Ecclesiastes 1:12-18

Common English Bible

The Teacher’s quest

¹²I am the Teacher. I was king over Israel in Jerusalem.

¹³I applied my mind to investigate and to explore by wisdom all that happens under heaven. It’s an unhappy obsession that God has given to human beings.

¹⁴When I observed all that happens under the sun, I realized that everything is pointless, a chasing after wind.

¹⁵What’s crooked can’t be straightened;
what isn’t there can’t be counted.

¹⁶I said to myself, Look here, I have grown much wiser than any who ruled over Jerusalem before me. My mind has absorbed great wisdom and knowledge. ¹⁷But when I set my mind to understand wisdom, and also to understand madness and folly, I realized that this too was just wind chasing.

¹⁸Remember:
In much wisdom is much aggravation;
the more knowledge, the more pain.

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