Chapter 1 of Kohelet is the grand opening to the question of purpose: What remains for a person from all his toil in this world? In this lesson, we will examine two central verses - "What profit does a man have from all his toil which he toils under the sun?" and "A generation goes and a generation comes, but the earth stands forever" - and see how the Targum, the Midrashim, Rashi, the Alshich, the Malbim, the Ramban, and others explain them, leading to the great foundation: purpose cannot be found within the thing itself.
מַה־יִּתְרוֹן לָאָדָם בְּכָל־עֲמָלוֹ שֶׁיַּעֲמֹל תַּחַת הַשָּׁמֶשׁ׃ - What profit does a man have from all his toil which he toils under the sun?
The Targum explains: What profit is there for a person after he ultimately dies, from all the toil he toiled under the sun in this world? What remains for you from all of it? And the Targum adds: only to engage in Torah and receive full reward in the World to Come before the Master of the Universe. It is like that fox who entered the vineyard - hungry I entered, hungry I left. What did the vineyard give you? But if you took from within the vineyard and threw grapes outside, when you left you would have something to eat. So it is with a person when he arrives here: What profit does he have if he will die in the end? Only what he transfers over there, to the World of Truth. Therefore, toil "under the sun," here in the physical realm, has no profit whatsoever. But "above the sun" - high above the high, the World of Truth, eternity - there indeed is profit. Under the sun, whatever you toil for here, you will leave behind here.
The Midrash asks when Shlomo recited this verse, and answers: At the time Ashmedai cast Shlomo four hundred parsa'ot from his throne. It is a well-known account that Ashmedai kicked King Shlomo and banished him four hundred parsa'ot from his throne, as recounted in the Gemara in Gittin 68b. Regarding that hour Shlomo said: "What profit does a man have from all his toil" - look how much I toiled, how much I exerted myself, how much labor I expended, and what from all of this remains to me? Here I am like an impoverished wanderer going from house to house, one person gives me a dish of herbs and another gives me fatted fowl, and what remains of all my toil that I toiled?
The Midrash observes a nuance in the phrasing: Could you think that "in all his toil" refers even to the toil of Torah? The verse teaches, "his toil" - his own toil. It does not say "in all toil," but rather "in all his toil." This means: in his own toil, which is not the toil of a mitzvah, there is no benefit; but in the toil of the Holy One, blessed be He, in the toil of Torah, which is the true toil - there is certainly profit.
And so too with the continuation of the verse: "Which he toils under the sun." The Gemara in Shabbat 30b says: It is in toil under the sun that there is no profit, but in toil that preceded the sun, there is profit. And what preceded the sun? The holy Torah, which existed nine hundred and seventy generations before the world was created. That is toil in Torah.
Rashi explains "what profit" - what reward and surplus, meaning what gain, does a person have in his toil? And Rashi adds an important observation: The word "tachat" here is not in the sense of physical location, as when one says the chair is under the table, but in the sense of exchange or replacement, as in "so-and-so in place of (tachat) so-and-so" or "and offered it up instead of (tachat) Isaac" - "tachat" means in place of. If so, "under (tachat) the sun" means in exchange for the sun. And what is the sun? A metaphor for the Torah, as it is stated, "For a mitzvah is a candle and Torah is light," and the Torah possesses intrinsic light and is compared to the sun. It follows that any toil for which a person trades away engagement in Torah - what reward is there in it? What profit is there in something that comes in place of the sun, in place of the Torah itself?
The Imrei Shefer explains: When we speak of "yitron" (profit or advantage), it is always one thing relative to another. One says that gold has an advantage over silver, silver over copper, copper over iron or tin. Advantage is always defined by how one thing surpasses another. The same applies to the relationship between an action and its purpose: the purpose always surpasses the action, since the action is merely a preparation and a means to the purpose. For example, if someone wants to attend a wedding, he rides a bus to get there. Is the bus ride the purpose? No, it is the action, and its entire existence is for the sake of the purpose. And since the entire action was performed for the sake of the purpose, it is inconceivable to say that the action is more important than the purpose. The purpose is always the superior and more refined thing, and it is for its sake that the action is performed.
