New International Version
Ecclesiastes 1:15
15What is crooked cannot be straightened; what is lacking cannot be counted.
Ecclesiastes 1:15 in other versions
- King James Version (KJV)That which is crooked cannot be made straight: and that which is wanting cannot be numbered.
- English Standard Version (ESV)What is crooked cannot be made straight, and what is lacking cannot be counted.
- New King James Version (NKJV)What is crooked cannot be made straight, And what is lacking cannot be numbered.
- New Living Translation (NLT)What is wrong cannot be made right. What is missing cannot be recovered.
Context of Ecclesiastes 1:15
13I applied my mind to study and to explore by wisdom all that is done under the heavens. What a heavy burden God has laid on mankind! 14I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind. What is crooked cannot be straightened; what is lacking cannot be counted. 16I said to myself, “Look, I have increased in wisdom more than anyone who has ruled over Jerusalem before me; I have experienced much of wisdom and knowledge.” 17Then I applied myself to the understanding of wisdom, and also of madness and folly, but I learned that this, too, is a chasing after the wind.
Read all of Ecclesiastes 1Ecclesiastes 1:15 word by word
מְעֻוָּ֖ת לֹא־יוּכַ֣ל לִתְקֹ֑ן וְחֶסְר֖וֹן לֹא־יוּכַ֥ל לְהִמָּנֽוֹת׃Read the interlinear
Words taken from the KJV.
Cross-references for Ecclesiastes 1:15
- Ecclesiastes 3:14I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.
- Ecclesiastes 7:12Wisdom is a shelter as money is a shelter, but the advantage of knowledge is this: Wisdom preserves those who have it.
- Job 11:6and disclose to you the secrets of wisdom, for true wisdom has two sides. Know this: God has even forgotten some of your sin.
- Job 34:29But if he remains silent, who can condemn him? If he hides his face, who can see him? Yet he is over individual and nation alike,
- Isaiah 40:4Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain.
- Lamentations 3:37Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it?
- Daniel 4:35All the peoples of the earth are regarded as nothing. He does as he pleases with the powers of heaven and the peoples of the earth. No one can hold back his hand or say to him: “What have you done?”
- Matthew 6:27Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
Commentaries on Ecclesiastes 1:15
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary · v. 15That which is crooked cannot be made straight - There are many apparent irregularities and anomalies in nature for which we cannot account; and there are many defects that cannot be supplied. This is the impression from a general view of nature; but the more we study and investigate its operations, the more we shall be convinced that all is a consecutive and well-ordered whole; and that in the chain of nature not one link is broken, deficient, or lost.Read the comment
- Barnes’ Notes on the Bible · v. 15He saw clearly both the disorder and incompleteness of human actions (compare the marginal reference), and also man‘s impotence to rectify them.Read the comment
- Matthew Henry Concise Commentary · v. 12-18Verses 12-18 Solomon tried all things, and found them vanity. He found his searches after knowledge weariness, not only to the flesh, but to the mind. The more he saw of the works done under the sun, the more he saw their vanity; and the sight often vexed his spirit. He could neither gain that satisfaction to himself, nor do that good to others, which he expected. Even the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom discovered man's wickedness and misery; so that the…Read the comment
- Tyndale Open Study Notes · v. 12-18The Teacher examines how wisdom, work, and pleasure relate to each other.Read the comment
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary · v. 1515. Investigation (Ec 1:13) into human ways is vain labor, for they are hopelessly "crooked" and "cannot be made straight" by it (Ec 7:13). God, the chief good, alone can do this (Is 40:4; 45:2). wanting--(Da 5:27). numbered--so as to make a complete number; so equivalent to "supplied" [Maurer]. Or, rather, man's state is utterly wanting; and that which is wholly defective cannot be numbered or calculated. The investigator thinks he can draw up, in…Read the comment
Topics related to Ecclesiastes 1:15
In the dictionaries
Commentaries on Ecclesiastes 1
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
- Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
- Matthew Henry Concise Commentary
- Tyndale Open Study Notes
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary
- Rashi on Tanakh
- Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
- John Wesley’s Notes
- Darby Translation Notes
- Geneva Bible Translation Notes
- Kingcomments
- Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary
- Matthew Henry’s Modern English Commentary
- Scofield Reference Notes, 1917 Edition
- Original Douay–Rheims Annotations
- Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary
- EGW Writings
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