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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadPaul Kretzmann Commentary - Ecclesiastes 12:1 - 12:7
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
An Appeal to the Young
v. 1. Remember, now, thy Creator in the days of thy youth, with a feeling of reverence and gratitude for the many blessings received, the product of true faith in the heart, while the evil days come not, those of advanced age, nor the years draw nigh when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them, when the vigor of youth and maturity is replaced by the feeling of decay and the feebleness of senility;
v. 2. while the sun, or the light, the refreshing beauty of the morning light, or the moon, or the stars be not darkened, when the light of youthful life is darkened by the shadows of advancing old age, nor the clouds return after the rain, one misfortune or calamity following another;
v. 3. in the day when the keepers of the house, all the members and organs of the body, especially the hands and feet, shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves, bent over with the weight of age, the legs no longer standing upright, but crooked and misshapen with the various ailments of age, and the grinders cease because they are few, the teeth, particularly the molars, having decayed and fallen out, and those that look out of the windows, the eyes admitting light to the body, be darkened, as sight becomes feeble,
v. 4. and the doors shall be shut in the streets, the mouth, with the upper and lower lips, no longer being able to perform its function of speaking well, when the sound of the grinding is low, the voice, breathing out from the wall of the teeth, lacking the power and force of youth, and he shall rise up at the voice of the bird, his voice being reduced to the low, whispering sound of old men, and all the daughters of music shall be brought low, the ears, growing deaf, no longer enjoy the singing as in former days;
v. 5. also when they shall be afraid of that which is high, since their strength will no longer permit their climbing, and fears shall be in the way, they are readily overcome with timidity, they no longer have the courage to overcome perils and obstacles, and the almond-tree shall flourish, whose white blossoms in the midst of winter were a fitting symbol of old age with its silvery hair, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, when even the least weight becomes distressing, and desire shall fail, when interest in almost everything languishes and dies, because man goeth to his long home, he is rapidly approaching death and the grave, which will hold him for many years, and the mourners, having come to give him an honorable burial, go about the streets;
v. 6. or ever the silver cord, that by which the lamp of life was supposed to be suspended, be loosed, the thread of life being severed, or the golden bowl, conceived to be holding the oil of life, be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, the body, particularly with its organs of respiration, being compared to a vessel for drawing water regularly, or the wheel, with which the water was raised from the reservoir, broken at the cistern, the reference being to the breaking down of the whole mechanism of the body in death.
v. 7. Then shall the dust, out of which man was formed at the beginning, Gen_2:7, return to the earth as it was, Gen_3:19, and the spirit, namely, of every one that died in the true faith, shall return unto God, who gave it; for into the hands of God all His children commend their souls at all times. Note: This paragraph is one of the most beautiful poetical passages in the entire Bible and deserves to be studied for its form as well as for its contents, the earnest and searching admonition contained in its lofty sentences.