from one’s labor, saying: “Look! The best thing that I myself have seen, which is pretty, is that one should eat and drink and see good for all his hard work with which he works hard under the sun for the number of the days of his life that the true God has given him, for that is his portion.”​—Eccl. 5:18.

Commenting on the good effect this has upon the individual, Solomon states: “Also every man to whom the true God has given riches and material possessions, he has even empowered him to eat from it and to carry off his portion and to rejoice in his hard work. This is the gift of God. For not often will he remember the days of his life, because the true God is preoccupying him with the rejoicing of his heart.”​—Eccl. 5:19, 20.

The man who recognizes his prosperity as a gift from God will not hoard riches but will use them to bring joy to others. Such a man has a balanced view of his possessions because of allowing himself to be guided by godly wisdom. Therefore, he gets personal enjoyment from what he has. Jehovah God has empowered him to find pleasure in food and drink in the sense that he grants the individual the wisdom to use material things properly. At the same time such an individual is not unduly concerning himself with the brevity of life and its problems and uncertainties. No, he is getting so much enjoyment from doing good in his life that the negative aspects do not dominate his thinking. He is joyful at heart.

Surely one’s striving to get wholesome enjoyment in life is the wise course. It shields one from the disappointment experienced by those whose life is fully occupied by materialistic pursuits.

Questions From Readers

● In John 1:1 the term “god” is applied to both the Father and the Son, the Word. But in the Greek text the word for “god” (theos) is written differently in these two instances. Why? What does it mean?

To a person unfamiliar with the Greek language it might seem that there is a significance indicated by the fact that first the word is spelled theon and next theos. But the difference is simply a matter of complying with the Greek grammatical case used.

John 1:1 reads: “In [the] beginning the Word was, and the Word was with God [τὸν θεὸν, literally, the god], and the Word was a god [θεὸς].”

Greek has five cases​—nominative, genitive, dative, accusative and vocative. How a word is spelled can vary depending on the case in which it is used. Take, as an example, the definite article “the.” In the masculine gender “the” is respectively written in the first four of these cases: ὁ, τοῦ, τῷ, τὸν, in the singular number.

Similarly, in John 1:1 the word theos is spelled in accord with the particular case being employed. In the first instance (“the Word was with God”) it is in the accusative case and thus is spelled θεὸν But in the second occurrence it is in the nominative case, and so it is spelled θεὸς. The spelling of theos does not of itself indicate the person or position of the one designated, as 2 Corinthians 4:4, 6 illustrates. In 2 Co 4 verse four Satan is identified as θεὸς, “the god of this system of things,” and in 2 Co 4 verse six the Creator is designated θεὸς. The spelling is theos in both verses, for the nominative case is used in each. So the fact that theos is spelled differently in its two occurrences in John 1:1 does not show any difference in meaning; “god” is the meaning in both instances.

What is interesting is that in John 1:1 the definite article ὁ [ho] is not used in front of theos when applied to the Son, the Word. Regarding