Ecclesiastes 4: What Is Better?

Part of wisdom's benefit comes from the insight it gives us into which state of affairs may be better for us.  Whenever we get a chance to make choices regarding our situation, we do well to do so with wisdom.  In Ecclesiastes 4, Solomon offers his opinion on several matters about what is better.

For instance, he believes the dead to be better off than the living, apparently because they are safe from the oppression and evil that exists in the world.  He considers even better, however, to be one unborn who has not yet seen such things.

Which would you rather have?  Two handfuls "with toil and a chasing after the wind" or one handful, but with peace and quiet?  Disproving the maxim that only the bottom line matters, Solomon would choose the latter rather than the former (vs. 6).  So would I.

"Two are better than one," Solomon wrote in a passage that was read during my wedding ceremony, "because they have a good reward for their toil.  For if they fall, one will lift up the other; but woe to who is alone and falls and does not have another to help.  Again, if two lie together, they keep warm; but how can one keep warm alone?  And though one may prevail against another, two will withstand one.  A threefold cord is not quickly broken" (vs. 9-12).  Here Solomon determines that two are better than one, and then includes the explanation why he feels this way.

Finally, Solomon remarks that a poor but wise youth is better than an old but foolish king, who will no longer take advice (vs. 13).  It makes you wonder if he had anyone specific in mind?

Yet in spite of drawing conclusions about what is better, Solomon's real verdict seems to be that everything, at its root, is really just vanity and a chasing after the wind.