Yet because the wicked do not fear God, it will not go well with them, and their days will not lengthen like a shadow.
Parallel translations
- WEB But it shall not be well with the wicked, neither shall he lengthen days like a shadow; because he doesn’t fear God.
- KJV But it shall not be well with the wicked, neither shall he prolong his days, which are as a shadow; because he feareth not before God.
- NKJV But it will not be well with the wicked; nor will he prolong his days, which are as a shadow, because he does not fear before God.
- NASB But it will not go well for the evil person and he will not lengthen his days like a shadow, because he does not fear God.
- NLT The wicked will not prosper, for they do not fear God. Their days will never grow long like the evening shadows.
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
It will not go well with the wicked, whose days are as fleeting as a shadow, because he does not fear God. The lack of reverence is the root of the wicked person's ruin.
Overview
Complementing verse 12, this verse declares the certain, if not always immediate, ill end of those who refuse to fear God. Their life, however long it seems, is ultimately without lasting substance. This sober warning underscores that the fear of the Lord is the foundation of true life, fully secured for believers in Christ (Proverbs 9:10; John 3:36).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 18
- Eccl 6:12For who knows what is good for a man during the few days in which he passes through his fleeting life like a shadow? Who can tell a man what will come after him under the sun?
- Job 14:2Like a flower, he comes forth, then withers away; like a fleeting shadow, he does not endure.
- Isa 3:11Woe to the wicked; disaster is upon them! For they will be repaid with what their hands have done.
- Mal 3:18So you will again distinguish between the righteous and the wicked, between those who serve God and those who do not.”
- Isa 57:21“There is no peace,” says my God, “for the wicked.”
- Ps 55:23But You, O God, will bring them down to the Pit of destruction; men of bloodshed and deceit will not live out half their days. But I will trust in You.
- Job 18:5Indeed, the lamp of the wicked is extinguished; the flame of his fire does not glow.
- Job 21:30Indeed, the evil man is spared from the day of calamity, delivered from the day of wrath.
- Matt 13:49–50So will it be at the end of the age: The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous,
- Ps 144:4Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow.
- Isa 30:13this iniquity of yours is like a breach about to fail, a bulge in a high wall, whose collapse will come suddenly—in an instant!
- Ps 39:5You, indeed, have made my days as handbreadths, and my lifetime as nothing before You. Truly each man at his best exists as but a breath. Selah
- 2 Pet 2:3In their greed, these false teachers will exploit you with deceptive words. The longstanding verdict against them remains in force, and their destruction does not sleep.
- Jas 4:14You do not even know what will happen tomorrow! What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.
- John 5:29and come out—those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.
- Ps 11:5The LORD tests the righteous and the wicked; His soul hates the lover of violence.
- Job 20:5the triumph of the wicked has been brief and the joy of the godless momentary?
- Job 7:6–7My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle; they come to an end without hope.
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 8:13 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.