Ecclesiastes 8

1Who is like the wise man, and who knows the interpretation of a matter? A man's wisdom lights up his face, and the sternness of his face is changed.

2I say, keep the king’s command because of the oath of God.

3Do not be hasty to leave his presence. Do not take your stand in an evil matter, for he does whatever he pleases.

4For a king’s word has authority, and who may say to him, “What are you doing?”

5Whoever keeps a command will experience no harm, and a wise heart knows the proper time and judgment.

6For every matter has its time and judgment, for man's trouble weighs heavily upon him.

7For he does not know what will be, for who can tell him how it will be?

8No man has power over the wind to restrain it, and there is no power over the day of death. There is no release from war, and wickedness will not deliver its owners.

9All this I have seen while giving my attention to every deed done under the sun, at a time when man ruled over man to his harm.

10And so I saw the wicked buried; they had come and gone from the holy place, and they were forgotten in the city where they had done so. This too is vanity.

11Because the sentence against an evil deed is not carried out quickly, the hearts of the sons of man are emboldened to do evil.

12Though a sinner does evil a hundred times and lives long, yet I also know that it will be well for those who fear God, who fear before him.

13But it will not go well for the wicked, and he will not prolong his days like a shadow, because he does not fear before God.

14There is a vanity that occurs on the earth: there are righteous people who receive what the deeds of the wicked deserve, and there are wicked people who receive what the deeds of the righteous deserve. I said that this too is vanity.

15So I commended joy, because there is nothing better for man under the sun than to eat and to drink and to rejoice; and this will accompany him in his labor during the days of his life that God has given him under the sun.

16When I applied my heart to know wisdom and to observe the activity that is done on the earth—for even by day and by night his eyes see no sleep—

17then I saw all the work of God: man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun. However much man labors to seek it out, he will not find it; and even if the wise man says he knows, he cannot find it out.