Ecclesiastes 1:17

Translations

King James Version (KJV)

And I gave my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I perceived that this also is vexation of spirit.

American King James Version (AKJV)

And I gave my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I perceived that this also is vexation of spirit.

American Standard Version (ASV)

And I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I perceived that this also was a striving after wind.

Basic English Translation (BBE)

And I gave my heart to getting knowledge of wisdom, and of the ways of the foolish. And I saw that this again was desire for wind.

Webster's Revision

And I gave my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I perceived that this also is vexation of spirit.

World English Bible

I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also was a chasing after wind.

English Revised Version (ERV)

And I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I perceived that this also was a striving after wind.

Clarke's Ecclesiastes 1:17 Bible Commentary

To know madness and folly - הוללות ושכלות holloth vesichluth. Παραβολας και επιστημην, "Parables and science." - Septuagint. So the Syriac; nearly so the Arabic.

"What were error and foolishness." - Coverdale. Perhaps gayety and sobriety may be the better meaning for these two difficult words. I can scarcely think they are taken in that bad sense in which our translation exhibits them. "I tried pleasure in all its forms; and sobriety and self-abnegation to their utmost extent." Choheleth paraphrases, "Even fools and madmen taught me rules."

Barnes's Ecclesiastes 1:17 Bible Commentary

To know madness and folly - A knowledge of folly would help him to discern wisdom, and to exercise that chief function of practical wisdom - to avoid folly.

Wesley's Ecclesiastes 1:17 Bible Commentary

1:17 To know - That I might throughly understand the nature and difference of truth and error, of virtue and vice.