In the morning sow your seed, and in the evening don’t withhold your hand; for you don’t know which will prosper, whether this or that, or whether they both will be equally good.
Parallel Translations
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In the morning sow your seed, and in the evening don’t withhold your hand; for you don’t know which will prosper, whether this or that, or whether they both will be equally good.
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In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good.
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In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thy hand; for thou knowest not which shall prosper, whether this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good.
Cross-references (14)
Passages linked to Ecclesiastes 11:6 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- 2 Corinthians 9:10-11 Now may he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food, supply and multiply your seed for sowing, and increase the fruits of your righteousness, you being enriched in everything to all generosity, which produces thanksgiving to God through us.
- Isaiah 55:10 For as the rain comes down and the snow from the sky, and doesn’t return there, but waters the earth, and makes it grow and bud, and gives seed to the sower and bread to the eater;
- Haggai 1:6-11 You have sown much, and bring in little. You eat, but you don’t have enough. You drink, but you aren’t filled with drink. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm, and he who earns wages earns wages to put them into a bag with holes in it.” This is what Yahweh of Armies says: “Consider your ways. Go up to the mountain, bring wood, and build the house. I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified,” says Yahweh. “You looked for much, and, behold, it came to little; and when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why?” says Yahweh of Armies, “Because of my house that lies waste, while each of you is busy with his own house. Therefore for your sake the heavens withhold the dew, and the earth withholds its fruit. I called for a drought on the land, on the mountains, on the grain, on the new wine, on the oil, on that which the ground produces, on men, on livestock, and on all the labor of the hands.”
- Hosea 10:12 Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap according to kindness. Break up your fallow ground; for it is time to seek Yahweh, until he comes and rains righteousness on you.
- 2 Corinthians 9:6 Remember this: he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. He who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
- Zechariah 8:11-12 But now I will not be to the remnant of this people as in the former days,” says Yahweh of Armies. “For the seed of peace and the vine will yield its fruit, and the ground will give its increase, and the heavens will give their dew; and I will cause the remnant of this people to inherit all these things.
- John 4:36-38 He who reaps receives wages and gathers fruit to eternal life; that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this the saying is true, ‘One sows, and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap that for which you haven’t labored. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”
- 1 Corinthians 3:5-7 Who then is Apollos, and who is Paul, but servants through whom you believed, and each as the Lord gave to him? I planted. Apollos watered. But God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase.
- Haggai 2:17-19 I struck you with blight, mildew, and hail in all the work of your hands; yet you didn’t turn to me,’ says Yahweh. ‘Consider, please, from this day and backward, from the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, since the day that the foundation of Yahweh’s temple was laid, consider it. Is the seed yet in the barn? Yes, the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, and the olive tree haven’t produced. From today I will bless you.’ ”
- 2 Timothy 4:2 preach the word; be urgent in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort with all patience and teaching.
- Mark 4:26-29 He said, “God’s Kingdom is as if a man should cast seed on the earth, and should sleep and rise night and day, and the seed should spring up and grow, though he doesn’t know how. For the earth bears fruit: first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. But when the fruit is ripe, immediately he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.”
- Ecclesiastes 9:10 Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work, nor plan, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in Sheol, where you are going.
- Ecclesiastes 9:1 For all this I laid to my heart, even to explore all this: that the righteous, and the wise, and their works, are in the hand of God; whether it is love or hatred, man doesn’t know it; all is before them.
- Acts 11:20-21 But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who, when they had come to Antioch, spoke to the Hellenists, preaching the Lord Jesus. The hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number believed and turned to the Lord.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (15 sources)
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain Be not weary of well doing.
Be not weary of well doing.
That is, which of thy works are most agreeable to God.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Ecc 11:6 In the morning sow thy seed, and…
Ecc 11:6 In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they both [shall be] alike good.