It is told that in the time of the Chafetz Chaim, there was a man nicknamed Avremele Tzamtzik. He was the town fool, and he could not even pronounce the word "tzvantzik" - twenty - but would say "tzamtzik." Once, Avremele disappeared. People began searching for him in the surrounding towns: poor man, who knows what happened to him, perhaps he fell into a pit or a ditch; he was not fully in his right mind, and everyone was under great stress. After about a week and a half, Avremele showed up in the town. Everyone gathered around him: Where did you disappear to? What did you do? Where did you go? There are two versions of his answer: some say that a tobacco factory had opened in Grodno, and anyone who went there was promised a "shmeck tabak" - a pinch of snuff - for free; others say he said: Here, I ask for snuff and no one gives me any, so I said to myself that in Grodno they would give me some. Either way, he walked there for several days and walked back for several days, a week and a half of travel - all for a sniff of tobacco. Everyone burst out laughing; it was the joke of the town.
The only one who did not laugh was the Chafetz Chaim. When he heard what happened, he burst into tears. They asked him: Why is the Rav crying? He replied: We will arrive in the World of Truth, and they will say to me - do you know the distance from here to Grodno? A journey of a few days. But the distance from the World of Truth to here? After all, the Gemara says that from world to world, from Vilon to the next firmament, is a journey of five hundred years, and to reach the reality of the Upper World is a journey of thousands of years. And they will ask us: You traveled all this way for another steak? For another desire? For another pleasure? For a pinch of snuff? My brothers, they will laugh at us Above! When the Chafetz Chaim heard of this, he began to weep.
We must understand this exact principle: when a person journeys on and on, the goal must be far more important and elevated than the effort. It makes no sense to walk for several days when the purpose is merely a pinch of snuff, where the journey and the investment are incomparably greater than the outcome. Therefore, says the Imrei Shefer, when we see a person who labored for many years to build a house and finally finished it, one says: this is the profit of his toil. That is to say, this is the goal - finally, I have a home. When looking at the toil compared to the result, one calls the result "the profit of his toil": this is what he invested for, this is the goal.
Yet if we look at the world at large, can building a house truly be called an ultimate purpose? Here, the Malbim presents an example in Shirei HaNefesh, his commentary on Shir HaShirim, which we have already studied. A person loves money - why? To buy meat and wine. The true advantage lies in the meat and wine, while the money is merely the instrument and means to obtain them. Once he has the meat and wine, what is their purpose? To strengthen his body. If so, strengthening the body is the goal compared to the meat and wine. And once you have strengthened your body, what have you gained? You have a strong body - and what comes of that? I will live a long life. If so, a long life is the purpose for which I ate the meat and wine, and it is a higher purpose than merely strengthening the body, since strengthening the body is only for the sake of living longer.
And now, says the Malbim, you lived a long life - what was the purpose? Where does this long life lead you? On the contrary, realize that you have returned to the starting point: if you live a long life, you need more money to buy more meat and wine, in order to strengthen your body more, in order to keep living. It is a perpetual routine with no ultimate arrival, no finish line - one simply continues on and on. So it is when asking someone why he works, and he answers: To make a living. And why make a living? A person has to live on something; one needs to eat. And why do you eat? So that I have strength. And strength for what? Can a person work without strength? It turns out you eat to work and work to eat.
To what can this be compared? To a man who comes to show everyone an invention: a machine that generates electricity and charges a battery. The machine itself requires no external power source - powered by the battery it charged itself, it continues to spin and generate more electricity. For what purpose? To charge the battery. And for what? To keep running the motor. And for what? So that it charges the battery. Such an inventor would be institutionalized! Tell me, what does this machine produce? What is the output? What does it give? It gives a machine that charges a battery that runs the machine that keeps charging the battery. And human life looks exactly like this.
Regarding this, he says: What profit does a person have in all his toil that he toils under the sun? For every purpose here is merely a cause for something else, so what advantage does one have over the other? It turns out that here, in physical life, a person never arrives at an outcome about which he can say: Here is the profit; here I have reached the ultimate purpose. For the purpose always brings one back to the starting line, in an endless cycle. It is proven, therefore, that the purpose is not under the sun, but outside the sun.
