Ecclesiastes 1:14

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Ecclesiastes 1:12–16 · Berean Standard Bible

12 I, the Teacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem.

13 And I set my mind to seek and explore by wisdom all that is done under heaven. What a heavy burden God has laid upon the sons of men to occupy them!

14 I have seen all the things that are done under the sun, and have found them all to be futile, a pursuit of the wind.

15 What is crooked cannot be straightened, and what is lacking cannot be counted.

16 I said to myself, “Behold, I have grown and increased in wisdom beyond all those before me who were over Jerusalem, and my mind has observed a wealth of wisdom and knowledge.”

Hebrew words

Data created by STEPBible.org based on work at Tyndale House Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).

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Cross-references

The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge lists these related verses. Scripture text comes from the Berean Standard Bible.

Ecclesiastes 1:17

So I set my mind to know wisdom and madness and folly; I learned that this, too, is a pursuit of the wind.

Ecclesiastes 1:18

For with much wisdom comes much sorrow, and as knowledge grows, grief increases.

Ecclesiastes 2:11

Yet when I considered all the works that my hands had accomplished and what I had toiled to achieve, I found everything to be futile, a pursuit of the wind; there was nothing to be gained under the sun.

Ecclesiastes 2:17

So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. For everything is futile and a pursuit of the wind.

Ecclesiastes 2:26

To the man who is pleasing in His sight, He gives wisdom and knowledge and joy, but to the sinner He assigns the task of gathering and accumulating that which he will hand over to one who pleases God. This too is futile and a pursuit of the wind.

1 Kings 4:30

Solomon’s wisdom was greater than that of all the men of the East, greater than all the wisdom of Egypt.

1 Kings 4:31

He was wiser than all men—wiser than Ethan the Ezrahite, and wiser than Heman, Calcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol. And his fame spread throughout the surrounding nations.

1 Kings 4:32

Solomon composed three thousand proverbs, and his songs numbered a thousand and five.

Psalms 39:5

You, indeed, have made my days as handbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing before You. Truly each man at his best exists as but a breath. Selah

Psalms 39:6

Surely every man goes about like a phantom; surely he bustles in vain; he heaps up riches not knowing who will haul them away.