Ver. 6. In the morning sow thy seed, &c.] At all times be ready to every good work, {Tit 3:1} as the bee is abroad as soon as ever the sun breaks forth. Sow mercy in the morning, sow it likewise in the evening, as those bountiful Macedonians did, to the shame of those richer but harder Corinthians, sending once and again to Paul’s necessities. {2Co 8:3 Php 4:16} Oh, sow much and oft of this unfailable seed into God’s blessed bosom, the fruit whereof you are sure to reap at your greatest need. Men may be thankful, or they may not, Perraro grati reperiuntur, saith Cicero: it is ten to one if any cured leper turn again to give thanks. But "God is not unrighteous to forget your labour of love in ministering to his saints." {Heb 6:10} Haply you may not sow and reap the same day, as the widow of Sarepta did: haply the seed may lie underground some while, and not be quickened except it die; but have patience, nothing so sure as a crop of comfort to those that are duly merciful. Up therefore and be doing, lose no time, slip no season; it is but a morning and an evening, one short day of life wherein we have to work, and to advance your blessedness. Sow therefore continually: blessed is he that "soweth beside all waters." Blessed Bradford held that hour lost wherein he had not done some good with his hand, tongue, or pen. {a} Titus remembering one day that he had done no good to any one, cried out, Amici, diem perdidi. Friends, I have wasted a day. And again, Hodie non regnavimus. Today we were not the master. We have lost a day, &c. This was that Titus that never sent any suitor away with a sad heart, and was therefore counted and called Humani generis deliciae, the darling of mankind, the people’s sweetheart. The senate loaded him with more praises when he was dead than ever they did living and present.
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{a} Acts and Mon.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain In the morning, and in the evening; early and…
In the morning, and in the evening; early and late, in all seasons and occasions; do it speedily and continually, be not weary of it. Sow thy seed; do all good works, and especially that of almsgiving, as sowing is understood, 2Co 9:6; Gal 6:7.
Withhold not thine hand from working or giving.
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Whether shall prosper; which shall prosper most, as the next clause explains it; the positive degree being put for the comparative, or the superlative, which is not unusual in the Hebrew text. Which shall best answer thine end, or do most good to others, or which shall tend most to the comfort of thy great and last account; for thy morning alms may possibly be given to an unworthy person, or to one who did not need it, and will abuse it, and thy evening alms may fall upon a person of eminent worth, yea, upon an angel in human shape, which is remembered as a motive to hospitality, Heb 13:2, or upon one in extreme necessity, who might possibly have perished both in soul and body, if thou hadst not comforted and relieved him: or one time thou mayst give with more sincere intention, and with more tender compassion, than another time, and so one will be more right and more acceptable to God than the other.
Alike good; equally successful to the receiver, or to the giver.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain In the morning sow thy seed,.... Do all good…
In the morning sow thy seed,.... Do all good works early and diligently, which is expressed by sowing in righteousness, Hos 10:12; particularly alms deeds, often signified by sowing seed, Psa 112:9, Co2 9:6; this should be in the morning of youth, that persons may be inured to it betimes as Obadiah was; and in the morning of prosperity, as soon as ever Providence smiles on men, and puts it into the power of their hands, who should honour the Lord with the firstfruits of their increase;
and in the evening withhold not thine hand; from sowing seed, from doing good, particularly acts of charity, in the evening of old age, as Jarchi, like old Barzillai; an age in which men are apt to be more tenacious and covetous, and withhold more than is meet; yea, in the evening of adversity do not leave off doing good as much as can be; but do as the Macedonian churches, whose deep poverty abounded to the riches of their liberality in a great trial of affliction, Co2 8:2; in short, good is to be done at all times, as opportunity offers, throughout the whole of life, and in all conditions and circumstances;
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for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that; the seed sown in the morning or in the evening, which good work shall best succeed; therefore do both, try all ways, make use of all opportunities;
or whether they both shall be alike good; acceptable to God, and useful to men; and if so, a man will have no occasion to repent of what he has done both in youth and old age.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain In the morning - Early and late, in all…
In the morning - Early and late, in all seasons and occasions; do it speedily and continually, be not weary of it. Sow - Do all good works. With-hold not - From working or giving.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 6. In the morning sow thy seed] Be…
