Ecclesiastes 5:17 Commentary and Bible Study

The words ‘eateth in darkness’ tells us the verse is a figure: namely, that he gets a lot of sorrow out of being rich. Even though he may be rich, his riches have failed to deliver what they promised when he first set out to obtain them. They brought along with them so much sorrow and loss. How many live their entire lives in darkness? They never understand the true purpose of life. Even while they remain in the world and before they have to leave all behind, little can be said for their quality of life. They eat, they sustain life from day to day to the extent that they remains physically alive, but it is mere existence; it is simply offsetting the evil day when they must pass from this world never to return. Eating stands here for all satisfaction that a man obtains from this material world. It can scarcely be called life in the fullest sense for it is life without hope and without meaning. It is life lived as if we were animals with no eternal soul. What is the point of maintaining such an empty life? Yet our instincts for self-preservation will not allow us to do anything else. Life which ought to be a joy and which ought to contain its own pleasure becomes a burden. This is what the man without God calls life, because he has never experienced anything better to compare it with.