The Money Trap

¹Guard your steps when you go to God’s house; for to draw near to listen is better than to give the sacrifice of fools, for they don’t know that they do evil.

²Don’t be rash with your mouth, and don’t let your heart be hasty to utter anything before God; for God is in heaven, and you on earth. Therefore let your words be few.

³For as a dream comes with a multitude of cares, so a fool’s speech with a multitude of words.

⁴When you vow a vow to God, don’t defer to pay it; for he has no pleasure in fools. Pay that which you vow.

⁵It is better that you should not vow, than that you should vow and not pay.

⁶Don’t allow your mouth to lead you into sin. Don’t protest before the messenger that this was a mistake. Why should God be angry at your voice, and destroy the work of your hands?

⁷For in the multitude of dreams there are vanities, as well as in many words; but you must fear God.

⁸If you see the oppression of the poor, and the violent taking away of justice and righteousness in a district, don’t marvel at the matter, for one official is eyed by a higher one, and there are officials over them.

⁹Moreover the profit of the earth is for all. The king profits from the field.

¹⁰He who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver, nor he who loves abundance, with increase. This also is vanity.

¹¹When goods increase, those who eat them are increased; and what advantage is there to its owner, except to feast on them with his eyes?

¹²The sleep of a laboring man is sweet, whether he eats little or much; but the abundance of the rich will not allow him to sleep.

¹³There is a grievous evil which I have seen under the sun: wealth kept by its owner to his harm.

¹⁴Those riches perish by misfortune, and if he has fathered a son, there is nothing in his hand.

¹⁵As he came out of his mother’s womb, naked shall he go again as he came, and shall take nothing for his labor, which he may carry away in his hand.

¹⁶This also is a grievous evil, that in all points as he came, so shall he go. And what profit does he have who labors for the wind?

¹⁷All his days he also eats in darkness, he is frustrated, and has sickness and wrath.

¹⁸Behold, that which I have seen to be good and proper is for one to eat and to drink, and to enjoy good in all his labor, in which he labors under the sun, all the days of his life which God has given him; for this is his portion.

¹⁹Every man also to whom God has given riches and wealth, and has given him power to eat of it, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labor—this is the gift of God.

²⁰For he shall not often reflect on the days of his life, because God occupies him with the joy of his heart.

¹There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it is heavy on men:

²a man to whom God gives riches, wealth, and honor, so that he lacks nothing for his soul of all that he desires, yet God gives him no power to eat of it, but an alien eats it. This is vanity, and it is an evil disease.

³If a man fathers a hundred children, and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but his soul is not filled with good, and moreover he has no burial, I say that a stillborn child is better than he;

⁴for it comes in vanity, and departs in darkness, and its name is covered with darkness.

⁵Moreover it has not seen the sun nor known it. This has rest rather than the other.

⁶Yes, though he live a thousand years twice told, and yet fails to enjoy good, don’t all go to one place?

⁷All the labor of man is for his mouth, and yet the appetite is not filled.

⁸For what advantage has the wise more than the fool? What has the poor man, that knows how to walk before the living?

⁹Better is the sight of the eyes than the wandering of the desire. This also is vanity and a chasing after wind.

¹⁰Whatever has been, its name was given long ago; and it is known what man is; neither can he contend with him who is mightier than he.

¹¹For there are many words that create vanity. What does that profit man?

¹²For who knows what is good for man in life, all the days of his vain life which he spends like a shadow? For who can tell a man what will be after him under the sun?