Verse 6. In the morning sow thy seed] Be ready at all times to show mercy; begin in the morning, continue till the evening. Thou knowest not the most worthy object; it is enough that God knoweth; and if thy motive be good, he will applaud and reward thee; not according to the worthiness or unworthiness of the object of thy charity, but according to the motive which induced thee to relieve him.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Ecc 11:6. In the morning — Early and late,…
Ecc 11:6. In the morning — Early and late, in all seasons, and on all occasions; do it speedily and continually: be not weary of it. Sow thy seed — Do all good works, especially that of alms-giving, as sowing means, 2Co 9:6; Gal 6:7. In the evening withhold not thy hand — From working, or giving. For thou knowest not whether shall prosper — Which shall prosper most; which shall best answer thine end, or do most good to others; or which shall tend most to the comfort of thy great and final account. For thy morning alms may possibly be given to an unworthy person, or to one who did not need them, and will abuse them; and thy evening alms may fall upon a person of eminent worth, or upon one in extreme necessity, who might possibly have perished, both in soul and body, if thou hadst not relieved and comforted him. Besides, at one time thou mayest give with a more pure intention, and a more single eye to the glory of God, and with more tender compassion to thy distressed fellow-creature, than at another time, and so the one will be more right and acceptable to God than the other. Or whether they shall be both alike good — Equally successful to the receiver or to the giver.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Better. Be kind to all during life, Galatians vi.…
Better. Be kind to all during life, Galatians vi. 10. (Calmet) --- Do good, both in youth and in old age, (Worthington) lest, if thou shouldst grow remiss, all would be lost. (St. Jerome)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain morning . . . evening--early and late; when young…
morning . . . evening--early and late; when young and when old; in sunshine and under clouds.
seed--of godly works (Hos 10:12; Co2 9:10; Gal 6:7).
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prosper-- (Isa 55:10-11).
both . . . alike--Both the unpromising and the promising sowing may bear good fruit in others; certainly they shall to the faithful sower.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 6. Sow thy seed — This precept is an…
6. Sow thy seed — This precept is an inference. Diligence in labours calculated for good, will be sure of some return, perhaps of very copious returns. This beautiful verse, with its lively rhetorical figure, is often and aptly applied to the labours of the Christian ministry, and fits well to all deeds and efforts of benevolence. The next verse gives one sure return.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 6. In the morning sow thy seed] Once again…
6. In the morning sow thy seed] Once again the enigmatic form, as in Ecc_11:2, is the touchstone of interpreters. It has been held to mean (1) that men are to seek sensual pleasures not in the morning of their youth only, but in the eventide of age, not to be afraid of begetting children, in or out of wedlock, in any period of their life; or (2) that man is to work, as we say, early and late, doing his appointed task, regardless of the chances of life; or (3) with a more specific application of the same general principle, that he is to sow the seed of good and kindly deeds, and wait for the harvest, the prospect of which is hidden from him. Of these (3) seems every way the truest and most satisfying interpretation. In “withdraw not thy hand,” and in the use of the two demonstrative pronouns (in the Hebrew, however, the same pronoun is repeated, this or this), we have a parallel to the thought and language of ch. Ecc_7:18. The whole precept is a call to activity in good, not unlike that of Him who said “I must work the works of Him that sent me, while it is called to day: the night cometh, when no man can work” (Joh_9:4); who taught men to labour in the vineyard, even though they were not called to begin their work till the eleventh hour when it was “toward evening, and the day far spent” (Mat_20:1-16).
thou knowest not whether shall prosper] The ignorance of men as to the results of their labour, still more the apparent or the actual failure of their earlier efforts, tempts them too often to despondency and indolence. The maxim, like that of Ecc_11:6, bids them take comfort from that very ignorance. The seed sown in the morning of life may bear its harvest at once, or not till the evening of age. The man may reap at one and the same time the fruits of his earlier and his later sowing, and may find that “both are alike good.”
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (6) Prosper.—The word is used again in Ecc_10:10 and…
(6) Prosper.—The word is used again in Ecc_10:10 and Est_8:5, and belongs to modern Hebrew. (Comp. Gal_6:7-8.)
