Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
that which is high—The old are afraid of ascending a hill.
fears . . . in the way—Even on the level highway they are full of fears of falling, etc.
almond . . . flourish—In the East the hair is mostly dark. The white head of the old among the dark-haired is like an almond tree, with its white blossoms, among the dark trees around [HOLDEN]. The almond tree flowers on a leafless stock in winter (answering to old age, in which all the powers are dormant), while the other trees are flowerless. GESENIUS takes the Hebrew for flourishes from a different root, casts off; when the old man loses his gray hairs, as the almond tree casts its white flowers.
grasshoppers—the dry, shrivelled, old man, his backbone sticking out, his knees projecting forwards, his arms backwards, his head down, and the apophyses enlarged, is like that insect. Hence arose the fable, that Tithonus in very old age was changed into a grasshopper [PARKHURST]. "The locust raises itself to fly"; the old man about to leave the body is like a locust when it is assuming its winged form, and is about to fly [MAURER].
a burden—namely, to himself.
desire shall fail—satisfaction shall be abolished. For "desire," Vulgate has "the caper tree," provocative of lust; not so well.
long home— (Job 16:22; Job 17:13).
mourners— (Jeremiah 9:17-20), hired for the occasion (Matthew 9:23).
Other Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown entries containing Ecclesiastes 12:5:
Job 33:20
Ecclesiastes 12:1
Ecclesiastes 12:6
Isaiah 14:18
Jeremiah 9:17
Amos 5:16
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