This is a clear rule and fundamental principle: the purpose is always outside the thing itself, never within the thing itself. When one has a cup, the purpose is to drink, not the cup for its own sake; the cup is not a goal, but a vessel used for drinking. And so it is with everything in creation: a car is not a purpose, but a tool to get from one place to another. Everything a person possesses, its purpose must lie outside of it, while it serves as a vehicle for that purpose. If so, man himself - what profit has he in all his deeds here? The purpose must inevitably lie outside this world's reality, and therefore it is not "under the sun." If you remain strictly here, you are nothing more than a machine that charges itself. The purpose must be beyond the sun, outside this world, in the spiritual realm.
The Kol Ephraim explains that here Shlomo comes to explain the principle he established earlier. After all, Shlomo came to tell you that "vanity of vanities" - the greatest vanity of all vanities - is to say that everything is futile, for that is not true: man has a purpose, which is the service of Hashem, and the world has a purpose. And now he explains: even if all of man's life under the sun is filled with toil, and there is no escaping it, as each person has what was decreed for him from Heaven, and it seems like futility - what did the work I did a month ago, a year ago, two decades ago, give me? What did I take from all of it? - nevertheless, it comes to teach you: if an advantage (yitron) is found in all his toil, then the end will justify the means and everything was worthwhile. And this advantage must come from the outside. Therefore he says: "What profit does a man have from all his toil which he toils under the sun?" - in this itself there is no advantage; but if you brought all of this in order to reach spirituality, in order to reach the service of Hashem - here you have truly achieved an advantage. But if you achieved only a material advantage, that is neither an advantage nor of any benefit. And we will see this later in Shlomo's words in a more explicit manner.
The Me'am Lo'ez cites in the name of the Kol Yaakov that there really is an advantage to the world when a person toils under the sun. This is based on what the Rambam writes: Were it not for the "madmen," the world would not endure. For if a person were entirely rational, he would not invest his time in a building that will stand for two hundred years while he himself is about to leave this world. The Rambam says: he is mad. Yet it is good that there are such madmen, for without them no one would build anything lasting, saying, "I am leaving here anyway." Thus it turns out that there are madmen in the world who build things for hundreds of years, and in their "merit," in quotes, the world endures - but do not forget that he is still called a madman. It emerges, then, that the person himself has no profit, but the world does. Just like the man who planted a carob tree: he will no longer enjoy it, but his grandchildren will enjoy it. That is what he means: What surplus does the person himself retain from the toil he toiled under the sun? True, it benefits others and benefits the world, but what is the advantage to you? What do you have left from all of it? And the Kol Yaakov adds: there is a craftsman whose entire labor is for the sake of bread - he toils today, and with the money he earned he goes and buys food, leaving nothing for himself for the future. Such are man's affairs in this world: you left everything here, and ultimately a person departs to his eternal home leaving everything behind. So what profit does a man have from all his toil which he toils under the sun?
The Me'am Lo'ez cites a question in the name of the Mishmeret Eliezer regarding the precise wording: Why did the verse begin in the present tense - "in all his toil" (be-khol amalo) - and shift to the future tense - "which he will toil" (she-ya'amol)? It should have said, "in all his toil that he toiled under the sun," keeping the same tense throughout. He explains this with a parable: A person opens a business or a store, and when he sees losses over a certain period, he blames it on a recession, on new taxes, on wartime, and on all sorts of reasons. But if the business loses money for twenty years, for thirty years - and we mean someone who is genuinely losing, not those who just love to complain. They say Israelis love to complain: "Believe me, I make nothing; believe me, I have only expenses from this business." There was once a man who ran a bakery and loved to complain: "Believe me, I support the bakery from home; I bring money from home." They asked him, "Then how have you survived for years if you make no profit?" He replied, "Believe me, it is only from the one week of Pesach when I am closed - only from that do I survive, otherwise I wouldn't make it." In any case, there are situations where a business simply fails, and how long can you drag it out? Obviously, a person draws up a balance sheet of profit and loss and concludes: I am not going to keep spending my savings on a business that goes nowhere.
