Commentary - Ecclesiastes 2:18-26

Bird's-eye view

In this section of Ecclesiastes, the Preacher, Qoheleth, continues his methodical demolition of all human attempts to find ultimate meaning "under the sun." Having tested pleasure and wisdom and found them wanting, he now turns his analytical gaze upon the fruit of his own labor. The problem is not with the work itself, but with its finality, or rather, the lack thereof. The bitter pill he has to swallow is that everything he has built through toil and wisdom must be left behind to another man, and there is no guarantee that this heir will be anything other than a fool who will squander it all. This realization drives him to a profound despair. It is a great evil, a vexing vanity. However, just as the reader is about to be swallowed by this bleak conclusion, Qoheleth pivots. The answer is not to work harder or smarter, but to receive the simple joys of life, eating and drinking and finding satisfaction in one's labor, as a direct gift from the hand of God. This capacity for enjoyment is not a human achievement but a divine grace. The passage thus sets up a stark contrast: the man who strives in his own strength finds only despair, while the man who is good in God's sight receives wisdom, knowledge, and joy as a gift. Life under the sun is either a chasing after wind or a gift to be received, and the difference lies entirely in one's relationship to the Giver.

This is a foundational argument in the book. The world, considered on its own terms, is a closed loop of futility. Labor leads to accumulation, which leads to death, which leads to a transfer of assets to someone who didn't earn them. It's a cosmic joke if you try to make sense of it from the ground up. But Qoheleth introduces God into the equation, not as an abstract concept, but as the active Giver of all good things, including the very ability to enjoy those things. This is the key that unlocks the prison of vanity. The Christian reader sees here a profound pointer to the gospel: our ultimate inheritance is not what we build, but what Christ has built for us, an inheritance that cannot be squandered and is given freely by grace.

Outline

Context In Ecclesiastes

This passage comes at the end of a major section (Eccl 1:12-2:26) where Solomon recounts his personal quest for meaning. He has pursued wisdom (1:12-18), laughter and pleasure (2:1-3), and massive building projects and acquisitions (2:4-11). His conclusion after all this was that "all was vanity and a striving after wind." He then reflected on the ultimate equalizer of death, which comes to the wise man and the fool alike (2:12-17), a thought that caused him to hate life. Our current text flows directly from that hatred of life, focusing the lens specifically on the fruit of his labor. The despair articulated in verses 18-23 is the logical endpoint of a life lived for the stuff of this life. The pivot in verse 24 is therefore crucial for the entire book. It is the first time Qoheleth introduces the "gift of God" as the solution to the problem of vanity, a theme he will return to repeatedly (3:13; 5:19; 8:15; 9:7). This passage, then, serves as the initial presentation of the book's central thesis: meaning is not found by grasping, but by receiving.

Key Issues

The Can and the Can Opener

One of the central truths of this book, and one that is set before us plainly here, is that God's blessings are not a simple, one-part transaction. For the man who is not right with God, the blessings of this life are like thousands of cans of peaches, stacked to the ceiling, but with no can opener. He has the thing, but he does not have the ability to enjoy the thing. He has the wealth, but not the satisfaction. He has the food and drink, but not the gladness of heart. The Preacher's despair comes from looking at the cans. He worked his fingers to the bone to stack them all up, and now he has to leave them to some fool who will probably just knock the whole pile over. This is vanity. This is chasing the wind.

But then he looks up. He realizes that the ability to enjoy the peaches, the gladness of heart, the satisfaction in the labor, is a separate gift. It's the can opener. And God gives the can opener to whom He pleases. This is a truth that cuts straight across our modern sensibilities. We think that if we can just get the can, the enjoyment will come automatically. But it does not. How many miserable rich men are there? How many joyless workaholics? God gives His beloved both the can and the can opener. To those who persist in their sin, He gives the frustrating task of gathering and collecting more and more cans, only to have them handed over to those who have received the grace to enjoy them. This is not a call to passivity, but a call to right priorities. Seek the Giver first, not the gifts, and you may find He gives you both.

Verse by Verse Commentary

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.

The Preacher's logic is relentless. He has already concluded that death makes the wise man's life seem as futile as the fool's, and this made him hate life (2:17). Now he specifies what he hates: his amal, his toil, his wearisome labor. The reason for this hatred is not that the work was unpleasant or that the fruit was meager. Solomon's projects were magnificent. The reason is the problem of succession. All of it, every last vineyard, palace, and gold ingot, must be left behind. The finality of death severs his ownership completely. The phrase "under the sun" is key; it defines the sphere of his investigation. From a purely horizontal, earth-bound perspective, this is an insoluble problem. You can't take it with you.

19 And who knows whether he will be a wise man or a man of simpleminded folly? Yet he will have power over all the fruit of my labor for which I have labored and for which I have acted wisely under the sun. This too is vanity.

This verse sharpens the point of the previous one. Not only must he leave his wealth, but he has no control over the character of the one who receives it. History is filled with examples of diligent fathers who build an empire only to have it squandered by profligate sons. Solomon himself, the wisest man on earth, would be succeeded by his foolish son Rehoboam, who would promptly lose the majority of the kingdom (1 Kings 12). The great irony is that the fool will have "power" or authority over all that the wise man so carefully and skillfully built. The uncertainty of the heir's character renders the entire enterprise absurd from a worldly point of view. This is hebel, a vapor, a puff of smoke. It looks substantial for a moment, but it dissipates into nothing.

