So I said {to myself}, "God will surely judge the righteous and the wicked, for he has appointed a time [of judgment] for every deed and every work."

I have seen all these things in my vain life: Sometimes a righteous man perishes in [spite of] his righteousness, and sometimes a wicked man lives a long life in [spite of] his evil.

Do not be excessively righteous, and do not act excessively wise, lest you destroy yourself.

Surely there is no one righteous on the earth who [continually] does good and never sins.

What my heart sought, I did not find. Although I found one righteous man among one thousand, I did not find one [upright] woman among all these.

There [is] a vanity that happens on earth: sometimes the righteous suffer what the wicked deserve, and sometimes the wicked receive what the righteous deserve. I said, "This also [is] vanity!"

So all this I laid to my heart, and I concluded that the righteous and the wise, as well as their deeds, [are] in the hand of God. So no one knows anything that will [come] to them, whether [it will be] love or hatred.

The same fate [comes] to everyone: to the righteous and to the wicked, to the good and to the wicked, to the clean and to the unclean, to those who sacrifice and to those who do not sacrifice. As [with] the good [man], so also to the sinner; [as with] those who swear an oath, so [also] those who fear oaths.