And the nimshal (lesson): The yetzer hara incites a person day after day, year after year, decade after decade, and so his years pass in the pursuits of this world, and he sees that he has nothing left of it. From the pleasures of last year and the previous decade - what do you have left today? Can a person possibly continue investing in the yetzer hara's enterprise when he clearly sees it is a failing business? What did I gain from it, what did it give me? On the other hand, had I invested in spirituality - the principal remains for the World to Come, which is eternity upon eternity; here there is real advantage. And this is the precision: "What profit does a man have from all his toil" - make a soul-accounting of all the toil that has already taken place, and if you see that in the final tally you gained nothing, why do you continue to "toil under the sun"? Why keep investing in this failing enterprise? You ought to change course and begin investing in spirituality, in the more profitable venture. Hence the shift from the past and present tense to the future tense.
דּוֹר הֹלֵךְ וְדוֹר בָּא וְהָאָרֶץ לְעוֹלָם עֹמָדֶת׃ - A generation goes and a generation comes, but the earth stands forever.
The Targum states: King Shlomo said through the spirit of prophecy, the good generation of the righteous departs from the world because of the sins of the wicked generation that is destined to come after them. The Holy One, blessed be He, takes the righteous person so that he will not witness the wickedness of the wicked, so that he does not see or suffer from their evil deeds. "And the earth" stands forever to endure the retribution brought upon the world because of the sins of mankind - ultimately they will receive their punishment, and the earth stands to endure their sins and the retribution that will follow their actions.
The Pesikta Zutarta, also known as Midrash Lekach Tov, is the midrash of Rabbeinu Tuvia ben Eliezer, who lived approximately nine hundred years ago. In essence, it is an anthology of collected midrashim that he compiled along with his own additions. The great value of midrashic anthologies is that many midrashim were lost to us, leaving behind only remnants; when the early authorities collected these midrashim, it is thanks to them that we even know such teachings existed. For example, there is a midrash that the stone that sank into Goliath's forehead had an agreement with iron, and consequently brit milah is performed with iron rather than flint. It is a beautiful midrash, cited by early authorities, but anyone who searches Midrash Rabbah, Midrash Tanchuma, and all standard midrashic works will not find it. It was preserved for us solely because of those who quoted it. Incidentally, many midrashim used to be cited with unknown origins, and later, when the Yemenite community arrived with the Midrash HaGadol, it was discovered that they originated there. But in other lands, where there were persecutions and decrees of book-burning, these midrashim vanished. It is well known that many works were lost: there was a Yerushalmi on Kodashim, and we have citations from the Rishonim and commentaries on it, yet we do not possess it. Someone once attempted to forge it and claim he had discovered the Yerushalmi on Kodashim, but the forgery was subsequently exposed. There are works that we know existed, yet were lost.
And so he writes there: "'A generation goes and a generation comes' - this teaches that in the Future to Come, the dead will rise in the condition they were in at the time of their death." First, let us present the question raised by all the commentators: according to the natural order of the world, the verse should have said, "A generation comes and a generation goes" - first people are born, and only then do they die. Why, then, did it begin with the one who departs? The Midrash therefore explains that the verse comes to teach us that in the Future to Come, the dead will rise just as they were at the time of their death: the lame will rise lame, the blind will rise blind, as it is stated, "A generation goes and a generation comes" - just as it goes, so it comes. And why? So that people should not say that He put one person to death and resurrected another; rather, they rise with their blemishes and are then healed. For if they were to rise completely healed, people would not recognize them and would say, "Wait, this is not so-and-so; so-and-so was lame, so-and-so had lost an eye, so-and-so was missing a leg - this is not him." Therefore, the Holy One, blessed be He, first resurrects the dead in their previous condition, and only afterward heals them. This is "a generation goes": just as this generation goes, in that exact same condition it comes back, not yet healed.