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain In the morning sow thy seed. Do not let…
In the morning sow thy seed. Do not let your ignorance of the future and the inscrutability of God"s dealings lead you to indolence and apathy; do your appointed work; be active and diligent in your calling. The labor of the farmer is taken as a type of business generally, and was especially appropriate to the class of persons whom Koheleth is instructing. The injunction occurs naturally after ver. 4. And in the evening withhold not thine hand. Labor on untiredly from morn till evening. It is not an advice to rest during midday, as that was too hot a time to work (Stuart), but a call to spend the entire day in active employment, the two extremities being mentioned in order to include the whole. Work undertaken in a right spirit is a blessing, not a curse, shuts out many temptations, encourages many virtues. Some see here a special reference to the maxim at the beginning of the chapter, as though the author meant, "Exercise thy charity at all times, early and late," the metaphor being similar to that in 2Co_9:6, "He which soweth sparingly," etc. Others find a figure of the ages of, man in the "morning and evening," thus, "From earliest youth practice piety and purity, and continue such conduct to its close." This leads naturally to the subject of the following section; but it may be doubted whether this thought was in the author"s mind. It seems best to take the paragraph merely as commending activity, whether in business or in benevolence, without anxious regard to results which are in higher hands. "Withhold not thy hand," i.e. from sowing; Mhtw hJ cei) sou (Septuagint). For thou knowest not whether shall prosper, which of the two sewings, either this or that, the morning or evening sowing. It is a chance, and a man must risk something; if one fails, the other may succeed. Or whether they both shall be alike good. The uncertainty rouses to exertion; labor may at any rate secure half the crop, or even give a double produce, if both sewings succeed. So in religion and morality, the good seed sown early and late may bear fruit early or late, or may have blessed results all along. The Vulgate is less correct, Et si utrumque simul, melius or, "And if both together, it will be better."
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain In the morning sow thy seed.
Ecc_11:6
In the morning sow thy seed.
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The seed-time of life
The morning, as we apply it to Christian youth, stands for brightness, freshness, promise, for regenerate hope, the salt of life, for opportunity, activity, and corresponding responsibility. The morning is pre-eminently the sowing time. Noon and eventide will take their complexion from the morning, and morning, whether we improve or waste it, never returns. How important, then, that we should sow well, that our aims should be right, that we should lay up the opportunity and live crowded hours. First, as a matter of fact, we are all sowing. God has so constituted our nature that we must sow. Every thought, emotion, motive, is a seed; all our words and deeds are seeds which must generate, spring up, and bear fruit in our hearts and lives, in the hearts and lives of others, in time and in eternity. Our present characters are the harvests of seeds sown in the past of our lives. The seed we are sowing is imperishable. Be the winds ever so high, be the frosts ever so severe, germinate and spring up the seed must. Outward circumstances may hasten or check the growth, but cannot kill the seed. Like the man who scatters it, it is immortal.
I. Sow in the morning for your intellectual advantage. My mind to me a kingdom is, sang Edward Dyer, the friend of Sir Philip Sidney. But what if that kingdom is enveloped in darkness, or peopled with undisciplined, not to speak of evil, thoughts, the home of the crude, the distorted, the perverted and perverting in knowledge? The kingdom of the mind, to bring joy to its king, need be luminous with knowledge, peopled with wise and pure thoughts, the home of virtue, beauty, and order--a kingdom in which are reaped and sown harvest after harvest of sound attainment and discreet dissemination as life advances. I need hardly say that one of the best instruments of manly culture is reading. Young people should make companions of wise and good books. Read books that have in them, if I may so speak, mountains of strength, and gardens of beauty, and wide cornfields of knowledge, and fruits of ripe wisdom; books through which blow winds of purity, and whose pages are bright with sunshine of unstained joys. Thus will you be sowing in the morning the seed of a harvest of true satisfaction. Some young people begrudge the time and pains which the pursuit of knowledge demands.
