Sermon Tone Analysis

Scripture Reading

Introduction

As we’ve considered this book over the last few weeks, we’ve seen the extensive efforts of Solomon to find pleasure and meaning in life.

We’ve considered the great extents to which Solomon has gone in order to seek out and obtain meaning from the things of this world.

Last week we looked at Solomon’s great achievements in life, and how he sought to find meaning through his achievements, his wealth, great projects that he undertook etc.

Solomon applied himself to finding meaning in things that were on earth.

He made the effort to delve into the pleasures that the world has to offer.

He devoted a large portion of his time in life (many years in fact) to evaluating every conceivable form of pleasure available to man under the sun.

He searched out every activity and every detail of that which people believe brings happiness, and found all of it to be sorely incapable of achieving joy and meaning for a man.

His thinking is that since we are placed in this world to live our lives in the world under the sun, surely there should be some kind of ultimate pleasure and meaning that we should gain through life under the sun.

In verse 12 of Ecc 2, he turns his attention once again to a different possible source of gaining meaning / satisfaction in life, and this time it is through wisdom that he seeks to find meaning.

Already in Ecc 1:17, he had begun to consider this idea of wisdom as opposed to madness and folly.

He also came to a conclusion in Ecc 1:18 following his preliminary look at the opposing sides (wisdom vs. folly).

So his conclusion there was that wisdom, as well as folly, are a chasing after the wind.

But primarily his argument was that the more knowledge one has, the more grief one has.

1. Exploration Exhausted (v.12)

As Solomon continues in his pursuit of a potential source of meaning in the world, of some source of joy or lasting and substantial pleasure in this life, he once again “turns his thoughts to consider wisdom”

As he considers this life, and all that he is searching out, he considers that perhaps he hadn’t considered wisdom and folly in sufficient detail.

Perhaps he had overlooked something in any previous evaluation of wisdom that needed further consideration.

Note that as Solomon writes here about “madness and folly,” he is speaking about one and the same thing.

“Madness and folly” are one aspect being compared to “wisdom”.

As an aside...

It’s interesting that Solomon goes to these various subjects repeatedly through this book.

His reasoning and evaluating of life is very little different from our own.

If you’ve every had to make a serious decision about something, and you’re considering different options in life, you weigh up the pros and cons of the decision you’re about to make, in order to determine the right way forward.

And very often as you do that, you will find that you keep going around in circles.

The same ideas and perspectives come up in your mind over and over, and you try to evaluate this decision in light of these different perspectives, pros and cons, and sometimes you just feel you’re getting nowhere.

That’s how Solomon is evaluating things.

He keeps going over these things in his search for meaning.

But right here, as he now turns his thoughts (attention) to thinking about wisdom, and then comparing that with madness and folly, he is going to make some very important observations for us.

As he begins his look at this wisdom vs. folly, he begins by making an important observation in verse 12b...

“What more can the king’s successor do than what has already been done?”

This is a portion of the text that is notably difficult to translate (I won’t delve into the details of it…)

The likely meaning of the wording here by Solomon is that someone else will come after him, but they will add nothing more to the study of purpose and meaning, and can gain no further knowledge.

Everything that there is to know, really has been investigated.

One commentator writes this:

we can leave our wisdom for the guidance of the next generation; but how can we be sure they will value it or follow it?

“What can the man do that cometh after the king?” suggests that it is folly for successive generations to make the same “experiments” (and mistakes) when they can learn from their forefathers; but they do it just the same!

There is nothing new under the sun (1:9); they can only repeat what we have already done.

In the case of Solomon, he had so exhausted the study of meaning under the sun, that the question was: “What more can the king’s successor do?!”

One further aspect of importance here as we look at verse 12 is that Solomon’s mind has most definitely been drawn to the thought of death.

When speaking as a king of a successor that is to follow, it typically meant that the king would be dying.

And so Solomon is thinking about his own possible death, and what the implications of that death are.

We’ll see more of that this morning through our text, and then also in future as we go through this particular section to the end of chapter 2.

2. Wisdom and Folly Compared (v.13-14a)

In verses 13-14a, we will now see how Solomon proceeds to give his comparison between wisdom and folly.

Solomon begins his evaluation by bringing a comparison between wisdom and “mad folly”

Before we even consider this comparison, I want to emphasize that the wisdom that Solomon speaks about here is not necessary God-oriented wisdom.