Midrash Rabbah teaches: "A generation goes and a generation comes" - let every generation that comes in your days and every sage in your days be in your eyes like the generation that went and like the early sages who came before you. And this is what Scripture means when it says: "And you shall come to the Levitical priests and to the judge who will be in those days." Why must the verse specify "who will be in those days"? Could a person possibly go to a judge living in some other time? One only has the judge of his own days, so why emphasize this? Rather, it teaches that the judge of your generation is, in his own time, just like the judges who lived in the days of earlier generations.
The reason for this is as Shlomo will state more explicitly later: people always like to say, "In the past there were giants. If the Rambam were in our generation, there would be someone worth listening to and learning from; if Rav Chaim Kanievsky were with us today, if the Chafetz Chaim lived in our generation, if the Ben Ish Chai - I would certainly do whatever he said! But today, what can one say..." And so people say in every single generation. Therefore, Scripture tells us: know that "a generation goes and a generation comes" - although you see one generation depart and another arrive, know that the departing generation and the arriving generation correspond, and every sage is fitted to his own generation. That is why the verse states, "And you shall come to the Levitical priests and to the judge who will be in those days" - the judge of your days is the one suited to your generation. As for someone who imagines that if we had the Rambam today his leadership would be more widely accepted, the truth is that in his own lifetime people disputed him. Moreover, as has been observed, if the Rambam were alive in our generation he would faint every moment; he could not bear to live in the coarse, materialistic, and defiled reality of this generation. Rather, when the Holy One, blessed be He, fashions reality, He brings a sage suited to the state of that generation.
It is told of Rav Naftali of Ropshitz that he remarked: Scripture indicates that the Holy One, blessed be He, showed Adam HaRishon each generation and its sages, each generation and its judges. Now why was it necessary to show him the generation itself? Let Him show him the sages; what need was there to show him the common generation? Does Adam HaRishon need to be shown every ordinary person from the marketplace? Rather, Rav Naftali said of himself: when Adam HaRishon is shown Naftali, he would say, "What, you show me this man as a sage? This is a sage? These are the sages of the generation?" Therefore, they show him the generation as well, and then he says: "Ah, if this is the generation, then fine, even Naftali can be called a sage." This is why he had to be shown each generation alongside its sages. From here we understand that when a sage arises in a generation, he is tailored to that generation, and one should not think we need sages from other generations, who certainly would not have been suited to ours.
What is the precise definition of a dor (generation)? The Malbim explains this in his work Yair Or, a treatise he authored detailing his linguistic methodology - a kind of dictionary in which he clarifies the nuances and distinctions between near-synonymous words (his work HaKarmel is a broader compilation that includes Yair Or). There he analyzes dor, et, zeman, and various terms for time, each carrying its own distinct nuance; we will focus on what pertains to our discussion. The Malbim explains: time can be envisioned as a chained sequence of links - a retukah, meaning a chain. Time is like a chain composed of many links, which are the beings that come into existence and pass away once their life's span has run its course: a person is born and dies, another is born and dies. Each generation is a link in the chain. The life of the world from its beginning to its end is a multi-linked chain: one link is Avraham, the second Yitzchak, the third Yaakov. When Scripture wishes to designate the ongoing sequence of these links, it uses the term dor, as in the phrase dor dor (generation after generation).
And what is the meaning of omedet (abides / stands)? There as well, under the letter Ayin, the Malbim lists several meanings for the root amad. There is omed in the simple physical sense - one was sitting and now stands; there is omed in the sense of ceasing an action, as in "and she ceased [vata'amod] bearing children," where it does not mean she stood upright, but that she stopped. There is also al omdo - something that remains as it was before, unchanged. Here, in the verse "and the earth abides forever," it does not refer to standing stationary as opposed to physical motion or position at all, but rather that the earth endures permanently. That is the meaning of omedet here.
