Ecclesiastes 1:17
And I gave my heart to getting knowledge of wisdom, and of the ways of the foolish. And I saw that this again was desire for wind.
Bible in Basic English
In The King James Version
In Context
18Because in much wisdom is much grief, and increase of knowledge is increase of sorrow.
Cross References
Psalms 73:16When my thoughts were turned to see the reason of this, it was a weariness in my eyes;
Ecclesiastes 2:3I made a search with my heart to give pleasure to my flesh with wine, still guiding my heart with wisdom, and to go after foolish things, so that I might see what was good for the sons of men to do under the heavens all the days of their life.
Ecclesiastes 2:11Then I saw all the works which my hands had made, and everything I had been working to do; and I saw that all was to no purpose and desire for wind, and there was no profit under the sun.
Ecclesiastes 3:19Because the fate of the sons of men and the fate of the beasts is the same. As is the death of one so is the death of the other, and all have one spirit. Man is not higher than the beasts; because all is to no purpose.
Ecclesiastes 6:9What the eyes see is better than the wandering of desire. This is to no purpose and a desire for wind.
Ecclesiastes 7:25I gave my mind to knowledge and to searching for wisdom and the reason of things, and to the discovery that sin is foolish, and that to be foolish is to be without one's senses.
Matthew Henry on Ecclesiastes 1:13-18
Vanity of Human Wisdom. 12 I the Preacher was king over Israel in Jerusalem. 13 And I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven: this sore travail hath God given to the sons of man to be exercised therewith. 14 I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit. 15 That which is crooked cannot be made straight: and that which is wanting cannot be numbered. 16 I communed with mine own heart, saying, Lo, I am… Read the whole commentary →