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Text
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Explanation
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1
¶ Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready
to hear, than to give the sacrifice of fools: for they consider not that
they do evil.
.2
Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter any
thing before God: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore
let thy words be few.
3 For a dream cometh
through the multitude of business; and a fool's voice is known by multitude
of words. |
1
- Guard your steps What good advice. Solomon also says, avoid
empty words, joking, speak advisedly, sense the holiness of God in heaven
or preserve a heavenly atmosphere. This is far different from the modern
ways to "do chruch." |
4 ¶ When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it; for he hath
no pleasure in fools: pay that which thou hast vowed.
5 Better is it that
thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay.
6 Suffer not thy mouth
to cause thy flesh to sin; neither say thou before the angel, that it was
an error: wherefore should God be angry at thy voice, and destroy the work
of thine hands?
7 For in the multitude
of dreams and many words there are also divers vanities: but fear thou
God.
8 If thou seest the
oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice
in a province, marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the
highest regardeth; and there be higher than they. |
4
- Pay what you have vowed Consider
pledges to God as serious obligations.
6
- Mouth cause flesh to sin What we
say, good or bad, makes it easier to follow through.
6
- Say before the angel The word for
angel also means messenger. Apparently the advice is not to make excuses
for evil words. |
9 ¶
Moreover the profit of the earth is for all: the king himself is served
by the field.
10 He that loveth silver
shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance with increase:
this is also vanity.
11 When goods increase,
they are increased that eat them: and what good is there to the owners
thereof, saving the beholding of them with their eyes?
12 The sleep of a labouring
man is sweet, whether he eat little or much: but the abundance of the rich
will not suffer him to sleep.
13 There is a sore evil
which I have seen under the sun, namely, riches kept for the owners thereof
to their hurt.
14 But those riches
perish by evil travail: and he begetteth a son, and there is nothing in
his hand.
15 As he came forth
of his mother's womb, naked shall he return to go as he came, and shall
take nothing of his labour, which he may carry away in his hand.
16 And this also is
a sore evil, that in all points as he came, so shall he go: and what profit
hath he that hath laboured for the wind?
17 All his days also
he eateth in darkness, and he hath much sorrow and wrath with his sickness. |
10
- Love silver The greedy person is never satisfied.
12
- Sleep The working person who gets exercise may sleep better
than the rich. |
18 ¶
Behold that which I have seen: it is good and comely for one to eat and
to drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labour that he taketh under
the sun all the days of his life, which God giveth him: for it is his portion.
19 Every man also to
whom God hath given riches and wealth, and hath given him power to eat
thereof, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labour; this is
the gift of God.
20 For he shall not
much remember the days of his life; because God answereth him in the joy
of his heart. |
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