Ecclesiastes 10:11-20: a reflection

11If the snake bites before it is charmed, then is there no profit for the charmer’s tongue. 12The words of a wise man’s mouth are gracious; but a fool is swallowed by his own lips. 13The beginning of the words of his mouth is foolishness; and the end of his talk is mischievous madness. 14A fool also multiplies words. Man doesn’t know what will be; and that which will be after him, who can tell him? 15The labor of fools wearies every one of them; for he doesn’t know how to go to the city. 16Woe to you, land, when your king is a child, and your princes eat in the morning! 17Happy are you, land, when your king is the son of nobles, and your princes eat in due season, for strength, and not for drunkenness! 18By slothfulness the roof sinks in; and through idleness of the hands the house leaks. 19A feast is made for laughter, and wine makes the life glad; and money is the answer for all things. 20Don’t curse the king, no, not in your thoughts; and don’t curse the rich in your bedroom, for a bird of the sky may carry your voice, and that which has wings may tell the matter.

Ecclesiastes contrasts the speech of the wise and the fool. The words of a wise man's mouth are gracious, it says, but the lips of a fool consume him; and, tellingly, a fool multiplies words. The wise are marked by gracious, measured speech; the fool by an endless flood of talk that, in the end, swallows him up.

Notice the fool's particular failing: he multiplies words. He talks and talks, and the more he says, the more he exposes his folly and entangles himself. His own lips consume him. The wise person, by contrast, does not need to fill every silence, does not multiply words to prove himself; his speech is gracious and, by implication, sparing, chosen, weighty because it is not endless.

That is a searching word in an age of constant talk, of opinions poured out on every subject, of words multiplied without limit. We often assume that more words make us look wiser; Ecclesiastes says the opposite, that the fool is the one who multiplies words, and that they consume him. The wiser path is fewer words, and gracious ones, speech that is measured and kind rather than a flood. Guard your tongue against the impulse to say everything, to fill every silence, to multiply words. Let your speech be gracious and considered. Often the wisest thing is to say less, and to say it kindly.

Lord, the fool multiplies words and is consumed by his own lips, while the wise speak few and gracious words. In an age of constant talk, guard my tongue against the impulse to say everything and fill every silence. Help me speak less and more graciously, measured and kind, and to know that the wisest thing is often to say less. Make my words gracious.