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.
Parallel translations
- WEB Moreover it has not seen the sun nor known it. This has rest rather than the other.
- KJV Moreover he hath not seen the sun, nor known any thing: this hath more rest 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.
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 14:1“Man, who is born of a woman, is of few days, and full of trouble.
- Ps 58:8Let them be like a snail which melts and passes away, like the stillborn child, who has not seen the sun.
- Job 3:10–13because it didn’t shut up the doors of my mother’s womb, nor did it hide trouble from my eyes.
- Ps 90:7–9For we are consumed in your anger. We are troubled in your wrath.
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.