Ecclesiastes 6:5

but man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward.

Aren’t my days few? Stop! Leave me alone, that I may find a little comfort,

How then can man be just with God? Or how can he who is born of a woman be clean?

For all his days are sorrows, and his travail is grief; yes, even in the night his heart takes no rest. This also is vanity.

or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been, as infants who never saw light.

Wisdom is as good as an inheritance. Yes, it is more excellent for those who see the sun.

Jacob said to Pharaoh, “The years of my pilgrimage are one hundred thirty years. The days of the years of my life have been few and evil. They have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their pilgrimage.”

What is man, that he should be clean? What is he who is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?

Behold, you have made my days hand widths. My lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely every man stands as a breath.”

Behold, I was born in iniquity. My mother conceived me in sin.

Remember how short my time is, for what vanity you have created all the children of men!

Why did I come out of the womb to see labor and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?

Most certainly I tell you, among those who are born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptizer; yet he who is least in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he.

To Adam he said, “Because you have listened to your wife’s voice, and ate from the tree, about which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ the ground is cursed for your sake. You will eat from it with much labor all the days of your life.

“Isn’t a man forced to labor on earth? Aren’t his days like the days of a hired hand?

My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle, and are spent without hope.

“Now my days are swifter than a runner. They flee away. They see no good.

I broke the jaws of the unrighteous and plucked the prey out of his teeth.

So I hated life, because the work that is worked under the sun was grievous to me; for all is vanity and a chasing after wind.

If a man fathers a hundred children, and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but his soul is not filled with good, and moreover he has no burial; I say, that a stillborn child is better than he:

that you may be children of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.

Let her not, I pray, be as one dead, of whom the flesh is half consumed when he comes out of his mother’s womb.”

“Why didn’t I die from the womb? Why didn’t I give up the spirit when my mother bore me?

I should have been as though I had not been. I should have been carried from the womb to the grave.

“Man, who is born of a woman, is of few days, and full of trouble.

He has redeemed my soul from going into the pit. My life will see the light.’

to bring back his soul from the pit, that he may be enlightened with the light of the living.

For you have delivered my soul from death, and prevented my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of the living.

Let them be like a snail which melts and passes away, like the stillborn child, who has not seen the sun.

Therefore he consumed their days in vanity, and their years in terror.

For Yahweh God is a sun and a shield. Yahweh will give grace and glory. He withholds no good thing from those who walk blamelessly.

The light of the eyes rejoices the heart. Good news gives health to the bones.

The poor man and the oppressor have this in common: Yahweh gives sight to the eyes of both.

Then I saw that wisdom excels folly, as far as light excels darkness.

Truly the light is sweet, and it is a pleasant thing for the eyes to see the sun.

As for Ephraim, their glory will fly away like a bird. There will be no birth, no one with child, and no conception.

“Come to me, all you who labor and are heavily burdened, and I will give you rest.

Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

He asked his father, “How long has it been since this has come to him?” He said, “From childhood.

I will tell my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry.” ’

and the rich, in that he is made humble, because like the flower in the grass, he will pass away.

God saw the light, and saw that it was good. God divided the light from the darkness.