Again I saw all the oppressions that are done under the sun. And behold, the tears of the oppressed, and they had no one to comfort them! On the side of their oppressors there was power, and there was no one to comfort them. And I thought the dead who are already dead more fortunate than the living who are still alive. But better than both is he who has not yet been and has not seen the evil deeds that are done under the sun.
In this section of Ecclesiastes is taught both the preexistence of humans and their continued state in the afterlife. When God made Adam he saw all humanity in Adam. This is clear for several reasons:
Preexistence
1. In Gen. 3.15 God said two divisions of humanity will inhabit the world until final disposition: I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. God determined to save some who are in Christ who is the seed of the woman (please see Gal. 4.4 where Paul says Christ was born of a woman and not of the union of man and woman. There hardly exists any stock phrase to refer to people as “born of a woman” since all are born that way. I believe Paul is saying something more than Christ having a human nature). Subsequent to the Fall of humanity, all who in faith offer a covenant-making sacrifice to God, picturing the substitutionary death of Christ, are forgiven and demonstrate evidence of the fact.
2. Rom. 5.12-14 says that all sinned in Adam and die as a result even though they have no record of wrong doing since no formal law existed. So humanity was contained in Adam and the descendants procreated died physically since they died in Adam when he disobeyed God by listening to the woman who gave him the forbidden fruit. Again, preexistence is a given. Paul says that Christians were formerly “dead” before they turned to Christ in Eph. 2.1. Therefore, all humanity, whether righteous or wicked, were in existence and died in Adam.
3. Eccl. 4.3 mentions those who have not been born. God already knows those yet to be born who have not seen all the evil that occurs in the world.
Present State
Verse one of Ecclesiastes 4 describes the sorry state of man’s predicament in this life and constitutes the second state of human existence. Verse two also speaks of those “still alive.”
The Dead
Finally, the third state of human existence is referred to here in verse 2 as a more fortunate existence since they are free from earthly maladies. Also, Jesus speaks about those righteous resurrected when He refuted the Sadducees saying that all live before God in Luke 20.38. He points out the direct discourse from God in the burning bush when speaking to Moses in the present tense as being the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob who are now in His presence.
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