"16 Moreover, I saw under the sun that in the place of justice, even there was wickedness, and in the place of righteousness, even there was wickedness.17 I said in my heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time for every matter and for every work. 18 I said in my heart with regard to the children of man that God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts. 19 For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity. 20 All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return.21 Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upwards and the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth? 22 So I saw that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his work, for that is his lot. Who can bring him to see what will be after him?"
Ecclesiastes 3:16-22
The Preacher faces another problem in these verses, that of injustice. There is a twofold possibility of interpretation here: the reference may be to corruption in the judiciary, in the law courts; on the other hand it may have a more general reference, to the injustices of life in the world, when we see things happening that make us call in question the moral government of the universe. We ask, 'Why does God allow war?' or 'Why do innocent people suffer?' There are, in fact, no simple answers to these questions: these things remain unresolved. But not knowing all the answers does not mean frustration and despair: it simply acknowledges our creatureliness. It is enough to know that God will judge (17). Man is certainly cut down to size in all this, and kept from presumption. The modern translations of 18 make it clear that what is being said is that God tests men 'so that they may see that they are like the animals'. This is a curious sort of statement, that we might be inclined to cavil at, but we will begin to see what the preacher means if we remember that he is speaking from the point of view of 'under the sun' and that he is echoing the thought expressed in Psalm 49:12-20: 'Man that is in honour, and understandeth not, is like the beasts that perish'. Man's similarity to the beasts is only true from one point of view, insomuch and insofar as he regards himself merely biologically - in this regard he goes back to dust in the same way beasts do. But it is in his relationship to God that things are different. But he is different from the beasts by virtue of being made in the image of God and being invested with a soul. Man has self-consciousness: he knows he is a man: but the beast does not know that it is a beast. So much self-knowledge is given to man - but only so much, that is why man must be content with his own lot (22), accepting his creatureliness, in the spirit of 2:24 (see Note), remembering that 'under the sun' does not speak the final or truest word about the life of man.