Proverbs 30 - Ecclesiastes 2

New International Version - UK

This man’s utterance to Ithiel:

‘I am weary, God,
    but I can prevail.^[a]
2 Surely I am only a brute, not a man;
    I do not have human understanding.
³ I have not learned wisdom,
    nor have I attained to the knowledge of the Holy One.
⁴ Who has gone up to heaven and come down?
    Whose hands have gathered up the wind?
Who has wrapped up the waters in a cloak?
    Who has established all the ends of the earth?
What is his name, and what is the name of his son?
    Surely you know!

⁵ ‘Every word of God is flawless;
    he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.
⁶ Do not add to his words,
    or he will rebuke you and prove you a liar.

⁷ ‘Two things I ask of you, Lord;
    do not refuse me before I die:
⁸ keep falsehood and lies far from me;
    give me neither poverty nor riches,
    but give me only my daily bread.
⁹ Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you
    and say, “Who is the Lord?”
Or I may become poor and steal,
    and so dishonour the name of my God.

¹⁰ ‘Do not slander a servant to their master,
    or they will curse you, and you will pay for it.

¹¹ ‘There are those who curse their fathers
    and do not bless their mothers;
¹² those who are pure in their own eyes
    and yet are not cleansed of their filth;
¹³ those whose eyes are ever so haughty,
    whose glances are so disdainful;
¹⁴ those whose teeth are swords
    and whose jaws are set with knives
to devour the poor from the earth
    and the needy from among the human race.

¹⁵ ‘The leech has two daughters.
    “Give! Give!” they cry.

‘There are three things that are never satisfied,
    four that never say, “Enough!”:
¹⁶ the grave, the barren womb,
    land, which is never satisfied with water,
    and fire, which never says, “Enough!”

¹⁷ ‘The eye that mocks a father,
    that scorns an aged mother,
will be pecked out by the ravens of the valley,
    will be eaten by the vultures.

¹⁸ ‘There are three things that are too amazing for me,
    four that I do not understand:
¹⁹ the way of an eagle in the sky,
    the way of a snake on a rock,
the way of a ship on the high seas,
    and the way of a man with a young woman.

²⁰ ‘This is the way of an adulterous woman:
    she eats and wipes her mouth
    and says, “I’ve done nothing wrong.”

²¹ ‘Under three things the earth trembles,
    under four it cannot bear up:
²² a servant who becomes king,
    a godless fool who gets plenty to eat,
²³ a contemptible woman who gets married,
    and a servant who displaces her mistress.

²⁴ ‘Four things on earth are small,
    yet they are extremely wise:
²⁵ ants are creatures of little strength,
    yet they store up their food in the summer;
²⁶ hyraxes are creatures of little power,
    yet they make their home in the crags;
²⁷ locusts have no king,
    yet they advance together in ranks;
²⁸ a lizard can be caught with the hand,
    yet it is found in kings’ palaces.

²⁹ ‘There are three things that are stately in their stride,
    four that move with stately bearing:
³⁰ a lion, mighty among beasts,
    who retreats before nothing;
³¹ a strutting cock, a he-goat,
    and a king secure against revolt.^[b]

³² ‘If you play the fool and exalt yourself,
    or if you plan evil,
    clap your hand over your mouth!
³³ For as churning cream produces butter,
    and as twisting the nose produces blood,
    so stirring up anger produces strife.’

² Listen, my son! Listen, son of my womb!
    Listen, my son, the answer to my prayers!
³ Do not spend your strength^[c] on women,
    your vigour on those who ruin kings.

⁴ It is not for kings, Lemuel –
    it is not for kings to drink wine,
    not for rulers to crave beer,
⁵ lest they drink and forget what has been decreed,
    and deprive all the oppressed of their rights.
⁶ Let beer be for those who are perishing,
    wine for those who are in anguish!
⁷ Let them drink and forget their poverty
    and remember their misery no more.

⁸ Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves,
    for the rights of all who are destitute.
⁹ Speak up and judge fairly;
    defend the rights of the poor and needy.

² ‘Meaningless! Meaningless!’
    says the Teacher.
‘Utterly meaningless!
    Everything is meaningless.’

³ What do people gain from all their labours
    at which they toil under the sun?
⁴ Generations come and generations go,
    but the earth remains for ever.
⁵ The sun rises and the sun sets,
    and hurries back to where it rises.
⁶ The wind blows to the south
    and turns to the north;
round and round it goes,
    ever returning on its course.
⁷ All streams flow into the sea,
    yet the sea is never full.
To the place the streams come from,
    there they return again.
⁸ All things are wearisome,
    more than one can say.
The eye never has enough of seeing,
    nor the ear its fill of hearing.
⁹ What has been will be again,
    what has been done will be done again;
    there is nothing new under the sun.
¹⁰ Is there anything of which one can say,
    ‘Look! This is something new’?
It was here already, long ago;
    it was here before our time.
¹¹ No one remembers the former generations,
    and even those yet to come
will not be remembered
    by those who follow them.

¹⁵ What is crooked cannot be straightened;
    what is lacking cannot be counted.

¹⁸ For with much wisdom comes much sorrow;
    the more knowledge, the more grief.

¹⁰ I denied myself nothing my eyes desired;
    I refused my heart no pleasure.
My heart took delight in all my labour,
    and this was the reward for all my toil.
¹¹ Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done
    and what I had toiled to achieve,
everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind;
    nothing was gained under the sun.

‘The fate of the fool will overtake me also.
    What then do I gain by being wise?’
I said to myself,
    ‘This too is meaningless.’
¹⁶ For the wise, like the fool, will not be long remembered;
    the days have already come when both have been forgotten.
Like the fool, the wise too must die!