Rashi explains: "A generation goes and a generation comes" - for all that the wicked person toils and labors to extort and steal, he does not outlive his acquisitions. "Outliving one's works" (mevaleh et ma'asav) is an expression we will encounter later as well; it means that the person endures while his possessions wear out. If someone owns an object, lives a long life, and the object wears out, he is said to outlive his works: the object that is the product of his labor wears out while he remains alive. But the wicked person does not outlive his acquisitions, for the generation departs: ultimately, he will pass away while the property remains behind - meaning the object outlived him; he wore out before the object did. Then another generation comes and takes everything from the hands of his children. They left their surplus to their young ones, only for someone else to come and seize it from their children, as it says: "His sons shall conciliate the poor" - meaning they will be crushed and everything will be taken from them. What, then, did he gain? This is yet another expression of the futility of this world.
"And the earth abides forever" - who endures? The earth. Rashi explains that "the earth" refers to the humble and lowly, who humble themselves down to the earth. (In almost all printed editions, the text reads "who move themselves" [hameni'in atzmam], which is difficult to understand; examination reveals that the correct reading is "who bring themselves" [hamagi'in] or "who humble themselves" [makhni'in] down to the earth.) These are the humble who lower themselves to the earth, as it is written: "And the humble shall inherit the land." To the wicked person, Scripture says: a generation goes and a generation comes, and nothing will remain for you here. Who, then, endures forever? "The earth" - that is, whoever makes himself like the earth, the humble person who lowers himself. And Midrash Tanchuma states: All the righteous of Israel are called "earth," as it is written: "And you shall be to Me a land of delight" - and they are the ones who truly endure forever.
The Alshich explains that here Scripture comes to speak of the flaw of those who toil in material pursuits, the degradation of one who invests his entire essence in physicality and earthliness. He cites Midrash Shocher Tov on the verse, "The enemy is finished, ruins forever" (Tehillim 9:7): Constantine built Constantinople, Romulus built Rome, and Polius built Polia - and they perished, while their ruins endure. "Ruins" does not necessarily mean destroyed remnants; as Rabbi Shaul Sirillo explains, they were called ruins because they are ultimately destined to be destroyed. Here is an example of man having already worn out while his works endure: his deeds wear him out, yet he does not wear out his deeds - he wears away, while they remain. But with the Holy One, blessed be He, it is not so, Heaven forbid; rather, "and the cities you have uprooted, their very memory has perished, but Hashem abides forever" (Tehillim 9:7-8). They wear away and Hashem endures forever, for He, blessed be He, outlasts His creations and His creations do not wear Him out - unlike what happens to those who named lands after themselves, whose deeds and earth wore them down and consumed them.
Therefore, says the Alshich, it is regarding this that Kohelet says, "A generation goes, and a generation comes": how great is the mistake of those who occupy themselves with earthly pursuits, for these things wear down those who engage in them, and you wear away as a result of all this toil. We see this with our own eyes - a generation goes and a generation comes, while the earth, which the people of those generations made their primary focus, abides forever. Your deeds, the earthliness, everything you produced here on earth - that remains, but what is left of you? Nothing remains of man! If so, what should a person occupy himself with? Only the service of Hashem. Then, even if the earth wears out like a garment and the heavens dissipate like smoke, the souls of the righteous are eternal and will endure forever.
The Kol Efraim explains: It does not say, "A generation comes and a generation goes," because Scripture wants to demonstrate to us that man does not endure like the earth, for the earth is enduring, as we explained. He cites the verse, "Is there not a set term for man on earth?" (Iyov 7:1), and Ibn Ezra explains that this means there is an allotted time for man on earth - man does not remain here. As has been noted previously, a cemetery is called "the house of assembly for all living" (Beit Mo'ed LeChol Chai), because it is the place where ultimately everyone will assemble; no one will remain here, everyone will assemble there.
Had it said, "A generation comes and a generation goes," it would have implied that the generation that arrives is the same generation that departs - people were born and eventually died. But that is not what it comes to tell you. It comes to say: know that the generation that departed is remembered by no one. A new generation arises that does not know that earlier generation, "who knew not Yosef" (Shemot 1:8). That is "a generation goes, and a generation comes." It does not come merely to say that people are born and eventually die - that is the way of the world; what insight would there be in that? Rather: know that people live here and eventually die, and a new generation arrives for whom those who departed leave no memory whatsoever. Those who went - who remembers them at all? Who knows what they left behind? From this, a person should learn: why boast, exalt yourself, or feel proud over what you accomplished here? In truth, you accomplished nothing enduring and left nothing behind.
