12. Chasing The Wind

Sometimes the scriptures are just poetic. Makes sense, since the King James version of the Bible was written during Shakespeare's era, but I just never really think of them as poetry. But it turns out that for every "Of Dan; Ahiezer the son of Ammishaddai.Of Asher; Pagiel the son of Ocran. Of Gad; Eliasaph the son of Deuel" there's an, "I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal."

I came across a gem in my recent study--and it was in the Old Testament of all places! The book of Ecclesiastes has great insights into the materiality of this life compared to the substantiality of the next. It's in this book we get great lines like: "He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver" (vs. 10).

As I was reading here the other day I was really impressed with how poetic vs. 17 is: "what profit hath he that hath laboured for the wind?" before this line the writer has been speaking of the pointlessness of spending our days in seeking riches. This line is so beautiful in how it conjures that concept succinctly and with such a powerful image. In the end, seeking the illusion of happiness in material things is as pointless as running to catch the wind--as if you could hold it in your hands.

Of course the writers could have just said, "wickedness never was happiness", but the power of the lesson comes from the conjuring the image and applying it to mean something more tangible. Like all good poetry, you have to work for the meaning and in the work is were we learn the most powerful lessons.