Translation
So I said in my heart,
“As it happens to the fools, so it happens to me. So why was I more wise?” I said in my heart,
“This too is like a vapor.”
Go to footnote numberParaphrase
So I had a serious conversation with myself in which
I said, “I see that what happens to the fool will also happen to me. So what benefit did I reap from being wiser than the fool?” I also concluded in my mind that, because death is the universal leveler, “Even wisdom is like a vapor.”
Footnotes
1: “like a vapor”
He probably had in mind the A and first S of my acrostic PASSES. Even wisdom is like a vapor in that A: it Accomplishes nothing, and S: it is Short lived, it cannot reach beyond that event we call death. One could argue that true spiritually informed wisdom does have benefits for eternity, but Solomon’s focus is here is where death is unavoidable, and not even the wise can forestall it.