What Does Ecclesiastes 2:15 Mean in the King James?

Then said I in my heart, As it happeneth to the fool, so it happeneth even to me; and why was I then more wise? Then I said in my heart, that this also is vanity.

Ecclesiastes 2:15 · KJV

The analysis reads the King James wording.

King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

THE KEY

The same Hebrew root names both the fool’s event and what befalls the speaker, showing that wisdom cannot make a person exempt from the common occurrence.

THE MEANING

You may recognize what is happening more clearly than someone else and still meet the same human limit. The verse holds wisdom and shared fate side by side: clear seeing does not shield you from what reaches the fool. Calling this vanity names wisdom’s limit without making wisdom itself worthless.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

Wisdom does not guarantee protection from the losses and limits that reach everyone.

THE ROOT

יִקְרֵנִי

yiqreni

GROWS FROM

קָרָה

q-r-h

To happen, befall, or meet.

“happeneth” in this verse is yiqreni. The Hebrew places ⁨מִקְרֶה⁩ (miqreh, “event”) beside ⁨יִקְרֵנִי⁩ (yiqreni, “it befalls me”), both from ⁨קָרָה⁩ (q-r-h). The fool’s occurrence and the speaker’s own happening share one word-family, so wisdom offers understanding without immunity.

ALSO GROWS

miqreh: Occurrence; event.

מִקְרֶה

This noun names what happens to the fool, the same event the speaker says befalls him.

yiqreni: It happens to me; it befalls me.

יִקְרֵנִי

The verb uses the same root for what reaches the speaker, linking his fate to the fool’s.

THE PATTERN

A common condition crosses human distinctions, exposing how little wisdom or moral standing can guarantee exemption.

All things come alike to all: there is one event to the righteous, and to the wicked; to the good and to the clean, and to the unclean; to him that sacrificeth, and to him that sacrificeth not: as is the good, so is the sinner; and he that sweareth, as he that feareth an oath.

Ecclesiastes 9:2 · KJVThe same event reaches people on opposite sides of moral and religious distinctions.

For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast: for all is vanity.

Ecclesiastes 3:19 · KJVThe shared event of death reaches humans and beasts alike, limiting claims of human preeminence.

That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.

Matthew 5:45 · KJVSun and rain reach the just and unjust alike, crossing distinctions people might expect to determine what comes to them.

THE THREAD

All things come alike to all: there is one event to the righteous, and to the wicked; to the good and to the clean, and to the unclean; to him that sacrificeth, and to him that sacrificeth not: as is the good, so is the sinner; and he that sweareth, as he that feareth an oath.

Ecclesiastes 9:2 · KJV

The Hebrew noun ⁨מִקְרֶה⁩ (miqreh, “event”) appears here again as “one event.” That shared root widens the thought from the speaker and the fool to the righteous and the wicked: the same occurrence crosses the boundary between them.

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