Rex Trulove
King Solomon is widely accepted as the wisest man who ever lived. Not only was he an exceptionally wise king, he was also extremely wealthy. He was one of the wealthiest people in the Bible, if not the wealthiest. He owned land, livestock, had money and jewels, and had a huge number of servants.
Sometime around 300 B.C., King Solomon wrote Ecclesiastes. At the time, he was an old man who was nearing the end of his life and he knew it. He was an acute observer of human behavior. One passage he wrote is the subject of these poll questions. It can be found at Ecclesiastes 1:9 and it is from this that we get the phrase, “Nothing new under the sun”.
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
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Question of
Do you agree with Solomon’s assessment of human nature and human actions?
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Yes
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No
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Question of
Do you think that Solomon was referring to more than just human behavior and human actions?
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Yes
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No
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Question of
If this passage is true, does it comfort you or depress you?
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Comfort
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Depress
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Other (please explain)
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“nothing new under the sun” not always true.
Can you give me an example of a human behavior or action that is new? Only the tools change.
I believe Solomon was an intelligent man an a keen observer. So I take his words literally and that makes me a little not hopeful I guess. It reminds me a little of what they say about the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
Do you not also feel that it means that we don’t have to repeat the same mistakes over and over, but can learn from past mistakes? I find comfort in that.