What Does Ecclesiastes 9:2 Mean in the King James?
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.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The same event reaches every moral and ritual category, so what happens to you cannot by itself tell you which one you belong to.
THE MEANING
Death meets every kind of person named here: the aligned and the wicked, the clean and the unclean, the one who offers sacrifice and the one who does not. Its arrival crosses these categories without making them identical, and it is not a measure of your worth.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The life you receive is not a reliable moral scorecard: death reaches the aligned and the wicked alike.
THE ROOT
מִקְרֶה
miqreh
GROWS FROM
קרה
q-r-h
To happen, meet, or befall.
The root holds together an event and what happens to someone: the event is what comes to meet them. Here, that same occurrence reaches every person in the list, whatever their moral or ritual standing.
ALSO GROWS
qarah: To happen, occur, or befall
קָרָה
The verb and the noun share a root, linking the event to what happens or comes to meet someone.
miqreh: An occurrence or event
מִקְרֶה
The same noun appears in Ecclesiastes 3:19 for what befalls humans and animals, where the shared event is named as death.
צַדִּיק
tsaddiq
GROWS FROM
צדק
ts-d-q
Rightness or justice; alignment with what is right.
“righteous” in this verse is tsaddiq. The verse places the aligned person and the wicked person under one event. Their alignment and wrongdoing remain distinct, but neither gives a separate exemption from what meets everyone.
ALSO GROWS
tsedeq: Rightness or justice
צֶדֶק
This branch points to the standard of rightness behind the person called righteous.
tsedaqah: Righteousness or justice
צְדָקָה
This branch carries the same root into right conduct, showing that the verse names a moral state without making it a shield from death.
THE PATTERN
The conditions of life and death cross the boundaries people use to rank moral standing.
They shall lie down alike in the dust, and the worms shall cover them.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.THE THREAD
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.The word translated “befalleth” and “event” share the root קרה (q-r-h), meaning to happen, meet, or befall. Here the common event is named as death, extending the verse’s reach from human moral categories to human and animal life.
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