Ecclesiastes 2:25
New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition
25 for apart from him[a] who can eat or who can have enjoyment?
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- 2.25 Gk Syr: Heb apart from me
Ecclesiastes 2:1-12
New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition
The Futility of Self-Indulgence
2 I said to myself, “Come now, I will make a test of pleasure; enjoy yourself.” But again, this also was vanity.(A) 2 I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?”(B) 3 I searched with my mind how to cheer my body with wine—my mind still guiding me with wisdom—and how to lay hold on folly, until I might see what was good for mortals to do under heaven during the few days of their life. 4 I made great works; I built houses and planted vineyards for myself;(C) 5 I made myself gardens and parks and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees.(D) 6 I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. 7 I bought male and female slaves and had slaves who were born in my house; I also had great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem. 8 I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and of the provinces; I got singers, both men and women, and delights of the flesh, many concubines.[a](E)
9 So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem; also my wisdom remained with me.(F) 10 Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them; I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure from all my toil, and this was my reward from all my toil.(G) 11 Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had spent in doing it, and again, all was vanity and a chasing after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.(H)
Wisdom and Joy Given to One Who Pleases God
12 So I turned to consider wisdom and madness and folly, for what can the king’s successor do? Only what has already been done.(I)
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- 2.8 Meaning of Heb uncertain
1 Kings 4:21-24
New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition
21 [a]Solomon was sovereign over all the kingdoms from the Euphrates to the land of the Philistines, even to the border of Egypt; they brought tribute and served Solomon all the days of his life.[b](A)]]
22 Solomon’s provision for one day was thirty cors of choice flour and sixty cors of meal, 23 ten fat oxen and twenty pasture-fed cattle, one hundred sheep, besides deer, gazelles, roebucks, and fatted fowl. 24 For he had dominion over all the region west of the Euphrates,[c] and he had peace on all sides.(B)
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