The words of the teacher, son of David, king in the city of the Peaceful One – Jerusalem. Nothingness multiplied by nothingness equals nothingness is the teacher’s conclusion about life.

WHAT does one gain from one’s sweat in life?

Generation comes and goes, but the earth remains forever.

The sun rises, sets, and hurries back to where it had risen.

The wind travels eastward and makes a detour northward – it travels in a circuit; it always returns to its starting point.

All streams flow to the sea, yet the sea is not full – the waters find their way back to where they came from.

All about life is toil – it is beyond man – man cannot control it: The eye always desires more and the ear is never satisfied.

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new in life.

Or, does anything happen that one can call “New”? No, it has happened in the past – in the days before us.

As people today do not have a record of past happenings, people who are coming after will not have a record of things that are going to happen today.

I, the preacher, as king over Israel, in the city of the Peaceful One - Jerusalem,

gave my attention to finding out, by wisdom, all that is done under the sky – the painful toil that God has given man to be occupied with.

I viewed all the activities of man in life and found out that everything is meaningless – a chasing after the wind.

What is crooked cannot be made straight; what is lacking cannot be counted.

I said to myself, “I have become great – I am more intelligent than all who were in the city of the Peaceful One - Jerusalem - before me; yes, I had great regard for skill and knowledge.”

I concentrated on discerning between wisdom or knowledge and madness or folly. I discovered that this is also the chasing of wind.

With much skill is much sorrow; also, as knowledge increases, grief increases.