He explains that there are those whose entire aim, particularly in the ancient world but also today, is to magnify their name through conquest or wisdom. Alexander the Great conquered the entire known world until there were no more lands left to conquer. The kings of Egypt erected monuments and built massive pyramids so that they would have an everlasting name. Yet Scripture comes and says: understand that while these monuments may remain, what is left of you? The same applies today: Israel had a prime minister who was willing to sell everything off in an end-of-season clearance, just so history books would record that he made peace. And the United States had a president recorded as receiving a Nobel Peace Prize - for what? For the wars he waged. He brought no peace, only turmoil and chaos, and the president who followed had to put out the fires left behind. Yet nevertheless, a Nobel Peace Prize, because he was on the media's favored side, as is familiar in Israel as well, even though such figures are far from bringing true peace. A person wants to leave a footprint in history, to be talked about, to be remembered as someone who brought about a transformation, as an achiever. But is this the ultimate purpose? Is this the lasting advantage in this world? In the end, a new generation arrives, and of the generation that departed nothing remains; no one remembers them or sees them. And what does remain? "And the earth abides forever" - the earth, the elements, remain forever.
Consider something remarkable: Shlomo was the wisest of all men, and here he effectively formulated what thousands of years later became known as the law of conservation of matter, or the law of conservation of mass. This law was formally defined by Lavoisier in the eighteenth century, stating that nothing in the world ceases to exist: nothing new is created by man or nature, nothing can be introduced into existence out of nothing, nor can anything be eliminated from it. At most, a substance changes from one state of matter to another, molecules rearrange, but it does not disappear. This is what Scripture means by "and the earth abides forever" - the elements remain forever; "that which has been is that which shall be" (Kohelet 1:9) - nothing fundamentally new can be created here, and nothing present in the world can be removed from it.
It follows, then, that man and beast are the most fleeting and physical entities here, for everything you manufactured here endures, while man decays and withers in the earth. Thus the earth, which abides forever, is in a far better state than man: what you built and produced remains, while man is gone, leaving behind all that remains. One clarification should be added: when we speak of the four elements - earth representing solid, water representing liquid, wind representing gas and air, and fire representing energy and radiation - one should not mistakenly think this refers to what are called chemical elements today, the over one hundred elements on the periodic table. "Element" here refers to a fundamental state of matter: there is a state called solid, a state called liquid, and it does not mean an element in the modern scientific sense.
The Ramban offers a magnificent explanation here: Why does the verse mention the one that goes first, and only afterward the one that comes? The Ramban explains: here is an allusion to the mystery of ibbur - meaning the secret of reincarnation (gilgul), which early sages called ibbur. This reflects the teaching of Rabbi Nechunya ben HaKaneh, that Shlomo's words contain manifold layers of wisdom, and it is framed this way because generations reincarnate. "A generation goes, and a generation comes" - the very generation that departed is the generation that returns.
Chapter 1 places us before the fundamental question: "What advantage does a person have in all his toil that he toils under the sun?" The Targum, the Midrashim, and the Gemara teach that there is no advantage except through the toil of Torah, which preceded the sun; Rashi explains "under the sun" - in exchange for the sun, meaning any toil with which a person replaces the Torah; and the Imrei Shefer and the Malbim demonstrate that every physical goal brings us right back to the starting point, like a machine that recharges itself, and therefore the ultimate purpose must lie outside this world - in the spiritual realm. The verse "A generation goes and a generation comes" completes the picture: man passes on while his deeds remain, his deeds wear him out rather than him outlasting his deeds, and there is no remembrance of the generation that has gone. The one who endures forever is "the earth" - the humble who lower themselves to the earth, and the righteous of Israel who are called a "desirable land" (eretz cheifetz), whose souls are eternal. From this emerges the practical conclusion: to make an honest self-reckoning, to stop investing in a failing enterprise with no positive return, and to invest instead in a fruitful enterprise whose principal remains for the World to Come.