1 I said to myself, |Come now, I will test you with pleasure. So enjoy yourself.| And behold, it too was futility.
2 I said of laughter, |It is madness,| and of pleasure, |What does it accomplish?|
3 I explored with my mind [how] to stimulate my body with wine while my mind was guiding [me] wisely, and how to take hold of folly, until I could see what good there is for the sons of men to do under heaven the few years of their lives.
4 I enlarged my works: I built houses for myself, I planted vineyards for myself;
5 I made gardens and parks for myself and I planted in them all kinds of fruit trees;
6 I made ponds of water for myself from which to irrigate a forest of growing trees.
7 I bought male and female slaves and I had homeborn slaves. Also I possessed flocks and herds larger than all who preceded me in Jerusalem.
8 Also, I collected for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces. I provided for myself male and female singers and the pleasures of men-- many concubines.
9 Then I became great and increased more than all who preceded me in Jerusalem. My wisdom also stood by me.
10 All that my eyes desired I did not refuse them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart was pleased because of all my labor and this was my reward for all my labor.
11 Thus I considered all my activities which my hands had done and the labor which I had exerted, and behold all was vanity and striving after wind and there was no profit under the sun.
12 So I turned to consider wisdom, madness and folly; for what [will] the man [do] who will come after the king [except] what has already been done?
13 And I saw that wisdom excels folly as light excels darkness.
14 The wise man's eyes are in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. And yet I know that one fate befalls them both.
15 Then I said to myself, |As is the fate of the fool, it will also befall me. Why then have I been extremely wise?| So I said to myself, |This too is vanity.|
16 For there is no lasting remembrance of the wise man [as] with the fool, inasmuch as [in] the coming days all will be forgotten. And how the wise man and the fool alike die!
17 So I hated life, for the work which had been done under the sun was grievous to me; because everything is futility and striving after wind.
18 Thus I hated all the fruit of my labor for which I had labored under the sun, for I must leave it to the man who will come after me.
19 And who knows whether he will be a wise man or a fool? Yet he will have control over all the fruit of my labor for which I have labored by acting wisely under the sun. This too is vanity.
20 Therefore I completely despaired of all the fruit of my labor for which I had labored under the sun.
21 When there is a man who has labored with wisdom, knowledge and skill, then he gives his legacy to one who has not labored with them. This too is vanity and a great evil.
