Old Testament · Poetry and wisdom
Ecclesiastes chapter 7
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A good is better than fine , and the day of death better than the day of birth.It’s better to go to a house of mourning than to a house of feasting, because death is where everyone ends up — and the living should take that to .Grief is better than laughter, because when the face is , the heart grows .The heart of the is in the house of mourning, but the heart of is in the house of pleasure.It’s better to listen to a wise person’s than to listen to the of fools.Because the laughter of fools is like crackling under a pot — this too is .Because turns a wise person into a fool, and a corrupts the heart.The end of something is better than its beginning, and is better than .Don’t be quick to get angry in your , because anger in the lap of fools.Don’t say, “Why were the old days better than these?” — because it’s not that makes you ask that.Wisdom is as good as an — an advantage for anyone who .For wisdom is a , just as money is a shelter — but the advantage of is this: wisdom keeps its owner alive.Consider what has done: who can straighten what he has made ?On a good day, it. On a bad day, consider this: God made the one alongside the other, so that no one can what comes next.In my I’ve seen it all: a person destroyed despite their justice, and a person living long despite their corruption.Don’t be , and don’t make yourself excessively wise — why destroy yourself?Don’t be , and don’t be a fool — why die before your time?It’s good to hold onto one without letting go of the other. The person who God will navigate both.Wisdom gives a wise person more than ten in a city.There is certainly no one on earth so just that they always do good and never .Also, don’t pay attention to everything people say — otherwise you might hear your own cursing you.Because your own knows that you too have others many times.I all of this with wisdom. I said, “I will be wise” — but it was .What exists is far off and — who can find it?I turned my heart to know, to explore, and to seek out wisdom and — and to understand that is foolishness, and foolishness is .And I find something more bitter than death: the woman who is a — her heart is a net, her hands are chains. The one who God escapes her, but the one who gets caught.“Look,” says the , “this is what I found, adding one thing to another to find —““what I keep searching for but haven’t found: I found, but a woman among all of them I did not find.”Only this have I found: God made , but they have chased after endless .