This is not the “fear of the Lord” wisdom that we read about in Proverbs 9:10.

This is merely a kind of morally wise living in the world.

Applying good common sense and general understanding to the way in which you live your life in the world.

But even so, as Solomon evaluates wisdom in the world, he comes to the important conclusion that wisdom is indeed “better than folly”

As we live our lives in this world, says Solomon, it is better to live in a wise manner than in a foolish manner.

This idea of wisdom being better than folly is regularly conveyed by Solomon through the book of Proverbs.

In fact, much of the book of Proverbs is aimed at leading people away from a poor manner of life that is bound up in folly, and into a good manner of life that is found among the wise, which leads to life.

We need to remember that the book of Proverbs is a book that speaks in general terms, looking at things as a guiding principle, rather than as a rule.

But from what Solomon is saying here we should understand immediately that there is great advantage to living with wisdom in this world.

So Solomon states that wisdom is better than folly

The comparison that he uses is that of light and darkness.

Just as light is better than darkness, so wisdom is better than folly.

That’s no small comparison!

Solomon confirms this in verse 14 of our text when he says these words in verse 14a:

The wise man has eyes in his head,

while the fool walks in the darkness

The wise man has eyes in his head.

That’s a very plain way of saying that the person who is wise is able to properly see where he is going in this world.

As a wise man conducts his life in this world, he lives in such a manner that he sees things with clarity and understanding.

As such, the wise man is able to make decisions that are helpful, to walk in a manner that is fruitful, and to make great advancements in society.

This is the way that we most certainly would want to be living our lives in the world.

By way of contrast, the fool walks in darkness.

It is as if the fool has no eyes, and is not able to see, and thus walks around and gropes around in the darkness of life.

The fool is a person who makes decisions that are to his detriment because he fails to perceive that which is needed in order to make wise decisions.

There is a game that our children would enjoy playing at home, at night time, called Kitty, Kitty, Meow, Meow.

In this game, you would go into a room and turn off all the lights.

Curtains would be closed, to make the place as dark as possible.

One person would then be “on” and would have the task of finding and catching others that were playing the game, who had to move around in order to avoid being caught.

As the person who was on went around trying to find the others, they would call out “kitty, kitty” to which the other players had to respond “meow, meow”

Well one particular night this game got going in our house, and within 2 minutes of playing it, there were 2 separate collisions as children ran around in the darkness trying to escape this person who was on, and promptly collided with each other.

Blood was spilled, cries rang out, and we promptly put a stop to the game!!

The fact is that it was foolishness to walk around (let alone run around) in the dark without being able to see where you’re going.

The inevitable result is that you bump into things and cause yourself harm.

Furthermore, you have no way of seeing the danger that is approaching, and you end up being harmed without warning or foresight.

Solomon’s evaluation is such that he says that there are those who are fools in this world, and they are like those who literally have no eyes to be able to see where they are going.

They walk around in this world and stumble and fall over all manner of obstacles in the path of life, and they do not have the foresight to determine that the path they are going is destructive for them.

With such a stark contrast between what is wise and what is foolish, we are left with absolutely no doubt in our minds that Solomon here truly is exalting the excellencies of wisdom.

We shouldn’t miss this.

Wisdom in the world is essential to us living in a decent and proper manner without having all sorts of harm inflicted (physical, spiritual, emotional…)

Wisdom is as far superior to foolishness as the light is to darkness.

Let me ask you at this point, are you one who is living as a wise person in this world?

Or are you one who is living as a fool in this world?

3. The Fool and the Wise Overtaken (v.14b-16)

Having outlined the two different methods of walking around in the world - either as a wise man, thus walking in the light, or as a fool, thus walking in darkness - Solomon goes on to drive his actual thesis home.

In verse 14b he says this...

but I came to realize

that the same fate overtakes them both.

There is a reality in the world that will lead to effectually nullifying the benefit that wisdom brings to a person in the world.

The same fate is going to overtake both the wise man and the fool, and that fate is none other than death itself.

In other words, for all the benefits that you may gain through being wise in the world, you are yet going to suffer the same fate as the fool.

You will end up precisely where the fool ends up, no different.

This is the reality that every person living in the world is called to come face to face with.