Bible verse
So I said to myself, “The fate of the fool will also befall me. What then have I gained by being wise?” And I said to myself that this too is futile.
Ecclesiastes 2:15 · BSB
The verses around it, from Ecclesiastes 2.
11 Yet when I considered all the works that my hands had accomplished and what I had toiled to achieve, I found everything to be futile, a pursuit of the wind; there was nothing to be gained under the sun.
12 Then I turned to consider wisdom and madness and folly; for what more can the king’s successor do than what has already been accomplished?
13 And I saw that wisdom exceeds folly, just as light exceeds darkness:
14 The wise man has eyes in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. Yet I also came to realize that one fate overcomes them both.
15 So I said to myself, “The fate of the fool will also befall me. What then have I gained by being wise?” And I said to myself that this too is futile.
16 For there is no lasting remembrance of the wise, just as with the fool, seeing that both will be forgotten in the days to come. Alas, the wise man will die just like the fool!
17 So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. For everything is futile and a pursuit of the wind.
18 I hated all for which I had toiled under the sun, because I must leave it to the man who comes after me.
19 And who knows whether that man will be wise or foolish? Yet he will take over all the labor at which I have worked skillfully under the sun. This too is futile.
KJV
Then said I in my heart, As it happeneth to the fool, so it happeneth even to me; and why was I then more wise? Then I said in my heart, that this also [is] vanity.
ASV
Then said I in my heart, As it happeneth to the fool, so will it happen even to me; and why was I then more wise? Then said I in my heart, that this also is vanity.
ERV
Then said I in my heart, As it happeneth to the fool, so will it happen even to me; and why was I then more wise? Then I said in my heart, that this also was vanity.
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Scripture quotations are from the Berean Standard Bible, which is free of copyright restrictions for use on websites. Read the full Bible on Great Faith.