קהלת ג

A season is set for everything, a time for every experience under heaven:

A time for birthing and a time for dying,
A time for planting and a time for uprooting the planted;

A time for slaying and a time for healing,
A time for tearing down and a time for building up;

A time for weeping and a time for laughing,
A time for wailing and a time for dancing;

A time for throwing stones and a time for gathering stones,
A time for embracing and a time for shunning embraces;

A time for seeking and a time for losing,
A time for keeping and a time for discarding;

A time for ripping and a time for sewing,
A time for silence and a time for speaking;

A time for loving and a time for hating;
A time for war and a time for peace.

What value, then, can those who labor get from what they earn?

I have observed the business that God gave humankind to be concerned with:

[God] brings everything to pass precisely at its time; [God] also puts eternity in their mind, but without people ever guessing, from first to last, all the things that God brings to pass.

Thus I realized that the only worthwhile thing there is for them is to enjoy themselves and do what is good in their lifetime;

also, that whenever people do eat and drink and get enjoyment out of all their wealth, it is a gift of God.

I realized, too, that whatever God has brought to pass will recur evermore:
Nothing can be added to it
And nothing taken from it—
and God has brought to pass that mortals feel reverence.

What is occurring occurred long since,
And what is to occur occurred long since:
and God seeks the pursued.

And, indeed, I have observed under the sun:
Alongside justice there is wickedness,
Alongside righteousness there is wickedness.

I mused: “God will doom both righteous and wicked, for there is a time for every experience and for every happening.”

So I decided, as regards human beings, to dissociate them [from] the divine beings and to face the fact that they are animals.

For in respect of the fate of humans and the fate of animals, they have one and the same fate: as the one dies so dies the other, and both have the same lifebreath; humans have no superiority over animals, since both amount to nothing.

Both go to the same place; both came from dust and both return to dust.

Who knows if the lifebreath of humans does rise upward and if the breath of animals does sink down into the earth?

I saw that there is nothing better for people than to enjoy their possessions, since that is their portion. For who can enable them to see what will happen afterward?