Ecclesiastes 9:1-6: a reflection

1For all this I laid to my heart, even to explore all this: that the righteous, and the wise, and their works, are in the hand of God; whether it is love or hatred, man doesn’t know it; all is before them. 2All things come alike to all. There is one event to the righteous and to the wicked; to the good, to the clean, to the unclean, to him who sacrifices, and to him who doesn’t sacrifice. As is the good, so is the sinner; he who takes an oath, as he who fears an oath. 3This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that there is one event to all. Yes also, the heart of the sons of men is full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live, and after that they go to the dead. 4For to him who is joined with all the living there is hope; for a living dog is better than a dead lion. 5For the living know that they will die, but the dead don’t know anything, neither do they have any more a reward; for their memory is forgotten. 6Also their love, their hatred, and their envy has perished long ago; neither do they any longer have a portion forever in anything that is done under the sun.

Ecclesiastes looks unflinchingly at a hard fact: the same event, death, comes to everyone, righteous and wicked, good and bad alike. There is one event to all, the Teacher says; death does not sort people by their goodness in this life. And he adds, with grim realism, that the dead have no more part in anything done under the sun; their memory is forgotten. It is a sober meditation on the leveling reality of death.

But notice the turn the Teacher makes: for whoever is joined with all the living has hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion. Precisely because death is coming and levels all, the life we have now, while we have it, is precious and full of opportunity. The living, however lowly, have something the honored dead do not: they are alive, and life is the arena of hope, of action, of relationship with God. Death's certainty makes present life more precious, not less.

That is Ecclesiastes' bracing wisdom. Rather than letting the certainty of death breed despair, let it make you value and use the life you have now. You are among the living; you have today, with its opportunities to know God, to do good, to love, to live well. Do not waste it, or take it for granted, or postpone living until some other time. Death comes to all, and the living have what the dead do not: today. Value the life you have been given, and use it, in the fear of God, while it is yours.

Lord, Ecclesiastes reminds me that death comes to all and levels us, and that precisely for that reason, the life I have now is precious. Keep me from taking my days for granted or postponing real living. Help me value the life you have given me, and use it, today, to know you, to do good, to love, to live well in your fear. I am among the living; teach me to number my days and make them count, while today is still mine.