I built reservoirs to water my groves of flourishing trees.
Parallel translations
- WEB I made myself pools of water, to water from it the forest where trees were reared.
- KJV I made me pools of water, to water therewith the wood that bringeth forth trees:
- NKJV I made myself water pools from which to water the growing trees of the grove.
- NASB I made ponds of water for myself from which to irrigate a forest of growing trees.
- NLT I built reservoirs to collect the water to irrigate my many flourishing groves.
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
He built pools to irrigate his flourishing forests. His resources allowed him to engineer abundance on a grand scale.
Overview
The Preacher's waterworks display his immense capacity to shape and sustain his domain. Such mastery over creation represents the height of human achievement and provision. Yet all this self-sufficiency still leaves the heart empty, pointing to the truth that true life flows not from our own cisterns but from God, the fountain of living water.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 4
- Neh 2:14Then I went on to the Fountain Gate and the King’s Pool, but there was no room for the animal under me to get through;
- Jer 17:8He is like a tree planted by the waters that sends out its roots toward the stream. It does not fear when the heat comes, and its leaves are always green. It does not worry in a year of drought, nor does it cease to produce fruit.
- Ps 1:3He is like a tree planted by streams of water, yielding its fruit in season, whose leaf does not wither, and who prospers in all he does.
- Song 7:4Your neck is like a tower made of ivory; your eyes are like the pools of Heshbon by the gate of Bath-rabbim; your nose is like the tower of Lebanon, facing toward Damascus.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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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 2:6 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.