Tree of Life Version
Ecclesiastes 3:9
9What gain, then, does the laborer get with his toil?
Ecclesiastes 3:9 in other versions
- King James Version (KJV)What profit hath he that worketh in that wherein he laboureth?
- New International Version (NIV)What do workers gain from their toil?
- English Standard Version (ESV)What gain has the worker from his toil?
- New King James Version (NKJV)What profit has the worker from that in which he labors?
Context of Ecclesiastes 3:9
7a time to tear apart and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak; 8a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace. What gain, then, does the laborer get with his toil? 10I have seen the task that God has given to the children of men to keep them occupied. 11He has made everything beautiful in its time. Moreover, He has set eternity in their heart—yet without the possibility that humankind can ever discover the work that God has done from the beginning to the end.
Read all of Ecclesiastes 3Ecclesiastes 3:9 word by word
מַה־יִּתְרוֹן֙ הָֽעוֹשֶׂ֔ה בַּאֲשֶׁ֖ר ה֥וּא עָמֵֽל׃Read the interlinear
Words taken from the KJV.
Cross-references for Ecclesiastes 3:9
- Ecclesiastes 1:3What does a person gain in all his labor that he toils under the sun?
- Ecclesiastes 2:11Yet when I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended to accomplish it, behold, it all was futile and chasing after the wind. There was nothing to be gained under the sun.
- Ecclesiastes 5:16So, all his days he eats in darkness, and he has much grief, sickness, and humiliation.
- Proverbs 14:23In all hard work there is profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty.
- Matthew 16:26For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world but forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?
Commentaries on Ecclesiastes 3:9
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary · v. 9What profit hath he - What real good, what solid pleasure, is derived from all the labors of man? Necessity drives him to the principal part of his cares and toils; he labors that he may eat and drink; and he eats and drinks that he may be preserved alive, and kept from sickness and pain. Love of money, the basest of all passions, and restless ambition, drive men to many labors and expedients, which perplex and often destroy them. He, then, who lives…Read the comment
- Tyndale Open Study Notes · v. 9gain from his toil?: See Ecclesiastes 3:12–13.Read the comment
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary · v. 99. But these earthly pursuits, while lawful in their season, are "unprofitable" when made by man, what God never intended them to be, the chief good. Solomon had tried to create an artificial forced joy, at times when he ought rather to have been serious; the result, therefore, of his labor to be happy, out of God's order, was disappointment. "A time to plant" (Ec 3:2) refers to his planting (Ec 2:5); "laugh" (Ec 3:4), to Ec 2:1, 2; "his mirth,"…Read the comment
In the dictionaries
Commentaries on Ecclesiastes 3
- 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
- Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary
- EGW Writings
Tree of Life Version — © 2015 The Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society
Commentaries