The sun rises and the sun sets; it hurries back to where it rises.
Parallel translations
- WEB The sun also rises, and the sun goes down, and hurries to its place where it rises.
- KJV The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.
- NKJV The sun also rises, and the sun goes down, And hastens to the place where it arose.
- NASB Also, the sun rises and the sun sets; And hurrying to its place it rises there again.
- NLT The sun rises and the sun sets, then hurries around to rise again.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The sun rises, sets, and hurries back to rise again in a ceaseless cycle. It pictures nature's tireless, repetitive motion that never reaches a final goal.
Overview
Using the sun's daily circuit, the Preacher illustrates the wearying monotony of the created order. The repetition suggests constant activity without apparent progress or rest. Such observations expose the limits of a world locked in cycles, while Scripture as a whole points beyond the cycle to God's purposeful direction of history toward redemption.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Ps 42:1For the choirmaster. A Maskil of the sons of Korah. As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul longs after You, O God.
- Hab 3:11Sun and moon stood still in their places at the flash of Your flying arrows, at the brightness of Your shining spear.
- Ps 19:4–6their voice has gone out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. In the heavens He has pitched a tent for the sun.
- Josh 10:13–14So the sun stood still and the moon stopped until the nation took vengeance upon its enemies. Is this not written in the Book of Jashar? “So the sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day.”
- Gen 8:22As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall never cease.”
- Ps 89:36–37his offspring shall endure forever, and his throne before Me like the sun,
- Ps 104:19–23He made the moon to mark the seasons; the sun knows when to set.
- Jer 33:20“This is what the LORD says: If you can break My covenant with the day and My covenant with the night, so that day and night cease to occupy their appointed time,
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
The search that finds everything 'under the sun' to be vapor exposes the emptiness of life without God and drives us to the one who alone gives meaning, the resurrection that makes our labor not in vain.
How Ecclesiastes 1:5 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.