Ecclesiastes and the Search for Happiness
One of the most striking discoveries of Ecclesiastes is that a person's happiness is not found in wealth or possessions. The more we seek to acquire for ourselves, i.e., to fill ourselves with pleasures, the more our desires grow, and afterward we feel an even greater sense of emptiness.
Regarding this, Kohelet stated, “Whoever loves money never has enough money.” The sages expanded on this idea, saying,
“Because all their possessions and property are for themselves alone, and he who has a hundred wants two hundred, it follows that one does not die with half one’s wishes in one’s hand.”
—Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam), The Study of the Ten Sefirot, Part 1, “Inner Observation.”
In other words, not only do we fail to remain happy for long from what we acquire, but we actually double our sense of lack.
Similarly, we can observe that in recent decades humanity has been intensely searching for happiness. Before that, until the middle of the last century, humanity was primarily concerned with survival. People focused on having a home, earning a livelihood, maintaining good health, and caring for their families. These things brought them happiness.
Today, unlike in the past, the Western world is saturated with material abundance, especially in terms of consumer goods. Most of us are occupied with pursuing life's pleasures more than ensuring our survival. The whole world lies open before us with endless stimuli and opportunities. Yet excitement and novelty are increasingly difficult to find.
Increased Knowledge, Increased Sorrow
Ecclesiastes also addresses wisdom and knowledge. Kohelet believed that by acquiring wisdom and knowledge he would attain the happiness he longed for. He invested himself in learning, only to discover: “For with much wisdom comes much grief, and increasing knowledge increases sorrow.” He concludes that “there is no lasting remembrance of the wise any more than of the fool,” meaning that both ultimately end their lives in the same way, giving no advantage to wisdom.
Ultimately, what we all want is to be happy and enjoy life. We seek this through possessions, experiences, successful children, relationships, achievements, and more. Even wisdom and knowledge serve as means to attain pleasure and happiness.
Today, developed human society has reached unprecedented heights in knowledge, science, technology, economics, and medicine. Yet we still have not found the path to happiness. Like Ecclesiastes, we discover that vast knowledge does not enable a person to feel happier or more fulfilled than others. On the contrary.
This raises the question: can we find the happiness we seek through our work?
What Does a Person Gain from All Their Labor?
Ecclesiastes also speaks about labor, activity, deeds, and creation. For simplicity, we will use the term “work.”
We work to earn a living, but we do not always enjoy our jobs, nor do they always satisfy our needs. Today, beyond serving as a source of income, work is also tied to career development. The pursuit of success in social status, money, and honor, everything we associate with happiness, drives us to seek ever more satisfaction through our careers.
Under social pressure, many feel that if they do not succeed, they are somehow worthless. The pressure to achieve can harm our physical and mental health, as well as our relationships with others. This is how genuine happiness steadily diminishes.
On this matter, Ecclesiastes concludes:
“For what does a person get from all their labor and from the striving of their heart with which they toil under the sun? All their days are full of pain, and their work is grief; even at night their minds do not rest.”
Happiness is not attained through money, knowledge, or career success. How, then, can we hold on to it and truly enjoy life? The answer lies in understanding the nature of our desire.
The Mechanism of Pleasure
Within each of us is an innate desire, the aspiration to enjoy life. We all want to feel good and be happy. Every action we take stems from this fundamental desire. In the wisdom of Kabbalah, this is called “the desire to receive pleasure and delight.”
To desire pleasure means wanting to be filled with a sense of life and vitality. We possess many different desires, and when we fulfill them, we experience enjoyment. The most basic desires are for food, sex, family, and similar needs. Beyond these survival-oriented desires, which animals also possess, nature develops greater desires within human beings. We seek enjoyment through money, honor, power, and the acquisition of knowledge and wisdom. These are social-human desires that grow as we compare ourselves to others. Each person possesses these desires in varying proportions.
Let us examine how our desire works. Suppose I greatly desire to move to a new apartment, and eventually I succeed. For a month, two months, or perhaps even a year, I enjoy it. But over time, that enjoyment fades, and eventually I am left once again with a feeling of emptiness.
The same happens when I am very thirsty. The first sip brings immense pleasure, but with each additional sip, the pleasure diminishes. Eventually I can no longer drink, at least until the desire renews itself.
The same principle applies to anything that becomes routine. The reason is that our enjoyment does not reside in the thing itself, but in the repeated entry of pleasure into our desire. Once we obtain what we wanted, the strong desire we felt begins to weaken, and our sense of pleasure fades accordingly.
We often hear people say: “We wanted a better life, to study something interesting, build a career, succeed in business... We wanted to get married, and we did. We have everything, and every day we wake up next to the person we know so well...”
Once their aspirations have been fulfilled, routine sets in. They begin looking for renewal. This could take shape as vacations, moving homes, or expanding their families. People struggle to maintain the feeling that something new is entering their lives and revitalizing them.
Life experience eventually brings us to the realization that no matter how hard we try to be happy, we do not truly succeed. We all live according to a familiar pattern: we go to work, save money for vacations, homes, and education, buy things to make ourselves feel good, and try to protect ourselves and our children from harm. Until eventually we grow tired, grow old, or begin to feel that the entire race is futile, and we ask: “What is the purpose of all this life?”
It turns out that human life does have a purpose. Everything we go through ultimately develops within us existential questions such as: What is the meaning of our lives? Why do we live?
These are the same profound questions that Ecclesiastes asked.
King David, in the Book of Psalms, advised: “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” This means that true happiness and the genuine flavor of life are found through attaining the quality of love and bestowal.
Indeed, Ecclesiastes, the son of King David, concludes his search after experiencing all of life's trials: “The end of the matter, all has been heard: Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of humanity.”
Kabbalists explain that speaking about God or speaking about nature amounts to the same thing, and that commandments are synonymous with laws (for further discussion, see “The Peace” by Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag [Baal HaSulam]).
At the end of his search, Ecclesiastes discovered that a sense of wholeness in life results from living according to the laws of nature. The general law of nature is the aspiration to balance among all its parts, an aspiration to universal unity. On the human level, the Torah defines this principle through the great rule, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
If we fully realize this principle, creating relationships of love and giving above all differences between us, we become similar to the force of love and giving that underlies nature, and together we attain happiness.
From the outset, the human heart is egoistic. Human nature is to want everything for oneself and to think primarily of one's own benefit, whether consciously or unconsciously. Kohelet was born with the same nature. Initially, he wanted everything for himself, but he discovered that happiness is not found in fulfilling any individual desire.
“Nothing new under the sun,” Ecclesiastes declared, meaning that every attempt to enjoy life egoistically ultimately leads to emptiness and the need to seek something new. He came to understand that happiness can be achieved only when we find the correct attitude of love and bestowal to others.
This refers to perfect connection among people, born from the desire to resemble the upper force whose nature is love and giving. Each person cares for others just as they care for themselves and their family, while everyone else cares for them in return. Each person fulfills the desires of others, and they fulfill theirs. Only in this mutual way can people bring genuine happiness to one another. May we be granted the merit to achieve it.
Based on “New Life 187 – Ecclesiastes” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.