James H. Cagle
For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast: for all is vanity. All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?” (Ecclesiastes 3: 19-21 KJV).
To understand and interpret this text we must realize that though Solomon was the wisest man of his day there were things he did not know and understand that we today know and understand because we have a complete revelation of God’s will and way which Solomon did not have.
Solomon looked and beheld how when the man and the beasts died there was no difference in the deterioration of their bodies. While they live, they breathe the same air. Both have mortal bodies that are made of the dust of the earth and when their bodies die, they both return to the dust again from whence they came. Solomon could not see where man had a preeminence or superiority over the beast since they were both subject in the same manner to death.
Solomon, however, does make a distinction and shows the preeminence of man over the beast when he says that the spirit of man ultimately goes upward to God, but the spirit of beasts goes down into the earth. Solomon says in 12: 7, that “the spirit (of man) shall return unto God who gave it.” The spirits of lost men go down to Hell when they die but will ultimately ascend up to God for judgment and then afterward once again be cast down into Hell. The spirits of the saved go up to God when they die and remain with Him eternally.
Beasts do have a spirit. They are conscious of life and self-existence. But a beast is amoral. They cannot sin or disobey God. They have no sense of right and wrong. They have no God-consciousness. They are only aware of their animal needs and live by their instincts and intuition. They have no afterlife. There is no Heaven or Hell for them. When they die their existence ends.
Man can communicate with God and was created for fellowship with Him, but the beasts were not. There will be beasts in the millennial reign of Christ, when every beast will return to the state it was originally in before the Fall.
