For as a dream comes with a multitude of cares, so a fool’s speech with a multitude of words.
Parallel translations
- KJV For a dream cometh through the multitude of business; and a fool’s voice is known by multitude of words.
- BSB As a dream comes through many cares, so the speech of a fool comes with many words.
- NKJV For a dream comes through much activity, And a fool’s voice is known by his many words.
- NASB For the dream comes through much effort, and the voice of a fool through many words.
- NLT Too much activity gives you restless dreams; too many words make you a fool.
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
As anxious busyness breeds dreams, so a flood of words marks a fool's speech. It matters as a warning that many words, like restless cares, signal folly rather than wisdom.
Overview
The Preacher draws a proverb-like comparison: just as a mind full of cares produces dreams, so excessive talk reveals the fool. The verse reinforces the previous call to few words before God. Scripture repeatedly warns that in many words sin is not lacking (Proverbs 10:19), commending the restraint and weighed speech that wisdom, and ultimately the Lord, requires.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 4
- Prov 15:2The tongue of the wise commends knowledge, but the mouth of fools gush out folly.
- Prov 10:19In the multitude of words there is no lack of disobedience, but he who restrains his lips does wisely.
- Eccl 10:12–14The words of a wise man’s mouth are gracious; but a fool is swallowed by his own lips.
- Job 11:2“Shouldn’t the multitude of words be answered? Should a man full of talk be justified?
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 5:3 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
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