I made myself water pools from which to water the growing trees of the grove.
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:
- BSB I built reservoirs to water my groves of flourishing trees.
- 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 spring gate and to the king’s pool, but there was no place for the animal that was under me to pass.
- Jer 17:8For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, who spreads out its roots by the river, and shall not fear when heat comes, but its leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit.
- Ps 1:3He will be like a tree planted by the streams of water, that produces its fruit in its season, whose leaf also does not wither. Whatever he does shall prosper.
- Song 7:4Your neck is like an ivory tower. Your eyes are like the pools in Heshbon by the gate of Bathrabbim. Your nose is like the tower of Lebanon which looks toward Damascus.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
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 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.