Category: Beyond the Sun (The Hope of Ecclesiastes)
And I turned to inspect wisdom and insanity and folly because what will the man who will come after the king do? That which already was done. And I saw that there is advantage for wisdom more than folly like the advantage of light more than darkness. The wise man? His eyes are in his head; but the fool walks in darkness. Yet I knew again that one happening happens to them all. And I said in my heart, "Like the happening of the fool, likewise it will happen to me. And for what advantage was I wise then?" And I declared in my heart that likewise this is vapor. Because there is no memorial of the wise man or the fool for everlasting, in that already the days coming all will be forgotten. And how the wise will die with the fool. (Ecclesiastes 2:12-16)
Again, our sage is describing life on two levels. For the here and now, a diverse investment portfolio with a long-term perspective is far better than putting every earned quarter into the slot machines at Cripple Creek. It's the difference between 20/20 vision and blindness. Yet, in the longer-term perspective there is no difference between them. Each investor will come to an unimpressive demise and fill his tomb in the land of the forgotten to be remembered no more. In terms of lasting significance, the sage and the fool are in the same cardboard boat.
For the wise man, he will sink to the bottom of the sea knowing that all of his astute decision-making has accomplished nothing of lasting value. The next king will have to deal with the same issues. Solomon's victories in battle will not mean that his successor will have no battles to fight. His days will be spent doing the same things that Solomon did because the work is never done. Nothing of perpetual significance is ever achieved.
Sound depressing? As we will see, Solomon certainly thought so. If there is nothing beyond the sun, then there is nothing.