Ecclesiastes 3:5

A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A TIME TO CAST AWAY STONES - as out of a garden or vineyard (): as not one stone was left upon another of the great buildings of the temple, when it had ceased to be the true house of God. A TIME TO GATHER then followed-for building; figuratively, the Gentiles, once cast-away stones, were in due time made parts of the spiritual building (Ephesians 2:19), and children of Abraham (); so the restored Jews hereafter (Psalms 102:13;...

1-10 To expect unchanging happiness in a changing world, must end in disappointment. To bring ourselves to our state in life, is our duty and wisdom in this world. God's whole plan for the government of the world will be found altogether wise, just, and good. Then let us seize the favourable opportunity for every good purpose and work. The time to die is fast approaching. Thus labour and sorrow fill the world. This is given us, that we may always have something to do; none were sent into the world to be idle....

Verse Ecclesiastes 3:5. _A TIME TO CAST AWAY STONES, - TO GATHER STONES, - TO_ _EMBRACE, - TO REFRAIN_] "One while _domestic cares abortive_ prove, And then _successful_. Nature now invites _Connubial pleasures_: but, when _languid_ grown, No less _rejects_....

Stones may be regarded either as materials for building, or as impediments to the fertility of land (see 2 Kings 3:19, 2 Kings 3:25; Isaiah 5:2)....

EXPOSITION ECCLESIASTES 3:1 Section 4. In confirmation of the truth that man's happiness depends upon the will of God, Koheleth proceeds to show how _Providence arranges even the minutest concerns; that man can alter nothing, must make the best of things as they are, bear with anomalies, bounding his desires by this present life._ ECCLESIASTES 3:1 The providence of God disposes and arranges every detail of man's life. This proposition is stated first generally, and then worked out in particular by means of antithetical sentences. In Hebrew manuscripts and most printed texts Ecclesiastes 3:2 are arranged in two parallel col

A TIME TO CAST AWAY STONES, AND A TIME TO GATHER STONES TOGETHER,.... To cast stones out of a field or vineyard where they are hurtful, and to gather them together to make walls and fences of, or build houses with; and may be understood both of throwing down buildings, as the temple of Jerusalem, so that not one stone was left upon another; of pouring out the stones of the sanctuary, and of gathering them again and laying them on one another; which was done when the servants of the Lord took pleasure in the stones of Zion, and favoured the dust thereof. Some understand this of precious stones, and of casting them away through luxury, wantonness, or contempt, and gathering them again: and it may be applied, as to the neglect of the Gentiles for a long time, and the gathering of those stones of which children were raised to Abraham; so of the casting away of the Jews for their rejection of...

2. FURTHER RESULTS OF THE SEARCH CHAPTER 3 _ 1. The times of man under the sun (Ecclesiastes 3:1)_ 2. When then is the good? (Ecclesiastes 3:12) 3. Concerning judgment and the future (Ecclesiastes 3:16) Ecclesiastes 3:1. There is a time for everything. Twenty-eight “times” are mentioned, beginning with the time of birth and ending with the time for peace. Everything has a fixed time: Life-death; seeding-harvesting; killing-healing; breaking-down building-up; weeping-laughing; mourning-dancing, etc. These are the times of the entire race; that is what human life

From one point of view this section may be entitled _In Praise of Opportunism,_ from another _Human Helplessness._ Every action in which man can engage has its allotted season, but who can be sure that he has found this season? God's plan can be known only in part, hence man's efforts to succeed are always liable to fail; nothing remains but to enjoy the present. ECCLESIASTES 3:1. PURPOSE: read business or affair. In the Heb. the antitheses that follow are in parallel columns like a Greek _sustoichia_ or Table of Contrasts. Ecclesiastes 3:2. Untimely birth and untimely death are both abhorrent; human entrances and exits have their parallel in the agricultural operations of sowing and reaping. There is no need to compare...

TO CAST AWAY STONES: as out of. vineyard. Isaiah 5:2.Leviticus 14:40; Leviticus 14:45 Judges 20:16; 1 Kings 15:22.Lamentations 4:1. TO GATHER STONES TOGETHER (Compare Ecclesiastes 2:4). Deuteronomy 27:4;...

_A time to cast away stones_ The vagueness of the phrase has naturally given rise to conjectural interpretations. It seems obvious that the words cannot be a mere reproduction of Ecclesiastes 3:4 and therefore that the "casting away" and the "gathering" of stones must refer to something else than pulling down and building. Possibly we may think, with some interpreters, of the practice of covering fertile lands with stones as practised by an invading army (2 Kings 3:19) and clearing out the stones of a field or vineyard before planting it (Isaiah 5:2). In this case however we fail to see any link uniting the two clauses in the couplet. A possible explanation may be found (as Delitzsch half suggests) in the old Jewish practice,