Ecclesiastes 8:13

But it shall not be well with the wicked,.... It shall be ill with him; more is designed than is expressed, Isaiah 3:11; in life they have no solid peace and comfort; at death they will be turned

But it shall not be well with the wicked, neither shall he prolong his days, which are as a shadow; because he feareth not before God. Neither shall he prolong - not a contradiction to Ecclesiastes 8:12.

It shall not be well, i.e. it shall go very ill with him; great miseries are prepared for him; which is a figure oft used in Scripture, as hath been formerly and frequently observed. Neither shall he prolong his days, to wit, very long, or for ever, as he desireth. As a shadow; his life, though it may be or seem to be long, yet in truth is but a mere shadow, which will quickly vanish and disappear, and be as if it never had been; and many times, like a shadow, when it is longest, it is nearest to abolition. Because he feareth not before God; this is the punishment of his wickedness, and his casting off the fear and service of God. For although the lives of good men upon earth are short, as well as the lives of the wicked, yet their days are not like a shadow, because they are prolonged far beyond this mortal state, even to all eternity, and death itself doth but open the way for them to an endless life.

Ecclesiastes 8:13 But it shall not be well with the wicked, neither shall he prolong [his] days, [which are] as a shadow; because he feareth not before God.Ver. 13. But it shall not be well with the wicked.] (1.) Not always well, for "sin will be sure to find him out," and he that hath guilt in his bosom hath vengeance at his back. Where iniquity breaks fast, calamity will be sure to dine, and to sup where it dines, and to lodge where it sups. When iniquity is once ripe in the field, God will not let it shed to grow again, but cuts it up by a just and seasonable vengeance. (2.) Not at all well; since prosperity slayeth these fools, and as sunshine ripens their sin, and so fits them for ruin. Hence Bernard calls it, Misericordiam omni indignatione crudeliorem. Poison in wine works more furiously. The fatter the ox, the sooner to the slaughter. Neither shall he prolong his days.] See Psalms 55:23 Jeremiah 17:11. He dies tempore non suo though he lives long; he dies before he desires, and when it were better for him to do anything than to die; since he hath "walked in a vain show, disquieting himself in vain," tumbling his tub to no purpose, lengthening out "his days as a shadow": the longer the shade, the nearer the sun is to setting. His sun also sets in the burning lake, and it hasteneth to the descent: "An end is come, is come, is come." Because he feareth not before God.] But in hypocrisy before men, whose laces he feareth, and would be much ashamed that they should see what he doth in secret. But what saith the honest heathen? Si scirem homines ignoraturos et deos ignoscituros, tamen propter peccati turpitudinem, peccare non vellem. A good resolution surely, if as well put in execution. Sed libertas affuit scribent; non viventi, saith Augustine of this author: He was a better speaker than liver. That of David was spoken from his heart, "I foresee the Lord always before my face; I set him at my right hand," &c. "Be thou in the fear of the Lord all day long." Oυδειςανθρωπωναδικωντισινουκαποτισει. Nemo culpam gerit in pectore qui non idem Nemesin in tergo. Aug. De Civ. Dei, lib. vi. c. 10.

(13) As a shadow.—Ecclesiastes 6:12; Wis 2:5; see also Wis 4:8.

Verse 13. But it shall not be well with the wicked] Let not the long-spared sinner presume that, because sentence is not speedily executed on his evil works, and he is suffered to go on to his hundredth transgression, God has forgotten to punish. No; he feareth not before God; and therefore he shall not ultimately escape.

13. neither shall he prolong his days, which are as a shadow] The words seem at first in direct contradiction to the admission of the previous verse. But it is of the nature of the method of the book to teach by paradoxes, and to let the actual contradictions of the world reflect themselves in his teaching. What is meant is that the wicked does not gain by a prolonged life; that, as Isaiah had taught of old, “the sinner though he die a hundred years old, is as one accursed” (Isaiah 65:20). His life is still a shadow and “he disquieteth himself in vain” (Psalms 39:6). So the writer of the Wisdom of Solomon (Ecclesiastes 4:8) writes, probably not without a reference to this very passage, that “honourable age is not that which standeth in length of time, nor that is measured by the number of the years.” In the “days which are as a shadow,” so far as they refer to the shortness of human life in general, we find, as before in ch. Ecclesiastes 6:12, echoes of Greek thought. It is noticeable that in Wis 2:5, in accordance with what one may call the polemic tendency of the writer, the thought and the phrase are put into the mouth of the “ungodly, who reasoned not aright.” The universal fact, however, has become a universal thought and finds echoes everywhere (Psalms 102:11; Psalms 144:4).

13. Prolong his days — The words, as a shadow, should precede “prolong his days.” “His days” shall flee like a “shadow.”