Read New International Version, 2011 Ecclesiastes 3 Bible Online

Ecclesiastes 3 - New International Version, 2011 bible

Ecclesiastes 3

¹There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:

²a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,

³a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build,

⁴a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance,

⁵a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,

⁶a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away,

⁷a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak,

⁸a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.

⁹What do workers gain from their toil?

¹⁰I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race.

¹¹He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet [3] no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.

¹²I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live.

¹³That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil — this is the gift of God.

¹⁴I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.

¹⁵Whatever is has already been, and what will be has been before; and God will call the past to account. [4]

¹⁶And I saw something else under the sun: In the place of judgment — wickedness was there, in the place of justice — wickedness was there.

¹⁷I said to myself, “God will bring into judgment both the righteous and the wicked, for there will be a time for every activity, a time to judge every deed.”

¹⁸I also said to myself, “As for humans, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals.

¹⁹Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath [5]; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless.

²⁰All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.

²¹Who knows if the human spirit rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?”

²²So I saw that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy their work, because that is their lot. For who can bring them to see what will happen after them?