Vanity is Ecclesiastes’ word for life under the sun when it is treated as if that were the whole sky.
Vanity of vanities,
says the Preacher,
vanity of vanities!
All is vanity.
What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?
The Hebrew is hebel
—
breath, vapor, a mist you cannot hold.
It is not that nothing matters.
It is that nothing under the sun will bear the weight of being God.
The Preacher is not a cynic who never feared the Lord. He is a wise man who walked the whole circuit—wisdom, pleasure, projects, stacks of silver—and found each one a handful of fog when it was asked to be the Chief End. A generation goes, a generation comes. The sun rises and the sun goes down. The eye is not satisfied with seeing. He calls toil, laughter, houses, gardens, even the race for a lasting name hebel and a striving after wind.
- The word can sting: certain days are vapor because death cuts the thread and a fool inherits the pile.
- It can also humble: you are a mist that appears for a little time, James says, in the same family of speech.
- Vanity in other pages is emptiness of speech and worship—people honor Me with their lips; they take the Lord’s name in vain; Gentiles multiply empty words.
Ecclesiastes is the long form of that warning aimed at a life. The book does not end in the fog. The end of the matter: fear God and keep His commandments. God will bring every deed into judgment. Under the sun is a lab. Above the sun is a throne. Vapor is real. It is not the last word.
- Hebel is breath, not “nothing exists.”
- Under the sun is the frame. Change the frame and the word changes weight.
- Gain is the question the vapor will not answer.
- Toil can be a gift to enjoy and still be vapor as a savior.
- James’s mist and the Preacher’s vanity are cousins.
- Empty worship is vanity of another kind—words with no heart.
- Fear God is how vapor becomes honesty instead of despair.
- Breath – Hebel; a wisp; cannot be stored.
- Under the Sun – Closed sky; same circuits.
- Toil and Gain – What is left in the hand?
- Inheritance – The fool may get what the wise stacked.
- Empty Words – Vain worship; vain repetitions; Name taken in vain.
- Mist of Life – You do not know tomorrow.
- The End of the Matter – Fear God; judgment; commandments kept.
- Ecclesiastes 1:2-3, 14 – “Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity. What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?”… I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.
- Ecclesiastes 2:11, 17 – Then I considered all that my hands had done… and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.
- Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 – The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.
- James 4:14 – You are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.
- Psalm 39:5, 11 – Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath… surely all mankind is a mere breath.
- Psalm 144:4 – Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow.
- Romans 8:20-21 – The creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption.
- Exodus 20:7 – You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
- Matthew 6:7 – Do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words.
- Isaiah 29:13 – This people draw near with their mouth and honor Me with their lips, while their hearts are far from Me.
- 1 Corinthians 15:58 – Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
- Psalm 127:1-2 – Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain.
- Ecclesiastes 3:11 – He has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.
Vanity of vanities. All is vanity. What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?
All is vanity and a striving after wind.
You are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.
The end of the matter: fear God and keep His commandments. God will bring every deed into judgment.
In the Lord your labor is not in vain.
He has put eternity into man’s heart.
Do not ask vapor to be a throne. Enjoy the gift. Do the work. Tell the truth about the fog. Then lift your eyes above the sun. Fear God. Keep the charge. The labor that looks like breath under the sun is not wasted in the Lord.
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