Ecclesiastes 2:18

Yea, I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun: because I should leave it unto the man that shall be after me.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(18) Eccles. 9:19. There seems to be no special reference to Rehoboam, but only the assertion of the general principle that the wisest of men must leave all that his labour has gained to be enjoyed by another who may be destitute of wisdom. The thought is not so much that it is a hardship for the wise man to leave what he has gained, as that it is that he should have no advantage over the fool who enjoys the same without any merit.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

2:18-26 Our hearts are very loth to quit their expectations of great things from the creature; but Solomon came to this at length. The world is a vale of tears, even to those that have much of it. See what fools they are, who make themselves drudges to the world, which affords a man nothing better than subsistence for the body. And the utmost he can attain in this respect is to allow himself a sober, cheerful use thereof, according to his rank and condition. But we must enjoy good in our labour; we must use those things to make us diligent and cheerful in worldly business. And this is the gift of God. Riches are a blessing or a curse to a man, according as he has, or has not, a heart to make a good use of them. To those that are accepted of the Lord, he gives joy and satisfaction in the knowledge and love of him. But to the sinner he allots labour, sorrow, vanity, and vexation, in seeking a worldly portion, which yet afterwards comes into better hands. Let the sinner seriously consider his latter end. To seek a lasting portion in the love of Christ and the blessings it bestows, is the only way to true and satisfying enjoyment even of this present world.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

I hated life - Compare this expression, extorted from Solomon by the perception of the vanity of his wisdom and greatness, with Romans 8:22-23. The words of Moses Numbers 11:15, and of Job JObadiah 3:21; Job 6:9, are scarcely less forcible. With some people, this feeling is a powerful motive to conversion Luke 14:26.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

18, 19. One hope alone was left to the disappointed worldling, the perpetuation of his name and riches, laboriously gathered, through his successor. For selfishness is mostly at the root of worldly parents' alleged providence for their children. But now the remembrance of how he himself, the piously reared child of David, had disregarded his father's dying charge (1Ch 28:9), suggested the sad misgivings as to what Rehoboam, his son by an idolatrous Ammonitess, Naamah, should prove to be; a foreboding too fully realized (1Ki 12:1-18; 14:21-31).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun; all these riches and buildings, and other fruits of my labour, were the matter of my repentance, and aggravations of my misery, because I must, and that everlastingly, part with them, and leave them all behind me.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Yea, I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun,.... The great works he made, the houses he built; the vineyards, gardens, and orchards he planted, &c. what he got by his labour, his riches and wealth; and what he also got, not by the labour of his hands, but of his mind. Some understand this of the books he wrote; which were a weariness to his body, and fatigue to his mind; and which he might fear some persons would make an ill use of: Aben Ezra interprets it of his labour in this book. All which he had no great regard unto, since it was to be left to another;

because I should leave it unto the man that shall be after me; because he could not enjoy the fruits of his labour himself, at least but a very short time: but must be obliged to leave all to another, his possessions, estates, riches, and treasure; which a man cannot carry with him when he dies, but must leave all behind him, to his heirs and successors (x). The Targum is,

"because I shall leave it to Rehoboam my son, who shall come after me; and Jeroboam his servant shall come and take ten tribes out of his hands, and possess half the kingdom.''

(x) "Rape, congere, aufer, posside, relinquendum est." Martial. Epigr. l. 8. Ephesians 43.

Geneva Study Bible

Yea, I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun: because I should leave it unto the man that shall be after me.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

18. because I should leave it unto the man that shall be after me] The history of the great ones of the earth presents not a few parallel utterances. Mazarin walks through the galleries of his palace and says to himself, “Il faut quitter tout cela.” Frederick William IV. of Prussia turns to his friend Bunsen as they stand on the terrace at Potsdam, and says, as they look out on the garden, “Das auch, das soll ich lassen,” (“This too I must leave behind me”.) The thought recurs again and again (chs. Ecclesiastes 4:8, Ecclesiastes 5:14, Ecclesiastes 6:2).

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 18. - Such had been his general view of men's actions; he now brings the thought home to his own case, which makes his distress more poignant. Yea (and), I hated all my labor which I had taken under the sun. He is disgusted to reflect upon all the trouble he has taken in life, when he thinks of what will become of the productions of his genius and the treasures which he has amassed. Because I should leave it (my labor, i.e. its results) unto the man that shall be after me. It is impossible that Solomon could thus have spoken of Rehoboam; and to suppose that he wrote thus after Jeroboam's attempt (1 Kings 2:26, etc.), and in contemplation of a possible usurper, is not warranted by any historical statement, the absolute security of the succession being all along expected, and the growing discontent being perfectly unknown to, or contemptuously disregarded by, the king. The sentiment is general, and recurs more than once; e.g., Ecclesiastes 4:8; Ecclesiastes 5:14; Ecclesiastes 6:2. Thus Horace, 'Epist.,' 2:2. 175 -

"Sic quia perpetuus nulli datur usus, et heres
Heredem alterius velut unda supervenit undam,
Quid vici prosunt aut horrea?" Ecclesiastes 2:18

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

"And I hated all my labour with which I laboured under the sun, that I should leave it to the man who shall be after me;" i.e., not: who shall come into existence after me, but: who shall occupy my place after me. The fiction discovers itself here in the expression: "The king," who would not thus express himself indefinitely and unsympathetically regarding his son and successor on the throne, is stripped of his historical individuality. The first and third שׁ are relat. pron. (quem, after the schema egymologicum עמל עמל, Ecclesiastes 2:11, Ecclesiastes 9:9, and qui), the second is relat. conj. (eo) quod. The suffix of שׁאן refers to the labour in the sense of that which is obtained by wearisome labour, accomplished or collected with labour; cf. כּח, product, fruit, Genesis 4:12; עבודה, effect, Isaiah 32:17.

How this man will be circumstanced who will have at his disposal that for which he has not laboured, is uncertain.