Ecclesiastes 7:5

REGARDING FOOLS

"It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise, than for a man to hear the song of fools. For as the crackling of thorns under a pot, so is the laughter of the look this also is vanity. Surely extortion maketh the wise man foolish, and a bribe destroyeth the understanding."

Here are denounced songs of fools (Ecclesiastes 7:5), the laughter of fools (Ecclesiastes 7:6) and the behavior of fools (Ecclesiastes 7:7).

"Songs of fools" (Ecclesiastes 7:5). "These are probably mirthful drinking songs such as are mentioned in Amos 6:5." These are the same as those sung in the house of mirth (Ecclesiastes 7:4).

"Crackling of thorns under a pot" (Ecclesiastes 7:6). Here again, there is a play on words in the Hebrew text, and this English rendition catches the spirit of it: "For like nettles crackling under kettles is the cackle of a fool."[11] "In the East, charcoal is commonly used for fires, but thorns (nettles) or stubble might be burned by the hasty, but the result was noise not heat."[12] This is an excellent simile for the noisy and worthless meaning of a fool's laughter.

"Extortion maketh the wise man foolish" (Ecclesiastes 7:7). It does not appear in our translation whether the extortion is the practice of one who was wise, but fell into sin, or if it was the extortion against the wise man by an oppressor. We believe the key is in the second clause (Ecclesiastes 7:7b). A bribe destroyeth the understanding (Ecclesiastes 7:7b). The parallelism of these two clauses in Ecclesiastes 7:7 indicates emphatically that extortion whether endured or practiced can cause even a wise man to lose his head and do foolish things; and that, "Whether he is either giving or receiving a bribe, either or both are foolish and sinful deeds."[13]; Isaiah 33:15 denounces the taking of a bribe as sinful; and it is just as sinful to give one. Again, the evil of bribes here reflects the teaching in one of Solomon's proverbs (Proverbs 15:27).