II. Sow in the morning the seed of noble manhood and womanhood. It has been asserted that the cardinal elements of national greatness are robust character, independent personality, and sincere religiousness. May not the same be said of individuals? Noble character is the supreme good. Without character even earthly knowledge is a vain possession in view of the highest ends of life, is only a phantasm of the brain, a fugitive mirage, whose illusive tropical gardens turn to dry sand. Without it, material prosperity is the souls deadly snare. Let me say, in what may seem a commonplace remark, that you must begin to sow it in repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, which are the seeds of the new life in the soul. Prayer, humility, courage, self-control, and kindness are precious seeds. Scatter them with no miserly hand. Oh, sow for character. It is of all precious things the most precious--the diamond among jewels, the rose among flowers, the throne in the kingdom of mans possessions. For value, for beauty, for service, for command, it is the one thing needful. Keep the Lord Jesus Christ before you. He is your ideal as well as your Saviour. Self-surrender, faith, love, righteous living and good companionship will lead on to likeness to Him.
III. Sow in the morning the seed of usefulness. The morning is your opportunity, a magnificent opportunity, while it lasts. Soon manhood and womanhood, with the cares of life, and the claims of lawful duties, will overtake you. Then there will be little time to give to the specific task of scattering the seed of saving truth. Fill the morning hours with labour. Let pleasure wait, or be you content with such joys as God gives the husbandman; not the artificial joys of the crowded resorts of the worlds pleasures, but natural joys that are well symbolized by the babble of the brook and the skylarks song. You cannot fling abroad a handful of seed, you cannot speak a loving word for your Master, or do a serviceable deed without unsealing in your own heart a fountain of gladness. Oh, the world needs you. Give yourselves to it. Bestow on it your hopefulness and brightness, your purity and tenderness, your best thought and effort. II any here are using the morning to sow evil seed, pause. Remember, if you sow the wind, you will reap the whirlwind. (R. C. Cowell)
Thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that.--
Magnificent failures
Every one must have been impressed with the curious fact that Columbus failed in most of the things that he tried for. He made a bad mistake at first in his reckonings. He never knew that he had not reached Asia. He looked for gold and wealth, but he died in poverty. Except that he proved that the earth was round, which had already been satisfactorily proved, everything turned out differently from what he thought. And yet we celebrate him as though he had completely succeeded. There is a certain kind of magnificent failure that takes hold of our imagination and sympathy even more effectively than unqualified success. The most thrilling episodes in history are stories like that of Columbus--of men who essayed vast endeavours, and, after all, proved to have done something vastly more important and other than they expected. The Protestant Reformation is such a story of magnificent failure. Nothing is more pathetic than the last weary year of Luthers life, Or the brave Zwingli dying in battle. The reformers had set out only to go a little way, to reform certain abuses and to correct a few errors. But they stirred up faction and war, they divided Germany, they let loose all manner of free thought. A hundred years after Luther the Reformation in Germany still looked like a failure. Now at last we enjoy what they only began to set in movement. The incoming religion is nobler, sunnier, more philosophical, more comprehensive than the reformers would have dared to accept. The story of the famous Savonarola is equally instructive. He did not save Florence. He could not work miracles, His visions did not come true. They put him to death like his Master. But the great world took up the holy impulse of his life; and his name, his passion for justice, his instinct for purity, passed over out of flames--a vitalizing spirit--into the infinite stream of our human destiny. One leaps at once, without citing other examples, to the great primitive Christ story. The story of Jesus is that of the most magnificent failure. As far as the records go, it seems clear that Jesus and His followers alike looked for what did not come. The glorious new kingdom of the sons of God was not ushered in before that generation passed away. The Son of Man did not appear in the skies. The good still suffered, the wicked and oppressors were not cast out. Nevertheless, we see that no one in Jesus place could have done more. No one ever had such magnificent success. We see the brotherly spirit which possessed Jesus going into all the world, even beyond where His name goes, slowly but surely banishing the ancient hate, banding men together, turning the evil into good. We believe that, if Jesus could see the