Wisdom Excels Folly
12 So I turned to consider wisdom, madness and folly; for what will the man do who will come after the king except what has already been done? 13 And I saw that wisdom excels folly as light excels darkness. 14 The wise man’s eyes are in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. And yet I know that one fate befalls them both. 15 Then I said [j]to myself, “As is the fate of the fool, it will also befall me. Why then have I been extremely wise?” So [k]I said to myself, “This too is vanity.” 16 For there is no [l]lasting remembrance of the wise man as with the fool, inasmuch as in the coming days all will be forgotten. And how the wise man and the fool alike die! 17 So I hated life, for the work which had been done under the sun was [m]grievous to me; because everything is futility and striving after wind.
Solomon hits the proverbial nail on the head, well almost… but we’ll get to that in a minute. In v. 12, he asks what his successor will do. What could Solomon’s son do that would be any different or better than what he had already done? That’s a pretty tall order, and cheating ahead a bit, we find out that it’s actually much worse. His son, Rehoboam, perfectly demonstrates v. 16, “in the coming days all will be forgotten.”
Rehoboam felt he had to change things up, he surely couldn’t just do what his father did. The people asked for one thing, his (foolish) friends told him another, and guess what he chose? Yup, for all the wisdom of Solomon, written down for the world to see, His son forgot (or ignored) it all. In the process, he started a civil war that would last for generations.
Yet the trap Solomon fell into (in his musings) was to compare his life with the fool (and his son). To be fair, there’s an ending coming that redeems it, but he demonstrates the futility of comparison–perhaps even on purpose. This comparison with his life and that of the fool made all his work as “evil”, beyond futile even.
Ultimately, Solomon couldn’t control what his son would choose, it was not his place. His task, and our own, is to do the best with what God has given us. When we do it well, God may even give us more to work with (Matt. 25:14). Had the man with five talents compared his end with the one who had one, perhaps he would have given up. After all, they were both going to die, and they couldn’t take those talents with them…
Instead, he chose to invest the money wisely, and use it to honor his master and the trust he had shown. How much more should we, who are destined for eternity, do our best with the resources entrusted to us. Don’t get stuck in comparison with those who have less, or even those who have more, it only serves to distract from the mission. Like Paul, “press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” There is no higher calling than that of our Lord, press on indeed!