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Ecclesiastes 3
Easy-to-Read Version
Ecclesiastes 3
Easy-to-Read Version
A Time for Everything
3 There is a right time for everything, and everything on earth will happen at the right time.
2 There is a time to be born
and a time to die.
There is a time to plant
and a time to pull up plants.
3 There is a time to kill
and a time to heal.
There is a time to destroy
and a time to build.
4 There is a time to cry
and a time to laugh.
There is a time to be sad
and a time to dance with joy.
5 There is a time to throw weapons down
and a time to pick them up.[a]
There is a time to hug someone
and a time to stop holding so tightly.
6 There is a time to look for something
and a time to consider it lost.
There is a time to keep things
and a time to throw things away.
7 There is a time to tear cloth
and a time to sew it.
There is a time to be silent
and a time to speak.
8 There is a time to love
and a time to hate.
There is a time for war
and a time for peace.
God Controls His World
9 Do people really gain anything from their hard work? 10 I saw all the hard work God gave us to do. 11 God gave us the ability to think about his world,[b] but we can never completely understand everything he does. And yet, he does everything at just the right time.
12 I learned that the best thing for people to do is to be happy and enjoy themselves as long as they live. 13 God wants everyone to eat, drink, and enjoy their work. These are gifts from God.
14 I learned that anything God does will continue forever. People cannot add anything to the work of God, and they cannot take anything away from it. God did this so that people would respect him. 15 What happened in the past has happened, and what will happen in the future will happen. But God wants to help those who have been treated badly.[c]
16 I also saw these things in this life[d]: I saw that the courts should be filled with goodness and fairness, but there is evil there now. 17 So I said to myself, “God has planned a time for everything, and he has planned a time to judge everything people do. He will judge good people and bad people.”
Are People Like Animals?
18 I thought about what people do to each other. And I said to myself, “God wants people to see that they are like animals. 19 The same thing happens to animals and to people—they die. People and animals have the same ‘breath.’[e] Is a dead animal different from a dead person? It is all so senseless! 20 The bodies of people and animals end the same way. They came from the earth, and, in the end, they will go back to the earth. 21 Who knows what happens to a person’s spirit? Who knows if a human’s spirit goes up to God while an animal’s spirit goes down into the ground?”
22 So I saw that the best thing people can do is to enjoy what they do, because that is all they have. Besides, no one can help another person see what will happen in the future.
Footnotes
- Ecclesiastes 3:5 Literally, “There is a time to throw stones away and a time to gather stones.”
- Ecclesiastes 3:11 the ability … world Or “a desire to know the future.”
- Ecclesiastes 3:15 Or “What happens now also happened in the past. What happens in the future has also happened before. God makes things happen again and again.”
- Ecclesiastes 3:16 in this life Literally, “under the sun.”
- Ecclesiastes 3:19 breath Or “spirit.”
Ecclesiastes 3
New International Version
Ecclesiastes 3
New International Version
A Time for Everything
3 There is a time(A) for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
2 a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,(B)
3 a time to kill(C) and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
6 a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
7 a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent(D) and a time to speak,
8 a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
9 What do workers gain from their toil?(E) 10 I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race.(F) 11 He has made everything beautiful in its time.(G) He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet[a] no one can fathom(H) what God has done from beginning to end.(I) 12 I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. 13 That each of them may eat and drink,(J) and find satisfaction(K) in all their toil—this is the gift of God.(L) 14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.(M)
15 Whatever is has already been,(N)
and what will be has been before;(O)
and God will call the past to account.[b]
16 And I saw something else under the sun:
In the place of judgment—wickedness was there,
in the place of justice—wickedness was there.
17 I said to myself,
“God will bring into judgment(P)
both the righteous and the wicked,
for there will be a time for every activity,
a time to judge every deed.”(Q)
18 I also said to myself, “As for humans, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals.(R) 19 Surely the fate of human beings(S) is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath[c]; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless. 20 All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.(T) 21 Who knows if the human spirit rises upward(U) and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?”
22 So I saw that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy their work,(V) because that is their lot.(W) For who can bring them to see what will happen after them?
Footnotes
- Ecclesiastes 3:11 Or also placed ignorance in the human heart, so that
- Ecclesiastes 3:15 Or God calls back the past
- Ecclesiastes 3:19 Or spirit
Easy-to-Read Version (ERV)
Copyright © 2006 by Bible League International
New International Version (NIV) 
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NIV Reverse Interlinear Bible: English to Hebrew and English to Greek. Copyright © 2019 by Zondervan.