Ecclesiastes 4:1-8

11I saw again all the ways that people are cruel on the earth. I saw some people who were crying because cruel people were hurting them. There was nobody who could help them. Nobody could rescue them from those cruel people.

2I thought about people who are already dead. I decided that they are happier than the people who are still alive.

3But people who have not yet been born are even happier! They have not seen the evil things that happen on the earth.

4I also thought about the clever work that people do. I saw that people work hard because they are jealous of each other. They want to do better than other people. I realized that this has no purpose. It is like somebody who tries to catch the wind.

5Foolish people refuse to work. They sit and they do nothing. So they become hungry and they die.

6It is good to have only a little food and be happy. That is better than too much hard work that gives you a lot of food. It is as useless as somebody who tries to catch the wind.

7I thought about something else on the earth that has no purpose.

8There are people who live alone. They have no friends, children or brothers. They work hard every day. They want to get more riches for themselves. But they are never happy with the things that they have. They should ask themselves, ‘Why am I working so hard? Am I helping anybody? I am not doing things that make me happy.’ Their work has no purpose. It only brings trouble to their lives.