Ecclesiastes 4:3

Yes, happier than the dead or the living seemed he who has not ever been, who has not seen the evil which is done under the sun.

Bible in Basic English

In The King James Version

Yea, better is he than both they, which hath not yet been, who hath not seen the evil work that is done under the sun.

In Context

2So my praise was for the dead who have gone to their death, more than for the living who still have life.

4And I saw that the cause of all the work and of everything which is done well was man's envy of his neighbour. This again is to no purpose and a desire for wind.

Read all of Ecclesiastes 4

Cross References

Job 3:16Or as a child dead at birth I might never have come into existence; like young children who have not seen the light.

Job 10:18Why then did you make me come out of my mother's body? It would have been better for me to have taken my last breath, and for no eye to have seen me,

Ecclesiastes 1:14I have seen all the works which are done under the sun; all is to no purpose, and desire for wind.

Ecclesiastes 6:3If a man has a hundred children, and his life is long so that the days of his years are great in number, but his soul takes no pleasure in good, and he is not honoured at his death; I say that a birth before its time is better than he.

Jeremiah 9:2If only I had in the waste land a night's resting-place for travellers, so that I might go away, far from my people! for they are all untrue, a band of false men.

Matthew 24:19But it will be hard for women who are with child and for those with babies at the breast in those days.

Matthew Henry on Ecclesiastes 4:2-4

The Prevalence of Oppression. 1 So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they had no comforter. 2 Wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive. 3 Yea, better is he than both they, which hath not yet been, who hath not seen the evil work that is done under the sun. Solomon had a large soul ( 1 Kings… Read the whole commentary →

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