1 A good name is better than oil of great price, and the day of death than the day of birth.
A good name is more to be desired than great wealth, and to be respected is better than silver and gold.
So my praise was for the dead who have gone to their death, more than for the living who still have life.
For to me life is Christ and death is profit. But if I go on living in the flesh--if this is the fruit of my work--then I do not see what decision to make. I am in a hard position between the two, having a desire to go away and be with Christ, which is very much better:
We are without fear, desiring to be free from the body, and to be with the Lord.
So while a meal was going on, the Evil One having now put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to be false to him,
And not one of these got the good things of the agreement, though they all had a good record through faith,
For we are conscious that if this our tent of flesh is taken down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal, in heaven.
Do not be glad, however, because you have power over spirits, but because your names are recorded in heaven.
The upright man goes to his death, and no one gives a thought to it; and god-fearing men are taken away, and no one is troubled by it; for the upright man is taken away because of evil-doing, and goes into peace. They are at rest in their last resting-places, every one going straight before him.
I will give to them in my house, and inside my walls, a place and a name better than that of sons and daughters; I will give them an eternal name which will not be cut off.
Dead flies make the oil of the perfumer give out an evil smell; more valued is a little wisdom than the great glory of the foolish.
The light of the eyes is a joy to the heart, and good news makes the bones fat.
There the passions of the evil are over, and those whose strength has come to an end have rest.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Ecclesiastes 7
Commentary on Ecclesiastes 7 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 7
Solomon had given many proofs and instances of the vanity of this world and the things of it; now, in this chapter,
Ecc 7:1-6
In these verses Solomon lays down some great truths which seem paradoxes to the unthinking part, that is, the far greatest part, of mankind.
Ecc 7:7-10
Solomon had often complained before of the oppressions which he saw under the sun, which gave occasion for many melancholy speculations and were a great discouragement to virtue and piety. Now here,
Ecc 7:11-22
Solomon, in these verses, recommends wisdom to us as the best antidote against those distempers of mind which we are liable to, by reason of the vanity and vexation of spirit that there are in the things of this world. Here are some of the praises and the precepts of wisdom.
Ecc 7:23-29
Solomon had hitherto been proving the vanity of the world and its utter insufficiency to make men happy; now here he comes to show the vileness of sin, and its certain tendency to make men miserable; and this, as the former, he proves from his own experience, and it was a dear-bought experience. He is here, more than any where in all this book, putting on the habit of a penitent. He reviews what he had been discoursing of already, and tells us that what he had said was what he knew and was well assured of, and what he resolved to stand by: All this have I proved by wisdom, v. 23. Now here,