3 Say a couple have scores of children and live a long, long life but never enjoy themselves - even though they end up with a big funeral! I'd say that a stillborn baby gets the better deal. 4 It gets its start in a mist and ends up in the dark - unnamed. 5 It sees nothing and knows nothing, but is better off by far than anyone living. 6 Even if someone lived a thousand years - make it two thousand! - but didn't enjoy anything, what's the point? Doesn't everyone end up in the same place?
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Ecclesiastes 6:3-6
Commentary on Ecclesiastes 6:1-6
(Read Ecclesiastes 6:1-6)
A man often has all he needs for outward enjoyment; yet the Lord leaves him so to covetousness or evil dispositions, that he makes no good or comfortable use of what he has. By one means or other his possessions come to strangers; this is vanity, and an evil disease. A numerous family was a matter of fond desire and of high honour among the Hebrews; and long life is the desire of mankind in general. Even with these additions a man may not be able to enjoy his riches, family, and life. Such a man, in his passage through life, seems to have been born for no end or use. And he who has entered on life only for one moment, to quit it the next, has a preferable lot to him who has lived long, but only to suffer.