“For to the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge, and joy; but to the sinner he gives travail, to gather and to heap up, that he may give to him who pleases God. This also is vanity and a chasing after wind.”

Reading this verse in context

This page shows one verse on its own, which is rarely how it was written. Ecclesiastes 2 contains 26 verses, and the sentences either side usually decide what this one means. Read the whole chapter before you quote it.

Text: World English Bible, Protestant edition (engwebp), eBible.org — public domain.