up and die, but there is another view as we shall see when we include God in our search for happiness and success.
Solomon hated all his toil (v18-23) because he couldn’t take anything with him to the next life and he had to leave it to someone else who might not value it and misuse or waste it. I’m reminded of the story when someone died, ‘such and such a body died, how much did he leave? The answer was ‘everything’. He was concerned that it could be seen that all he had done would be wasted and whether his toil was in vain. He seems to become depressed and in despair. The very thought that he might leave all his work and wealth to someone who turned out to be a fool seemed to trouble him and consequently his despair was well founded, because after Solomon’s death, Rehoboam turned out to be a fool in many ways (1 Kings 12, 1 Kings 14:21-31).
“Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor. This also, I saw, was from the hand of God. For who can eat, or who can have enjoyment, more than I?” (v24,25)
We’ve heard this before, haven’t we? ‘Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we….’ ‘Live for the moment’. I gather this is repeated several times in this book. It seems that he reaches the point that we should just make the best of it. He seems to have lost all thought of the future. Isn’t this what a person of the world, who is without God, can only do. How meaningless can life become? Some even work hard, do good, have fun and even try to be kind. They may even do wrong which they think is fine so long as they don’t get caught. This is very much in mould of hedonism – a person who believes that the pursuit of pleasure is the most important thing in life, a pleasure-seeker. They have no thought for eternity.
Solomon believes that this also, was from the hand of God. It is interesting that he still believes in God but it seems to be very superficial and as G.C.Morgan said, ‘Materialism becomes fatalism.’ There was no excuse for Solomon not having the best. In his circumstances he could have everything he wanted, he was rich beyond imagination.
God gives wisdom, knowledge and joy to good men recognised as such by God. Being good does, of course, not earn us salvation, because we see that God gives the work of gathering and collecting to the sinner so that he may give to him who is good. This is also meaningless and achieves very little (v26). Salvation is solely through repentance and faith in The Lord Jesus Christ and not good works. We should do good works whether we are saved or not. The basis of all good works is the Ten Commandments which is God’s blueprint for living, but keeping them, whilst they are the best rules for life, is not enough for salvation.
