Ecclesiastes 1:3
What profit hath man of all his labour wherewith he laboureth under the sun?
Darby Translation
In The King James Version
What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?
In Context
2Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities! all is vanity.
4[One] generation passeth away, and [another] generation cometh, but the earth standeth for ever.
Cross References
Ecclesiastes 2:11Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labour that it had cost me to do [them]; and behold, all was vanity and pursuit of the wind, and there was no profit under the sun.
Ecclesiastes 2:22For what will man have of all his labour and of the striving of his heart, wherewith he hath wearied himself under the sun?
Ecclesiastes 4:3and more fortunate than both is he who hath not yet been, who hath not seen the evil work that is done under the sun.
Ecclesiastes 5:16And this also is a grievous evil, that in all points as he came so doth he go away, and what profit hath he, in having laboured for the wind?
Ecclesiastes 6:12For who knoweth what is good for man in life, all the days of his vain life which he spendeth as a shadow? for who can tell man what shall be after him under the sun?
Ecclesiastes 8:15And I commended mirth, because there is nothing better for man under the sun than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry; for that shall abide with him of his labour the days of his life, which God hath given him under the sun.
Matthew Henry on Ecclesiastes 1:2-4
Ecclesiastes We are still among Solomon's happy men, his happy servants, that stood continually before him to hear his wisdom; and they are the choicest of all the dictates of his wisdom, such as were more immediately given by divine inspiration, that are here transmitted to us, not to be heard, as by them, but once, and then liable to be mistaken or forgotten, and by repetition to lose their beauty, but to be read, reviewed, revolved, and had in everlasting remembrance. The account we have of Solomon's apostasy… Read the whole commentary →