Ecclesiastes 8:8

Spirit] RM 'wind,' which it is God's prerogative to control. No discharge] Under the Jewish law exemption from service in war was granted in certain cases (Deuteronomy 20:5). In the battle with death no such release may be had.

9, 10. These vv. are expressed in such guarded language that to us they are scarcely intelligible. The line of thought is probably as follows. Although death swallows up the wicked in the end, nevertheless the writer's wide experience ever brings back to his mind cases where a man has exercised misrule to the hurt of his fellow-men. And then these evil men have received a stately burial, and been gathered to their fathers with all due observances. On the contrary, those who had lived virtuously have been dishonoured, expelled from the Temple and the Holy City, and dismissed from the minds even of the people among whom their good deeds had been done. Both honour and oblivion had been misplaced.