19 And who knoweth whether │ and no one knows whether he he shall be a wise _man_ or a │ will be wise or foolishly fool? yet shall he have rule │ clever, and yet he will have over all my labour wherein I │ power over all my toil at which have laboured, and wherein I │ I have moiled, and done so have shewed myself wise under │ wisely in this hot work-day the sun. This _is_ also vanity.│ world: another instance this │ of evanescence. (19.) =And who knows= (equivalent to ‘no-body does know’) whether =the wise= (with the article, meaning one who belongs to this class, and who will really act wisely) =or a fool?= (סכל――that is, a wisely-foolish person, one whose wisdom will prove a mistake according to the meaning of this word, see chapter ii. 3, references.; and will use this power provided to his hand either amiss, or so as to defeat the end the wise man had in view) =and he has power= (שלט, a favourite word of Koheleth’s; the exact meaning of this term may be found in Psalm cxix. 130) =in all my toil which I have toiled at, and which also I have made myself wise in= (_i.e._ spent my pains wisely in) =under the sun: besides this is vanity= (or, as we should say, ‘moreover this is another instance of vanity or evanescence’). 20 Therefore I went about to │ So then I came round to the cause my heart to despair of │ conclusion that I must bid all the labour which I took │ farewell to any hope of under the sun. │ satisfaction from anything I │ had toiled at in this work-day │ world; (20.) =I turned round then, I myself, to cause to despair with respect to my heart= (יאש, occurs 1 Samuel xxvii. 1, where the word is used of Saul giving up the search for David in despair) =over the toil which I toiled at under the sun.= 21 For there is a man whose │ because it amounts to this: labour _is_ in wisdom, and │ man, even when he toils wisely, in knowledge, and in equity; │ prudently, and successfully, yet to a man that hath not │ does so for some individual laboured therein shall he │ who has not toiled at all, and leave it _for_ his portion. │ gives it to him to possess: an This also _is_ vanity and a │ instance of evanescence, and great evil. │ very evil.