20 Therefore I turned my heart to despair of all my labor for which I had labored under the sun.

This is the logical and emotional nadir. Having followed his premise, that meaning must be found in the work itself, to its conclusion, he arrives at utter despair. The Hebrew indicates a decisive turn; he gave his heart over to it. This is not a passing melancholy; it is a settled, philosophical hopelessness based on his observations. If your life's meaning is tied to the permanence of your work's results, and you are honest about the reality of death and the foolishness of heirs, despair is the only rational response. He has looked into the abyss of a world without God's direct, gracious intervention, and it is bleak.

21 When there is a man who has labored with wisdom, knowledge, and skill, then he gives his portion to one who has not labored with them. This too is vanity and a great evil.

He restates the problem for emphasis, but adds a moral dimension. It is not just vanity; it is a "great evil." There is a profound injustice to it. One man applies wisdom, knowledge, and skill, all good things, and the fruit of it all is handed over as a portion to someone who did nothing to earn it. In our fallen world, this happens constantly. But the Preacher sees it as a deep wrongness in the fabric of things. Of course, the gospel turns this on its head. We, who have not labored, are given the portion of the one who labored with perfect wisdom, knowledge, and skill, Jesus Christ. What is a "great evil" under the sun becomes the fountain of all grace when we look to the Son.

22 For what does a man get in all his labor and in the striving of his heart with which he labors under the sun?

This is a rhetorical question, and the implied answer is "nothing of lasting value." He asks what a man's "take home pay" is from all his toil and all the "striving of his heart," which refers to the anxiety, the planning, the mental and emotional energy invested. When you add up all the sweat and all the worry, what is the net profit? From the perspective of "under the sun," the balance sheet comes up empty.

23 Because all his days his endeavor is painful and vexing; even at night his heart does not lie down. This too is vanity.

Not only is the outcome futile, but the process itself is miserable. His days are filled with pain and vexation. The work is hard, the deals go sour, the employees are difficult. And it doesn't stop when the sun goes down. At night, his heart finds no rest. He is consumed by worry about his ventures, his investments, his legacy. This is the portrait of the modern workaholic, driven by an anxiety that never sleeps. The whole process, from the sleepless nights to the foolish heir, is one great puff of smoke.

24 There is nothing better for a man than to eat and drink and have his soul see good in his labor. This also I have seen that it is from the hand of God.

Here is the great pivot. After driving the car of human reason straight into the brick wall of despair, Qoheleth puts it in reverse and turns down a different road entirely. The solution is not found in the future (legacy) but in the present. The highest good a man can achieve is to enjoy the simple, creaturely pleasures of eating and drinking, and to find satisfaction, to "see good," in his work. But this is not a call to hedonism. The crucial, foundational clause is the last one: "it is from the hand of God." The enjoyment is not something we generate; it is something we receive. It is a gift.

25 For who can eat and who can have enjoyment outside of Him?

This is the theological anchor for the previous statement. The question is absolute. Apart from God ("outside of Him"), no one can truly eat, in the sense of taking deep satisfaction in it, or have any real enjoyment. Unbelievers can certainly experience pleasure, but it is a fleeting, surface-level thing, always haunted by the vanity the Preacher has just described. The deep, settled joy in the goodness of God's creation is a capacity that only God can give. To try to enjoy the gifts while ignoring the Giver is to doom oneself to the frustration and despair of the previous verses.

26 For to a man who is good before Him, He has given wisdom and knowledge and gladness, while to the sinner He has given the endeavor of gathering and collecting so that he may give to one who is good before God. This too is vanity and striving after wind.

Qoheleth now draws a sharp distinction based on a man's standing before God. To the one who pleases Him, God gives a three-fold gift: wisdom, knowledge, and gladness. This is the divine "can opener." This man has the spiritual taste buds to enjoy life. In stark contrast, the sinner is given a task: the "endeavor of gathering and collecting." He is a drudge, a workhorse, piling up wealth that he cannot ultimately enjoy. And in a stroke of divine irony, the very purpose of his anxious toil is to accumulate wealth that will eventually be given to the one who is good before God. The Preacher concludes that this whole cycle, from the sinner's perspective, is vanity and a chasing after wind. The sinner is on a treadmill, working hard but going nowhere, while the righteous man is sitting at a feast, enjoying the gifts of his Father.

Application

This passage forces us to ask a very basic question: why do we work? If we are working for a legacy, to build something that will last, to make a name for ourselves, then we are, in the Preacher's terms, shepherding the wind. Our children may be fools. The economy may crash. The company may go bankrupt. Death will certainly take it all from our grasp. To base our identity and meaning on the fruit of our labor is to sign up for a life of anxious toil that ends in despair.

The Christian alternative is to see our work, our food, our drink, our families, and our very breath as gifts from the hand of a good God. The goal is not accumulation but faithful stewardship and grateful enjoyment. This frees us from the soul-crushing burden of having to create our own meaning. Our meaning is secure in Christ. Our inheritance is guaranteed in heaven. Therefore, we are free to work diligently, not out of anxiety, but out of gratitude. We are free to receive a paycheck, a meal, or a cold drink not as our due, but as an unexpected grace, a present from our Father.

This means we must repent of the idolatry of legacy. We must repent of the anxiety that keeps us awake at night, plotting and striving. We must confess that we cannot make ourselves happy and that we do not have the capacity for true joy apart from a gracious gift of the Spirit. We must ask God for the can opener. We must ask Him for the wisdom, knowledge, and gladness that He gives to those who please Him. And how do we please Him? By faith. We please Him when we abandon our own efforts to secure a meaningful life and rest entirely in the finished work of His Son, who labored perfectly on our behalf and who now freely gives us an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading.