Ecclesiastes 5:15 Commentary and Bible Study

Many believe the myth that we will have made a net gain at the end of life. How much enthusiasm could a man muster for a task which resulted in no gain? Yet there is a very simple calculation we can do which says that if we start with nothing and we end with nothing then we have gained nothing. Even a single day’s work which brings no gain is regarded as a very evil day. How much worse is an entire lifetime’s labour after which we have no more than we started with? Man cannot work without a reward, therefore the fact that he spends his entire life in arduous labour shows that he believes that he will obtain a reward, that there will be some gain from all his labour, but his belief in this reward is an act of self-delusion.It is so obvious that there is no material gain from life, and yet so dull are we that the self-evident must be spelled out and repeated again and again. We come into the world naked, with the skin with which God has covered us. Clothes which are considered a basic minimum to life and respectability have to be added, and though the body laid in the grave may be wrapped, those wrappings remain in this world and we take nothing with us. If we cannot even take the clothes that cover our nakedness with us, then far less can we take any of the treasures we have accrued in life. On our deathbed, we may be shown a statement of the millions we have in the bank, and we may hold in our hands silver, gold and precious stones, but we have no power to transport them into the next world with us. After the soul has departed our goods remain here. This is true, not just for some, but for all who have ever lived. It is not as if there is a slim chance that in the case of a small minority, it may be possible to take a few things with them out of this world. There has never been a single exception to this rule in the history of the world. What madness and self-delusion then to proceed through life on a different assumption!