travail of His soul, he would be satisfied. In the story of Columbus we distinguish two elements working out the evens of his life. He was right, on the whole, in the great main issue; namely, that, the earth being round, one voyaging west would find land, and, going far enough, the continent of Asia. All his greatness and success came of his following a great truth. But Columbus was mistaken by thousands of miles in all the details of his geography. His maps were drawn by guess-work, not from facts. This is typical of what has happened in all the pathetic tragedies. Thus Luther, brave as he was, only partly succeeded. His maps and charts, like Columbus, were not correct. The facts about this world by which to draw the maps in religion were not yet in. And the early Church, too, was right in its main direction. It started out toward the goal of a world religion. It was right to proclaim a good God and a righteous world, a gospel of faith and hope. But the noblest soul that ever sailed the sea of life had to work from the old charts. The unknown spaces of this world were a chaos of strange demonology. This had not yet been discovered to be a universe. Hence disasters and shipwrecks even to those who rightly sailed west. Here we stand to-day Confronting pressing questions of social and political administration. How can we most fairly organize society and humanize the relations of employers and the employed? Or take the gigantic question of the control of the drink traffic and the care of the intemperate. Good and earnest men are conscientiously divided over these questions. It is possible to-day that men are setting out from their Palos, and sailing west to find the distant lands of light. But others are also sailing, like Vasco da Gama, another and seemingly opposite course. It is possible that the men of neither expedition will find exactly what they look for. It is possible to-day that the bravest and noblest may be mistaken in their estimates of the contents of the seas into which humanity sails. Ah, we should be glad to know that the course was so short and the route so simple and straight as some of our friends believe! It may prove again that the world is larger and more capes must be rounded than are down on the present maps. I find everywhere that progress is a resultant of many forces and the impulse of many men. I find that all misunderstanding, narrowness, prejudice, and bitterness, lack of faith in God or man, on the part of any of us, is always so far a waste. But I find more notably yet that, though particular methods fail, no earnest work goes quite to waste, that all is taken up in the final readjustment. Every movement that has the true sailing direction--nay, even the mishaps and wrecks, so be they lie toward the land whither we sail--at last serve the worlds fleet of discovery. Vasco da Gama and Columbus each proved to help, and moved at last toward each other. It does not trouble me, therefore, that the good and wise differ, while yet we are only making maps. For this is to live in a world that moves and grows. It is to be learners and seekers of truth. It is to be children here that we may be sons of God by and by. (C. F. Dole.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 work with your hands
work with your hands
Here "hands" represents the whole person. AT: "keep on working" (See: Synecdoche)
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whether morning or evening, or this or that
These two phrases mean basically the same thing and emphasize that the person's work may prosper, no matter what time he has done it. AT: "whether the seed that you planted in the morning or the seed that you planted in the evening" (See: Doublet and Ellipsis)
light is sweet
Here the word "light" refers to being able to see the sun and therefore being alive. And, this speaks of the joy of being alive as if the light had a sweet taste. AT: "it is a joy to be able to see the sun" or "being alive is delightful" (See: Metonymy and Metaphor)
for the eyes to see the sun
The "eyes" represent the whole person. This phrase means basically the same thing as the previous phrase. AT: "for a person to see the sun" or "to be alive" (See: Synecdoche and Parallelism)
happy in all of them
Here the word "them" refers to the years that a person is alive.
the coming days of darkness
Future time is spoken of as if the "days are coming" And, here the word "darkness" refers to death. AT: "how many days that he will be dead" (See: Metaphor and Euphemism)
for they will be many
Here the word "they" refers to the "days of darkness" AT: "for he will be dead for many more days than he is alive" or "for he will be dead forever"
Everything to come is vanishing vapor
Here "vanishing vapor" is a metaphor. Possible meanings are 1) AT: "No one knows what will happen after he dies" or 2) AT: "Everything to come is meaningless" (See: Metaphor)
Everything to come
Possible meanings are 1) "Everything that happens after death" or 2) "Everything that happens in the future"
translationWords
seed
prosper
good
amen
light
darkness
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.