1 There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it [is] common among men:

2 A man to whom God-Elōhīm (The Living Word) [The Many Powered] has given riches, wealth, and honour, so that he wants nothing for his soul of all that he desires, yet God-Elōhīm (The Living Word) [The Many Powered] gives him not power to eat thereof, but a stranger eats it: this [is] vanity, and it [is] an evil disease.

3 If a man beget (to be father of; be ancestor of) an hundred [children], and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also [that] he have no burial; I say, [that] an untimely birth [is] better than he.

4 For he comes in with vanity, and departs in darkness, and his name shall be covered with darkness.

5 Moreover he has not seen the sun, nor known [anything]: this has more rest than the other.

6 Yes, though he live a thousand years twice [told], yet has he seen no good: do not all go to one place?

7 All the labour of man [is] for his mouth, and yet the appetite is not filled.

8 For what has the wise more than the fool? what has the poor, that knows to walk before the living?

9 Better [is] the sight of the eyes than the wandering of the desire: this [is] also vanity and anguish of spirit.

10 That which has been is named already, and it is known that it [is] man: neither may he contend with him that is mightier than he.

11 Seeing there be many things that increase vanity, what [is] man the better?

12 For who knows what [is] good for man in [this] life, all the days of his vain life which he spends as a shadow? for who can tell a man what shall be after him under the sun?