Moreover he hath not seen the sun, nor known any thing: this hath more rest than the other.
Parallel translations
- WEB Moreover it has not seen the sun nor known it. This has rest rather than the other.
- BSB The child, though neither seeing the sun nor knowing anything, has more rest than that man,
- NKJV Though it has not seen the sun or known anything, this has more rest than that man,
- NASB It has not even seen the sun nor does it know it; yet it is better off than that man.
- NLT and he would never have seen the sun or known of its existence. Yet he would have had more peace than in growing up to be an unhappy man.
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
Though it never saw the sun or knew anything, the stillborn child has more rest than the restless, joyless rich man. It matters because a life of toil without enjoyment can be more wearisome than no life at all.
Overview
The Preacher concludes the startling comparison: the stillborn, never having experienced the burdens of life, finds 'rest' the joyless man never knows. The point is the heavy futility of a life without God-given contentment. The very longing for true rest that this verse stirs finds its answer in Christ, who alone gives rest to the weary soul (Matthew 11:28-29).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 4
- Job 14:1Man that is born of a woman is of few days, and full of trouble.
- Ps 58:8As a snail which melteth, let every one of them pass away: like the untimely birth of a woman, that they may not see the sun.
- Job 3:10–13Because it shut not up the doors of my mother’s womb, nor hid sorrow from mine eyes.
- Ps 90:7–9For we are consumed by thine anger, and by thy wrath are we troubled.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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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 6:5 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.