Illustration by Yoseph Savan based on The Zohar
Ariel Ben Avraham – Ecclesiastes: The illusion of vanity and the reality of love (XII)
“The fool folds his hands and eats his own flesh. Better is a handful of relief than two handfuls of toil and frustration. And I returned and saw vanity under the sun.” (Ecclesiastes 4:5-7)
Selfishness leads us to live within the limits of our own haughtiness, anger, lust, indifference and indolence, with their negative trends and expressions. These restrict our actions and deeds to our materialistic fantasies and illusions, at the expense and detriment of the goodness inherent in life, by “folding our hands” towards ourselves.
“They slice off what is on the right hand but still are hungry, and they eat what is on the left hand but they are not sated. Each of them eats the flesh of his own arm.” (Isaiah 9:20)
In this predicament we end up eating our own existence (“flesh”), instead of focusing permanently on goodness as our true relief. Certainly, ego’s fantasies and illusions are our “toil and frustration” as the vanity and vexation under the sun.
“There is one, and there is no second; yea, he has neither son nor brother, and there is no end to all his toil; neither is his eye sated from wealth. Now for whom do I toil and deprive my soul of pleasure? This too is vanity and an unhappy affair.”
(Ecclesiastes 4:8)
A self-centered man has no other in mind except himself, who believes he is second to none. This total lack of generosity or compassion for others makes him work only for his own desires that will never be sated due to their temporary nature.
Hence we must question the real purpose of life, and ask for whom and for what we toil and deprive our true essence and identity of the total pleasure and fulfillment in goodness.
At some point in life we ultimately will realize that goodness is the reason and purpose of our complete well being, and that ego’s fantasies and illusions are vanity and an unhappy affair.
