And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive. But better than both is the one who has never been born, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun. – Ecclesiastes 4:2-3

Today’s Scripture Reading (September 29, 2016): Ecclesiastes 4

Pythagoras was a philosopher and mathematician who lived during the sixth-century B.C.E. He seems to have been a man of action. One of the sayings attributed to Pythagoras (most of what we know about the man was written decades or even centuries after his death) was that “Concern should drive us into action and not into a depression. No man is free who cannot control himself.” When there is something wrong, we need to be the agents of change to right the wrong. Even if we fail, some action is preferable to only reporting what it is that is wrong.

Admittedly, a casual walk through the Book of Ecclesiastes can be a very depressing journey, partially because Solomon seems just to point out how broken our world really is. We get glimpses of an answer, but no real lasting solution – and no action to follow. Just a reporting of what is wrong.

And then Solomon days that the dead are happier than those who are alive, but that the lucky ones are the people who were never born because those who were never born have never experienced all of the evil that takes place “under the sun.” In reading this phrase, I wonder if Solomon has someone specific in mind. Maybe the dead would include his father. David was a successful king, but he was also a man that lived through many trials, from being chased through the wilderness by the reigning king at the time, Saul, to uprising within his own family. He was chased out of Jerusalem by a son who had decided that he was not going to wait for Dad to die and seized the throne early. Dear old Dad had been a military mastermind, but he was also guilty of adultery and murder. David knew the depths with which evil can infiltrate our lives.

But the real lucky one, according to Solomon, might have been his older brother. He (according to the biblical account the first born of Solomon and Bathsheba was left unnamed) died before he could experience all of the evil this world could produce. Therefore, he was the lucky one.

I am not sure that I agree with Solomon. The problem is that the unborn and the dead can do nothing to be agents of change in our world. And that is what is needed. I hate to admit it, but it is Pythagoras that is right. Injustice should drive toward justice and wrong toward what is right. I can’t change the world (with all of the racial unrest on this planet I wish that I could), but I can make sure that I am always driving my own corner of the world toward what is right. And if we all did that, this world would be a very different place.  

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Ecclesiastes 5